ROBYN HITCHCOCK @ ALEXANDRA PALACE, LONDON

The singer-songwriter having last year released his new studio album, ‘Shufflemania!’, performed an electric and acoustic set at the refurbished Alexandra Palace Theatre room. He started his show on a cover of the swinging rock of Robyn Hitchcock and The Egyptians’ ‘Oceanside’ and the twinging guitar of ‘The Cars She Used To Drive’ from his 1982 second solo album, ‘Groovy Decay’.

After changing over to acoustic, Hitchcock played from his 2011 album ‘Tromsø, Kaptein‘ with ‘Old Man Weather’, featuring keyboard organ and double bass. Hitchcock’s wife Emma Swift then came onstage to sing with him on ‘Glass Hotel’, from his debut studio album, as well as on new album song ‘The Man Who Loves The Rain’.

Swift left the stage to make way for The Soft Boys’ Kimberley Rew on guitar, for the band’s covers of ‘Tonight’ and the psychedelic clawing guitar of ‘Kingdom of Love’, also performing from Hitchcock’s third solo album, ‘I Often Dream of Trains’, with ‘Sounds Great When You’re Dead’; its plucky guitar and creeping basslines straining into a Beatles-esque chorus.

Hitchcock finished his set with a mixture of old and new material from both The Soft Boys and his last studio album: from the crumbling country blues, slide guitar of ‘Midnight Tram to Nowhere’ to the protest punk of ‘I Wanna Destroy You’, and ending on a cover of The Beatles’ ‘When My Guitar Gently Weeps’.

25/02/23: Robyn Hitchcock @ Alexandra Palace, London.