BAM Magazine
September 20, 1996
Robyn Hitchcock, Moss Elixir
(Warner Bros.)
++½
by Greg Heller
Robyn Hitchcock has finally officially split from those pesky Egyptians. Besides not having made a decent album with the group since 1991's Perspex Island (and some would argue even that was crap compared to 1986's Element Of Light), the one-time Soft Boy now concedes -- in that special British way -- to having "lost the band habit". After several years of relative silence, the then label-less Hitchcock began recording Moss Elixir back in 1994. Soon after, Rhino released an (overly?) ambitious Robyn Hitchcock nine-album retrospective, and Warner Bros. picked up the Folk flower-boy to bring the world this confusing effort: equal parts delicate Folk and long-winded nonsense.
A primarily solo-acoustic record (backed where necessary by the occasionally haunting violin of long-term sidekick Deni Bonet), Moss Elixir reaffirms Hitchcock's devotion to the often troubling ideology of music-as-poetry. Kicking off with "Sinister But She Was Happy", Hitchcock continues his long tradition of female description over a rolling violin and melodic background electric guitar. Sounding more McCartney than ever, "The Devil's Radio" (complete with psychedelic slide whistle) is a somewhat gorgeous tirade against Robyn's hatred of choice: mass media. With an even sharper tongue in "Filthy Bird", he laments the boob-tube nation: "Look at the massacre on cable/But you know it won't happen here/We're all too busy watching massacres on cable".
With its warped horns and maniacal laugh tracks, Moss Elixir is more Syd Barret than Dylan. From the Blues twang of "Man With a Woman's Shadow" (with guest freak friend and former Beefheart backbone Morris Tepper) to the jangly strumming on "I Am Not Me", this is clearly his most musically accomplished work in years. But -- call it American-simpleton syndrome if you like -- I still think he reaches, both structurally and lyrically. There are awkward breakdowns and bridges all over the place, and the tales he weaves suffer from terminal wordiness. Take "Filthy Bird": "Look at me down there on the viaduct/Covered in grease and lime and scales/Mummering thank you to the gravel, and the gales".
There's an identity crisis going on here. Moss Elixir, perhaps like Hitchcock himself, wants to be simple but can't. Just when you think he's hit a nice stride, he'll come right back spouting some jumbled garbage like, "What's your mother for?/Not a launch pad for your father", and you'll be scratching your head all over again. Then again, there might be some real genius in here -- and I'm just not smart enough to find it.
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