Sunday Telegraph
November 23, 1997
A Surreal Syd Barrett Rock
by Tobias Hill
Robyn Hitchcock comes on stage in a clownish polka dot shirt, mumbling under his breath until the audience quieten down, straining to hear him. The mumble rises to a mutter: "He swore they would remain even this time. No one in the audience was going to swell, or tip over sideways like in Montreal. The guitar usually helped, so he tried that."
And he does, picking away at "Gene Hackman" while laughter ripples and swells through the Jazz Cafe's tiers. Hitchcock whittles at the acoustic strings with small, hard movements, then whacks into the heavier chords. The song lyrics are just like Hitchcock's rambling interludes; brilliant, verging on incoherent.
Robyn Hitchcock is the kind of musician you like or loathe. Sometimes he's the kind of musician you like and loathe. His voice is so grating, you wish someone would do proper covers of his best songs -- "Madonna Of The Wasps", or "Queen Elvis". His lyrics are a kaleidoscope of nonsense -- sometimes brilliant, often repetitive. "She was sinister but she was happy", Hitchcock sings on his most recent album (Moss Elixir, Warner, 1996), "like a chandelier festooned with leeches". Aha! That would be sinister leeches and a happy chandelier, would it? Or vice versa? Or do we care?
Hitchcock's nonsense is fun, but only in small doses. If the tabloids revealed that Robyn was the secret love-child of Alfred Hitchcock, the only surprising thing would be that the press had finally noticed Robyn Hitchcock, last of the great British eccentrics. Surreality is the singer's meat and drink, and in fact his music has something in common with his namesake's film work: it's clever, very dark, and very funny (actually, Robyn Hitchcock's father was a quirky novelist whose subjects included a woman giving birth to a rubber tyre -- there's pedigree for you).
After 44 years and more than 15 albums, Hitchcock is still a relative unknown, but over the years his slightly sinister, Syd Barrett-ish brand of Psychedelia has sold more than a million albums worldwide, and next year is looking up. January sees the release of a new album and a 90-minute performance film directed by Jonathan (Silence Of The Lambs) Demme.
After the acoustic set he switches to electric guitar, orders coffee and starts to mutter again. The crowd cranes forward. "Most of the your life, if you're lucky, nothing happens: you're born, you have a few hot drinks and you die. You have to make your own crises. This one goes out to Baby Spice." And he's off again, the crowd's laughter swelling behind him.
Recently Hitchcock did a four-night concert in a New York shop-window, but then that's the kind of artist he is. Watch his space.
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