A warm and fuzzy Partridge? Not!

XTC's Andy Partridge doesn't do iTunes. He finds the idea of a rocker his age -- 53 -- getting up on stage "embarrassing." Partridge's place is the studio. With his band -- known for their semi-hits "Dear God" and "Mayor of Simpleton" -- on hiatus, the singer has assembled more than 100 of his demos, rejects, and oddities for a nine-disc set, "The Fuzzy Warbles Collectors Album." We spoke to Partridge from his home in Swindon, England. GEOFF EDGERS

Q. I've read that this set is, in part, a response to bootleggers.

A. It was starting to eat my soul. They'd actually send me bootlegs and say, "We pressed up 1,000 of these, and they're selling really well." I've been robbed all my life by corrupt lawyers, corrupt managers, and corrupt record companies. And then I began to think, wait, I can bootleg myself really good.

Q. You've got a lot of songs here that could be on any XTC album. And then a lot of things that can best be described as oddities?

A. It's answering-phone messages, it's jingles we did, it's rejected film music, it's rejected songs we did for other people. It's basically a dumpster of stuff I have no use for.

Q. You stopped playing concerts in the early '80s. Why?

A. We had spent five years touring, solidly with no time off. I started to get physically very worn down. I knew we had a very corrupt manager and a very bad record deal, and it started to dawn on me over those years that I was doing this performing puppy routine. . . . I was becoming a malcontent. And then right near the end of this, I was addicted to Valium for 13 years. From the age of 13 to the age of 26. I was taking handfuls of these every day. . . . Come the age of 26, I just stopped taking it foolishly half the way through an enormous American tour. I had no concept of addiction and withdrawal. My world became unwound.

Q. That's pretty incredible. And it has been years since that point. You could play live now, couldn't you?

A. I could do that if I wanted to . But when I see people of my age on stage I think, just get off. It's embarrassing. Pop music is a kid's currency. The best bands are 18 to 25, they're a gang, they've got guitars, they're cranked up and showing off.

Q. Will XTC ever record together again?

A. Not in the foreseeable future, but I like the idea that as a brand, that it could come out at any time. It may not be a year, it may not be five years. But I wouldn't write it off. Stranger things have happened .

Q. Here's a strange thing. Did you see that Todd Rundgren, whom you fought with so much when he produced "Skylarking," is touring around as the lead singer of the Cars?

A. I always thought the Cars were frighteningly bland. I thought they were like the food that people serve in old people's retirement homes, the stuff where there's somebody behind the screen chewing up the food before they serve it.

Q. Do you write every day?

A. No. I rarely write. In fact, I try not to write. If I try, it never seems to come out properly. It's like trying to squeeze out a baby that isn't gestated. You have to tune your head to radio nothing. You're running the bath or walking around the store for some milk and a loaf of bread and suddenly, bing, the genies are whispering in your head.

Q. That inspiration must hit all the time.

A. No, sometimes I go for months without something coming in.

Q. Are you worried?

A. Can I be immodest for a second?

Q. Sure.

A. Because I have written some of the best songs that have ever come out of a human being on the planet Earth. "Easter Theatre." "River of Orchids." "Wrapped in Gray." Even if I get hit by the cosmic steamroller tomorrow, I feel I've done my service for all time.