Online review by user 'Irish Settler' on Steve Hoffman Music Forum
My wife and I saw Robyn in Louisville last Thursday and he was great, as usual. He did the encore unamplified among the crowd. He was so close to me during the first encore number that I could not feasibly film him without seeming rude or potentially disrupting him. His voice is stunningly loud and clear off microphone, as is his guitar playing; many of us commented after the gig that he sounded BETTER on the floor than he did channeled through the house PA system.

However, I did capture a nice version of his very last encore song. There was a crew of rude male audience members who talked loudly during the entire set. When he announced right before this final song that he was playing things from his record collection, one of these inebriated musical geniuses screamed out, "Balloon Man!", which is as close to shouting "Freebird!" as one can get at a Robyn Hithcock gig, I guess. Just to set up the clip below, Robyn turned to him and said, "No, I don't have my own records in my collection..."

I've seen him seven times and he always wanders around before his show, typically watching a bit of the opening act's set. I think this confounds some audience members who don't expect to see the featured artist at the next urinal over in the restroom.

One lady, who arrived via taxi already drunk, asked me to "follow him into the bathroom...that's Robyn Hitchcock...don't you know what he looks like?" Yes, drunk lady, I do. Please leave him alone. She didn't. She harangued him after he exited the facility. Being an Englishman, he gave her more time in a cordial manner than I would have in that instance, especially as he was due to go onstage any minute.

As forum member Gardo correctly observed in another Robyn Hitchcock thread, he is "friendly but guarded" with the fans. He was very accessible after the show to sign things, but he would very abruptly take interest, or disinterest, in what was going on and move onto the next person in line. He was more effusive with the female attendees, putting an improvised cartoon on the back of someone named Jeni's poster of his version of an "eye" phone, for example.

One bloke bored him to tears with a stack of things for him to autograph. He simply signed his moniker on all of them save one. He refused to sign the guy's final bootleg LP, saying, "...you know how it goes, if I sign this, it probably will depreciate in value!"

It was raining buckets and we had a long drive back, so I had my wife fetch our vehicle. She abhors standing in line, so I ran back into the venue by myself with the CD cover of "Element of Light" for him to sign. I asked him to make it out to my wife Angie, who was still in the car. He asked, "Has she been in the car for the entire gig?" I laughed and tried to explain the situation. This is what he put on the CD cover, "Don't let them keep you in the car, Angie! Robyn H." I tried to thank him, but he and his third polka dot shirt of the night had already moved onto the next guest...

His voice was very strong; it has not seemed to age much since I first saw him solo in 1990. His acoustic guitar playing has only improved over the years. His tours of America's heartland are becoming more rare and the man is going to turn 61 in a few weeks. If you have the chance to see him live, don't miss the opportunity.