READIN

Friday, October 26th, 2007

🦋 I Wanna Go Backwards

O happy day! Robyn Hitchcock's box set I Wanna Go Backwards is published and arrives on my doorstep. Looks really good -- tomorrow I am going to spend some time savoring it. There is Black Snake Dîamond Röle, his first solo record, and which was the one album of his I got to know by heart when I was a teenager -- this print also includes nearly a whole nother record's worth of extra tracks, ones I love off of Eaten by her own Dinner, and ones I have never heard of -- I Often Dream of Trains, which a lot of Hitchcock fans seem to list as their favorite record; and Eye, which I love the songs that I'm familiar with but don't really know the record as a whole. Jer told me that when Eye came out he had started getting disillusioned with Robyn and the record reminded him of why he thought Robyn was a great musician. (I wasn't really listening to new records at that time because of not having a CD player.) And, and that's not all -- rounding out the set is a double album of demo tapes from the '80's titled While Thatcher Mauled Britain. Looks like this is going to be my afternoon activity tomorrow -- I had been planning to march against the war, but this fair-weather patriot is put off by forecasts of 100% chance heavy rain.

posted evening of October 26th, 2007: Respond
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Saturday, October 27th, 2007

🦋 While there's still time

My favorite thing about I Wanna Go Backwards, on first listening, may be the inclusion of "All I wanna do is fall in love" as a bonus track on Black Snake Dîamond Röle. I was not aware of that song before this afternoon but it is now one of my favorite Hitchcock songs. So I was glad to hear it -- all of that record was really nice to hear again, as was Eye (except I remembered how "Queen Elvis" kind of turned me off to that record -- but the good tracks more than make up for that). Also I was happy to see some key tracks from Eaten By Her Own Dinner on the bonus material for BSDR -- including the majestically weird "Happy the Golden Prince". ("So that's who I am!") The record of unreleased demo tapes, While Thatcher Mauled Britain (fantastic title), is going to take a few more listenings before I decide how worthwhile it is to me; most of the versions of songs I knew did not seem as good as the album versions, and I didn't listen that closely to the songs I did not know from elsewhere.

But seriously, "All I wanna do is fall in love", what a magnificent song. Other extremely good things about listening to this collection: "Executioner", and multiple versions of "Raining Twilight Coast"....also: remember how I said that "She Doesn't Exist" doesn't do bitter as well as "Positively 4th Street"? "Nowhere Girl" is not aiming for quite the same thing as "4th Street" -- but it sure is bitter, and it sure is a fantastic song.

posted evening of October 27th, 2007: Respond

Monday, January 14th, 2008

🦋 "I don't know how likeable she was..."

I was just looking at the jacket of While Thatcher Mauled Britain and noticed a cartoon of Hitchcock's. A little bit hilarious in the context of these past few days.

posted evening of January 14th, 2008: Respond
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🦋 Shining down, on the water

It's worth pointing out just how great the bonus tracks on the CD of Black Snake Dîamond Röle are. I wrote a couple of months ago about how much I like "All I Wanna Do is Fall in Love" -- "A Skull, a Suitcase, and a Long Red Bottle of Wine" and "It Was the Night" are similarly great (although "It Was the Night" seems like a lousy title to me). And there's much more! The take #2 of "I Watch the Cars" (take #1 is maybe my favorite song on the original record) is not so good however.

posted evening of January 14th, 2008: Respond