Robyn Hitchcock + the Venus 3!
Posted: Thu Sep 14, 2006 7:38 pm

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ROBYN HITCHCOCK & the VENUS 3
With special guest PATRIK FITZGERALD

Legendary British artist joined by R.E.M. members for one show only at Auckland’s Kings Arms on Tuesday, October 24th

Robyn Hitchcock and the Venus 3 -- Peter Buck, Scott McCaughey and Bill Rieflin, “old friends who are 3/4ths of the Minus 5 and half of R.E.M." – are to visit New Zealand for a one-off show in the intimate surroundings of Auckland rock venue the Kings Arms. Seem peculiar?
"When we play live, we sound like a smart garage band, to my ears," says Robyn.
But it isn’t many ‘garage’ bands that boast R.E.M.’s guitarist, keyboard player, and the former drummer of Ministry as its members…but then again, there isn’t any other bandleader who has so thoroughly influenced the course of modern music while remaining something of an enduring cult figure.

Beginning as a strummer in Cambridge, England's folk clubs, Robyn Hitchcock formed the Soft Boys -- one of alternative rock's least-celebrated but most influential bands -- in 1976 on the heels of the punk revolution, playing a crude psychedelic/folk-rock. By the time R.E.M. and the Replacements revealed the Soft Boys influence on their own bands, Hitchcock had moved on to what would become his distinguished solo career through the 80s, 90s and 00s, unwittingly helping shape the pop strain of contemporary alternative rock.

Releasing records like his stark debut, Black Snake Diamond Role (1981), the warm, all-acoustic I Often Dream of Trains (1984) and the psychedelicized Groovy Decay (1982), Hitchcock continues to record and tour as a solo and band act, often with his highly-regarded band the Egyptians. His direction has veered from the folky Moss Elixir (1996) and the rocky Jewels for Sophia (1999) to the folk-rock tribute to Bob Dylan, Robyn Sings! (2002); and his 2004 release Spooked was a collaboration with alternative country artists Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, of which The New York Times noted Hitchcock was an "...acute observer of love, death and the entire evolutionary continuum..."

It is both fitting and exciting that this continuum has swung around so that the new Robyn Hitchcock & the Venus 3 album Ole Tarantula is a culmination of his past, present and future, where Hitchcock and the Venus 3 are joined by Ian MacLagan (Small Faces), Chris Bellew (Presidents Of The USA) and more.

It’s not only musicians who have paid tribute to Robyn Hitchcock -- in 1998, acclaimed director and fan Jonathan Demme placed him in a shop window for the concert film Storefront Hitchcock, and later enlisted him for a role in the 2004 remake of The Manchurian Candidate.

Special guest at this show is fellow punk-era outsider PATRIK FITZGERALD, another of the class of ’76 who realized that the punk revolution should not be confined to sped-up pub rock with shouted vocals. Patrik’s one-man-and-his-guitar approach to DIY punk made 1977’s ‘Safety Pin Stuck In My Heart’ a John Peel favourite and an enduring indie punk anthem, kicking off an intriguing career in and out of the public eye. For the last 9 years Patrik has been resident in New Zealand, and his recent return to playing live was heralded by an August tour of Scandinavia and the UK, where London’s TimeOut magazine declared him “hugely influential these days” and highlighted his 12 Bar show as “most recommended of the week”.

Need we tell you that this one is a show you can’t afford to miss?

Robyn Hitchcock and the Venus 3
With special guest PATRIK FITZGERALD

ONE SHOW ONLY

KINGS ARMS, AUCKLAND
Tuesday October 24th

Tickets from TICKETEK www.ticketek.co.nz and REAL GROOVY

RE: Robyn Hitchcock + the Venus 3!
Posted: Tue Jul 3, 2007 10:51 pm

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