Pandomag
June 24, 2000
Gra
Grant-Lee Phillips And Robyn Hitchcock At The Crocodile Cafe
Seattle, 6/24/2000
by Charles Redell
Before every show I review, there's this moment of abject fear. I stand there in the club thinking that there's no way I'll have anything to say. I picture myself sitting for hours, staring at my screen, while millions of you sit, waiting to know how the show really was. But tonight, I knew, would be different. There isn't a possibility that a show by Robyn Hitchcock and Grant-Lee Phillips could leave me blank. There's too much energy in their presence, too much pathos in their songs, and most importantly of all, they are consummate entertainers able to leave an audience wowed.
Something tonight onstage at the Crocodile would put my brain in gear and get the words flowing.
Now, here I am at the opposite end of the spectrum. My mind is awash with images and words while my fingers race along the keyboard unable to keep up. There is so much to process and so much to keep up with that I feel overloaded with things to tell you. I know: every writer should have such problems.
How did this happen? Two men got up onstage with a sublime sense for entertaining and a remarkable talent for keeping audiences engaged; and tried, while playing perfectly with each other, to always outdo one another too. They put on a show made up of their absolutely wonderful songs, hilarious interludes between those songs, and a tribute to the Pop music history that allows them to exist as the entertainers they are today.
They have a sensibility about that popular music that not only allows them to write beautiful songs and lyrics, but also to write silly or cheesy songs that knock you on the floor while they leave you laughing in the aisles. Instead of being turned off by the inherent cheese of a lyric like: "I watered the tomatoes and I think of you/No one's ever watered me the way you do" one knows Hitchcock means what he sings, and the image is the only one he had available at the time. True Popular music, good Popular music, as an art, is not forced or contrived. Rather, it's meant to entertain and to bring an audience into a performer's life for a night. Grant-Lee and Robyn are masters at this.
Although very similar in style (both play acoustic guitars and both write lyrics that'll kill you with their beautiful simplicity), they are different enough so as to be perfectly complementary. For each song, one was able to concentrate on either singing or playing his guitar while the other did the opposite. Now this is not intended to mean that either is not fully capable of doing both at the same time. They both are. But because these two men are so completely on the same page musically, one is able to take over front-man duties, (singing) and the other gets to be the hands (playing the guitar) on each song. The result, if you close your eyes, is hearing a beautiful singer play his guitar as if it were a physical extension of himself.
Of course, each song was not just sung by one or the other. They took full advantage of their wide talents by harmonizing their familiar songs in new ways too. Grant-Lee's voice is high and melodic. Robyn's is much closer to a baritone. Full and rich, he can get down to the notes that I think Grant would like to hit, but is just not built to. Together they create two completely different tones that, through hard work on the part of their producers, mix and play together in a quite melodic and, at times, haunting way.
Anyone who has ever seen Robyn Hitchcock or Grant-Lee Phillips play solo or
with one of their bands knows that they are first and foremost entertainers. This is why I first fell in love with Grant Lee Buffalo (Grant's most recent band). Coming from a theatre background, I was enamored that first time because it was so much more than a Rock show. It was an event, a chance to entertain an audience for hours, and a chance for him to shine. Apparently the same is true for Robyn Hitchcock (before tonight I had never seen him play).
Every song warrants a story, every story, a joke. Whether they are playing a song or killing time while they tune up or fix a broken string, the show never stops for either of them. There is always something going on for the audience to watch. There are stories and jokes, magic tricks and one-liners galore. Grant showed us a few of the ways he can play his hair, and Robyn talked about any little thing that occurred to him as soon as it did.
But beyond the stories and the standard songs of theirs that they both played, we were also treated to an informal tribute to Pop music. Covers abounded. Not the least of which was one of "Are You Experienced?" by Jimi Hendrix, and one of "A Day In The Life" from Sgt. Pepper's. The Jimi cover fully exemplified everything a cover of one of his songs should be. It was totally new and different -- while fun for the performers and audience alike because of that difference. Grant-Lee banged on the highest notes of the piano while Robyn danced his "trippy dance" around the stage (not the only time we saw it tonight, either). Arms waving and hips swaying, he stayed completely true to the lyrics while saturating them with their full meaning and feeling through a total clarity of voice that Jimi never had. "A Day In The Life" (which was supposed to be a show-closer, but the crowd wouldn't let them leave after only three encores) was pure fun. They took a song we all know, and sang it the way we all do. They did the bass-fills with their voices and missed the high notes the same way that everyone but The Beatles do. More than a cover, it was an homage to a great song that has permeated our culture and given them the chance to be what they are.
I'm still not out of words (if you can believe that after the tome above). But I know a review has to end some time before the reader's eyes fall out
of their head. But, like the show, there doesn't seem to be a clean way to end this. It's so much fun to write about two people having so much fun that I just want it to go on and on and on. More moments keep popping to mind that I should tell you about, and I keep looking back trying to find ways to add them in. But there is no way to now. You'll just have to take it from me that there is always more to say when one talks of either of these men. (Just as there is always more for them to say and do, too.) This is exactly what makes writing about them and seeing them such an honored pleasure.
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