ROBYN HITCHCOCK & ANDY PARTRIDGE – PLANET ENGLAND (2019) – Dancing in the Moonlight of our Existence

In keeping with my Hitchcock theme of sorts this past week, here’s another doozy from Robyn, this time in collaboration with the reclusive XTC genius Andy Partridge. I played this album endlessly upon arrival! ‘Planet England‘ seemingly came out of nowhere in the fall of 2019. It is a musical brain trust that was made in Psychedelic Pop heaven, or so it seems to many of us. “He’s a Scorpio and I’m Pisces, so we’re the same astrological team as Richard Burton and Liz Taylor, except neither of us is Welsh, sadly,” Robyn mused at the time. “Two old psychedelic pensioners rocking away in a shed in a back garden.” Recorded in a Shed in Swindon (no doubt, Andy’s) according to the liner notes, you can hear how much fun these two had making this wonderful record. “Sorry luv…we’re closed.” Indeed.

The Extended Play record begins with a statement, “Turn Me On Dead Man“. Their voices weave together very well, with Robyn taking lead while Andy fills the track with layered harmonies, taking on a modernist 1967 full-dimensional sheen. Backwards and forwards Rickenbacker 12-string, a McCartneyesque bassline, string hits, swaying verses, golden harps sustaining into the coda. It flows directly into the transcendent mid-tempo dirge of “Flight Attendants Please Prepare For Love“. Unfocused, murky, aloof, drifting, listing, oozing lysergic sonic bliss. You can really hear BOTH artists’ inherent styles intertwined in this two-chord modal roller, Hitchcock and Partridge vocals interpolating throughout. “Got My…” sounds like a late-era XTC outtake: acoustic, whimsical, and thoroughly English in sound and verse. Both guys take verses again. mingled with one another in perfect juxtaposed harmony lines. It ends with the gloriously catchy “Planet England“. Doomy rain clouds and thunder loom over a merry upbeat procession of choir hymns, tubular bells, wooden guitars, pulsing bass, throbbing strings, and voices from the street. It ends with a ring as the English rain fades off in the distance.

The record is HIGHLY recommended. Links to find it are below. Happy hunting…