Today is the 66th birthday of the one and only Robert Wyatt...
Wyatt first came to prominence as the drummer in late 60's art rock band, The Soft Machine before starting a solo career in the early 70's...it was not long in to his solo career that he fell from an open window at a party and fractured his back resulting in him spending his time since in a wheelchair...his first release after the accident is generally considered to be his finest work, the beautiful and charming Rock Bottom...
In the mid 70's he made his first appearance on TOTP with a bizarre cover of I'm a Believer...initially the Beeb refused to allow him to appear on the show as he was in a wheelchair (as if the nation would be horrified by seeing a singer in a wheelchair) but relented after much pressure from the music weeklies...
For much of the remainder of the 70's Wyatt did not record much but in the 80's inspired, in part, by Thatcher coming to power, he came back with a vengeance and recorded some of the best music of his career, most notably his version of Shipbuilding...for the entirety of the song his voice sounds on the verge of breaking but is sung with such depth and honesty that it literally brings me to tears every time I listen to it...if he had never recorded anything else this track alone raises Wyatt head and shoulders above most other singers...
Wyatt pretty much records when he wants to...paints, writes, devotes himself to left wing causes and manages to enlist some pretty decent fellow musicians to collaborate with him...step forward Paul Weller,Phil Manzanera, Brian Eno to name a few...
Happy Birthday Robert Wyatt...we need more like you...
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