Hecklergigs: Edwyn Collins, Shepherd’s Bush Empire

“I had a stroke you know, and it’s affected me deeply,” says Edwyn Collins to the hushed Shepherd’s Bush Empire crowd. “I’m working every day on it though,” he promises, “and I’m recovering my progress. Gradually, I’m up and up.”

This last sentence is delivered with a broad smile as Collins sits on a small amp in centre stage. His report on the illness he has suffered is brief, partly because of the effects it has had on his speech, but also because he is intent on giving his audience as much of the music they came for as possible.

In reality, the short story is incredibly modest, because the stroke that Collins refers to actually left him unable to walk or talk, let alone play the guitar.

That was over two years ago, but rather than just count himself lucky to have survived, Collins has undergone intensive speech therapy and, incredibly, here he is tonight, live and on stage.

He needed some help to get there though, guided to his perch by a helper and a rather stylish silver-topped cane, and as he sits to perform, his right hand is fixed in a fist while the left beats a rhythm on his knee throughout.

If the crowd had feared that Collins’ vocal performance would be similarly affected, then any doubts vanish when he opens with Falling And Laughing, the first single from Glasgow post punks Orange Juice in 1980, influencing countless bands such as Franz Ferdinand.

On that subject, Collins has said that he even had to teach himself how to laugh again, and he has certainly been successful. His singing voice remains as velvet deep and languidly cool as ever and his laugh isn’t far behind, booming out when guitarist Roddy Frame shares a joke.

Frame, the ex-Aztec Camera frontman and fellow Postcard Records signing of old, is also on top form tonight, even dishing out a riff from his old band after calls from the audience.

“Tonight Matthew, I want to be James Kirk,” he says in tribute to the Orange Juice guitarist, but in truth, Frame’s solo on A Girl Like You is closer to Marty McFly’s in Back To The Future- so much fun you want to rewind and play it again.

There’s no pausing though, and Collins delivers favourites like One Track Mind and Rip It Up one after the other, answering simply ‘Orange Juice, Edwyn Collins’ to requests for anything else.

It’s one such request that reminds us of the struggle Collins has overcome when a suggestion brings the response: “I can’t play that one because I can’t remember it. Seriously.”

Indeed, Collins has been reading from a lyric book for the whole show, but he’s none the worse for it and a stomping encore of Blue Boy is spine-tingling.

The hit parade has been welcome, but we’ve also heard Home Again from his recent album recorded pre- stroke, and Searching For The Truth, written since.

Proof if proof were needed that Collins’ work is not done, and as he says himself, ‘the possibilities are endless’.

[story by Tom Aktinson]