Bucketfull Of Brains
Spring, 1997 (Issue 54)
Robyn Hitchcock
Gotta Let His Brain Out
by Thomas Anderson
Like a fish swimming up through the murk, Robyn Hitchcock is finally surfacing. After having released a dizzying array of records with The Soft Boys, The Egyptians, and as a solo artist; after having been lauded as a new Syd Barrett, a new Ray Davies, and a new Velvet Underground he's now being seen (and understood) for what he is -- not a leader of some psychedelic revival (which he has already outlived), nor merely the creator of whimsical titles like "Sandra's Having Her Brain Out", but a terrific singer-songwriter with a fine ear for melody and an unmatched gift for metaphoric originality. He's one of those guys who is so original and so good that you've always known his day would come. He's been leapfrogging from one small indie label to another for the better part of two decades, and finally the "record biz" is taking serious note of him. He's gained a seat at the Rock 'n' Roll table by his insistence on it, and he's never had to embarrass himself (or his fans) in the process.
His new Warner Bros. album, Moss Elixir, is one of his best and most accessible. The songs -- while never sounding too stark or bare-bones -- are very simply arranged, allowing the beauty of the melodies and the captivating lyrical imagery to hit you in their purest form. There aren't even drums on a number of the tracks. It's a very simple and excellent album, and one that Syd Barrett, Ray Davies, or the Velvet Underground would have claimed with pride.
I called our artist and talked to him first and foremost about songwriting, Bob Dylan, and the speed of things. Here's what he had to say.
Last year you were on a panel at SXSW talking about how Bob Dylan -- and in particular his song "Visions Of Johanna" -- had been a big influence on you. Tell me a little about that.
Well, that really changed everything for me. I mean, it did for so many people. I heard Dylan, and -- just like I said on the panel -- like a child lost in the woods: the first thing it sees it thinks is its father. I heard "Like A Rolling Stone" and that was it: BANG, y'know? My childhood had gone. My interest in whatever I'd been keen on. It had all been replaced by this Jewish kid from Minnesota [Laughs]. But there it was: it was "Like A Rolling Stone". And when "Visions Of Johanna" came out in the fall, I remember thinking, "This is the song."
A lot of British artists (like Clapton) seem to have been very taken with the Americana aspect of Dylan and The Band. Was that a part of it for you?
Oh, no. It was nothing to do with countries or cultures. It was just what the emanation was, coming out of those records. It was partly the words. But I think it was also the way they were delivered: they were this, sort of, incredible mixture of emotions. I mean, most of Dylan's songs are laments in some way, or complaints. He's never been one to celebrate things very much. Especially in the last 20 years, he's gone right down as black as it can get. But when he was younger, there was more dynamics to his stuff. There were all sorts of different feeling in there. And I think "Visions Of Johanna"...there was this, kind of, compassion and humor and anger and cynicism, and also resignation. Y'know, whatever it is is inevitable, and you shrug your shoulders and carry on. I suppose you could say that's just being philosophical. So, all this was carried in a song, and I've had time to, sort of, analyze this over the years. But at the time, I didn't really think about it. I just thought, "That's for me. I'm climbing into that song. Good bye." And that was, I suppose, when I decided I was gonna be a songwriter. I wanted to be somebody in that mold.
You'd already heard The Beatles by that time, right?
Yeah, yeah, I had. But it didn't occur to me that that would be something I would do. Because...I don't know...the Beatles was very much Pop music. I never really thought I was gonna be a Pop star...and I wasn't [Laughs]. Y'know? I never really wanted to be. I didn't know that Dylan was a cult figure. But I suppose that was the button I was pushing.
Let's talk about some of the songs you've covered. You did a version of the Beatles' "A Day In The Life" which came out on a flexi-disc for this very magazine.
Well, given that "A Day In The Life" was part of this whole record where The Beatles said, "We can't do this stuff live, so we can't tour," (although in fact I think they just didn't want to tour) I think it's very satisfying to be able to do that song with just an acoustic guitar and piano. So maybe that's why we did that one.
How about "Caroline Says II", by Lou Reed?
Well, I like that too. That was on Berlin, but I think he'd written it a while before that. I always found that one quite an easy one to sing. That was really one of the first times I'd performed something, sort of, serious -- as an adult song -- in the public eye in The Soft Boys. And that's always been a song I'd wished I'd written.
Lou Reed was very much a, sort of, extension of Bob Dylan. He was an extension of a certain side of Bob Dylan. The, kind of, particularly cynical, menacing side. Oddly enough, though, he seems to have survived better than Dylan has. He's still making records that are intriguing, where Bob isn't making records at all. Dylan is also spokesman for his generation, which is something Lou never quite achieved.
I understand Dylan is setting up his own record label.
Is he? Wow! I wonder if he's gonna have any songs to go on it.
Well, supposedly first up will be a Jimmie Rodgers tribute record with people like Steve Earle on it.
Now, Jimmie Rodgers..."The Singing Brakeman"?
Yeah.
Yeah. Dylan compared himself to that. Anyway -- wherever we were -- that's why "Caroline Says". And I think I sang it recently on some, sort of, Canadian show.
I got the impression, on that live recording of "Caroline Says II", that the audience thought the song was yours, and that it was supposed to be funny.
That's because that's what they would expect from me. It worked quite well, because they laughed, then they realized it wasn't funny. But I mean, there are certain lines...y'know, Lou Reed has a certain way of crossing the dateline from extreem grimness into abusrdity. I think that's generally how comedy works: you just go past a certain pint, things get more and more unberable, and then suddenly they're funny. And that happens a lot, I suppose.
How about "That's When Your Heartaches Begin"?
Ah, that was the very flippant version [Laughs]. I don't think I'd do that now. That earned us some bad points in certain places, although I thought my rap at the end of it was quite funny. But that was Elvis Presley wasn't it, singin' that stuff? I liked early Elvis. I should've been more reverential to it. I probably would be now.
Speaking of Elvis, you also covered John Cale's arrangement of "Heartbreak Hotel".
That wasn't even my idea, so it's a double ripoff. That was very good, though. We used to end The Soft Boys' set with that. Even the people who didn't get the more frantic, scrambling, offerings that The Soft Boys did, they all got "Heartbreak Hotel" because it was basically just mental.
You've got a lot of records out, y'know?
Well, I'm quite old -- and I've been doing nothing else. You think about a postman who's been delivering letters all his or her life. You could say, "Well, you've posted a lot of letters." And it'd be true. That's what the function is. That's what the job is.
Yeah, but does it amaze you to look back at all your work?
Not really. I mean, I know it's there, and it's, sort of, paid for me to carry on writing songs. But I'm much more interested in writing them than I am with what happens afterwards. If I'm live, I dig up songs to perform. There are songs -- like "Queen Of Eyes" -- which I must've sung two thousand times by now. And I guess it's nice (rather than having to rely on singing "That's When Your Heartaches Begin", or "Visions Of Johanna"). I've now got my own standards to fall back on.
Does any of your older stuff sound naive to you now?
Yeah, quite a lot. For starters, I don't think I sing anything that I wrote before 1979. And in 1979, I'd been already attempting to write songs for ten years. I mean, my first solo finished song probably wasn't 'til 1971. So that's eight years of songs that, as far as I'm concerned, are completely worthless [Laughs].
Y'know, in the early days (maybe this is a point worth making) I'd go and play in the Folk clubs. And what I got by on, basically, was comedy. I didn't think my performances were ever, sort of, soulful, or brought a tear to anyone's eye, or captured anyone's attention very much. The thing I was best at was comedy. So I would do songs that had a comic element in them. Or I'd even do songs, and then change the words to make them funny. Which I really despise -- I think it's the lowest thing to do, y'know? But I did it just to, sort of, get used to being onstage. And I think a lot of the songs I wrote, they were pehraps only successful if they were funny. My attempts at being serious were so dour.
So, to get back to your original question, I think I wrote "Queen Of Eyes" and "Kingdom Of Love" in '79. From then on, the songs have begun to last. But there are songs I wouldn't do now -- like "Sometimes I Wish I Was A Pretty Girl" -- because I think they're too misogynist.
Y'know, at the time I just felt I hated humanity -- I wasn't out to get women. But I think, looking back on it, I hated humanity and especially women [Laughs]. But "Pretty Girl" wasn't just an attack at women. It was an attack at me and my very existence. I don't know. I think there are certain things I just wouldn't push anymore, y'know what I mean? "Sandra's Having Her Brain Out": I don't think I'd do that.
Is songwriting pretty effortless for you?
No, no. But it's quite easy to come up with a song about nothing. So, it's quite easy to make something out of nothing. I could write a song, y'know, in ten minutes, easily. But it might just fade away. It's not really effortless, it's just that I've done it for so long.
Tell me a little about writing under-the-gun. Say you had a deadline to have an album done, and you had no inspiration.
Well, I don't normally start a record unless I've got a full complement of songs. I mean, I've got a project now, actually, where I'm supposed to be filmed. It's going to be a new album, and Jonathan Demme is supposed to be filming it live. So it's a question of how many new songs I put in, or how many old ones. And I'm trying to come up with a complete set of new songs. So I suppose I'm slightly under-the-gun. But I've got quite a few old ones that I haven't sung, or recorded. Or things lying around that I could shove in. I dunno. It should be fairly quick.
"The Speed Of Things" (on your new album) seems more autobiographical than most of your work.
Well, yeah, it's more literal, if you like. but they're all autobiographical. I've never been able to put myself in someone else's shoes -- very occasionally, but mostly they're all to do with me and how I was feeling. That doesn't mean to say that all the events I've described actually happend, but they felt like they did. "Speed Of Things" is just very matter-of-fact. I was having a panic attack in a, sort of, outdoor parking lot by the sea off The Isle Of Wight, in Britain. I had a cup of tea (or something), it was about five o'clock, and was just beginning to sweat. I had this pen and a piece of paper, and I wrote it down: "The terror of the moment". I don't know if you ever get that. But, you realize that you're moving from one moment to the next, and any moment your soul could be sucked out of your body. It's just pure terror. I mean, not the pure terror of when somebody puts a gun to your head, or you know you're about to be raped (or something). But just existential paranoia -- usually brought on by drinking too much the night before. But sometimes these things just happen. And I worte the song down. I had this feeling that "this is the moment". Y'know, when you look at a row of lightbulbs, and they'll just have a little light flickering. A lot that appears to be traveling through the lightbulbs -- maybe it's making up the sign or something (like Las Vegas) -- that's what I was thinking of at the moment. A series of lightbulbs being briefly lit, one after the other. And I wrote that song down.
I went to a high school reunion recently, and a lot of people whom I remember as teenagers now sort of look like Kenny Rogers. I was amazed at the speed with which time passes and people change.
Yeah. What I look back on, more than the number of albums I've done, is just the amount of time I've lived through. Because so much of it is lost because you're thinking about something else while you're supposed to be living. I now do a lot of things like just remembering different weather conditions. I might just glimpse the light coming through the trees and think, "Oh yeah, that's like July, 1973." Or, "There's a bit of mist in the air, and it's August: that feels like August, 1971." So I, kind of, keep all this time in bottles, as it were. I can, sort of, go and uncork them, and smell them. I think you can almost feel...it's like railway carriages: the longer you go, the more stuff you have behind you. And if you turn a corner, suddenly all the carriages rattle behind you, and they have to keep pace with you. I mean, I know I physically weigh more than I did at 18. I've put on (whatever it is) I'm sure 30 or 40 pounds. I just feel that much more weighed down by everything that's happened to me than I did then. I don't mean I'm necessarily unhappier, or anything -- I wasn't particualrly happy when I was a teenager. But I can just, sort of, feel this solid block of time... [Laughs] ...bouncing around with me.
As more time passes, is it easier to write more literally about yourself?
Well, that's a good point. There's more things to dig up. I don't know if I'm becoming any more "out front". I think sometimes I am, sometimes I'm not. I don't know. I'm very tidal: I don't know what controls my moods in some writing. I'm not sure that they're really going anywhere. I think there are fewer words than there used to be, that's for sure. It's a lot less word-based. I still like to have a title to start with. Sometimes it'll turn itself into a whole song, and sometimes it won't turn itself into anything.
It seems like a lot of songwriters (Dylan, for instance), as they mature, their output gets smaller but increases in quality.
No, it's really not true in Dylan's case. Y'know, it hasn't really improved. But so much of Dylan is actually in the performance, as well as in the songs. Yeah, I guess as you get older you exercise more quality-control. Also, as you get to know how things work, you probably experiment less, because you know how to write a song. A good example of this would be someone like Bryan Ferry. Early Roxy Music was quite experimental, and I didn't think the songs were that great. They just seemed to be chords that were, sort of, stuck together to make it into a song. I didn't think Ferry hit his stride until the late-'70s, where Roxy re-formed, and he'd had his buts-up with Jerry Hall, and then he started producing (I thought) really fine songs. But he's also obviously, somewhere along the line, learned to write songs conventionally, which he hadn't really mastered at the beginning. Or the early Soft Boys stuff, where we had to have all these different time signatures just to keep everybody interested. It was also just fun seeing how many little beats you could stick onto a song before the whole thing collapsed. I mean, I wouldn't do a song like "Return Of The Sacred Crab" now. Even by the end of The Soft Boys, it was, sort of, clear that it was actually more fun to perform songs like "Kingdom Of Love" or "Queen Of Eyes" -- that were straight-ahead -- than it was doing the more difficult ones.
You briefly retired from the music business after The Soft Boys, right?
Yeah. Well, I wasn't really in the music business at that stage [Laughs]. I had no career to retire from. I think that's what I was so pissed off about. So I, sort of, flounced out of nothing, as it were.
Also, in the essay you wrote for Rolling Stone's Alt-Rock-A-Rama, you sounded like you were ready to call it quits again. But at this point in time, aren't you pretty-well resigned to the fact that you'll be doing this forever?
I do. But, y'know, you're only as good as your last song. I can't say that because I've done 23 albums, I've got another 23 albums in me. I might go downstairs and pick up a guitar, and none of the songs I'm working on are any good. In '93...I think I wrote that in '94, actually. In '93, after the last Egyptians tour, I was seriously thinking of just switching away from music into painting and writing because I hadn't written a song in (whatever) eight months, or something. I was living in D.C., and I think it was probably the wrong place. My guitar just wouldn't come to life. I remember being in that flat. I didn't write a single song in it. And I was very disturbed because -- as you know -- I'm normally quite prolific. So I just thought, "Maybe I'm gonna have to stop." I know now (since I've got a quiver-full of new songs, and managed to do a new album and I'm halfway through yet another one)...so I can say, "Yes, I'm gonna do this forever." But from a, kind of, minute-to-minute perspective, with your nose right down in the furrow, rather than swooping up over the field, you just don't really know how long it's gonna last.
You said a while back that you could never find the "right place" in the music business for your stuff. It seems like you've created your own personal place now by your own perseverence.
I've got my own little chair in the corner. But I don't think it's a chair in the corner that anyone else is going to inherit. I've made a place for myself, but it's only for life. Whereas someone like Dylan, he pioneered a new series of niches, a new way of defining people. I mean, post-Dylan there were all these people that grew up -- Van Morrison, and Elvis Costello, and Lou Reed, and Neil Young -- and they're all expressing themselves in the way that Dylan expressed himself. I suppose I'm like one of them. I don't know whether I've created something that you can pass down, that other musicians will pick up that mantle, y'know?
Is that important to you?
Well, I think everyone wants to last, in some way or other. Once I stop writing, once I'm dead...because I've written so many songs, you could probably feed everything I did into a computer sequence, and plot a curve, and you could say, "Well, if he was alive now, he'd be writing songs like this." Which would be intriguing. But failing that, if you feel that you've influenced people, then what you're doing is passed down. Just as I had stuff passed down to me from Folk and Blues and Pop.
What's the worst thing about the music business?
The worst thing about the music business? I don't know, because I haven't really experienced the big ripoffs. I think one thing about the music business is you're encouraged to confuse financial and psychological gain with artistic development. In other words, if you're good you're selling a lot of records. And if you sell a lot of records, there will always be people around to say how good you are. You'll get bigger articles written about you in more glowing terms. There are exceptions to this, but in general... Simply by selling records, you are somehow convinced that you are a great artist. They always use the word "artist" when talking about musicians, y'know? Most of them aren't artists. They're just baboons with their nose in the Rock 'n' Roll trough. They may have an artistic streak -- but so do most criminals. I think it's that...the way they confuse money and self-aggrandizement with being a great artist. The two have nothing to do with each other.
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