Nashville Rooms
Details
- Date
- November 16, 1978
- Venue
- Nashville Rooms London, England (West Kensington)
- Billed As
- The Soft Boys
- Gig Type
- Concert
Notes
Also playing that night: Plain Characters
Ad from page 13 of Kimberley Rew's Soft Boys scrapbook
Setlist from Kimberley's archive.
Image used with permission.
Setlist sheet reads 17th Nov, not 16th, but show was the 16th per the newspaper ad.
Newspaper listing from 'Record Mirror' dated November 18, 1978
Ad from page 13 of Kimberley Rew's Soft Boys scrapbook
Setlist from Kimberley's archive.
Image used with permission.
Setlist sheet reads 17th Nov, not 16th, but show was the 16th per the newspaper ad.
Newspaper listing from 'Record Mirror' dated November 18, 1978
Set List
- Hear My Brane Hitchcock, Windsor, Davies, Metcalfe
- (I Want to Be An) Anglepoise Lamp
- Do the Chisel
- The Return of the Sacred Crab
- Human Music
- Sandra's Having Her Brain Out
- The Pigworker
- Muriel's Hoof/The Rout of the Clones trad., arr. Robyn Hitchcock et al
- Blues in the Dark
- Mystery Train Junior Parker
- Skool Dinner Blues
- Leppo and the Jooves
- Give it to the Soft Boys Robyn Hitchcock, Robert Lamb
- Heartbreak Hotel Elvis Presley
Reviews
1978
Soft Boys
Nashville
by Rick Joseph
Dama Edna and The Damned punctured London's monotony uptown, while platoons of thrillgazers crammed into North End Road's hottest niterie.
The Soft Boys' busy performance was a beehive of frantic energy aimed at evoking a mood, but succeeding at the expense of musical unity.
For influences they delved into an eclectic potpourri of musical snatches and styles, some of which surfaced elegantly while a lot of it sank in a quag of subliminal complexity.
Their unorthodoxy is revealed most strongly through singer Robyn Hitchcock, who hails from an abyss of his own.
A latter day Bela Lugosi look-alike, he growled his farrago of self-penned songs, touching upon private obsessions of transsexuality, shellfish, crowbar wallers and Sandra's brain transplant. He's a closet genius in the Syd Barrett vein, and a fine vocalist to boot.
Dynamics were supplied by the agile fretting and footwork of guitarist Kimberley Rew, cleverly twiddling with shards of creative feedback; and Jim Melton, who trapezed on and off stage to play spicy harmonica or de-mist his mirror shades. Cohesion was dutifully provided (almost) by drummer Morris Windsor and Andy "Pigworker" Metclafe on bass.
Together they handled mutant hybrids of Reggae, Psychedelia, Punkthrash and Gregorian Plainsong, and highlighted the show with some unexpectedly good R&B tunes.
Notwithstanding the dictates of fashion, The Soft Boys may be destined for a future flirt with fame. Their impish inventiveness and disregard for Rock protocol make them unlike any other band in business. But in their eagerness to subvert, they frequently lost control of the musical pacing. Result: noise; hip-fracture.
I'll gladly look up any future Soft gig, if only to pick up the bits I missed when I blinked during tonight's show.
Soft Boys
Nashville
by Rick Joseph
Dama Edna and The Damned punctured London's monotony uptown, while platoons of thrillgazers crammed into North End Road's hottest niterie.
The Soft Boys' busy performance was a beehive of frantic energy aimed at evoking a mood, but succeeding at the expense of musical unity.
For influences they delved into an eclectic potpourri of musical snatches and styles, some of which surfaced elegantly while a lot of it sank in a quag of subliminal complexity.
Their unorthodoxy is revealed most strongly through singer Robyn Hitchcock, who hails from an abyss of his own.
A latter day Bela Lugosi look-alike, he growled his farrago of self-penned songs, touching upon private obsessions of transsexuality, shellfish, crowbar wallers and Sandra's brain transplant. He's a closet genius in the Syd Barrett vein, and a fine vocalist to boot.
Dynamics were supplied by the agile fretting and footwork of guitarist Kimberley Rew, cleverly twiddling with shards of creative feedback; and Jim Melton, who trapezed on and off stage to play spicy harmonica or de-mist his mirror shades. Cohesion was dutifully provided (almost) by drummer Morris Windsor and Andy "Pigworker" Metclafe on bass.
Together they handled mutant hybrids of Reggae, Psychedelia, Punkthrash and Gregorian Plainsong, and highlighted the show with some unexpectedly good R&B tunes.
Notwithstanding the dictates of fashion, The Soft Boys may be destined for a future flirt with fame. Their impish inventiveness and disregard for Rock protocol make them unlike any other band in business. But in their eagerness to subvert, they frequently lost control of the musical pacing. Result: noise; hip-fracture.
I'll gladly look up any future Soft gig, if only to pick up the bits I missed when I blinked during tonight's show.