Robyn and Emma's house
Details
- Date
- February 03, 2021
- Venue
- Robyn and Emma's house London, England
- Billed As
- Robyn Hitchcock & Emma Swift
- Gig Type
- Online
Set List
- The Cheese Alarm Robyn solo
- Chinese Water Python Robyn solo
- Point it at Gran Robyn solo
- Fifty Two Stations
- Somewhere Apart
- Impossible Air Emma Swift Emma vocals
- Brookwood Necropolis Improvised Robyn improvised short song
- N.Y. Doll Robyn solo
- Upgrade Me
- Chinese Bones
- Our House Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young Emma vocals
Reviews
Review by Adrienne Meddock from Zub Records
I have been a loyal Wednesday (and occasionally Friday) Groover for the extraordinary series of home concerts from the Nashville home of Robyn Hitchcock, Emma Swift, Scottish Folds Tubby and Ringo, and their Furry Cabal of stuffed animals. While usually Steve writes these reviews, I've been tagged in to relay my impression of tonight’s intimate concert from the Swiftcock Sweet Home Quarantine. While Steve is detailed and methodical, I tend to be more big picture than play-by-play. So here goes; I’ll probably swing to the latter.
The night began with a Groover favorite, ‘The Cheese Alarm,’ Robyn’s guitar ringing (like said cheese alarm) crisp and bright. The Edge (stuffed monkey) provided the name of the next requester for ‘Chinese Water Python,’ played as a beautiful instrumental with medieval musical forebears (at least as I heard it). A very lively ‘Point It At Gran’ followed. Robyn spoke with a mixture of sadness and straightforwardness of reaching for memories that only your departed parents could share and confirm.
Emma entered in a black and white polka dot halter top, bringing Reg a white on black polka dot cuppa to coordinate with his white dot on black shirt. She joined him on ‘Fifty Two Stations,’ her inventive harmonies bringing much to the arrangement.
Studio C was quite warm tonight, and they apologized to the snowbound Groovers, who were not similarly situated. They bantered about perms, and the smell of perms. They launched into ‘Somewhere Apart.’ Emma sang one of her new songs, ‘Impossible Air.’ She is undertaking the song-a-week challenge in 2021, so perhaps we’ll hear a new Swift composition on the regular.
Robyn sang a silly song on the necropolis theme as the banter had taken a turn towards the goofy macabre. Emma left to find power for the laptop, while Robyn sang a song in honor of Arthur Kane’s birthday, the lovely elegiac ‘N.Y. Doll.’
Emma returned with Ringo Morrissey Stardust, their gloomier cat with ‘Year-round Affective Disorder.’ Robyn and Em launched into ‘Upgrade Me,’ one of the great Patreon tracks from 2020. Reg announced mid-song “there he is!” as other cat Tubby wandered into the room. Tubbins remained elusive though, uncaptured. Having spent the last two days stalking my feline overlords BB then Banana to capture them for their annual well-kitty visits, these feline disappearing arts are well known to me.
RH announces, “it’s Graham Nash’s birthday, so let’s play another one of my songs…” They then rated the members of CSNY in various categories (nicest, best moustache) before playing ‘Chinese Bones,’ a song he’d have liked to have CSNY perform. I can hear it. I also heard Simon and Garfunkel, of all groups, doing a pretty good version in my imagination (not the similarly dubbed nighthawks from detectorists, as discussed in each of our reviews of that perfect series at tinyurl.com/zubtreasure).
Emma grabbed a cheat sheet for the real Graham Nash song, from the 1971 Deja Vu album that Reg said was “the badge of all Groovers” of that time. Emma sang lead on ‘Our House.’ This is one of those AOR FM staples to which I am fairly immune, its charm lost to me, having become twee and mundane through overplay and over-familiarity. They managed to make it sound fresh. They joked about Young leaving the Stills-Young band, mid-tour, via telegram. Emma said she’d need to send a fax from the office in these quarantine days, to Robyn in another room of the house. They laughed, but guys, your Groovers like our little Wednesday Family Fun Nights. I’m requesting Al Green, stat, to keep us together!
--Adrienne Meddock, Substitute Groover
I have been a loyal Wednesday (and occasionally Friday) Groover for the extraordinary series of home concerts from the Nashville home of Robyn Hitchcock, Emma Swift, Scottish Folds Tubby and Ringo, and their Furry Cabal of stuffed animals. While usually Steve writes these reviews, I've been tagged in to relay my impression of tonight’s intimate concert from the Swiftcock Sweet Home Quarantine. While Steve is detailed and methodical, I tend to be more big picture than play-by-play. So here goes; I’ll probably swing to the latter.
The night began with a Groover favorite, ‘The Cheese Alarm,’ Robyn’s guitar ringing (like said cheese alarm) crisp and bright. The Edge (stuffed monkey) provided the name of the next requester for ‘Chinese Water Python,’ played as a beautiful instrumental with medieval musical forebears (at least as I heard it). A very lively ‘Point It At Gran’ followed. Robyn spoke with a mixture of sadness and straightforwardness of reaching for memories that only your departed parents could share and confirm.
Emma entered in a black and white polka dot halter top, bringing Reg a white on black polka dot cuppa to coordinate with his white dot on black shirt. She joined him on ‘Fifty Two Stations,’ her inventive harmonies bringing much to the arrangement.
Studio C was quite warm tonight, and they apologized to the snowbound Groovers, who were not similarly situated. They bantered about perms, and the smell of perms. They launched into ‘Somewhere Apart.’ Emma sang one of her new songs, ‘Impossible Air.’ She is undertaking the song-a-week challenge in 2021, so perhaps we’ll hear a new Swift composition on the regular.
Robyn sang a silly song on the necropolis theme as the banter had taken a turn towards the goofy macabre. Emma left to find power for the laptop, while Robyn sang a song in honor of Arthur Kane’s birthday, the lovely elegiac ‘N.Y. Doll.’
Emma returned with Ringo Morrissey Stardust, their gloomier cat with ‘Year-round Affective Disorder.’ Robyn and Em launched into ‘Upgrade Me,’ one of the great Patreon tracks from 2020. Reg announced mid-song “there he is!” as other cat Tubby wandered into the room. Tubbins remained elusive though, uncaptured. Having spent the last two days stalking my feline overlords BB then Banana to capture them for their annual well-kitty visits, these feline disappearing arts are well known to me.
RH announces, “it’s Graham Nash’s birthday, so let’s play another one of my songs…” They then rated the members of CSNY in various categories (nicest, best moustache) before playing ‘Chinese Bones,’ a song he’d have liked to have CSNY perform. I can hear it. I also heard Simon and Garfunkel, of all groups, doing a pretty good version in my imagination (not the similarly dubbed nighthawks from detectorists, as discussed in each of our reviews of that perfect series at tinyurl.com/zubtreasure).
Emma grabbed a cheat sheet for the real Graham Nash song, from the 1971 Deja Vu album that Reg said was “the badge of all Groovers” of that time. Emma sang lead on ‘Our House.’ This is one of those AOR FM staples to which I am fairly immune, its charm lost to me, having become twee and mundane through overplay and over-familiarity. They managed to make it sound fresh. They joked about Young leaving the Stills-Young band, mid-tour, via telegram. Emma said she’d need to send a fax from the office in these quarantine days, to Robyn in another room of the house. They laughed, but guys, your Groovers like our little Wednesday Family Fun Nights. I’m requesting Al Green, stat, to keep us together!
--Adrienne Meddock, Substitute Groover