Musical Interlude: Robyn Hitchcock

The highlight of my Bank Holiday weekend (such is the fullness and richness of my life) was purchasing Robyn Hitchcock’s new album, “This is the BBC”, a compilation of sessions he did for the Andy Kershaw and Mark Radcliffe radio shows between 1995 and 1999.

This is the third release of material recorded for the BBC (a previous collection of Andy Kershaw sessions was released in 1994 and a live concert from the Cambridge Folk Festival came out in 1998) and there are no real shocks: only two tracks have never previously appeared on a Hitchcock album a cover of Bob Dylan’s It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry and a jingle for Andy Kershaw. That said it is a worthy release with Madonna of the Wasps, Cheese Alarm and De Chirico Street being the stand out tracks for me.

Despite plying his trade for nearly 30 years, Robyn is largely unknown here in the UK and those that do know his work seem to be split evenly between love and hate. I doubt it will bring him a new audience but it will be a welcome addition to any fan’s collection (who if they are anything like me would probably buy an album of him reading extracts from the Falkirk phone book)

Robyn's Official website can be accessed here or from the link on my sidebar.

While I am on the subject of music, I have been criticised by an old friend for not highlighting the prog rock scene in this blog. To remedy this I would like to draw attention to Melodicrock.com which has more poodle-haired pomp rockers than you can shake a stick at.