New Times L.A.
April 5, 2001
The Soft Boys
by Keven McAlester
History has been kinder than age to The Soft Boys' music. Their three studio albums, by which a small cult swore upon their release, have since become canonized as beacons of tuneful literacy, evoked with the breathless awe of the reverent. And if you heard them in 1979, or even 1989, you'd probably agree; catchy and surreal, they had the wisdom of age and the uncoordination of youth -- a spastic shorthand of good influences (Byrds, Barrett, Beefheart) and good melodies. The quartet's frenetic exuberance could make their songs seem like accidents, but subsequent events -- Robyn Hitchcock's long and wonderful solo career, Kimberley Rew's shorter and less wonderful stint in Katrina And The Waves -- have since proved otherwise.
Yet listen 20 years later, and the urgency has dissipated. The songs have lost none of their tunefulness, but the rush of revelation has become a nod of acknowledgment or, on occasion ("The Pigworker", "Wey Wey Hep Uh Hole"), a cringe of embarrassment. The band's last (and easily best) album, Underwater Moonlight, sounds less like the final burst of an inspired group than a raucous demo for Hitchcock's solo career; its finest moments ("I Wanna Destroy You", "Queen Of Eyes", the sublime "Tonight") aren't so much the pinnacle of what came before as the blueprint for what followed. The band's other two studio albums, A Can Of Bees and Invisible Hits, have a much higher quaint-to-quality ratio; it's startling that something once considered so timeless could now so often sound dated.
Perhaps acknowledging that, or perhaps acknowledging the futility of reunions in general, The Soft Boys have reportedly worked up a fair amount of new material for their current tour. The occasion is Matador Records' rerelease of Underwater Moonlight, but such an extended reunion isn't much of a surprise: Hitchcock has worked extensively with drummer Morris Windsor and bassist Matthew Seligman throughout his solo career; he's toured with Rew over the past couple of years; and the band already did a one-off reunion gig in 1994. Advance notice of this tour suggests that The Soft Boys' shows will be much like their albums: good enough to transcend nostalgia, but not great enough to inspire it.
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