READIN

Wednesday, February 18th, 2009

🦋 Material Robyn

Robyn Hitchcock was on BBC Radio 4's Material World last Thursday, on Darwin's birthday -- the show does not usually feature live music, but they marked the occasion with Robyn singing "We Evolve".

What you call God
I call evolution.
What you call fate
I call mum and dad.
They drive you mad...

Download the podcast from the BBC -- music begins about 15 minutes in.

posted evening of February 18th, 2009: Respond
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Wednesday, February 25th, 2009

🦋 On stage at the Largo

Driving home from work, I was listening to Robyn Hitchcock's April 3 1999 show at the Largo (in LA? I think so) and some of his patter caught my attention. And I thought hey, it's been a little while since I posted a transcription of Hitchcock's stage patter, why not give it a whirl? So here you go. Note: I don't think Robyn is really at the top of his game in this concert -- he sounds tired and probably drunk, and the music and patter both have a lot of rough edges -- I think he is acknowledging this when he says, after "Viva Sea-Tac", "Man, I am so rocking. Not even." He manages to come up with some interesting ideas amid the incoherence though. Patter below the fold.

posted evening of February 25th, 2009: 4 responses
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Tuesday, March third, 2009

🦋 Happy Birthday, Robyn!

56 years old today and absolutely in his prime musically.

posted afternoon of March third, 2009: Respond
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Tuesday, March 17th, 2009

🦋 Playlist

Thanks Jer for sending me this link! Robyn Hitchcock posted a playlist on Rhapsody a couple of years ago (October '06), which I didn't know about until today. It's got a nice mix of old and new, stuff I know and stuff I've heard of and stuff I have not.

Robyn's Picks

1. "Wang Dang Doodle," by Howlin' Wolf
2. "Say Man," by Bo Diddley
3. "Champagne Supernova," by Oasis
4. "Lucifer Sam," by Pink Floyd
5. "Finest Worksong," by R.E.M.
6. "In Liverpool," by Suzanne Vega
7. "Look At Miss Ohio," by Gillian Welch
8. "Happiness," by Grant Lee Buffalo
9. "Slow Dog," by Belly
10. "God," by John Lennon
11. "The Red Telephone," by Love
12. "Kicks," by Lou Reed
13. "The Lark in the Morning," by Steeleye Span
14. "Station To Station," by David Bowie
15. "To Turn You On," by Roxy Music
16. "Lately I've Let Things Slide," by Nick Lowe

posted evening of March 17th, 2009: Respond
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Thursday, March 19th, 2009

🦋 The Practical Uses of Discomfort

Robyn Hitchcock speaks with Paul Byrne of Movies.ie about making Rachel Getting Married (which sounds like a whole lot of fun) and about Sex, Food, Death, and Insects.

Byrne: During [Sex, Food, Death, and Insects] you said at one point, "At heart I'm a frightened, angry person -- that's why my stuff isn't totally insubstantial, I'm constantly deep down inside in a kind of rage..." And it made me think, well, here you've got people like Gillian Welch and... Jonathan Demme's a fan... you've been playing music for a long time, The Soft Boys and everything, and I was thinking does that make it easier? Because for a lot of artists, to have some kind of recognition, some outlet, you know, eases the soul a bit, I don't know whether, is it still true that you have that rage in you? I guess you only said it last year so maybe it is still true...

Hitchcock: I haven't had enough therapy to get rid of it completely, you know, just enough to find it... Yeah, everybody is at some level of discomfort. Even the people you mention. And some people are in more pain than others, some people know what to do with their discomfort. You know, I mean I could be playing with my hair, I could be, you know, picking on an E♭ or something like that, I could be smoking except it's illegal to smoke now; there's all these manifestations of what to do with your own dis-ease... For me, I turn it into music, and a lot of other people I know; that's how we metabolize. We breathe in life and we breathe out music; it keeps us sane and it seems to be somehow good for the environment, you know, like plants take in CO₂ and produce oxygen, we take in the anxiety of life and give out music. And I'm very happy to be able to do that.

posted evening of March 19th, 2009: Respond
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Monday, March 23rd, 2009

🦋 Saying goodnight

Another Robyn Hitchcock interview, from Yep Roc -- here he is talking, among other things, about the title track from Goodnight Oslo, what it is about and where it comes from.

As you get older, I suppose you have to vacate certain comfort zones. Because in the end, they're not comforting, they're stifling. So, you have to move out of your shell -- you cannot stay where you were.

I'm meaning to write an extended post or series of posts about the songs on this record, which I like a whole lot -- trying to find a couple-of-hours block of time that I can devote to that.

posted afternoon of March 23rd, 2009: Respond
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Friday, March 27th, 2009

🦋 Goodnight Oslo: deep listen

Coming up! This evening is not quite upon us yet; I need to do things like put Sylvia to bed and tidy the kitchen, before it can truly be thought of as evening; but I am planning once all that is taken care of, to spend a couple of hours listening to and writing about the songs on Goodnight Oslo. (I did this a couple of years ago with Perspex Island, at the beginning of my infatuation with Robyn Hitchcock.)

I just noticed (at Hot Rox Avec Lying Sweet Talk) a really nice quote from Robyn, in a 2002 interview with Rolling Stone -- he is asked about what fan reaction he is anticipating to the forthcoming Nextdoorland, and replies:

They'll be initially pleased to hear it, and then they'll say it's not as good as Under Water Moonlight and then about five years down the line they'll probably get to like it on it's own merit," he says. "I can see the different layers of icing -- they'll like licking off the first layer, they won't like licking off the second layer, but once they've got through, the third layer's pretty good.

So, stay tuned -- more later.

(Update: Oh wait, strike that. The disc is in the car which Ellen drove to visit her friend. Oh well, something else... maybe I'll do some reading instead.)

posted evening of March 27th, 2009: 2 responses

Thursday, May 14th, 2009

🦋 And dreamt herself was such a faded form

YepRoc records has made the video for "I'm Falling" available online.

posted evening of May 14th, 2009: Respond

Thursday, June 18th, 2009

🦋 Come for the Robyn Hitchcock, stay for the John Wesley Harding

So I heard a while back about this tape of a John Wesley Harding concert which featured some performances by Robyn Hitchcock, called "A Bloody Show: Live at Bumbershoot 2005" -- and I had kicking around in my consciousness some occasional recommendations that I listen to Harding, and of course the obvious Dylan tie-in. So I put it on my NetFlix queue and forgot about it until it came in the mail yesterday.

Popped it in the player without much idea of what to expect -- I guess I was expecting some Dylan-influenced singing with guitar kind of thing. But wow! This thing is nothing like anything I could have expected. It is completely sui generis and is touched with brilliance. Harding is singing ballads that he has written (strongly and clearly derivative from particular folk ballads) with two other singers, either a capella or accompanied by a string quartet, sometimes Harding is playing guitar;* Robyn is narrating the performance reading excerpts from Harding's book Misfortune -- I had not known he was a novelist -- and great stage patter, from various of the performers.

The ballads are beautiful; I cannot find any recordings of them on the web so can only recommend that you watch the concert tape. Two lovely Harding performances are on YouTube, though. The song "Misfortune" is the first track on this concert tape, and is kind of what I had been expecting ("Dylan-influenced singing with guitar kind of thing"), and is just great:

* And more instrumentation -- a hurdy-gurdy is featured on "The Lady Dressed in Green"! And there's a full rock band on a few tracks at the end!

posted evening of June 18th, 2009: Respond
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Wednesday, August 12th, 2009

🦋 If that were air, it would be a long way to fall.

Robyn Hitchcock on "Words and Music from Studio A"! Some unreleased tracks, some interesting conversation. All solo and acoustic.

posted evening of August 12th, 2009: Respond

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