Oranges & Lemons is the 11th studio album and the second double album by the English band XTC, released 27 February 1989 on Virgin Records. It is the follow-up to 1986's Skylarking. The title (derived from the nursery rhyme of the same name) was chosen in reference to the band's poor financial standing at the time, while the music is characterised as a 1980s update of 1960s psychedelia. It received critical acclaim and became the band's highest-charting album since 1982's English Settlement, rising to number 28 in the UK and number 44 in the US.
The album is primarily pop and rock, although a variety of other styles are plundered throughout, such as jazz, reggae, hard rock, Middle Eastern music and Zairean soukous. 12 of the album's 15 tracks were written by guitarist Andy Partridge, with the rest by bassist Colin Moulding. The work projected brighter, more upbeat and aggressive moods than Skylarking, and the harsher effect returned the group closer to the sound of their earlier records. Lyrically, most of the songs focus on parent-child relationships and the state of world affairs. Partridge's ornate vision for the psychedelic opening track "Garden of Earthly Delights" exemplified the album's general aesthetic, which he described as songs that could be singles in a "bizarre perfect universe". and in turn, Partridge resented that his suggestions were repeatedly undermined by Rundgren.
After Skylarking, Partridge suffered a brief writer's block. He recalled "getting really worried. I wrote a few things and I thought it was shit. Then suddenly loads of stuff started coming out, and it wasn't shit." Both 25 O'Clock and Psonic Psunspot outsold the latest XTC albums of the time (1984's The Big Express in the former's case). They then contributed a newly recorded song, "Happy Families", to the John Hughes film She's Having a Baby (1988).
In early 1988, XTC began rehearsing material for their next LP. At the suggestion of A&R executive Jeremy Lascelles, young American producer Paul Fox was recruited based on the strength of a Boy George remix that the label commissioned of him. Partridge disliked the original track but enjoyed Fox's remix: "It was really shiny, powerful and impressive." Fox subsequently flew to England and met Partridge at his home: "He was obviously a huge fan of the band and was willing to translate what we wanted onto tape." He offered them a cheap studio rate in Los Angeles, which the band accepted. Another reason for recording in the US with an American producer, guitarist Dave Gregory said, was that the US had become "our biggest market". XTC, accompanied by the Moulding and Partridge families, arrived in Los Angeles on 12 May and stayed at the Oakwood Apartments in north Hollywood. The families returned home after two months; Partridge and bassist Colin Moulding then shared an apartment for the remainder of their stay.