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Jewels for Sophia

Robyn Hitchcock - Jewels for Sophia Audio CD

A fair review of the Robyn Hitchcock "Jewels for Sophia" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Robyn Hitchcock reviews here, or go back to the Robyn Hitchcock tabs.

Band: Robyn Hitchcock
Title: Jewels for Sophia
Rating:

Release Date: 1999-07-20
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Mexican God 2: Cheese Alarm 3: Viva! Sea-Tac 4: I Feel Beautiful 5: You've Got a Sweet Mouth on You, Baby 6: NASA Clapping 7: Sally Was a Legend 8: Antwoman 9: Elizabeth Jade 10: No, I Don't Remember Guildford 11: Dark Princess 12: Jewels for Sophia

Not this time Robyn

Feels like he had nothing to say but had a record due. Tired and lacking. A few moments here and there but overall lacks any memorable tunes. Everybody can lay a fat egg and Robyn is human. Thank god for Moss Elixer.
Avoid as a starting place but any Hitcher will eventually own it.

seattle: its got the best coffee, computers, and smack!

My other favorite songs on this CD are Cheese Alarm (an ode to cheese), I Feel Beautiful (a sweet ballad), Antwoman (an ode his elusive dream woman), and the title track, Jewels For Sophia (a anthem-like love ballad). This CD is worth buying just for the "Viva! Sea-Tac" track, the chorus of which is "viva seattle tacoma, viva viva viva sea-tac; they've got the best computers and coffee and smack!" As a biased Seattle resident I have to agree. Overall this is great songwriting, and Robyn Hitchcock not only has a charismatic and expressive voice, he has an excellent sense of humor.

Uneven
"Mexican God," "Viva Seatac," "Antwoman" and the title track all range from good to excellent but for the rest of the album I just find myself checking my watch a lot to see how long until the lame filler material plays out and the good songs come on. As much as I like Robyn Hitchcock, this album is one of his weaker efforts overall. Robyn's not usually this boring, but much of this album just doesn't go anywhere interesting, lyrically or musically.

If you're interested in Robyn Hitchcock there are better places to start. "Moss Elixir," "Globe of Frogs" and the Soft Boys' "Underwater Moonlight" are all very strong albums that will keep your finger away from the Skip Forward button on your iPod. Keep an eye out for this one in the used bin, but don't pay full price for it.

Love Hitchcock? Hear some of his best on JEWELS FOR SOPHIA
We're not likely to hear his pinched, high-pitched English croon on a #1 hit single. Robyn Hitchcock has the talent to write hit pop songs, but prefers to do music his own way. To that I say thank (insert deity of choice here) that he follows his own muse.

True, Robyn did flirt with the idea of pop success and even came close to it with a few tunes from PERSPEX ISLAND. The tunes were good, the eccentric tendencies were toned down, personal element turned up . . . but pop success didn't exactly materialize.

So now Robyn is stuck with his rather small but loyal fan base. And now he's older, wiser and more introspective, too. I would daresay JEWELS FOR SOPHIA contains some of the best songs he's ever written (and maybe a few of his worst). His lyrics are as weird as ever and he's got plenty of great musicians along for the ride, including Peter Buck of R. E. M. and Soft Boy bandmate Kimberly Rew.

"Mexican God" - slides into the album laid-back style, a few doo-wop verses thrown in. "Time will destroy you like a Mexican God. " *****

"The Cheese Alarm" - beautiful acoustic guitar introduces this strange finger-picker with tabla accompaniment. It soon takes off as Robyn carries on about an apparent cheese obsession of his. ****1/2

"Viva! Sea-Tac" - noisy, jangling tune that's frankly not too original or inspiring. **

"I Feel Beautiful" - A surprizingly warm and intimate love song played with a pretty straight face (by Hitchcock's standards). *****

"You've Got a Sweet Mouth On You, Baby" - A truly sweet tune, wacky yet gorgeous. *****

"NASA Clapping" - Similar to "Viva! Sea-Tac" but a bit more inspired. The runaway-train drumbeat can't compensate for this lackluster tune although there is some great guitar on the track and some blazing harmonica. It's not that Hitchcock can't rock, but the more upbeat tunes on JEWELS tend to be least mormorable ones. ***

"Sally Was a Legend" - This is another upbeat track, but this one turned out to be a pretty good pop song. The Kimberly Rew influence shines through here. ****

"Antwoman" - With its chugging, tugging groove, this cut is soooo cool and I just love the lyrics. "Being just contaminates the void . . . " *****+

"Elizabeth Jade" - Another swinging uptempo rocker, this one has standard chord changes in a style you've probably heard a million times, but it's well executed. ***1/4

"No, I Don't Remember Guildford" - brilliant, nostalgic sounding, yet it's actually anti-nostalgia. Great, lonesome (mouth) harp. "Show some respect/ To the ghosts that are ruining your life/ It's your life . . . " Robyn's double-tracked voice is exquisite here. *****

"Dark Princess" - You might not have ever guessed he was capable of it, but this one's really sexy. Love the "chamberlin" (vibrophone?). This is one of his very best songs. *****+

"Jewels for Sophia" - Spiraling guitars woven with spiraling vocals, weird percussion, lyrics completely out to lunch . . . this one's mind-blowingly good. *****+

bonus material -
When some homosexual-sounding voice (apparently taken from an answering machine) comes on to announce a screening of "Goodfellas," it's clear we are steering off the map into Robyn's bizarre "netherworld. " A strange, rather dischordant piano begins pounding away and Robyn starts riffing at the mouth. Weirdness abounds for several minutes until the song sort of self-destructs and immediately segues into "Gene Hackman" (*****) which seems to have been recorded at some laid-back party with friends, just Robyn and his guitar. Fans will love it. .

Don't bloat, eat the cheese and gloat...
1999's "Jewels for Sophia" contains some absolutely brilliant lines: "Time will destroy you like a Mexican god"; "Being just contaminates the void"; "Half the world starving and half the world bloats half the world sits on the other and gloats"; "At least when I die, your memory will too". Hitchcock's lyrics alone can make a trip through one of his albums a worthy endeavor. Sometimes Hitchcock's more rock-oriented albums leave the lyrics drowning and screaming for help in the mix. Consequently, many fans seem to be cleaved by his two "personas" - the acoustic and the electric. "Jewels for Sophia" strikes a nice balance for the most part. The arrangements allow the listener to articulate the lines without missing the instrumentation, and the electric and acoustic seem to make great bedmates here. Lush strumming mixes amazingly well with distorted thunder clashes of electric guitar in many places. Grinding rock songs segue into delicate acoustic ballads and vice versa. Both the rough and sensitive Hitchcock get air time on "Jewels for Sophia".

"Mexican God" starts off the album with an impromptu feeling (much like the Soft Boys "Can of Bees"). Robyn counts down after mumbling something into the microphone. This one has a sparse but driving arrangement - only acoustic guitar, bass, and drums. The song grants eternal destruction to four different people and situations. A pean to mortality.

"Cheese Alarm" is both brilliant and stupid. It showcases Hitchcock's ability to elevate the ridiculous to the profound. The lyrics read like Monty Python's "Cheeseshop sketch" then morph into a statement on gluttony and dominance. It features driving tablas and an introduction reminiscent of Bollywood.

"Viva! Sea-Tac" brings the album to full throttle. It grooves and drives while seeming to both praise and condemn the "Seattle Movement" of the late 1990s. It also falls apart at the end, opening the album to "I Feel Beautiful" - a tender acoustic love song (that comes close to falling on the sappy side of the fence) with an amazingly beautiful dulcimer-esque solo.

The haunting "No, I Don't Remember Guilford" seems like a semi-amnesiac remembrance of an English holocaust. It's one of the album's best tracks.

"Jewels for Sophia" presents some excellent Hitchcock. The moody, grooving, beautiful, disturbing, ridiculous, and profound all find a home on this album. Hitchcock's career has attempted to synthesize all of these elements, and his best music does have the ability to bring out the absurdity and beauty of existence. Some of the music on "Jewels of Sophia" reaches these heights.

Lastly, don't miss the live acoustic "Gene Hackman" track hidden at the end of the album.

You can see a complete list of all Robyn Hitchcock discography, or go back to the Robyn Hitchcock tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.