Reason #1068 To Love Robyn Hitchcock

Not that anyone should need more than a song or two to understand the need to embrace his demented genius, but Robyn Hitchcock articulates things I can't quite grasp, and manages to do so with a quiet beauty. The Guardian today asked "tastemakers" for their opinion on who excited them during last weekend's SXSW festival. Robyn chose Elvis Perkins (whom I've mentioned a few times here, and whose recent debut Ash Wednesday really fulfills much of the promise of his demos), and hits on much I've wanted to say and adds the requisite Hitchcock twist:

"He looks like Another Side of Bob Dylan-era Dylan - the button-down shirt, mouth-harp and the hair going up - crossed with Rolling Thunder-era Dylan 10 years later with the upright bass. But the mood of the music isn't Dylan-y at all; it's quite ramshackle and very direct, passionate but not self-conscious. He didn't appear to take himself too seriously. There's a very interesting story to his life but the music that came out of it wasn't what you'd expect. He's got quite a feisty band, with a bass player who looks like Chuck Norris and a drummer who looks as if he must know how frightening he looks. And what with having two names that come from the Million Dollar Quartet - as in Elvis Presley and Carl Perkins; it's like being called Roy Cash - he is, as we say, so a story. One to watch."