COME ON PILGRIM (1987)Starts promisingly with the kind of guitar sound that you can only get by using a really knackered amp on 'Caribou'. A bit like Billy Bragg in his prime. Both behind and ahead of their time I'd say, combining clear late seventies punk elements with the forthcoming grunge explosion. The songs are short too. 'Caribou' weighs in at the longest as the only one exceeding 3 minutes. Admirable. It all sounds quite conventional to me, but, it is possible that Pixies were true pioneers and what I count as conventional was groundbreaking at the time.Both The Holiday Song and Nimrod's Son remind me of the Buzzcocks. The vocal style is definitely in the Pete Shelley mould. The latter also borrows it's riff heavily from 'Ace of Spades'. The closing 'Levitate Me' starts with a really satisfyingly rolling deep guitar which is a nice contrast to Frank's whiny vocal. I enjoyed this a lot. As a debut it's very accomplished and they are clearly more than just a punk band, they have good tunes too.
SURFER ROSA (1988)So they're really a punk band aren't they, if anything? This album covers the full range of punk styles (and there are more than you might think. 'Bone Machine' has a kind of plodding quality to it, which is not meant as a negative and has an almost rapped vocal. 'Break My Body' goes into a Public Image Limited area and 'Something Against You' is a kind of berserk thrash. 'Broken Face' has a kind of weird yipping at the beginning and comes close to their predecessors The Dickies. The later track, 'Tony's Theme' which is introduced as a song about a superhero called Tony also reminded me of their song 'Gigantor' (about a Japanese cartoon superhero). Now, 'Gigantic' is sung by bassist Kim Deal and is definitely a foreshadowing of all those US talent show popstrels of the Clarkson, Swift, Lavigne ilk, although the subject matter is a little more 'grown up' I think. 'River Euphrates' collapses into some fairly savage wailing at the end. 'Oh My Golly' features what Wikipedia calls 'studio banter', which amounts to a conversation involving a fair amount of swearing. There's more chit-chat at the start of 'I'm Amazed' too.
DOOLITTLE (1989)They like a solo bass intro, do the Pixies. 'Debaser' starts it off and delivers some pretty unnerving manic laughter midway through. Something about it reminded me of 'Sonic Reducer' by the Dead Boys on their album 'Young, Loud and Snotty', but on revisiting the latter on Spotify I couldn't really detect any real similarities other than the obvious punk heritage. Nice to hear that one again though. Frank whispers the lyric menacingly on 'Tame', before launching into screamy madness for the chorus. 'Wave Of Mutilation' is quite well known isn't it? I think I've heard it before. It certainly is a bit more accessible than a lot of their output, despite the title.There's a bit of that crunchy guitar thing that Radiohead used in 'Creep' on 'I Bleed'. They don't really go for very cheery themes do they? Having said that 'Here Comes Your Man' is a much more breezy affair, at least musically. It could almost be Tom Petty. 'Monkey Gone To Heaven' with it's dreamy vocals had me racking my brains for something that has come since that is very similar, but can't quite put my finger on it. Maybe 'New Adventures in Hi-Fi' era REM? 'Mr Grieves' is a bit of a departure, much more complex than some of the more straightforward thrashes, typified by the following track 'Crackity Jones'. I liked the Smiths-like 'La La Love You', especially the whistling. Always room for that on any album. I found 'No 13 Baby' a bit dull. Lots of chugging and rather pedestrian guitar.Contrast with 'There Goes My Gun'which packs a lot into it's 1 minute 50 running time. The vocal on 'Silver' is slightly reminiscent of the foxes who regularly wail outside our house on summer nights. That's not a good thing by the way. 'Gouge Away' finishes it off. A rather good committed effort. To me this is their best so far. A bit more varied than previous efforts and I'm beginning to see why they are so highly regarded.
BOSSANOVA (1990)Straight in with an instrumental for Cecilia Ann (which is kind of like the Shadows if they'd started 30 years later) before getting down to some serious shouty stuff in 'Rock Music'. Things eventually calm down for 'Velouria' which is in a similar vein to 'Wave of Mutilation' from Doolittle. I was listening to 'All Over The World' while walking into work. It features some rather irritating loud-hailer speech in the background and I was convinced it was coming from my surroundings rather than the record. 'Dig For Fire' is great, but probably far too commercial for the hardcore fans. 'Stormy Weather' is interesting since it has a quite subtle change of pace halfway through. I reckon the time signature probably changes a couple of time actually. The closer is 'Havalina'. Quite a reflective piece of guitar pop with ethereal vocals. Very pleasant after everything that's gone before. I'm glad I'm coming to the end. It's been interesting, but I've been in an alternative American guitar rock rut for too long now. Let's see what their 2013 comeback is like and then move on to something a little more mainstream.
INDIE CINDY (2013)Well they've certainly matured. This is a much easier listen than anything that has gone before. So much so that J. walked into the kitchen as I was playing it said "This is alright, are you off the Pixies now?" The change is typified by 'Greens and Blues' which is a kind of soft Indie pop unlike anything they've done before. The title track has a bit of a harder edge but still shows the more tuneful influence before breaking down into some frantic guitar. The start of 'Magdalena 318' sounds like it could have been made in the BBC radiophonic workshop. The kind of off-the-wall noises that introduced the latest monster in early Doctor Who. The rest is similar. 'Ring The Bell' is tunefully jangly and my favourite track on the album, 'Another Toe In The Ocean' is a good measured piece of grunge. So by and large the new incarnation has dispensed with all the scary noises and mad vocals for a more mainstream but still Pixie-ish sound.
One thing I've learned from doing the Pixies and the Afghan Whigs before them is that I prefer to do this kind of thing with bands that I have some kind of 'previous' with. Hearing new stuff is fun, but it's not very relatable to past experience. So next we'll move on to Fleetwood Mac, who are hopefully sufficiently preposterous to generate some amusement.
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