The Rocket
October 11, 1995
Robyn Hitchcock
The Backstage, Seattle, September 29
by Chris Nickson
They say the devil has all the best tunes. He must have been at the club that night, because he gave more than a few to Robyn Hitchcock -- not that the man needs them. Since the days of The Soft Boys, he's been doing nicely by himself, thank you. Whether it was songs about tomatoes or tiny pink insects that are really bombers, this was a typical Hitchcock performance: a theater of the moderately absurd paraded before us. Appearing solo, his eccentric charm was quite effortless. He didn't have to win over the full house. They were his from the moment he walked onstage.
It's Robyn's slightly loopy worldview and wonderful between-song prattle that gets written about. But one thing that tends to be ignored is his songwriting style. While he exists somewhere that is outside time, he is, in fact, quite the child of the '60s. His work mixes classic Pop structures, left-field weirdness of English Psychedelia (a lot of his material isn't that far removed from Syd-era Floyd, for example), and guitar techniques of traditional Britfolk. These elements made his version of Hendrix's "The Wind Cries Mary" a particularly interesting and curiously apt choice for a cover song. Robyn's no Jimi, but he is a vastly underrated guitarist -- whether on the acoustic, utilizing a number of different tunings; or on the electric, where he could move a little further out still.
More recognizable material, like "Glass Hotel" and the deliciously lush "I Got a Message for You" ("It's about why the English reproduce"), got the best reaction from the audience -- most of whom seemed more familiar with the idea of Robyn Hitchcock than his work. That's fine because -- like some improvising magician -- you never knew quite what he was going to pull from his hat. It was good that he steered clear of the "hits" -- no "Flesh Number One" or "Brenda's Iron Sledge". And the occasional cry for "My Wife And My Dead Wife" went, thankfully, unheeded. Instead, he took us on a circutious path around the fringes of his career. This is what a Hitchcock show should be about: a stroll through an overgrown garden, where one is never quite sure whether that large plant in the corner will emit perfume or try to devour you. Or, possibly, both.
Whether it was good or bad (and actually, I've seen him better, if you need to know) doesn't quite matter. You can't judge Robyn by those standards. He simply is, and there's no one quite like him. Every performance is going to be a series of earthly (and sometimes earthy) delights.
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