May 3
Tim Robbins and the Rogues Gallery Band – The Basement, Sydney - 28 April, 2011
Folk music seems to be all the craze for actor-turned-singers.
Scarlett Johansson received scathing criticism for her Tom Waits cover album, and Hugh Laurie, who plays television’s famous cranky doctor Gregory House, has had to defend himself for singing the blues despite his riches and success.
But Tim Robbins seems to stand out. His soulful voice and decades of guitar-playing are proof that he’s got the musical chops. And an unfortunate spate of personal crises and tragedy has seen him experience emotional depths, perhaps far more than is required to sing the blues.
When his debut album with the Rogues Gallery band was released, Tim was famously quoted as calling it his midlife crisis record, as it came after a failed film project and the end of his 23-year relationship with Susan Sarandon. Just this month, both of his parents passed away just twelve days apart.
The Shawshank Redemption star, was in Australia when he found out his mother had passed away, and he was in town to play at Sydney’s iconic Blues and Funk venue, The Basement, in his first tour of Australia as a singer-songwriter. Pictures of Mary and Gil Robbins hung behind Robbins and the Rogues Gallery Band at their Basement gig, almost as if they were watching over their two talented boys as they took to the stage.
Despite his recent loss, Tim seemed relaxed, opening his show by saying “Happy to be here in Sydney.” A hecking audience member replied, “Happy to have you Tim!” To which he playfully responded, “Well you can have me all night.”
In tribute to his musical parents, Tim introduced a song that he first heard as a child sitting on his mothers lap. The crowd roared along with him as he sang, “O Mary don’t you weep, don’t you mourn,” and laughed as he explained the lyric, “it’s not Pharoah’s army got drowned, it’s drownded, you gotta sing drownded.”
As a recording of Gil Robbins, who was a singer in the US folk group The Highwaymen, was played, Tim Robbins swayed his giant, six-foot-five frame to the strains of his father’s voice, before joining in with the rest of the band to conclude the song.
Tim’s own songs reveal a person who is open to the suffering and struggles of others. His song ‘Crush on You’, was written about a 16-year-old boy trying to find his way through life as a gay man in an ignorant and intolerant society.
Another track of his debut release, Time To Kill, was written after a 22-year-old US soldier approached him to vent about the atrocities of war the soldier had experienced in Iraq. Set to a driving beat, this song was one of the more moving songs of his set.
After spotting a poster of Billie Holiday at the venue, Tim ended the night with ‘What a Little Moonlight Can Do’, before returning to the stage for an encore set comprising of a Hank Williams cover and favourites from his own album.
With little evidence of the grief he must be going through, he refused to do any interviews after learning of the death of his mother, Tim Robbins waved goodbye to the crowd, bowed and left the stage with a smile on his face. And crowd dissipated just before midnight satisfied with having Tim Robbins all night.
