Robyn Hitchcock, the 73-year-old English psych rocker, has released his latest album The Confuser, recorded in Nashville with a crack team of session musicians. The album opens with the Lennonesque powerpop track 'I Am This Thing', which begins with the line, 'I owe a lot to a dead man’s cock.' Hitchcock lives in Nashville with his second wife, Australian singer-songwriter Emma Swift, where he runs a boutique record label.
'I’m not just some sort of old public school dilettante floating around the South Bank or whatever,' Hitchcock protests. 'Making it work in Nashville means I actually am a real musician songwriter in the real musician songwriter town. And I think, “OK, I actually did do this!” I wanted to go to Nashville when I, as a 13-year-old boarding school boy, heard those Dylan records he made here. And a mere 60 years later, here I am!'
Influences and Legacy
Hitchcock’s influences are rooted in the 1960s. 'Although my prime influence was Bob Dylan,' he says, 'and Dylan showed me what I wanted to be, Syd Barrett showed me how I could be it. And I actually wound up sounding like John Lennon. To me, the Beatles are at the beginning and the end of everything. But my role has always just been to carry on a certain kind of music, which appeared in 66 and 67. My influences are all those old dead English blokes, basically.'
When asked if he is the last old dead English bloke who isn’t actually dead, Hitchcock laughs: 'Well, I’m the last high-functioning one. I mean, there’s Julian Cope and Andy Partridge of XTC, but they’re out of commission for playing live. But you can go and see me. I didn’t invent this field of music, but I’ve perpetuated it. I wanted to maintain a tradition and do new work in that tradition. But the guys I worship were innovators. I’m the opposite. I’m sweeping up after them. It’s like, “Oh God, here comes Hitchcock with the broom.”'
The New Album: The Confuser
The Confuser is described as a comfortable sock of an album, but Hitchcock still attempts to explore new territory. The Nashville session musicians provide a walking bass and cowbell groove on 'My Dead Astronaut', while 'Building from the Ruins' is a white funk workout. 'Monday for Me' is a waltz-time folksy critique of the working week. Hitchcock’s 70s collaborator Kimberley Rew adds guitar to 'Breathless'.
Hitchcock’s career began as frontman of Cambridge’s the Soft Boys during the punk era. Their second album, 1980’s Underwater Moonlight, became hugely influential on the American indie scene of the 1980s. Hitchcock later formed Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians, scoring hits like 'Balloon Man' and 'So You Think You’re in Love'. 'It’s funny when people think of me as an 80s artist,' Hitchcock reflects, 'because I think of myself as a 60s artist. I literally am the last to hatch out, I think. I should be in a museum with Ron Wood. I was never actually a pop star. I was on MTV quite a lot in the States in the late 80s and early 90s, but that’s a long time back. I always manage to dodge the extreme limelight. You know, in some ways I’ve avoided both success and failure. It’s fantastic. And it’s always a bit of a shock when somebody identifies me. Mostly they think I’m Nick Lowe, which is great. But then occasionally people then think Nick is me. I’ve signed an autograph as Nick Lowe once or twice.'
Memoirs and Personal Reflections
Hitchcock’s first memoir, 1967 (2024), details his formative year. His latest volume, Stranded in the Future, is a writerly work where personal and painful aspects are sublimated. 'Some of it technically couldn’t have happened at all,' Hitchcock agrees. 'But that’s to do with my capacity to embrace delusion. And my tendency to create my own personal myth. You mythologise your life and then you can plunder it for songs or jokes or stories or whatever.'
In one section, the young Hitchcock writes a nasty song about elderly neighbours complaining about the Soft Boys’ rehearsals. 'I was a self-centred, entitled little horror and arguably I still am. I’ve just learned to mask it more, and also I’ve learned to make a living out of it.'
Hitchcock has also been open about being on the autism spectrum. In 1967, he conceded: 'I [was] what would in the 21st century be called “on the spectrum”, at the high-functioning end of autism.' He reflects: 'I’m not a conventional soul-barer. I’m probably more interested in creating a version of my existence than actually showing people the real Robyn. Maybe there isn’t a real Robyn. Someone described me as “the Peter Sellers of rock”, which I took as a compliment. I did have a therapist once who said, “You’ve really built some place to hide and it’s extremely difficult to get at you,” which I thought was interesting.'
The Confuser is released via Tiny Ghost records on 24 July. Robyn Hitchcock tours the UK and Europe from September.
