A most excellent birthday eve

On the evening a March 19 a high school fantasy was realized when I saw Robyn Hitchcock the Venus 3 at the Nick, with my #1 concert companion Roy Burns, who moved back to Birmingham from Boston last month.

I haven't full explained or even fully realized how fantastic the world looks when one of your closest friends goes from living 1200 miles to less than a mile from your locale. So many our institutions have been reinstated like Friday night movie night and Sunday dinner which was a tradition started and shared with our mutual friend, now Roy's wife, Liane. The most important institutions is going to shows together and now that Birmingham has exploded with worthwhile live music of late (thanks to the booking powers that Bottletree, WorkPlay, Alabama Theater and sometimes The Nick) we have started catching up on seven years worth of missed opportunities.

When I saw Robyn Hitchcock's name in the Birmingham Weekly I thought it had to be a misprint. He has always been a favorite of mine since back in high school when he toured as Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians. Roy and later said that his style reminds us both of Syd Barrett, XTC and of course, The Beatles. At the show he delivered to about 100 fans some of his best songs like "Vibrating," "Madonna of the Wasps" and " Flesh Number One (Beatle Dennis)" as well as many that were new to me, the standout being a song he wrote about Arthur "Killer" Kane, former bass player for the New York Dolls. The bizarre irony was that Roy and I had been discussing the movie made about his life, New York Doll, that I blogged about a couple of weeks back, right before the show started at the bar and then Robyn Hitchcock comes out, starts talking what a fantastic movie it is and low-and-behold, he has written a song about it, appropriately named, "N.Y. Doll."

Peter Buck did not disappoint either. Roy and I both thought that this side job with Hitchcock might be more fun for him than the pressures of gigging in giant venues with R.E.M., especially since their latest album sales have been slow and the band has been hesitant to continue touring with a "greatest hits" mentality. Both Buck and Hitchcock are fans of psychedelia so hearing them play together, Hitchcock with his Barrettesque style and Buck, with his very Roger McGuinn-influenced style, was a perfect melding of two fantastic and talented musicians who have shaped my musical tastes. I would have gone to see either and been delighted, seeing both was really the best birthday present I could have asked for.

More photos of the show are here.