1981
Robyn Hitchcock
The Venue
by Paul Tickell
This time last year The Soft Boys were a jumble novelty: late-'60s American Psychedelic mixing in with the English madcap sensibility of Syd Barrett and Kevin Ayers. There were even a few messy Punk sentiments thrown in, and it was no surprise to find -- in the space of one track -- sitars, alarm clocks, and driving Rock bass in happy disharmony.
I'm not sure why guitarist, songwriter and vocalist Robyn Hitchcock broke up the band. His recent solo album, though it goes against the grain of the times, sounds mundane: Soft Boys without the warts.
The live show is pretty much a reflection of the album but with more razzmatazz. Bassist Matt Seligman (ex-Softie and now a Thompson Twin) and guitarist and saxist Anthony Thistlethwaite pranced about in huge bizarre fish-head masks: the effect was of a Rock band wombling through the film Zardoz. Although drummer Rod Johnson could only manage a headband, the two female backing vocalists kept up the incongruous spirit of things by dressing like the Wicked Witch from The Wizard Of Oz. Robyn himself was off at a different visual tangent, in mutton chops and baggy peasant shirt.
The music and more so those torrential lyrics had something in common with Russell's appalling shock-horror hit-or-miss talent. Anyone for a song about policemen's dreams or your own Oedipal dreams about ma and pa? A source close to Robyn informs me that you're just meant to enjoy this kind of thing, get pissed... Well, I like to see the "Boo!" in taboo themes, otherwise the songs might as well be about Milton Keynes.
The band, steady rather than heady, kept him upright. In one corner of the stage two dummies sat under a sunshade. Young Parisiens? No, octogenarians under a Whitbread advert: this is a Robyn Hitchcock production. And he's all for recording his altering states and following the traffic that flows through his brain. I think he's running on the spot. Dotty.
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