Robyn Hitchcock... Gigography

Robyn Hitchcock & Minus 3
Concert appearance: Fri., 20 Jan. 2006

Academy II
Birmingham, England UK
setlist incomplete

Set list:

If You Were A Priest
Acid Bird
When I Was A Kid
Ole! Tarantula
Birdshead
Driving Aloud (Radio Storm)
Beautiful Queen
Cigarettes, Coffee & Booze (Minus 5)
Bells of Rhymney (Pete Seeger/Idris Davies)
Queen of Eyes
Give It To the Soft Boys

from universaltrendsetter.org


i'm in a dismal mood... the gig isn't very full and i'm in Birmingham.

Luckily i got a hug from Scott. so it's not all bad.

better is to come.

Looking relaxed and slightly disorganised the band wander onstage, faff
a bout, look at ach other and kick into my favourite song of all time,
"if you were a priest", with Scott getting to do the harmony on the last
chorus. "acid bird" follows and then "when i was a kid".. all vintage
Hitchcock tunes... after that i lose track... a new song, which sounds
absolutely wonderful... the gloriously funny "ole tarantula", which
always made me think of Scott anyway - 'furry black legs and a spicy
goatee' - has the man adding great vocals to it... there's confusion
with a missing 12 string, which is found, but it's transformed into an
acoustic fender and not a black rickenbacker... meaning "birdshead" has
to be restarted as Robyn is laughing too much.

for the encores we get a M5 song, "cigarettes, coffee and booze" as well
as some more classics, "bells of rhymney" - which they do a last verse
version of again as the, now recovered, 12 string had only 11 useable.
"queen of eyes" was meant to be the end, but someone, and i'm certain
it's Scott, persuaded the band to do "give it to the soft boys" with McC
howling like a wounded animal.

other highlights... possible the best version of "driving aloud" i've
heard. "beautiful queen" was excellent, but will never get near the
viva-seatacII one.

-Laurence

the atmosphere onstage was relaxed, lots of jokes from Robyn and
Scott... Morris Windsor joined them for additional percussion and vocals
at the end, taking over drum duties for the last track as i'm sure Bill
had no idea how the song went... in fact, i think Scott knew it the best
of all of them!

Peter was the centre of attention, posing for pics and signing stuff, he
didn't mind and was wandering around saying hello to all.

Nottingam tonight... then cambridge, brighton, london and exeter for me.

The sound was great as well, that's because Robyn had Hessu over from
Finland to do it, there is no finer live sound guy than him. he's not at
cambridge, so be warned!

-Laurence


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