Heaven Releases Gigs Lyrics Comments

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Author
Robyn Hitchcock
According to our records, Robyn has played this song 168 times, most recently at The Chapel on May 21, 2025. He first performed it at Dingwalls on November 17, 1984, 40 years and 6 months earlier.

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From Robyn on Patreon in 2025
In the autumn of 1984, I realized that two of my favourite bands of the time, Talking Heads and The Psychedelic Furs, had both written dreamy, exhilarating songs entitled “Heaven”. So one afternoon, as the chestnut leaves swirled outside the kitchen window ,I sat at the table with my guitar and made up a tune of my own with that same title. The tune came easily, as did the chorus, although I don’t remember writing the words down anywhere. The composition was largely about itself. It was simple, didn’t contain any labyrinths or whirlpools: it did its job and stayed on track, like an express train.

I took it to my new backing group, the Egyptians. They comprised Cambridge musician Roger Jackson on keyboards, my old school friend Fletcher on saxophone, and two recovering Soft Boys, Morris Windsor and Andy Metcalfe on drums and bass respectively. After a few gigs Fletcher fell off the band. He was too much an individual to be part of a group. The others took to “Heaven” well. It came out clean, clear and very 1980s: almost stadium rock, sprinkled with the digital patina of the day. We even performed it on British television at one point, so mainstream did it sound.

Not everyone was happy about this. My partner and my sister both did a double-take when they saw us premiere it at Dingwall’s. “It just doesn’t sound like you, Robyn.” My old friend Tom Hibbert, an often hilarious music writer who is sadly now deceased, told me it was the worst song I’d ever written. A reviewer in the Melody Maker wrote that me coming up with “Heaven” was as if George Michael had come up with “Layla”. I’m not sure who was being complimented and who was being dissed there.

In any event, the song was released twice in 1985, first on “FegMania!” and then on the live “Gotta Let This Hen Out.” These were coincidentally my first two US album releases. The young Americans dug it, but, true to life, we didn’t have the business clout to make it an actual hit. But then again, did I even want it to be?

Regardless, my own personal “Heaven” continued to evolve. In the early 1990s, I lowered the key, and dropped the tempo. It became less rabid and more devotional. We performed it acoustically in the late Egyptians days, and I carried on playing it solo as the century wound down. I’d never given much thought to the lyrics, having never formalized them on paper, but they seemed to be about addiction. Or, if you prefer it, compulsion.

For the last ten years or so, I’ve sung it occasionally with Emma, and I feel now it’s evoking a sense of the sacred. Songs are good places for contradicting emotions to lay across each other, and “Heaven” is definitely collecting some of those. Recently Emma and I have recorded it again at a session in Los Angeles with our friend Kenneth Pattengale of the Milk Carton Kids. This latest incarnation is in an even lower key, and awaits Emma’s harmony. We're not in LA again for a spell, so this recording is some months from being finished, but I hope our final version will give you stained-glass goosebumps and get you lighting a candle to the soul(s) of your choice.

Lyrics

You've got heaven
Heaven in your hand
You've got heaven
Running through your land
Why don't you fight for it?
You're right for it, you know
Why don't you kill for it
Get ill for it also?

You've got heaven
You've got heaven
You've got arms and you've got legs and you've got heaven

Heaven in your eyes
You've got heaven
Don't you recognize?
And when you wake for it
You'll ache for it all night
And when you dream for it
You'll scream for it all right

You've got heaven
You've got heaven
You've got arms and you've got legs and you've got heaven

You've got heaven
Every single time
You've got heaven
Every single climb
And when you seek for it
You peak for it all day
And when you choose for it
You'll ooze for it, I'll say

You've got heaven
You're just heaven
You're just heaven
You've got arms and you've got legs and you've got heaven
You've got arms and you've got legs and you've got heaven
You've got arms, legs, heaven
You've got arms, you've got legs, you've got heaven
You've got arms
You've got legs, and you've got heaven
Arms, use your legs, and you've got heaven