jD is joined by Mike Hogan from the 3 songs podcast w/ Bob Nastanovich. Learn about the Meeting Malkmus origin story while Mike shares his Pavement origin story and dissects song seventeen on the countdown.

Transcript:

Track 1:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 2:

[0:02] So today we're talking all about song number 18 from the masterpiece Wowie Zowie. It's the absolutely gorgeous father to a sister of thought. Vish, what are your initial thoughts about this song? Well, you know, I was so happy that we landed on this as a song to talk about because I do love Wowie Zowie. I have a sense memory of picking it up when it came out i think the day it came out this is interesting it's a really fascinating song because in some ways it's super accessible uh musically uh it leans with the pedal steel and some of the other moves it leans towards kind of country music um i will say uh as i was pondering it i i mean i i know we are in a vacuum here of people who love pavement right and who love Stephen Malcomus, but as I was listening to this in preparation for our chat, I'm like, Malcomus is like an underrated everything.

Track 1:

[1:04] Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown.

Track 3:

[1:12] Hey, it's J.D. here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for Seminole Indie Rock Band, Pavement. Week over week, we're going to countdown the 50 essential pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots. I then tabulated the results using an abacus and a four-slice toaster I had fashioned into a time machine. Now I pull the blinds of the time curtain. Yesterday is totally getting a do-over. How will your favorite song fare in the rankings? You'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that. This week I'm joined by Pavement superfan Mike fucking Hogan. How the hell are you, Mike? I'm doing good, JD. JD uh it's nice to talk to you yeah it's nice to talk to you too I've listened to you you know uh over the years with Bob on the on the pod and uh we've been lonesome for you yeah I was uh you know in advance of this I was like god when did we start that podcast and I looked the first episode was August of 2017 um and we did 177 episodes the last one being December of of, uh, 2022. And I think that was the only one we did that year too. I don't know. I haven't, I haven't checked, but yeah, we were pretty, we were pretty active, uh, for a few years with some breaks in between. Um, but, uh, but yeah, um, it was fun.

Track 3:

[2:39] So will the podcast be dusted off at some point? Will we get the Pavement-esque reunion tour? That's kind of the open question. I wouldn't say no. We don't have any immediate plans. The last time I talked to Bob about it was probably about, I don't know, four or five months ago. And he said maybe after the new year. You know, I think we we really paused things because, you know, obviously Pavement was rehearsing and then touring and things were hectic. We actually had this I had this idea to do a different like tour diary podcast in every city. Yeah.

Track 3:

[3:21] Like, you know, of course, the podcast that we did was very synchronous where we would talk back and forth. We would play songs but i was i had this idea where he would asynchronously record like five or ten minutes about like i'm in kansas city and here's my experience with kansas city and then we he'd pick a song that was kansas city based and i'd pick you know but it never it never ended up working out it would have been fun maybe damn that would have been great yeah maybe on the next reunion tour maybe the next reunion tour but yeah i think you know i mean between that and you know he's had some life changes i've had some life changes we kind of just were like let's take a pause let's um maybe start fresh you know after 177 episodes it's like how many different bands can you talk about that you haven't talked about in the first 176 so uh um you know i think if we came back we would probably you know might keep the same format but allow ourselves the opportunity to revisit and almost treat it as a fresh start. Hmm. That's interesting. You heard it here first, folks. No promises, you know, but no promises either way, really. Right. That's cool. It's, you know, you're saying there's a chance.

Track 3:

[4:41] Cool. Well, let's get right into it. Let's talk about your pavement origin story. story? Boy, um, I think I first heard of pavement. Um, I wasn't early enough to get the first seven inch. Um, but I think maybe the first drag city seven inch, um, it was probably the first time I'd heard of them. I don't know if I even bought it at the time I was in that era. I was in college. I was at very active in the college radio station at Santa Clara University KSU. And I was a music director for a little while. And there, you know, obviously, Pavement was getting a bit of buzz. And I remember them just being this band that had put out a few singles. They were getting written up in zines. You know, there wasn't social media. So there wasn't any of that buzz at that time. And it was it was like unless you had someone that had a copy you you know It was almost impossible to even find in stores, So they had this just kind of air about them of like and and there were no photos of them There weren't even their names. It was just SM and spiral stairs, and it was just this like very.

Track 3:

[6:02] Mysterious like who the hell are these guys and then little bits would come out where it was like Like, oh, you know, one of them worked at the Whitney as a as a as a guide. And they recorded in this in the studio in Stockton. And, you know, the the the drummer is the guy that runs the studio. He's just this old crazy dude. You know, it was just like little bits of information would kind of come out. And I think I think really what kind of hooked me was probably the 10 inch perfect sound forever. And then by the time Slandered and Enchanted came out, it was like I was full on waiting for it. And I think the first time I saw them, the only time I saw them until the reunion tour a couple years ago, was in San Francisco at the Kennel Club a week before Slandered and Enchanted came out.

Track 3:

[6:56] Was released. And shit. Yes, because I worked at the radio station, we had an advanced copy. So I was I was like, vigorously listening to the record. And so totally prepared for the show. And it's funny, because I think it was written up in one of the papers, one of the San Francisco papers, because the buzz was already even big. Even though Matador was still a pretty small label at the time. It was like this local band, local ish band is kind of getting uh some attention and uh it was funny the show was sold out and gary was out front like shaking people's hands as they walked into the show like could not believe that everybody was there to see him you know he'd been trying for years and years to hit it big in the music industry and couldn't believe that these two weird college kids that came into his studio was like his venue for We're actually getting some level of success. So it was kind of cool.

Track 3:

[7:59] Oh, very cool. Yeah. How was that show? It was, it was amazing. It was a little, um, ramshackle as some of their shows back then could have been. Um, but I just remember, you know, because I was so excited for it. Um, I just remember being like, odd, like, wow, this is great. You know? And then I never got a chance to see them again until they did the reunion tour. Uh, it was probably 30, a little over 30 years between my first and second pavement show that's hey you know what when you see them before slant it drops you're doing pretty good right like i like i think that's phenomenal i think the article in the paper said it would be like their 20th show that they played or something like that so it was certainly one of you know because before then they were just a recording band and you know they didn't it was you know all of the i think the earlier records were just the two of them plus gary uh and so they they sort of had to figure out like how are we as a band when we're playing out live and uh you know it was early enough that i think that i was still seeing some of that evolution of what pavement would become oh that is so fucking cool i you You know, I didn't get on board until very late, very late. So they were already broken up. Like, yeah.

Track 3:

[9:23] So, yeah, I got on board very late. And it's just listening to all this kind of talk, which I've heard, you know, a lot. I've done a lot of these at this point, these interviews and listening to people's pavement origin stories. Uh, you know, there's a lot of people who came late, but the people who came early have really fantastic stories. Like, you know, the fact that, uh, there were a mystery, you know, and that's something when I interviewed spiral, he said they really, that was something that was really important to them. And in fact, he was disappointed when they sort of dropped the. Like he wished they could have kept going with the – I don't know how they would have done that. Played in lucha masks or something? I don't know. Daft Punk did it for how many years, right? Oh, that's a good point. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. Or the residents. I mean it had been done before. But yeah, that was certainly part of the mystique for me. And seeing them, like, wow, they're real people when I saw them live. It was like – this is the, you know, yeah, the reveal of the curtain.

Track 3:

[10:31] But yeah, and that was why when slanted, I mean, perfect, perfect sound forever, too. But especially when slanted dropped, it was like felt very fresh, felt familiar, but totally different at the same time. And that's why in some ways, I think my experience of pavement is just naturally different from somebody that experienced them later when they already had this full body of work. And you could see you could see that progression because there was just this question of where were they going and what would they do next and um i can imagine the ep that came after was like oh my god these four songs are just amazing incredible like like and and it was uh.

Track 3:

[11:19] Yeah it was interesting it was um a very exciting time and they were like a very important band for me in that, in that period of my life. I bet. So what, um, is your go-to record at this point? Do you have one or, I mean, I know that's a tough question because it probably changes week, week over week, but you know, just think about right now, what would you, if, if we get off the phone here and you want to just reminisce about some pavement, what are you going to throw? It's hard because, you know, I think as somebody who had that level of experience about like this mystique early on and the seven inches were and, you know, the early albums were really just so ingrained in my memory. Like, I almost don't need I listened to Slandered and Enchanted before our talk today. And it was probably the first time in a couple years that I'd listened to it. But it was like, I knew every one of those songs. So in intimately, I knew every note, every lyric, every, you know, Baba Baba, you know, like every little like, like, part of the songs in a way that the later albums.

Track 3:

[12:38] I'm not as intimately familiar with. So when I listen to a later record, it's almost like hearing it fresh. And I can't distance myself from my experience of like Perfect Sound Forever back when it came out, or Slanded went back when it came out. But that said, I think if I were to just be like, I wanna put on a record, um well i mean watery domestic is probably my favorite piece of work that they did but it's only four songs so it's wrong but it's so fast yeah it just is over so quickly and i think i only had it on cd i only recently bought the the vinyl of it and i didn't realize that the little like you know that little like transitional piece i didn't realize it was at the end of a song i thought it was the intro of a song because i always just listened to the cd ah and it just went i never paid enough attention to it because i didn't listen to it on shuffle or anything um and so it was almost revelatory when i got it on vinyl i was like this is like the way it's supposed to be like and then i flipped the side over um so that must have been brain busting It was kind of weird. I thought that was the intro to the song, but it was really the outro.

Track 3:

[14:04] Well, speaking of Pavement songs, should we get into the song that you're going to cover? Yeah, let's do it. All right. We'll be right back after listening to song number 17.

Track 1:

[14:19] Hey, this is Bob Nestanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening. And now on with a countdown.

Track 2:

[14:28] 17.

Track 3:

[16:10] There you have it. Song number 17 is Zurich is Stained from the debut long play Slanted and Enchanted. Mike, is this song in fact slanted and or enchanted? Discuss. Yes, indeed. I love this song. This song, it really is. And it's sort of an oasis. I love where it appears on the record. it's coming straight out of the chaos of uh conduit for sale and right before the chaos of chelsea's little wrists and you get this like really light breezy but fast song i mean it's not a ballad it's not like here it is it is this breezy light almost feels like it would be.

Track 3:

[17:03] At home on the velvet underground's third record you know there's this mood to it that feels, in some ways different from earlier in the record and even what comes a little later where there's a lot of like fuzz and noise it's just this light little break um that's almost this perfect little slice of i don't even know how long it is but i'm guessing it's less than two minutes it's It's just, uh, yeah, it's, it's in and out. Yeah. It's in and out. And, and the whole time Malchmus, I don't think really pauses the vocals for more than a second or two. It's just beautiful little instrumentation with his vocals kind of just strung throughout it all. Yeah. I'm singing it in my head right now. It's right. It's, it's, uh.

Track 3:

[17:59] I mean, you know, and it's like the chorus keeps coming back and then he ends it with the, you know, like just it is a perfect little song. It's just a perfect slice of, and if I were to play somebody that had never heard Pavement, if I would play them, what is from a songwriting perspective, what is a quintessential Pavement song? You know, there are probably a few others that might come to mind, but this is like one of those like sleeper cuts. It's just such a perfect little song that doesn't get the buzz of like the Summer Babes or, you know, some of the more hit songs. I just I love it, though. yeah it's a it's a it's a really great song it's very different from the rest of the record for for sure it like maybe even it's like more at home on crooked rain crooked rain like you know like just sonically but uh but you're right where it hits in the record is is just is just right and And it's a refreshing little wafer, you know, before the next meal. Yes. Or the next course.

Track 3:

[19:22] Yeah. I think because of where it hits in the record, it feels mellower, you know? Feels in contrast to some of the other songs that come before and after it. What did you say is right before it? Conduit? Conduit, yeah. Okay, yeah. So it comes out of that frantic chaos into this breezy little, there's like the twang guitar, there's no fuzz, it's just this kind of light, catchy little, very short song, song, but that feels fully formed. It's not one of those songs that feels too short. You know, it just is like an idea song. Like, like there's a lot of those on Wowie, for example. Right. Yeah. Yes. Right. Or, you know, I mean, I can even think of like Emmett Rhodes lullaby. I don't know if you know that song. It's, it's, it was used. I first heard of it in, um, I think Royal Tenenbaums, one of those Wes Anderson movies, but, um, it's a beautiful little song and it's It's only a minute long, and it just feels too short. Zyrka's Dane does not like that. It just feels fully formed, even though it's only a minute in, I don't know, 50 or something. Yeah.

Track 3:

[20:41] What was I going to ask you? I was going to ask you if you've got a line on what it's potentially about. And if not, that's cool. I don't know. No, I mean, I miss Malcolm. This is hard. I, I kind of try not to read in too much to the lyrics because I also don't really trust the lyrics. Um, if you know what I mean, like if the lyric sheet, um, is often or not, I wouldn't say often, sometimes the lyric sheet, Like I'm looking at the lyric sheet right now that is included in the vinyl of Slanted and Enchanted. And the one that stands out is not necessarily Zerka Stain, but on Loretta's scars, you know, the, the line from now on, I can see the sun is always what I knew it to be. But the lyric sheet says from now on, I can see the slums. And so. Really? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so I sort of, especially with Mouthmasters lyrics, I try not to read too much into it. It's just this like, kind of catchy thing.

Track 3:

[22:06] You know, like a jumble of words that make sense within the music of the song. I call it word salad. Yeah. I call it word salad. You get a tasty morsel in every forkful. You know, there's a little bit of everything. There's imagery. There's, you know, these slant rhymes sometimes. Really cool phrases. Memorable phrases. Yes. I almost feel like, you know, I can't sing it strong enough is a great line. I don't know what it's about. Right. And I don't even know if it's about, I mean, the song is Zurich is Stained. I don't even think it's about Zurich. There's no other sort of mention of it. Yeah, I mean, right. Like, it's okay. It's not your fault. Cool. cool.

Track 3:

[22:57] Whose fault is it? Do we even care? I don't know. I just try not to. I try not to read too much into it. And I think one of the one of the things that I noticed and what I've always kind of tried to avoid when I would talk music, you know, the songs when when Bob and I did three songs, but is I would, I would try and talk about the music and not try to analyze the lyrics so much, unless there was something that really like, like stood out and grabbed me and resonated with me. Um, but yeah, I think, I think Malchmus is especially at this phrase, you know, phase of his career. I felt like each line was its kind of own self-contained mini story and often didn't even like match or connect or follow the line that came after it um so to your question what's the song about i have no idea that's cool well i'll pivot completely then and we'll go back to three songs for a minute how the fuck you know did you and bob connect yeah this is this is kind of.

Track 3:

[24:09] Obviously, I was a fan for a while, for a long time. And I'm thinking back in 2013, I moved to New York City. And I started working at a horse racing company. Okay. And actually, it probably was 2014 that I moved there in 2013. Probably a year later, I got the job at the horse racing company. And as I'm sure you know, Bob has always been interested in horse racing. And what he was, I was based in New York, he was based in Iowa. But he was the local representative for the Iowa racetrack for the company that I worked for. And so when I get there and I see, you know, Bob Nastanovich, I'm like, hey, man, what's up? And we started working together for work. And then I was at some point I was like, you know, I'm familiar with your band, Bandza, you know, because I was also certainly familiar with the Silver Jews as well. So good. And so we just became friends. I worked there. I think Bob got laid off because horse racing is not really a growth industry. So Bob got laid off. And then a year or two later, I got laid off.

Track 3:

[25:37] But we were always friendly friends. I'd consider us friends. We became friends, even though we lived a couple thousand miles away from each other. Yeah um and after i got laid off in 2017 i was like hey i got some time now you want you want you want to do a music podcast um and he was like yeah sure and so we threw around ideas of like what it would be about and how we would approach it what we would call it all of that and he suggested three songs and we just kind of bandied back and forth uh you know hey this is this is is sort of how i want to do it i just want it to be like two friends talking music and sharing music that we like with each other kind of like the way it was back when pavement started when you just couldn't find things online there was no online you just had to hear about it because somebody you knew was into it and be like oh you got to check this out you'll love it so that was sort of the spirit of it we started i think our first episode i know our first episode i didn't have a mixer it sounds like shit you couldn't really hear bob bob couldn't hear the songs um but i just left it up anyway because they were good songs and it just it was uh a good a good chat um and then by episode two i got i bought a mixer and a mic and uh we're we're off.

Track 3:

[27:00] Game changed. Game changed. And we, yeah, we were friends for probably two and a half years before we did the podcast. Yeah. And then we did the podcast for probably another two and a half years before we met in person. So I knew Bob and was friends with Bob for five years before we'd ever. And you guys did an episode together in person, right? We did one episode in person. Yeah. Okay. I remember listening to that one. Yeah. I mean, I've listened to a bunch, but I specifically remember that one. Yeah. It was sort of weird because we're doing this with video. I can see you, so you can see me. I can see when you're ready to talk. We didn't do any of that. Bob didn't want to be on camera. He felt uncomfortable. He's out on his back porch. He's just running around. You'd hear the dog in the background. So I didn't know when he was done talking, and we would sometimes talk over each other. So doing the one in person when we could actually see each other's cues was a little strange, to be honest. Because we had done, I don't know, at that point, two and a half years worth, probably close to 100 episodes. That's what I was going to say. I feel like it was in the 90s, that episode. But I might be wrong. Yeah. That was probably after. Because we did the 100th episode.

Track 3:

[28:21] Yeah, we did the 100th episode, which was the David Berman Silver Jews focus one. Which is still our most listened to episode. That was the episode 100. And I know we recorded it a few months before we met in person. So, yeah, we probably did 110 before we'd ever met in person. And the reason we met, the way we met, was Bob came to Portland in January of 2020 because there was a tribute show to David and to Silver Juice. And so Bob, so we, you know, I think there were a number of people that played, including.

Track 3:

[29:02] Uh, um, the woman, Rebecca from the Spananes, um, played a set. Um, there were a few others that played, but the headliner was, uh, just a duo of Bob and Steven playing, playing silver juice stuff, which, and you can find it, you can find the recording on, um, on YouTube and famously one of it's great. It's actually worth seeking out because, you know, it was, it was cool to see. Um but someone in the comments was like this sounds like shit and then bob replied and he's like sorry man i can give you your five bucks back or whatever and and then the guy was like oh i'm really sorry i didn't mean to you know it's he's like that is spectacular yeah so it's it's almost it's worth watching for sure but it's almost worth seeking out to to find that little nugget of, of exchange, um, in, in the, in the YouTube comments section. But, um, but yeah, that was the first time we met. Did you parlay that meeting into, uh, an opportunity to meet with SM? I did. Yes. So this is, this is sort of my meeting mouth story. Although I actually met him in the nineties briefly at Satyricon when, um, the Geraldine Fibbers were playing. He.

Track 3:

[30:23] He lived in Portland at that point, and I think I was still down in Eugene, but I was and have been good friends with Nels Klein for years and years and years, put out some of his records back in the 90s. And then he got into the Geraldine Fibbers and was playing guitar with them. They played a show at Satyricon and I was hanging out with Nels and Stephen came to the show. And so I met him briefly then in the 90s. um but then yeah flash forward 20 plus years january 2020 so that the the day before the show.

Track 3:

[30:57] That they played uh with a tribute to to david is the day that bob and i hung out we recorded the podcast that day we went and had lunch we had dinner i just hung we just hung out together all day. And then, um, I was going to head home and he's like, ah, just crash, crash in Stephen's basement. There's, there's two couches there. I I'm on one, you can crash on the other. And I was like, yeah, okay, no problem. And so, um, we got back there, I don't know, around midnight, everybody was asleep. We'd go down to the basement and, you know, and then I get up around eight or so to go to leave and um the basement stairs were right at the top uh or the top of the stairs was right at the kitchen and so um i went there was a bathroom in the basement i went and used the bathroom and i was about like putting my shoes on and about to leave and steven's wife jessica comes to the top of the stairs and is like bob's bob and i'm standing there, and I just say like I didn't know what to say of course I'm like uh, Bob's friend and she's like oh Bob had a sleepover and I was like uh yeah hi I'm Mike so um.

Track 3:

[32:17] So then, and, and so that was sort of a strange little, and then I got, you know, got my shoes and my jacket and I'm like going up the stairs and what at the top of the stairs, it's like you see the full kitchen and, you know, Jessica and Steve's daughters were in the kitchen having breakfast. And I'm like, um, nice to meet you. Thanks for letting me crash here. Even though you didn't know I was crashing here. here um uh you know like hey i'm mike and just like really sheepishly like trying to leave and the back door is right kind of at you go to the top of the stairs and to the right is the kitchen and straight ahead is the the side door um that goes to their their driveway and i'm like trying to open the side door and jessica's like it kind of sticks a little bit do you want me to help and And I'm like, oh, I think I got it. And so I'm like fiddling with the doorknob for like 10 seconds, which felt like two minutes. And then I finally got it opened and it was like, all right, thanks. See you later.

Track 3:

[33:25] And then later that day, you know, Bob said, come on over. We'll hang out. And so I came over later that day and then met them in earnest. And they were very sweet. She was very sweet. You know, like, I'm really sorry. And I was here and she's like, don't worry about it. And then Steven was there. And he was like, they were just kind of.

Track 3:

[33:43] Prepping for the show later that evening and um he was very nice he actually gave me he just finished reading lou reed's a biography on lou reed he's like i'm looking for on it and i was like yeah sure so i've got steve's steven's copy of uh the lou reed biography up in my my bedroom.

Track 3:

[34:01] Somewhere that's spectacular i think that's really cool yeah yeah borrowing books from steven malcolm any other uh chances that you met him or um yeah i mean i've met him briefly a few other times you know bob um would come to town when pavement was rehearsing i think they rehearsed for about almost a month before they did their their first reunion tour in 2022 22 um yeah bob bob stayed here for probably maybe not quite a month maybe three or four weeks two or three weeks and um you know i would not every day but regularly after they were done i would you know hang out with bob a little bit and we'd get some dinner or whatever and one night there was some band playing and um steven and jessica went and we tagged along and so i've met him a number of times we're i would say we're friendly but we're not friends i don't have his number he doesn't have mine you know if if i were to run into him around town which um happens now and then i'd probably feel too shy to say hi but um if i did i think he would know who i was and be okay with it that's that's.

Track 3:

[35:19] Pretty neat though i would say yeah you know i mean this is one of the things about portland it's like a it's a it's kind of a small town it's a big big enough city but it's also kind of a small town yeah well i want to share something with you because it's kind of funny uh you know it's in the lore of meeting malchmus i reached out to bob when i first conceived of this podcast in the fall of uh 2018 and asked him if he wanted to co-host meeting malchmus and this is the you know this is the premise and blah blah blah and uh i didn't have it all nailed down at that point um but i gave him the i gave him the highlights and he's He's like, he responded back and he's like, sounds fun, but I'm already doing a podcast. And I was like, tell me what it's called. And that's how I found out about your podcast.

Track 3:

[36:11] But that's also how Bob ended up not on Needy Malcomus, if he would have done it, if he would have done it. Well, so I apologize because I feel like I'm the reason why he said no. Although I would have to check. There were times, and I think that the fall of 2018 was one of those times. There were times, and if you look back through our episodes, you'll see big gaps, and it's often.

Track 3:

[36:37] Associated with life events. And my, my daughter was born in July of 2018. And I think right after that, we actually did probably a six month pause. Cause I was like, I don't, I'm working. And, uh, you know, I mean, I took a little time off, you know, I'm not sleeping yet. Like, uh, as priorities go, I don't know if I'll have time to talk to you for a little bit. So you, even though Bob, I mean, and I appreciate Bob being loyal to me. It was probably during a pause, and he probably could have said, hey, I've got the time right now. I am doing a podcast, but we're not doing it right away. That's funny. Yeah. So do you have anything you want to plug other than three songs at this point? What's the episode that people should grab of three songs aside from the Berman episode? Episode like what would you say is is a standout episode that gives you a real sense of what the show is well okay so those are almost two questions because.

Track 3:

[37:41] The standout episode of what the show is this the premise of the show was bob would bring three songs to play to me that he thought i maybe didn't know uh and might like and i would do the same for him um and so those some of those early episodes where we were still finding our footing were a lot of the songs where it was like, Oh my God, I fucking love this song so much. Like the X is state of shock. Um, you know, like some, some of these go between songs or some of these like old blue songs that, that just like really resonated with me in a strong way. I was like, I, you know, I don't know if you know this, but like, I want to play it for you and just get your reaction. Um, so, you know, I don't know. I, don't have the list in front of me and my screen saver went to sleep. So I, you know, I'm not even going to log in to figure out what some of those early episodes were. Um, but, uh, you know, I, what I, what I also tried to do, and it was never a spoken thing between Bob and I, but I, I was inherently conscious of the fact we were two middle-aged white dudes.

Track 3:

[38:54] Talking music and i wanted to make sure we weren't just talking about white dudes no it is very if you haven't listened to it listen to it but there are there are like i'm just going i'm making this up but like throat singers and or did you have a throat singer uh i don't know if we went quite that wild but we would do yeah it's everywhere though it's like you guys you guys covered the spectrum yes music all kinds of genres all kinds of countries we try we tried to go all around the world you know and we tried to also be very inclusive of all genders and you know because again it's just two white dudes talking we didn't want it to be like very focused on on like western western music you know that said we didn't want to make it so obscure that people would be like, there's not anything here for me, you know, like, we would try to try to walk that line where it would still be fun and worthwhile. And, you know, I think if nothing else, it was just, I hope that people came because they liked Bob, and they liked me, and they felt like they were listening in to friends.

Track 3:

[40:08] And they felt like they were one of of our friends that were experiencing this music and experiencing this conversation at the same time. Um, I hope it was more that and not like, Oh, I'm going to list, listen because today they're talking about, you know, Sebado or whatever. I'm going to listen because today they're talking about some band I know, and I want to hear what they say.

Track 3:

[40:30] I, I, I was, I hope we built enough of an audience that liked us and trusted us. So that's it. It's the trust piece. It's like you guys were sort of a modern day equivalent of like the record shop dude, you know, that trusted guy that, you know, Gary Gal.

Track 3:

[40:51] It's like, hey, I saw you buying these two records. Yeah. You're probably going to totally dig this. Yes. Yes. Tastemakers. I hope, I hope the unjudgmental record shop dude that wasn't like, oh, I can't believe you bought this.

Track 3:

[41:06] No, I don't mean that. You know some of those types, right? Yeah. We wanted it to be, you know, I also didn't want it to be a situation where I was, you know, ripping on someone's art. Or if I didn't like it, I would just be like, oh, it's maybe not my thing. But most of the time, everything Bob played for me, I was into or found some sort of way to resonate with.

Track 3:

[41:32] But aside from that, I mean, I'm not doing any podcasts. I don't have anything to plug. I mean, I think those that have listened to the show know that Bob runs a small record label. And back in the 90s, I ran a small record label called Little Brother Records. Records um you know uh i've got a few of the old back stock and maybe i'll send me your address i'll send you a little package of some of the old records i put out um oh wow cool yeah um you know and it's uh so but i wouldn't say i have that to plug it's just part of my it's part of my origin story yeah absolutely well i really want to thank you for taking this time with me today it's been a blast talking to you dude yeah appreciate it thanks for thinking of me thanks for including me no you're you're near top of the list when i started thinking of like people that i solicited to like on my twitter and stuff like that uh i i asked basically anybody and everybody but then i also had like the celebrity wing you know and uh you appeared on that list so i i company you're in.

Track 3:

[42:42] I don't know if I would even come close to listing me as a celebrity, but I appreciate the thought. In the podcast, in the indie rock podcast world, I would see you. If you want to say our top episode, which is the Berman one, that got maybe 12,000 listens, if that makes me a celebrity. I mean, you know. If you had 12,000 people in your living room listening to you talk, that would be a pretty fucking big deal. That's true. I don't know if I'd have enough food for them.

Track 3:

[43:14] I had a friend tell me that early on in podcasting. They were, you know, they were like, because I was like, I don't know. I don't want to put myself out there and see the numbers. And they were like, if you have 12 people that listen, like, that's pretty cool. Well, I think more than that, but the sense that you, that I get is that you approach it the way that Bob and I approached it. And, um, you know, I had the advantage of kind of tagging along to a, a, a celebrity.

Track 3:

[43:43] And so Bob's name helped bring in listeners, but we, we didn't, we didn't do any promotion other than maybe, you know, little like, like Twitter promotion. We didn't, we didn't solicit any, um, sponsors or anything like that. We didn't ever want to try and find a way to monetize it because if we were doing that, it wouldn't be what I wanted. Yeah. And it wouldn't be fun. It wouldn't be, it would be like work, you know, and I wanted it to be my release for like, here's an opportunity to talk to my friend about music. Um, and maybe, you know, maybe we will find an audience you know if you're if you're authentic and you're doing something for the right reasons often the audience finds you it may take a little while um but that's i think that's also about the the way i look at a lot of the music that i like you know bands like sonic youth weren't you know or or the x is another huge band that i just have loved for their whole career they're not worried about is it going to sell or whatever and they just they find the audience eventually.

Track 3:

[44:52] Yeah i would say i would say authenticity is a is a reasonable place to start from, yeah that's the best i can do yeah yeah hey again thanks so much and uh wash your goddamn hands.

Track 1:

[45:11] Thanks for listening to Meeting Malcomus, a pavement podcast where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email. JD at Meeting Malcomus dot com.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the show jD welcomes Vish from his own Kreative Kontrol, if you haven't checked it out get after it!

Vish discusses song 18 and shares his Pavement origin story.

Transcript:

Track 1:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 2:

[0:02] This week we're going deep on Box Elder. How are you feeling about song number 19, Kyra, from the COWI? I fucking love Box Elder so much. It's a great song. It's one of the earlier Pavement songs. I think it's a very early Pavement song, which is cool. And it's one that really holds up.

Track 1:

[0:25] I think, too. you. Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown.

Track 3:

[0:34] Hey, it's JD here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for Seminole Indie Rock Band Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballads. I then tabulated the results using an abacus, a wet towel, and some scrawny kid from 10th grade gym class. How will your favorite songs fare in the rankings? You'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that. This week I'm joined by Pavement superfan Vish from Creative Control with Vish Khanna. Dude, thanks for taking some time to do this. It means a lot. How the hell are you doing? I'm well, JD. Thanks for having me on your show. How are you doing? I'm great today. It's a little overcast here, but it's about five degrees so i'm gonna go for a walk later and uh.

Track 3:

[1:24] And that's a, that's, those are good times for me. Very nice. That's good. Going outside. Can't beat it. Yeah. No, you can't at all. Well, let's not beat around the bush, speaking of beat it, and get right into your Pavement Origins story.

Track 3:

[1:38] Talk to me about that, Vish. Well, I was trying to, you know, I knew I was coming on your show, so I figured I should try to ponder this, you know, and I, I was trying to remember. Remember, I think I first came upon the band when I read about them in Spin Magazine, like, I think before Crooked Rain came out. And I don't know what it was about that piece. This is right around the time I started getting to go to record stores. You know, I'm, what would I have been then? I would have been 15, 16. Some of us were driving so we could leave Cambridge, Ontario, where I'm from, and we could go to Kitchener and Waterloo and Toronto. They had the cooler record stores those were like uh college university towns so then we started going to record stores and then you start talking to the record store people and they tell you what they like and you respect them because they're your surrogate parents so somebody somebody somewhere along the line told me about pavement i i'm pretty sure it was the spin magazine article that i was i started devouring more and more music journalism and i think it was that so i remember owning uh slanted and enchanted and also uh the record store had the trigger cut single so i think i bought both things and i'm fairly certain about both things and uh i will say that that first single got me completely obsessed with their singles um because i think they're.

Track 3:

[3:07] I don't know, they're one of the greatest treasure troves of any band I can think of. I know you've probably talked about this with others, but I really value Pavement B-Sides. Like, I wasn't that surprised. I mean, I was surprised that Harness Your Hopes went kind of bonkers recently, but like, I'm not surprised. Like, Pavement B-Sides, I know some of them better than I know the album songs, to be honest with you. I just became so obsessed with how great, like, the the quality of their B-sides really spoke to me. And then, yeah, that's one of the, and then I feel like that was a gateway into like, what is Silver Jews? Like, why is this, what is Silver Jews in the pavement section? What is it? Oh, it's a, it's a project. Oh, there's Bob and Steve on the back of the album covers. So they're in this, I guess. And so, yeah, the B-side alternate pavement universe if you will really spoke to me and still does uh i find myself uh kind of you know mumbling song lyrics and and tunes and melodies from you know humming them from from all the b-side so yeah i i would i would position myself that way as someone who i get a little obsessive so it wasn't just the album uh the albums it was like i want to get all the singles so i owned every single.

Track 3:

[4:24] On mostly on compact disc when i was coming up of age and now i've got them all on actually you know what i ordered i ordered that thing that you ordered the box that i ordered the singles box that i have a bunch of them but i was like what the hell i'm gonna do it so the book looks good yeah everything about it looks good i love pavement so uh i just thought i would get that too and uh yeah i think that's pretty much it that's where i discovered them and then of course they blew up uh you know they're one of those bands that all your cool uh heroes were talking talking about before you even heard them you know so you'd read a interview with somebody you liked and they'd mention pavements you're like what is this pavement so really have a time and place for me word of mouth and then actually digging in i have still a sense memory of playing slanted and enchanted and hearing summer babe and you're just like what the hell so yeah i'd say that's that that that's that's got to be it i think that's it and you got to be there for the release of watery then did you as somebody who was like sort of ep and single obsessed did you pick that up when it came out i did i did pick it up i don't know if i got it right when it came out i can't say that for sure because i feel like i still came to them a little bit later um because i'm sure they were that article was 93 like i don't think it was about slanted it was just mentioned so but i got it yeah and as you may have heard me talk about it's yeah it's my it's like my favorite thing, really, in some ways. I love, and yeah, I miss Gary Young.

Track 3:

[5:51] I never got to meet or talk to Gary Young, but yeah, the drumming as a drummer as well, as a budding drummer, like hearing Gary's playing, that had a huge influence on me too. So yeah, that era. Put your finger on what it is, isn't it?

Track 3:

[6:06] Like, what it is about Gary's drumming. I love Westy. I love him. He's a great guy, and he's a great drummer. But there's something about Gary. There's something about the looseness and the showmanship of people like Gary Young. I would say here in Canada, we have Mark Gaudette, who was in Eric's trip, and his drumming, too. Like, it's punk rock, but it's a bit more technical. And it's precise, but it's loose. And it just has it. He's making an instrument. you know they have their own voice i suppose as drummers they have their own like you hear it and you're like oh that's that's that's either gary or as i mentioned mark for two examples uh or it's someone copying them you know it's someone someone kind of ripping them off so i certainly was of this learning how to play the instrument and getting into some really amazing drummers at the time uh just because i didn't take drum lessons i would just listen to things or go see bands and And certain people and their drumming had a huge impact on me. And certainly early pavement drumming, you know, I think it's an underrated facet of that band. Did you get a chance to see the Gary Dock?

Track 3:

[7:18] No, you know what? I haven't seen that doc. That's a good call. I've been rather swamped of late and I need to do that. Have you seen it? Yeah, it's really, it's, it's pretty fabulous. Yeah, I can imagine. You're right. I should, I don't know. I'm at a thing where I got to do so much and I process so much information and music and I can't keep up with everything. So yeah, I saw it come through and I was like, yeah, I will watch that eventually. And then before you know it, I don't think I'm alone in this where there's just so much stuff to consume, but yeah, good Good call. Good call. I'll try to track it down on, I don't know if it's on a thing, a service or whatever, a streaming service, but I'll try and watch that. Yeah, I think it is because I don't know how I would have seen it. I forgot. Yeah. Um, when, when did you finally get to, uh, see them live or did you see them live in the original sort of run? I saw them for the first time in Barrie, Ontario at Lollapalooza in 1995. This was the. Wow. Lollapalooza curated by Sonic Youth.

Track 3:

[8:18] So also on the bill was, it was supposed to be Sinead, or sorry, it was supposed, yeah, it was supposed to be Sinead O'Connor, but I think I attended the first show that she couldn't play because she was pregnant. And so Elastica filled in, but the day was like a mighty, mighty Boston's first time I got to see the Jesus lizard. Blizzard, uh, uh, Pavement obviously played during the day, uh, Hole played. Beck was on the lineup too, wasn't he? Yeah, I saw Beck play two sets, one on the main stage, uh, this was just ahead, uh, ahead of Odile coming up, and, um, he also did a side stage, uh, performance where I actually spoke to him, he, he came down and, uh, signed autographs, so he signed, I don't know where it is but he signed my Lollapalooza ticket stub and I asked him I actually I think I, I tripped him out a little because I'd heard that he was going to be collaborating with a Toronto musician. And when I mentioned it, he was like, oh, yeah, we have been talking about that. Like he was I kind of nardwired him.

Track 3:

[9:23] I didn't mean it was just a rumor. I just said it. And he was like, oh, yeah, we were talking about that. So anyway. Yeah. So, yeah. And the Far Side played and Moby played and all sorts of amazing eclectic. Yeah. Yeah, Cypress Hill was one of the headliners. Bob Nastanovich, when he was on my show, I did a little documentary about Bright in the Corners. And he talked extensively about their experiences with some of the artists and their experiences playing Lollapalooza. And Bob's amazing innovation of suggesting that instead of getting a bus, they would each get minivans. He got a great deal in some rental minivans and that way they could play and then just drive ahead to the show and not worry about the gear and all that stuff and and and they could kind of travel at their leisure and uh yeah anyway so Lollapalooza 95 is the first show then I saw them at the Phoenix in Toronto for the Bright in the Corners tour and then I saw them play uh you remember the cool house and the, sorry, for those wondering in Toronto.

Track 3:

[10:33] There was a venue and it had two rooms. It was called the Warehouse. And then beside it was something called the Government, a smaller room. And then the Warehouse became, it was like the RPM Warehouse or something like that. That's right. And then it changed names. It was the Cool House, but I think the Government was still there. So for Terror Twilight, as I recall, Pavement played the Government. So the smaller room on that tour. So I saw them there. And then I saw them on Toronto Island on the first reunion tour with the Broken Social scene.

Track 3:

[11:08] And I think that's the last time I was invited or I was supposed to go see them in Austin, Texas. And Bob hooked me up. And I think I might have even been able to attend the Austin City Limits taping. But unfortunately, I couldn't make it at the last minute. So that was a bit of a bummer. But I regret it. But, you know, it was weird, still weird pandemic times then. And I, I think there was also other stuff going on. So I didn't get to see them on this current reunion, but it still seems to be going as we're speaking. So who knows?

Track 3:

[11:42] Maybe I can see them somehow. now yeah yeah and we are recording this in early april so yeah there's we're not uh that's not a scoop people just in case you're listening to this in october and you're like oh christ they're coming back um they may they very may well be i just edited the bob episode and you know i sort of teased him because he's like we're done after south america and i was like come on come on yeah i'll believe you're done when i when when you're done yeah but um enough about me back to you uh i'm curious about the lola performance like so you got to see them in a government isn't intimate but it's nice um and then you got to see them in um lollapalooza in front of a big crowd what do you think of the the festival version of pavement well i mean obviously it's well documented that they didn't have the best time on that tour on some level uh in slow century there's obviously the the fracas uh you know uh where people are throwing mud at them and all sorts of a rock at steven actually uh you know i i was a kid i mean that was sensory overload i i was just going to how old was I? So 95 I was had I even turned.

Track 3:

[13:08] Yeah, I was not even, what was I, seven, 16 or something like that? I don't know. I was not an old, I was young. You were 76? No, wait a minute. Yeah, I was 17. So I was born, no, I was born in 77. So I hadn't yet turned 18. So I was 17. And yeah, it was just, that was a bonkers year, to be honest with you. That summer, I went to everything. I went to so many festivals.

Track 3:

[13:31] For all my bellyaching about my parents not letting me do stuff, they let me do a lot of stuff that summer so uh yeah i don't i think i was just overwhelmed by how many people were surrounding me and and and i got up as close as i could for pavement um and we got up really close like seeing the jesus lizard was a bit i love the jesus lizard already at that point i just love them and to see them was like they were larger than life and you know yeah for those who've never seen them or footage of them at that point, Yao would come into the crowd, you know, he would leap off the stage and crowd surf and all that kind of stuff and sing while he was doing it. So it was very immersive. And then Pavement, relatively the opposite, you know, they're on stage and the songs are great and they played well, as I recall. But on some level, I remember just making a point of getting up as close as possible and trying not to, at the same time, you know, be conscious of not bothering people as you move your way up, you know, because I was kind of annoyed at everyone running around and pushing their way forward and all that stuff. So, uh... Never made sense to me. Yeah, it just... That's my main memory of just, like, trying to... I was probably... For the Jesus Lizard and Pavement, I was probably... That was the closest I was probably, uh, to the stage. And, uh... And then otherwise, yeah, I don't know. I mean, I have...

Track 3:

[14:57] I have a real sense memory of the Phoenix show for Bright in the Corners for a few reasons. And I've talked about them with Bob, at least.

Track 3:

[15:05] Bob did an interpolation of a Cool Keith song, which I just, I was like, oh, I didn't know people knew about Cool Keith. Like I had only started listening to Cool Keith at that time. And he did. I have no clue. blue cool keith is a a really uh innovative uh underground hip-hop superstar he was in a group called ultra magnetic mcs and then he went solo as dr octagon and as cool keith has all these pseudonyms and uh to be precise uh and oh yeah black elvis like he had all these cool names so to be precise i believe as i recall bob was quoting dr the dr octagon project and he just did it in the middle of a song and then also the other thing that occurred to me and it's sort of relevant to the song today is during uh stereo when steven malcolm is saying the lines about getty lee and his voice being so high he shot his voice up super high like a comically high effect how did it get so like just pitch perfect super high i think it's i think it's documented in a much music interview that they did that day or whatever, like while they were in town. And then obviously afterwards, they interspersed some live footage of the band playing.

Track 3:

[16:26] And Stephen singing, you know, on this song that we're here to talk about today is so remarkable to me. And I remember that I had this sense memory of him singing that and thinking it was very amusing. I thought it was more amusing than impressive at the time. but over over time as i um have come to value steven's singing voice and his range and his ability, And just instincts as a singer, I view it as more impressive now than, I still think it's funny because I think he's got a comical element to his choices and certainly live anything can happen, but they were just, I think that Bright in the Corner show is the, it's certainly one of the best shows I've ever seen. So I would also say it's one of the, if not the, it was the best time I saw Pavement probably. Oh, that's a great venue. That's what I, that's, I think the Phoenix is phenomenal. I don't want to discount the reunion show I saw because I think with age and time away from each other, they actually have, I don't know, I don't know how many reunion shows you've seen, but often I find that these bands that, particularly for us, you know, the bands around in the 90s, when they come back, they're better. Yeah. They seem more at ease with themselves as people and as players.

Track 3:

[17:45] And so the absence, I don't know what it is. They just seem more relaxed. And I think when you're more relaxed, you play better. I think 20-something angst, we'll call it. I think if you're not relaxed with each other, you don't play as well. You're just a little uptight. And then as you sort of resign yourself to, well, not resign yourself, but as you sort of get, yeah, you let go of things. I guess that is a way of putting it. You kind of let go of any little grudges and you don't have that angst, whether it's your own or whether it's about yourself or whether it's interpersonal. And I think you just play better. So when I saw the Jesus Lizard on the reunion tour, having seen them several times in the 90s, I just was like, I think they're better. You know, they might be better. better and pavement as i recall from the toronto island show it felt good they played so well you know together um but up until that point yeah i would say that bright in the corners show i saw at.

Track 3:

[18:46] The phoenix in toronto was just like they were just on fire it was brilliant so yeah cool yeah well before we get into song number 18 i gotta ask you as one of the only people i know that has interviewed Mark Eibold, the reclusive Mark Eibold, how the hell did you do it? And that interview, by the way, was phenomenal. It was great.

Track 3:

[19:09] Well, that's very kind of you to say. I have to draw back on my memory for this. So the occasion was the Terror Twilight reissue from a year or two or a couple of years ago, whenever it was. Yeah, who knows? And like you, I think my social entry point into this band is Bob Mstanovich.

Track 3:

[19:32] Absolutely. So Bob is, uh, I've gone on record saying this to others. I think I said it maybe to him during our terror twilight discussion. Bob is the greatest podcast guest of all time. You don't even have to ask him a question and he starts. He's so funny and he's so frank and he says things that I surprised he might say. I love him so much and he's been very kind to me over the years as well. I first spoke with Bob, uh around the time of that reunion uh tour um uh and so what was that 2009 10 thank you very much yeah sorry i think the jesus lizard was 2009 so yeah i spoke to bob around that period and then we've maintained contact basically ever since that was for my college radio show actually and then so that was here in toronto yes that's right yeah well i lived when i was living in ontario at at the time. Um, I had a college radio show and would play some pavement and Bob was a guest on that show. And he's, and I probably wrote a magazine article for exclaim magazine as well. That's what I do and used to do more often. Anyway. Um.

Track 3:

[20:43] Yeah. So the Tara Twilight thing came about by this point, Bob and I had, he'd been on my podcast a few times. And so I just, I'm sure I went through the proper channels to get, try to figure out the interview and get the music and the, and you know, all the assets and all that. But Bob, I think I was like, Bob, like, can we get everyone? Let's just get everyone on the show. Probably like you have done, like you just, you know, you're, you're trying to do this now. You're trying to talk to as many of the members as you possibly can. Absolutely. And in the loop. So, yeah, you know, I'm emailing Stephen and I think I texted Stephen because, you know, he wasn't responding.

Track 3:

[21:22] And so we sort of landed on Westy and Bob and Mark and then Jesper, who was involved in the reissue for Matador, was going to take part. And then at the day of, Mark couldn't do it. He was in transit. He couldn't join us for the group call. But yeah, Bob connected us over email, I believe, and maybe text, I don't recall. And so Mark and I, Mark felt, I think, kind of badly that he couldn't do it, like that he said he would do it and that he didn't end up doing it. And uh i i assume bob vouched for me you know um and so that was kind of it uh really we corresponded uh he felt badly that he couldn't make the group call we arranged a time we had a good talk you heard it uh and then i believe i put it out the right after i had put out that that group call uh so back to back it was like pavement week on my show for terror twilight light. Um, so, uh, yeah, I don't, can't recall cause I do so many of these, uh.

Track 3:

[22:37] Exactly what mark and i talked about i think we talked about some of his, radio listening habits you did yes he still uses a radio yeah you might actually have a better perspective on it than me at this point because i just don't remember uh you know i jd i'm sure you're familiar with this you do so many of them uh interviews uh episodes you're just like oh yeah, i forgot i had so and so on the show what the hell did we talk about again i that happens to me all the time when i edit i'll be listening and i'll be like it sounds like a conversation between somebody who doubles my voice and my guests because i don't recall virtually anything about what we talked about well i remember realizing it was um a real kind of rarity for mark to do such a thing i think at the time um a sonic youth uh archival compilation had had just come out that mark appeared on so there's just a fair amount to talk about it was a lot of memory jogging unfortunately for him like you know trying to remember the terror twilight sessions trying to remember playing with sonic youth like all about a decade out from doing it you know or more a decade or more 20 years um so uh yeah i i he was very lovely and uh and forthcoming and um.

Track 3:

[23:59] I really appreciate it. I think I've spoken to everyone but Gary, I suppose. I never got a chance to speak to Gary Young. But in terms of the, I guess, whatever, core or original lineup, yeah, I've talked to all of them at some points in my life. And I hope to talk to them again.

Track 3:

[24:20] Yeah, I do adore them. So it's, yeah. You can tell. You can really tell. And we should have said this off the top, but Viche is, Creative Control is a podcast, if you haven't listened to it, you should listen to it. If you like music, if you're maybe a bit obsessive about music, Viche does a really phenomenal job of, you know, conversations with famous people. People uh for people who listen to this show you might want to start with some of the david berman stuff because it's it's pretty spectacular and uh and then work your way through the pavement but it's all it's all good from the stuff that i've heard for sure well thank you for the kind words and for saying so yeah i uh i do love doing the show and uh it has uh you know it's granted me access and insight, uh, to, and from people I really, truly admire and adore. And, uh, yeah, I marvel at, uh, what I've been able to, uh, accomplish and get away with, uh, it is, it is, I don't really understand it, but certain people like Bob and others, uh, uh, have a fondness for me and return to the show and all that sort of stuff. And, uh, so yeah, it means a lot. Thanks for saying that. No, no, I should have said it off the top. but uh what do you say we talk about the the song this week song number 18 let's do it okay we'll be back right after this hey.

Track 1:

[25:48] This is bob mistanovich from pavement uh thanks for listening and now on with a countdown 18.

Track 3:

[29:27] So today we're talking all about song number 18 from the masterpiece Wowie Zowie. It's the absolutely gorgeous Father to a Sister of Thought. Vish, what are your initial thoughts about this song? Well, you know, I was so happy that we landed on this as a song to talk about because I do love Wowie Zowie. I have a sense memory of picking it up when it came out. I think the day it came out. um and um obviously a strange sort of a strange record uh an eclectic record uh and this is interesting it's a really fascinating song because in some ways it's super accessible uh musically it leans with the pedal steel and some of the other moves it leans towards country music.

Track 3:

[30:18] I will say, as I was pondering it, I mean, I know we are in a vacuum here of people who love Pavement and who love Stephen Malcomus, but as I was listening to this in preparation for our chat, I'm like, Malcomus is like an underrated everything. I really feel that way. And in particular, I think he's a remarkable singer. And, you know.

Track 3:

[30:51] And this song, I think, exemplifies that. He makes super fascinating choices with his phrasing, I think, and just the notes he's going to go for on words. Like, I don't know how to put it. I'm not super adept at maybe talking about music on that level. But it's just very dynamic, the way he shoots his voice up and sort of speaks, sings one line.

Track 3:

[31:17] And I think aside from missing his sort of grittiness, he also is a great screamer, great yeller. He really is. Like Paul McCartney level dynamic range, I think, with Steven when he wants to. Like he can sing. I don't know if that resonates with you. Like McCartney, to me, can sing anything. He can sing a ballad. He can sing like a Little Richard Rocker and sound like a punk. Like it's bonkers, that guy's vocal range. And I think Malcomus is in that, totally in that vein. So he's not yelling on this song but i think if anyone is interested like this song is a perfect showcase for what he can do as a vocalist and before i go much further jd does that resonate with you it certainly does i when i think of this song you know the word i used right off the bat was gorgeous uh and it's gorgeous in a number of ways the vocal the melody uh like his ability as a songwriter. I don't know how much of the arranging he did, or if it was Easley who said, let's use this pedal steel.

Track 3:

[32:25] But nevertheless, it just works so well with the timbre of his voice. And it all comes together in a really lovely ball.

Track 3:

[32:36] Yeah, and I think the little contrarian aspect to, or I don't know how to describe it, this little element of, yeah, it's a little contrary, I think, you know, I don't think I'm saying anything untoward where there's an element of self-sabotage sometimes in the pavement realm where everything's going fine, and then all of a sudden, let's pull the plug and do something wild and nuts or crazy, you know what I mean? And then yeah so this song has this really jaunty country vibe and then it ends with this like, minimalist noise rock stomp damn yeah yeah yeah like it gets it suddenly becomes a little more punk after the sort of so it's kind of this and it's all part of this it's that end it has nothing to do with anything else we've heard no instrumentally nothing but it works like it works so perfectly and i think it's a way of being like all right i think i think we're getting a little saccharin here it's too gentle or something let's end a little more raucous and uh so to me i hadn't really pondered it as such before but between malchumus i think singing his ass off and and really showing his range uh the band also ends up playing very dynamically and really beautifully and and also grit like as i say there's some grit towards the end so in a weird way.

Track 3:

[34:03] And again i hadn't thought of it like this was a single as i recall um like there was a video for it and whatnot and they're all dressed up in like country western garb and all these sorts of things, but uh no it's a nice exemplification like this is a pretty good gateway in the pavement if you were like yeah listen to this song again you never heard of this band try this song just try it it's got humor it's enigmatic lyrically the arrangement itself is beautiful but funny uh yeah i i really think uh 18 this should be in the top five it's really wonderful wow yeah i would have it in my top 10 yeah i know you top 10 sure i don't know what these ratings mean i don't believe in ratings and awards but it's water cooler talk no it's i'm just saying as i think about it more first of all uh anyone out there listening uh once i dig into a topic i get a little excitable. So, uh, you can make the argument like, what about these other 10 songs? And I'd be like, yeah, yeah, those are also great. But this, this to me, I think, as I say, it's got a nice balance of earnestness, irreverence, beautiful singing, wonderful playing. Uh, yeah, I just think all across the board, it's beautiful. Yeah. Uh, well said.

Track 3:

[35:20] When you think back to buying Wowie Zowie, you said you got it on the day it came out. First of all, that's very cool.

Track 3:

[35:29] And second of all, I wonder, just to go on a tangent for a moment.

Track 3:

[35:34] I wonder if your penchant for B-sides helped you with that record. Because it's almost constructed to me where there's like a song and then more of a b-side song than a song than more of a b-side song uh you know i'm thinking like brink's job and and and stuff like that um yeah you know so that that would have really helped but what were you thinking the first time and this is asking you to really stretch your brain i apologize but what were you thinking the first time you heard this song on this wicked roller coaster ride of a record you know what it's i know this song gets come or rather the album why always how he gets compared a lot to the white album sure by the beatles um who are from liverpool uh and are no longer around but they were uh that album was um i think it's rightly regarded as this uh odd pastiche niche of sounds and ideas and somehow it it only coheres because contextually they made it cohere like it doesn't really make a ton of sense as an album but it's one of those albums where like i couldn't tell you what the best song on it is because i almost view it conceptually as a whole Oh, wow. Wow. So, there's some of it, like, you can, there are singles from it and whatnot.

Track 3:

[37:01] But I have a weird, this is more about me, I suppose, JD, than maybe most people, but like, I'm an albums person. So, when an artist or a band puts out an album, I assume, rightly or wrongly, in some cases it's not the case, but I assume it's a unified statement that they're making of a time, of.

Track 3:

[37:25] Rolling Stones, certain bands, you'll be like, yeah, this album is actually like odds and sods from the previous couple of albums that they just reworked or whatever, revisited. Um, and they still count as albums, you know, certainly Stones in the seventies, you can make that argument. There's a few records where, yeah, like just what I'm describing, it's an album, but it's really like leftovers from some ideas they had. Um, I would put Wowie Zowie in that white album category of like, it's a whole thing. Like, the way it's sequenced, the way songs blend together.

Track 3:

[38:04] As soon as you hear an artist do that, where the songs kind of barely, there's barely any air between them. Right. That's a sequencing choice. That's a mastering choice. That's all sorts of choices they're making. but there's then tends to be this coherence between them this isn't the case all across wowie zowie but there are songs as you know where it's just the next one just starts you're just right into another song um so it becomes a sort of sweet like thing all this to say uh i might be stalling to answer your question because i haven't listened to the whole album in some time this is going to prompt me to i listened to this song on its own and i will say it was a bit weird.

Track 3:

[38:48] To hear it on its own because i don't listen to pavement sorry as i've tried to just maybe exemplify i generally don't listen to um bands i got a friend pointed out to me a few years ago he was we were in a band together and he said yeah you once said you don't like greatest hits compilations i said i said that said yeah we were driving we were listening to like acdc or something and you were just it came up in conversation and you said you don't like greatest hits compilations because the context of the music is all out of order and i said right that makes sense to me yeah you're i said yeah okay i don't remember saying that sometimes i say things and i don't remember that i said them and i said oh yeah well i mean i said i said it and it stuck with him like he said yeah i've started to listen that way now because you're right like the context of an album is so important to it so when you asked me to be on the show and and suggested uh you know that we were going to talk about this particular song i just listened to it on its own.

Track 3:

[39:52] Totally weird. Totally weird to hear it out of the album context. So I think going back to my sense memory, I don't know. I mean, it starts with We Dance, which is weird. And then you're right. Some of the songs seem, I mean, to some people, they would seem like half finished ideas. That's right. Right. Or just like little jabs of things, you know. So you're absolutely right too, like Serpentine Pad, Brink's Job, those sound like they could be B-sides, but I would argue that the pavement B-sides are never really, they don't feel like throwaways to me. I agree. Sometimes they're a little looser and more fun, like things happen and that you wouldn't really hear. No I don't even you know what I'm just going to retract that I think they are all fully.

Track 3:

[40:48] Realized songs that stand on their own but yeah Wowie Zowie I suppose might have been the first sort of inkling that this band could do anything and they weren't afraid to try anything, I'm sure some people were disappointed after Crooked Rain Crooked Rain to hear this, band be a little more punk but also as we're talking about a song that like I say who knows I don't know I I've not really thought about this in a long time but I'm sure making the construction of wowie zowie and the sequencing was potentially a reaction to how much success and how they broke through with crooked rain.

Track 3:

[41:34] Yeah, I can get behind that thought because, I mean, it's almost outlined in Cut Your Hair, right? Yeah. That's sort of the blueprint for Wowie Zowie in a way. Yeah, like not deliberately self-sabotaging themselves, but being like, we're maybe a little too big. Let's do something a little less accessible. Like, let's do something a little more. I just want to be clear. I think it's brilliant. I don't find it confusing. But if you got into Cut Your Hair or Gold Sounds or got into that band that you saw freak out on The Tonight Show, you know... And then listen to Pueblo. Yeah, yeah. I think you're kind of like... Yeah. You would just be like, as a band, I doubt it was even conscious, but maybe it was. Maybe we should do something that's a little more like wild. And if that was the case, I'm not sure it was, I'm sure there's literature and I should have maybe revisited some of the liner notes and reissues and things to read about where their mindset was at. But, you know, even describing father to a sister of thought, it has that mix of totally, totally accessible. I could play this for my country music loving grandfather, but then it ends with like, Hey, grandpa, we're still kind of a punk band. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah.

Track 3:

[43:02] Oh, that's great. Going back to the theory of potentially sabotaging themselves, which I'm with you, I don't think they did it on purpose.

Track 3:

[43:13] I almost think it's like a sound and style change. You're right, Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain was so accessible, and it had a familiar sound. It had sort of a California classic rock kind of vibe to it. It crooked rain is i will interject only to say that i think crooked rain is also super weird.

Track 3:

[43:35] It is it helped them break through but it is a weird album like it starts weird it has like a full studio sound like it sounds like i know that was made in a bit of a patchwork as well but like it sounds more like a studio record um sure they went they went to a place that that it wasn't going to be noisy and hissy and ambient even though it has elements of that like it has a warmth to it but it's a weird and wildly arranged album too but this is even well coming off a slant coming off a slanted though it seems it just seems more you know readily available i suppose to to a wider birth of people yeah but what i was going to say is it almost reminds me of what sm did when he went solo that first record is so accessible and so poppy and so hooky and so earwormy it's amazing and then he did piglib after that which i fucking adore but it's so off the wall compared to the self-titled debut yeah and if we're viewing malcolm as you know uh obviously obviously the main driver of of their songs then yeah it's it's his whims and it's his.

Track 3:

[44:50] His notions for a batch of songs like you know i think bright in the corners is uh on some level it's the cleanest sounding pavement album but it's also the most esoteric and and you know i the songs sprawl and they're all over the place as well but it's also somehow more coherent and contained than wowie zowie like but but the songs stretch out that's their what did we talk about with somebody recently uh maybe it was with the pavement guys uh grateful dead type stuff yeah sure yeah like it it has a it's it's a little more zen it's less frenetic even though the imagery and whatnot is pretty intense and some of the arrangements are too so yeah i think it's just modes again this goes back to my argument i love albums i love knowing that we're hearing where a band was at, at that given time. Uh, and, and that, that batch of songs, however, like wowie zowie, however disparate the songs might be from one another, that's what they were into. Like, that's what was going on with them at the time, whether it had anything to do with external considerations or perceptions about who they were, uh, how successful they wanted to be. Like Like, that might just be all bullshit I'm making up. It could just be that's just what he had, what Malcomus and what the band had going.

Track 3:

[46:18] And this is it. You know, why waste it? This is, it's all over the place. Let's put it out as one thing. The next album, a little, like, I think it's, it's fair to say, uh, Bright in the Corners. Well, you know, maybe it's not fair to say, I'll ask you. Bright in the Corners, probably safe to say a more coherent sounding album than Why We Sowie. Absolutely. Yeah. It's, it's a more album-y album. Right. In a sense. But I also think Slanton and Enchanted all sounds like it's from the same expression, too. Sure, I guess I mean album to album. I just love the way it opens. There's a middle, and then there's an end. There's a finite end with Finn. Yeah yeah well i mean maybe i don't know like we we mentioned lollapalooza uh there was something going on in the in the moment in the cultural moment where you it was really cool to be an open-ended music listener it was really cool to be like yes we're playing with a folk musician we're playing with shanae o'connor and cypress hill on the same day bonkers and the jesus lizard like on some level that is a culture saying everyone is welcome every sound has merit.

Track 3:

[47:34] We're sick of the orthodoxies we're sick of there being camps um and so maybe wowie zowie reflects that too uh on a musical level it can be noise damaged it can be a beautiful if strange folk song, it can be a country song, it can be a goddamn screamer where Malcolm clearly loses his voice you know, on Half a Canyon or whatever. Like, it's.

Track 3:

[48:01] Yeah, as we speak of it, I love that album. And like I say, though, I'm having trouble decontextualizing this song from the whole. Right. And that's more about me. But if we really dial into it, when I say this is a good exemplification of Pavement as a whole, maybe it's a good exemplification of Wowie Zowie as a whole. It has that beauty and thoughtful lyricism where you're like, what's he talking about? What's going on? this is really interesting imagery. Is he talking about Corpus Christi, Texas? Or is he talking about Corpus Christi, the kind of event? Like, I remember just thinking right away, why is he singing about Texas? Like, I have that sense memory. And I have this song and some, I'm just a man. Like, I have just little bits of lyrics that are just always with me that I just hum to myself. And yeah, I, this is one of those songs where I just have sort of mindlessly sung it out loud to myself as i'm sort of tooling around my my life you know i don't know if you have that where you just have these lyrical lyrical fragments but this is definitely one of those songs.

Track 3:

[49:08] And uh i think um yeah it exemplifies both the band and the album in a really fascinating way for me cool well is there anything you want to say uh more about father to a sister of thought or, well you know i'm a lyrics guy and we didn't uh have a chance to get too far into it but i also i know that i mean it's on the surface it seems to be about spirituality and uh people's relationships to that but with malcolm is also you never really know um on some level i think he's spoken about this song and whatnot but um no i don't know all i'll say is i marvel at the guy and i don't think uh he's one of these people i don't think we marvel at enough as a guitar player as a musician as a as a lyricist and particularly on this song as a singer and i hope uh this isn't uh some people don't find this to be a hyperbole but you know i think we take him for granted as He's a vocalist, and this is a great example of what he can do.

Track 3:

[50:15] Agreed. Well, Vish, it's been dynamite to talk to you today. We went off on a few different directions, and I'm glad we got to do that. Do you want to talk a little bit more about you and the podcast? And I want to say right off the bat that I said it earlier, Creative Control, it's with K's, Creative Control. So if you're searching for it on the Google, you're going to want to spell it correctly. Correctly well thank you thank visha style of correctly well i will uh immediately say that this is a reference to a hot snake song of the same name creative control um so that's why i didn't make up the case thing and now there's like a fashion company called creative control and i think someone like fashions themselves a rapper and they call themselves creative control but they kind of show up and they don't show up i don't know what's going on but anyway yeah that's my show i mean on the internet they'll be like tweeting ramp like rabidly and then they just disappear. And then I don't know what's going on. Anyway. Yeah. Nothing to do. I, Hey, I copped the name from a band I like, so I can't really complain. Complain spelled with a K by the way.

Track 3:

[51:23] So, uh, yeah, I have this podcast and as we're speaking, uh, you know, it's, it's still going, uh, and it's more important to me than ever because, uh, it is now my main, job at the moment as maybe by October it won't be, but, um.

Track 3:

[51:41] Yeah, so all I can say is if you support the work of people like me and JD and want to support podcasters, crowdfunding, I don't know about you, JD, and we don't have to talk too much shop, but the advertising revenue is very minimal and it's honestly a little gross. No offense to your sponsors.

Track 3:

[52:01] I'd rather just not have it. Yeah, I'd rather not have it. But yeah, the crowdfunding and the Patreon that I have is particularly important to me at the moment. So I have different incentives and different tiers and all that kind of stuff, like pay tiers, and it's flexible and monthly and all that kind of stuff. So sorry to make this about the money. We've already talked about some of the content or whatever, like the people I talked to. Yeah, I'm proud of it. It seems to be relentless. It's never going to stop unless I do and stop making it. That sounded morbid. uh by the way if i die the show will likely die too i i just want to be clear about that but no i i love doing the show it's afforded me um some wonderful experiences and both in the conversations and then just from people like you jd reaching out wanting to talk i mean it means a lot to me so thank you for giving me a time to some time to plug and thank you for having me on this wonderful show of yours and for the the lovely conversation it means a lot yeah for me Me too. Thank you so much. All right, everybody, that's what we've got today. So be cool. Make sure you're safe and wash your goddamn hands.

Track 1:

[53:15] Thanks for listening to Meeting Malcolmists, a pavement podcast where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email. JD at MeetingMalcolmists.com. You.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week jD is joined by Kyra from the cornfields of Western Illinois to discuss both her Pavement origin story as well as her perspective on track 19.

Transcript:

Track 2:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50. Blackout. So what do you think, Jessica, from Ann Arbor? I think it is a very solid Pavement song. Yeah. Like, I think it belongs in the top 20 to 30. Okay. Because, I don't know, it hits all the right Pavement beats. Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band Pavement.

Track 3:

[0:27] And you're listening to The Countdown. Hey, it's J.D. here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for Seminal Indie Rock Band, Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that you selected with your very own Top 20 ballots. I then tabulated the results using an abacus, six taquitos, and a bottle of bismal. How will your favorite songs fare in the rankings? Rankings you'll need to tune in to find out so there's that this week i'm joined by pavement superfan kyra from the cornfields of western illinois illinois illinois how the fuck is it going my friend it's uh pretty fucking great thank you for asking all right well um let's let's not beat around the bush let's get right into this let's talk about your pavement origin story.

Track 3:

[1:27] Okay um i got into pavement in the early 90s um i um graduated high school in 1994 so that was the year oh cool all right so um so you know um yeah i was 18 years old i was getting ready to graduate high school and um i'd been hearing about pavement you know and like spin and stuff magazine spin magazine and stuff like that and it sounded cool but here in the middle of fucking nowhere cornfield um they just didn't have everything you know or um you know just things were slower to get here maybe yeah stuff like that um but it's a it's a small town western illinois i lived in a town of 800 people 801 people and um i'm right now i'm in the college town that's not far from there which is a town of like 20 000 i think okay western illinois University and that's where I live now and that's where I kind of grew up around here and ended up back here but so anyway I was a teenage kid and I was into Nirvana and Pearl Jam Soundgarden all that all that stuff Alice in Chains but I was also getting into cool stuff I had a really cool curiosity I think you know I was into uh Dinosaur Jr. I was getting into Sonic Youth and uh.

Track 3:

[2:43] Sugar, The Replacements, REM, Morphine, just stuff like that. I think I was getting into alternative type music. And I was also really getting into Bob Dylan around that time. Oh, wow. That's pretty diverse.

Track 3:

[3:00] So Pavement kind of clicked with me. I got that CD called No Alternative. It was a compilation. It had a bunch of cool bands. It had a new Nirvana song on it. I think that's why I wanted to get it, because it had a cool Nirvana. A new hidden track on it or something like that um but the pavement song was really cool it was unseen power of the picket fence which is that weird rem kind of tribute not one of their best tunes but it's fun and it's cool and it introduced me to their how goofy and uh quirky and there's there's their sound and stuff like that right right so and i thought that's cool i like that filed it away maybe, hip-pocketed it. But then I got off work. I worked at the Hardee's here in town, the fast food restaurant. I got off work, went home, and I turned on my little black-and-white TV I had in my room and watched the end of the Jay Leno show. And he had pavement as his guests on his show, and I just, they played Cut Your Hair. Yeah. And it was, I just thought, I fell in love right there. I was like, this is the coolest thing I've ever heard.

Track 3:

[4:17] And... And you're not wrong. Yeah, right? And it was around that time where Kurt Cobain died, too. And I was a big Nirvana fan. And shit was just really serious and heavy and kind of depressing. I was listening to a lot of Pearl Jam and Nirvana and Soundgarden and Alice in Chains. And everybody was a junkie and everybody was depressed. And pavement was a cool thing to come across around that time when I was an 18-year-old impressionable youth. because it wasn't really like that. It was fun, but it still felt very urgent, I felt. Their music felt vital and urgent and had a lot of depth and meaning for an 18-year-old kid, I think. Yeah. So it was a good breather from that serious stuff I've been listening to, and I was just instantly in love with that. And my friend, I think I went to school a couple days later, and my friend's like, hey, I bought that pavement tape that you told me about on Jay Leno or whatever. And he loaned it to me, and it was Crooked Ring, Crooked Ring. And of course, that's the greatest album ever made. So that was a pretty big one to get and get into. And I fell in love with that instantly, all those great songs. Songs, you know, Gold Sound, Silent Kid, Fillmore Jive, Ranged Life.

Track 3:

[5:47] Every song on that one's a banger, right? It's a masterpiece. Yeah, so I got into that. I was like, well, I got to go get more of this. So I came over here to the record store. We used to have four record stores in this town. Now we have zero. Oh, shit.

Track 3:

[6:02] Sucks but um anyway there's uh i came over here and bought the i saw another pavement cd and it was uh watery domestic chicken on the cover and that that's also the greatest thing ever made the greatest ep ever made i guess the greatest album ever no argument from me right and this was all within like maybe a few weeks a week or a week of each other and i just loved that i thought that was the best best thing i'd ever heard um and yeah i was just in love with paper after that And I was like, this is my band. You found your band. Yeah. And I eventually, over the next few months, started getting the other stuff. I got that Westing, which I don't know if you can see it back there, my little Steve Keen of the Westing cover. A friend gave me that. She bought it down from him in Oklahoma. But anyway, that's a great, that's a cool collection of tunes. And I was like, introduced me to their early stuff, which I thought was pretty cool. But I really like what they were doing currently more, you know, yeah, they're crooked rain stuff and you know And then I started just buying everything I could get from pavement and then I heard slanted enchanted I'm like, holy shit. This is also the greatest album ever made. So Yeah, yeah all that stuff. And then wowie zowie came out like maybe a year later, you know It wasn't very long and that one was pretty amazing too little little more of a head fuck than the other ones which is I.

Track 3:

[7:27] Awesome you know and i just a big fan ever since um did you convert people as well i tried you had like so that you had some sort of echo chamber to be talking about this or were you isolated with your fandom um well that's a good question because my friends some of my friends kind of dug when i dug pavement and when i played it for them but i don't think they were they clicked with it like i I did, where they were totally in love with it, but they enjoyed that album, Crooked Rain and Crooked Rain. I think I might have played them something off Debris Slide or something like that. I don't know about this one, but I remember that. I actually joined the Navy right after I graduated high school and found out in the Navy that nobody liked pavement or heard of pavement.

Track 3:

[8:18] I hardly met anybody. buddy um but i was traveling a lot and i would go to different towns to different record stores and find the find different pavement things so that was kind of fun and i would try to turn people onto it and it didn't really click very much i converted a few people though over the years i guess i had a roommate have people to talk to about it right yeah i had a roommate who was a drummer and i played him uh watery domestic i think and he was just blown away by the drumming I think that's Gary Young, right? Doing the crazy drumming on that one. Yeah, the drumming on that was Texas Never Whispers is so cool. And he was pretty blown away by that. He's like, this drumming is so different and not your typical drumming, I guess. So I converted a few people here and there over the years. Did you ever manage to see them live?

Track 3:

[9:08] I did, yeah, finally, two years ago. Oh, cool. I saw them at the Chicago Theater. Yeah, good venue? They were so good. It's a classic venue, but it's not my preferred type of venue to see them in, but it was a beautiful place, and I was seeing the greatest band ever there. They sounded really good. They sounded so good on that. Yeah, they were great. So um i saw that i saw um steven malchemist and the jicks also when they first went on tour in like 2001 and that was a really cool show yeah yeah um bob was driving the rv and uh selling t-shirts really it just seemed really like a cool little tour um i think steven's um malchemist's girlfriend was in the band kind of for a while there um and she was kind of like doing background own vocals and stuff like that so it was kind of a fun gig um yeah i saw him on the pig lib tour.

Track 3:

[10:13] Uh but i didn't make it out i don't i wonder where he would have played here for pig lib he played at a bar called lee's palace which is like just a great venue to you know just yeah he's into and i like those be with your people right i would rather do that than be at the show the Chicago theater but um this was at the metro where I saw in Chicago which is a it's kind of the cool venue in Chicago where all the cool bands play but um and I'm from small town it's three hours to Chicago for me a three or four hour drive um and you know it's scary in Chicago because it's hard to drive and traffic and stuff like that but that's why I didn't go to a lot of shows when I was a kid.

Track 3:

[10:56] Just because I'm a hillbilly and uh I um didn't make it to see them when I when I would have loved to have seen them when they were at Lollapalooza or playing small clubs and stuff like that, touring behind Slanton and Enchanted. But no, I just kind of didn't get the chance to actually see them. I remember actually my now ex-wife bought me tickets to see them just on a whim. I told her I wanted to go see them in New York when they first reunited, like the reunion in 2010. 2010, I guess it would have been. Yeah, and she actually bought tickets, but we ended up going to Jamaica and getting married instead around the same time, so I had to cancel that. I mean, that's kind of a bust.

Track 3:

[11:45] So I kind of missed the opportunity there, I guess. But yeah, I've just been a huge fan ever since. I always felt like all of their album releases were like an event. And I remember hanging out like when I was stationed in Texas, hanging out with some friends when Bright in the Corners came out.

Track 3:

[12:08] Playing it for them, and they actually really liked some of the songs on it. I remember, like, Stereo and Shady Lane and stuff like that. I thought that stuff could have been a hit. I was like, this stuff's going to be a hit, guys. And they're like, yeah, sure. And, of course, I'm always wrong. I was always wrong about that. I'm actually a radio person. I used to run the alternative rock station here in town when they had one, and I was always a champion of pavement.

Track 3:

[12:32] I do have a funny story, I guess, kind of funny. So I worked for the radio station here in town. there's like this local group of six radio stations yeah um and i was the um i ran the alternative station i was the music director and the dj there and then uh also was like the classic morning classic rock morning show person and um also the news kind of a news person too i just kind of did a lot of things jack of all trades or whatever but um our little station group got bought out by this uh corporate butthole hedge fund dude came down and bought the stations and then fired all the people basically but um they kind of kept me around for a couple months and i learned how to they talked told me i had to do the news so i was the news director and i had to make news stories and stuff like that which not much of a journalist but i was doing i was trying but um eventually they had they were going to fire me too and they did and i knew they were going to fire me so i did not go out without a fight and i um made this news story about how oh, the new owner was a butthole and all this stuff. But, you know, I still had like two something minutes left on my newscast.

Track 3:

[13:40] So I play, I'm like, oh, and here's pavement, gold sounds. And then I put gold sounds in there. And then I broadcast that out the rest of the day. They fired me across the whole area on all six of their stations. And so that went out and I exposed people to pavement and made my little...

Track 3:

[14:03] Snide remarks about the the butthole uh guy who bought the stations and fired everybody and, it was uh it was a good feeling you played gold sounds yeah yeah i just i just thought that was a good it was it was a good length i think it's it's it might be my favorite of their songs i i don't know what i don't have i don't think i have a favorite but i have many but um yeah that Very nostalgic. Yeah, it is. Yeah, it's just got that feel. Yeah, just something wistful about it, I guess.

Track 3:

[14:37] But, yeah, that was... Do you have a go-to record at this point? Like, do you have one that you'll put on, you know, when you're feeling pavement-y? Or does it depend on a specific mood? It's definitely a mood thing. It seems like Wowie Zowie is always getting played around here a lot for some reason. Um because that one's that one's big it's like the white album kind of you know favorite albums so it's a big long one with uh different moods and stuff like that and i kind of it's kind of how i am a moody person so i like the roller coaster ride of that one and i like the kind of woozy sound of a lot of the songs on that one i think it's just this beautiful sounding record and.

Track 3:

[15:20] Um, it's got songs I don't like on it, even like a couple that kind of, I find a little more jarring, but, uh, it's still the one I've been listening to the most, I guess. But I, um, the first three, I think are, you know, the greatest albums ever made. And, um, I like the other ones also. So I have those ones on vinyl. I don't have the last two albums on vinyl and I play a lot of vinyl. So I guess that's why I, um, but my kids are into it too. That's kind of cool. They've, uh, tick tock was the harness your hopes thing. I heard my kids listening to it and I was like, Whoa, that's so cool. And they, uh, they would like, I had a t-shirt and didn't fit me anymore. So they would, they would fight over the t-shirt. They had a couple of daughters.

Track 3:

[16:10] Yeah. Right. But they, uh, they did. I tried to get them a little deeper into it, but they, they know harness your hopes. Which is cool and uh i was like why what does this mean my daughter said it's for a fit check i'm like what the heck is a fit check it's like an outfit showing off your outfit yeah i didn't know that it's been around yeah yeah so that's it's over my head too i'm 50 years old yeah, so i think that's pretty cool and then i've they've gotten into it it's cool seeing younger kids get into it i see it every once in a while i see somebody who's considerably younger than to myself almost in my kids age and getting into Pavement I'm like that's good it means it's I was right this whole time you know about this great band justice.

Track 3:

[16:55] Exactly well Kyra what do you say we flip the record and get into track number 19.

Track 3:

[17:08] Okay alright we'll do that right after this.

Track 3:

[19:46] This week, we're going deep on Box Elder. How are you feeling about song number 19, Kyra, from the COWI? I fucking love Box Elder so much. It's a great song. It's one of the earlier Pavement songs. I think it's a very early Pavement song. Say it's, you know, song number one. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Which is cool. And it's one that really holds up, I think, too. So I was saying, if you're just joining us, I got into Pavement in 1994 at Crook and Rain, and it was awesome. And then I got Watery Domestic, and then I think a few weeks later, I got the Westing collection of tunes. And yeah, I just remember that one, immediately liking that song.

Track 3:

[20:37] One thing I like about it is it's got a twee kind of twee element to it almost like a beat happening or something like that, like K Records Calvin Johnson kind of sound which I didn't really know much about then but when I hear it now and there's also something R.E.M. About that guitar riff on that I agree with you there Early R.E.M., for sure. Yeah, and I know that it was a big influence on them. And I'm a huge R.E.M. fan now. So there's that. And that song, I actually had to look this up, but it said that it's a true collaboration between the two, Stephen and Scott. Spiral, yeah. Yeah, they kind of just, it was his riff, I think, and then Malcolm Husky wrote the lyrics and sang over it. And they didn't really write songs like that before or after. It's kind of one of the only ones that was like really a collaboration like that, I guess. Very. I mean, I think they were all collaborations in one way or the other, but...

Track 3:

[21:42] Yeah, for sure. On that tune. I love the lyrics of the tune. I love the meaning of it. I'm from Vermont, Illinois. Vermont IL, population 801. And Box Elder MO is just, I'm going to head to Box Elder MO. It's just he's going to head to some hillbilly ass town in Missouri. It's kind of what that's what i got out of it anyway um but being from a small town and being somebody who's different i'm a transgender woman um i didn't know it then but it's something i've always felt and it's something i still feel and getting hearing that line i've got to get the fuck out of this town meant something back then and recently maybe in the last couple years that tune is really everyone's like man i really love this song because i love that line i've got to get get the fuck out of this town because i was living in this other small town nearby which is just very, bigotty town and i was ready to get the fuck out of there so i'm glad to be out of that town um had to get the fuck out of that town and come over here to yes box elder love that that it means box elder yeah it's got some deep deep meaning um i think and uh yeah i'm in a place where there's I was in the town, there's not a lot of pavement fans, you know?

Track 3:

[23:02] So get the fuck out of this town. So yeah, it's a cool song. I think their sound and their songwriting improved significantly after that. But as an early tune, I think it's definitely one of their best. And it's one that definitely means something to me, I think, for sure. Love that song. Love Box Elder. It's a good one. What do you think about where it landed on the countdown, number 19?

Track 3:

[23:33] That's actually perfect. Do you think it's a fair spot for it? Yeah. I guess, yeah. I think it's a perfect spot. I mean, considering they made so many other great songs and that they really improved on their sound after that, but also as an early tune and they're finding their sound, I think that was definitely one of the most important songs in there.

Track 3:

[23:56] In their canon of awesome tunes. Well, really, I mean, if you think back, this song was covered by Wedding Present and played by John Peel. And I wonder if John Peel hadn't got his hands or mine wrapped around pavement. Like, they are so huge in the UK. Yeah. And it just makes me wonder what, you know, what would have happened had they not had access to you know john peel it would have been very interesting but so that's how he got into them through wedding presents cover that's how uh my memory is so shit but i feel that sounds yeah okay yeah if i'm wrong send me an email jd meeting malcolmus at gmail.com new email address everybody well kyra it's been good talking to you today from uh western illinois and uh talking about box elder i enjoyed myself i hope you enjoyed yourself and um that's about what we have to say do you have anything you want to plug.

Track 3:

[25:04] Um no i mean i i host a i host a folk uh alternative country americana radio show on tri-states public radio every sunday night at seven o'clock if people are into that sort of stuff um but uh that's what i do but nothing to plug i'm just here to talk about pavement.

Track 3:

[25:25] Love it i love the show it's a it's great show keep up the good work oh thanks that means a lot for real that's what i gotta say this week and uh we'll be back next week with song number 18 we are in the thick of the top 20 my goodness wash your goddamn hands.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

jD, what gives it's Friday! Well I've decided to take a pause to reflect on the list thus far. I've enlisted Allison from Portland and Elvar from Iceland to go on this journey. They will discuss, dissect and debate the list as it stands thus far. Enjoy!

Transcript:

Track 2:

[0:15] Hey, it's J.D. here, back for another episode of the Pavement Top 50 Countdown. Hey, wait a minute. It's Friday. I can't be doing the countdown today. I just did number 20 on Monday. We're cracking the top 20.

Track 2:

[0:31] This coming Monday, we're going to hit song number 19, if you can believe it. We're so far down this list, it makes me cuckoo bird. because we've yet to sort of analyze the list with context. So we're going to remedy that today. I've got two people that are chomping at the bit to discuss, dissect, and talk in detail. How do you like that alliteration? About the list thus far. Song 50 to song 20. That's right. right, they are going to tear that son of a bitch limb from fucking limb and talk to you about whether songs are rated too high, too low, just right. Are songs missing from this list that should be in the 50 to 20 range? Are there songs in the 50 to 20 range that you would not have in the top 50 or should they be inside the top 50 if they're not inside the top 20 i don't know what i just said there i'm a little fucked up so there's that so let's get right to this let's waste no more time we have got allison from portland and elvar from iceland joining us elvar how the fuck are you doing, man?

Track 1:

[1:56] Pretty good. Pretty good. Elvar over here. Good to be here, man. Thanks for inviting me on. It's good to have you over.

Track 2:

[2:03] So from Icelandic, we go to Portlandic. Portland get it uh anyway uh allison from portland how are you doing motherfucker it's.

Track 1:

[2:14] Going great um allison over here and uh yeah thanks for thanks for having us yeah it's really great i love the pavement poster in your background by the way thank you that's pretty pretty slick um so you, know i don't think it's fair to go into the list before we get a sense of your pavement origins origin stories. We sort of need to hear those. So, Allison, we'll start with you. Yeah, I'll give a little origin story.

Track 1:

[2:44] So, my freshman year of college, it would have been all through high school and stuff. I was really into post-punk and just all kinds of punk rock and stuff like that. And I got really, really into the fall. And then I met a guy on an internet dating website who told me if I should, or I guess it would be an app, but he said, if you like the fall, you should listen to Pavement because the fall was one of their influences. And we can get into that and my thoughts on that opinion that some people have a little bit. But either way, I listened to Pavement and totally loved it. And it was just kind of like the soundtrack to my college career. And then since then, I've just, it always stuck with me. And over the past couple of years, getting to see him play all the reunion shows and stuff, it's just been a huge part of my life. So, yeah, it's a band that's influenced by all the stuff that I love. And did something totally unique. So yeah, that's kind of how I got into them. How cool is that? It's almost as though they were constructed in a laboratory just for Allison. That's how I feel, yeah.

Track 2:

[4:09] So Allison, is there anything you want to tell us about live performances you've seen? Anything like that?

Track 1:

[4:16] The Portland reunion show as they kicked off the tour a couple years ago. Well, I saw them two times since then. Then I saw him in Seattle and then also in Salt Lake City since then. And then hopefully seeing him, well, definitely seeing him in Seattle again later this year. So, like, cool. Oh, yeah? Oh, cool. Yeah, they're playing Bumper Shoot, so. Right, right, right. Yeah. And then I guess that'll be the end, right? Because we've got news of the Hard Quartet. Yeah.

Track 1:

[4:47] Yeah i think what's that alvar you haven't heard no what's that malcolm has uh announced his next band oh yeah the hard quartet yeah the hard quartet yeah i heard the hardcore set yeah how do you guys like the new track by the way i honestly haven't listened yeah you allison have you heard it yeah i like it yeah it's pretty good yeah very very gixxy for sure yeah for sure yeah i'm excited to see the rest of the record definitely i'm probably gonna wait for the whole record to drop because i like to listen to things yeah like completely when i heard the song i was like yeah it's i'm gonna i'm gonna love it in context definitely it's a context song i think you know today is all about context isn't it we're putting context to the list you know we're now i want to hear about your yes yes sure so in 2010 i was introduced to payment in my early 20s so i used to be like a rocker like i was into guns and roses when i was seven and music has always been like big for me and then this guy outney from this icelandic band fm belfast he was like hey you have to check out pavement you know like wowie sawie and i got p clip that's the first one i got okay i thought it was okay then i went to this record store and this guy was like yeah this is the best payment album gave me bright in the corners which is debatable and then i just got into it i remember just like going to youtube and listening to these like slanted and and and crooked rain, and just like, it blew my mind, you know?

Track 1:

[6:17] Like, it changed my life. And like I said, I was like 22 or something. So I got fairly late into the game, but I'm born in the late 80s. So...

Track 1:

[6:28] I saw Stephen Malkovich and the Jigs at November 19th in 2011 in Milan at a place called The Tunnel and we had a really nice interaction. I did like a shout out. I shouted out, do not feed the claustrophobic oyster which was my funny way of kind of requesting the track you know and Malkovich did like a skit like we but a lot I remember like I forget what he said but he finished it up with we don't know in songs about oysters so you know that was pretty cool so.

Track 1:

[7:04] And i don't know if you guys know but pavement played here last uh summer like three nights yeah and that's like a thing like wilco did it i went and saw all three wilco shows nick cave just did it because he sold out so it's like a hot shit in iceland to come and do like a vegas you know thing so so that was pretty i'm so regretful that i didn't make it i wanted to go so badly and i made some really good friends from america who i'm talking to like daily now you know like through through pain so that's awesome so yeah pavement bringing people together since 1989 1989. Definitely. Definitely. Let me say this though. They did play some of the same songs like, you know, throughout the night. What Wilco did, they played three, 23 tracks at, and never the same song. And that was mind blowing. So kudos to Wilco. I don't know if I can throw that out at the payment. Of course you can. Of course you can. That was like, like fuck, you know, so, but awesome. Awesome. Great. That's my origin story.

Track 1:

[8:13] All right. Well, we sound like we've got two qualified, bonafide folks here to analyze this list. So let's start at the start.

Track 1:

[8:25] What do you think? Have you been listening? Have you been arguing with yourself when you hear some of these songs come out and you hear these people talk about the virtues of these songs? Songs um are you pleasantly surprised are you disappointed give it to me all alvar you can start buddy a little bit of both do you want me to start with the songs who are too lower or or too high you know you you are the leader my friend let me start with this loretta scars is at number 34 and that's probably my single favorite songs of all time uh wow just i don't know just the way he You guys know the song, the way he sings it in this pleating, nonchalant tone.

Track 1:

[9:17] And when it kicks into full gear, I can just fucking hear eons of human history in that song, for lack of a better word. Really? And like the way he sings it, like the way he sings Loretta's scars, the way his voice like winds up on Loretta and then lazily speaks the scars. I fucking love that. That's my favorite vocal melody of all time. And I don't know why, just like if people, for the last 10 years, if people ask me, what's your favorite song? I always go to that song. It's just.

Track 1:

[9:57] So you're pissed at 34? 34 yeah where is it on your list it's it's definitely higher than 34 because i i love that song um i don't know i'm not super good with like the different like with like pedal talk but whatever tone um he's got on that like fuzzy slanted era guitar is like one of my favorite tones so yeah um i think loretta scars is like one of the best examples of that and um i don't one of my favorite things that malchus does with his voice is like change register a lot like kind of what you're saying and um he does it beautifully in that song um yeah i definitely think that one could have been higher but i think a lot of the slanted songs could be higher but that's my my My own preference. And the lyrics. Interesting note, at number 34, that's the first song from Slanted and Enchanted on the list. That's the lowest one. That's the lowest one. Interesting. Yeah. That's insane. That's insane. I don't know how many others are on the list. I can't tell you, but. Right. But.

Track 1:

[11:16] But it's cool. He's using like, Mark Musch uses two guitar tunings on this album for these guitar heads. And he's using the C, G, D, G, B, E tuning, which makes this really nice dissonance. Like he's doing pop chords, but like, you know, that's what's great about this album. You know, he's doing like pop chords, these weird left field pop structures, but with these, you know, alternative tunings that really bring this awesome, awesome flavor, you know, and Gary's on the drums.

Track 1:

[11:49] It's just like, I don't know. It's just a beast. She's a beast yeah i could go on about that song you know but like you know i'll just i'll just have to do like a separate youtube video on it but you know yeah definitely allison do you have one you want to pick up i was very surprised to see where is it so i can make sure i get the number right i was very surprised to see pueblo at 39 because i thought that could be way higher um it's funny because like in the 30s and 40s i i mean i guess that's still pretty high out of 100 but a lot of my absolute favorites are on here so like pueblo number 39 and starlings the slipstream at 40 those two are like two of my favorites so seeing those ranked at that level right next to each other um is a little bit interesting i think they're similar songs too um just in the way that they kind of get into this like mellow ballad um era from from that that time of pavement where he kind of leaned into the more melodic ballads a little bit.

Track 1:

[13:04] Uh, and it's like a lot of belting out and sort of like a climax in the song. Uh, I really associate that with those two tracks. So I was really thinking it would be higher than, um, that level. And then there's some other ones on there. I said slanted, but I guess more of what I was referring to is like the early, like Westing and like before they did, uh, more of the full length records. And it was a lot of like EPs and stuff. A lot of those early days are my favorite songs. So I thought that some of these would be a little bit higher too. Like Home would be one. Yeah. Yeah, there's very little representation on the three EPs. I'm just looking quickly here. Yeah. And. Five, six songs. Yeah, like maybe Pacific Trim. There's one from Pacific Trim. So in the top. Yeah. Gosh, in the stuff that we've listened to, I almost gave something away. But in the stuff that we've listened to so far, there's nothing from the three EPs. Oh, really? I thought Forklift was in there. Wait, do you mean the early ones? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What about Hackler Spray? Isn't that there?

Track 1:

[14:21] Hackler Spray is in the 93. It's on the top 100. It's on the top 100, but not the top 50. Oh, we're not going to the 100. Sorry, sorry, sorry. We're talking about 50, yeah. We're talking about 50, of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. I was going over those two a lot and being like, I don't know about this, but anyways. I saw that... Can I go on? I saw that Blackout was number 20. That's easily a top five for me.

Track 1:

[16:49] A top five definitely and I feel that song and paired with like Motion Suggest Itself and Father of a Sister of a Thought like these three are examples of Malkmus and the band, making up this like unique style when the music and the lyrics and the melodies and the performances are all put together somewhere between indie rock and alternative country but neither, and I don't know, it's so weary and so stoned and so depressed, and I feel like even if we listen to the stuff that was going on on Crooked and the stuff that was going on Bright in the Corners, similar songs like Lorraine's Live or Finn or something.

Track 1:

[17:37] There's this point in time where they made the songs, and just like Pueblo, and Grounded, for me, probably top five songs ever on an album, never matched in production, and resonance just the way it sounds, the way it feels with the lyrics I haven't done psychedelics and listened to those songs but it would just really crush my soul probably in a good way and I realized that going through and I'm really listening to it and I was like wow this is the best stuff that I, and I can't really, if you guys can give me an example of something that sounds similar I would love to hear it you know like Like, like, like if I could challenge you like that, I don't know. I know I like, I'm experiencing this different differently than you guys, but like really blows my mind.

Track 1:

[18:28] Like, yeah, I'm trying to think, but like, wow. He is an interesting record to try and find comps on. Right. Because it's so all over the place. Yeah. It's got elements of those first EPs. Like, I think those, you know, those burst songs that are anywhere from like a minute 30 to like two 10. You know, that almost feel incomplete, but they're still awesome.

Track 1:

[18:50] They're on there. And then you've got something like Father to a Sister of Thought. And then you've got, like, it's just so diverse. Yeah. Yeah. The reason I love Wowie Zowie is because it really feels like they piecemealed together a record that's just like super, like you said, diverse. Verse and it has a it has a very sort of like exile on main street or um yeah yeah i mean honestly that'd be my biggest comparison just in terms of like the spirit of the record because there's so many different things going on and so many different types of songs and even like, genres almost like yes some of it is really poppy stuff some of it is like they really harken back to like the early EPs on Huawei Zhaoyi.

Track 1:

[19:38] Yeah would you guys never just cut it down to like a 46 two-side record have you never thought about that i would love to know the the spiral like i hope someday that comes out did he want to do that he had a track listing at some point for the record that was about an 11 song record i think okay and uh i would love to know the sequence and i would love to know what didn't make the cut but that would be crazy would you guys not cut anything of it i would keep it exactly as it is yeah yeah i probably would too i'm i'm very much um i really think that they got their records right in terms of like the sequence of them and what songs were included on them like i love hearing you know the bonus releases that have come out that incorporate like like, unreleased songs or b-sides from singles or whatever, but I think the way they laid their records out is pretty perfect most of the time. Well put, well put, yeah.

Track 1:

[20:40] They're five records, and they're all different, and they're all very, very good, like, bordering on masterpieces if they're not masterpieces. Like, don't get me wrong, it's my ultimate favorite band, but I love to nitpick, you know, like... That's why you're here, buddy, that's why you're here. That's fun, yeah. I was happy to see You Are Light in the top 50 because I feel like that's a super underrated Terror Twilight song.

Track 1:

[21:12] It's definitely like the highlight of that record for me. So I was really happy that was on there. What do you guys think about that one? It's one of my favorites on that record, for sure. It made my top 70, definitely. And yeah, sorry, I went over the 50, I forgot. But yeah. Oh, that's okay. You're the light. That's a beautiful one. Definitely. It is. You are a light. I love the way it begins. I know that sounds very specific, but it's just sort of flipping on, kind of, you know? Yeah. Yeah, definitely.

Track 1:

[21:48] And whatever where where is that on the it was number 45 is you are light okay yeah so shoot the shoot the singer at 25 that for me is a top 10 what do you guys think oof yeah i mean all of the i feel like watery domestic songs are way up there for me i think he really they really found.

Track 1:

[22:14] What the band was about with those songs like yeah the singer i'm glad it's in the top 25 because i feel like some of the the ep songs like don't get as uh much traction with like newer, you know pavement fans like it took me a while after getting into them to listen to like the eps and stuff like that so glad that people are listening to it i think that's a great song what's interesting to me is you look at shoot the singer is 25 and then texas never whispers is 22 i would definitely flip those two yeah uh i love texas never whispers i think uh watery is, absolutely perfect it's it's even the even the outtakes from it greenlander etc are are uh so So Stark, um, they're, they're great songs as well, but, um, I like shoot the singer better. So yeah, it would be, it would be, it would have to be higher. I don't know where I could put it, but I feel like everything from watery could be in my top 15. Yeah. Like lions is 61. That's definitely a top 20. And yeah.

Track 1:

[23:30] Yeah, that's a great one. And it's also like you said, this perfection of this era. We have this super low, down-tuned guitar accompanying the bass that's barely audible, and then a slightly distorted guitar making all these single notes all over the place accompanying the vocals. And Malkomash is just nailing the vocals, and Gary is just nailing these drum fills, and the lyrics are great. And I don't know if I'm going too deep into it, but I feel like the lyrics on Watery, They are their own things. They are different from the lyrics on Crooked Rain and different from the lyrics.

Track 1:

[24:05] On Maui Sawi. It's amazing. I'm so glad we got this session because they were evolving so fast. And even like these extra tracks, like on the LA Desert Origins, we have like sessions from 93, like early Elevate Me Later and Rains Live and Grounded stuff. Stuff that's just like the band it's got gary it's got like some of it's got gary right yeah and then you can see the bands just doing different versions of these songs and just how, how full of magic they were back then you know just like i don't know just makes me realize how freaking great they actually are and were you know so yeah watery definitely absolutely yeah definitely up there yeah they found it yeah i one of my favorite things about gary's drumming um i play the drums and he really inspired me a lot because um he really leaned into like you don't have to play like a one four beat and keep it like you know a regular rock beat like he always kind of threw in some sort of like strange like instrumentation for keeping time and i think a A lot of the watery songs had that and a lot of the slanted songs had that.

Track 1:

[25:22] Um well think about his choice even his choices on on summer babe that that hi-hat that that like triple with the hi-hat like going into yeah like that's cool like that's innovative right like that sounds like something i haven't really heard that much definitely right that's yeah that's exactly what i'm talking about that sort of just like interesting unique spin on things that he did I don't know if you guys noticed I had to like my friend had to point it out to me on Loretta Scars when he's singing from now on I can see the sun he's just doing.

Track 1:

[26:00] On the hi-hat and the and the snare and nothing else a little bass drum, and I didn't notice like like just like you said super left field stuff but still fits so much that like you know oh yeah great great drummer rest in peace gary rest in peace that's right, now have either you guys had the chance to see the documentary no i wonder when it's going to come out like gary i got a i got a chance to watch it because i interviewed the director and he sent me a link so i could watch it but i assumed it would be out by now like i haven't i haven't talked about that on the podcast because don't they just go around these they have to go around for like sometimes a few months or something around these different, festivals. Right. Before that's true. Yeah. But yeah, definitely. Is it good? How is it? It was good. It was really interesting. He's an interesting dude, man. He's far out.

Track 1:

[26:59] Is it like a documentary style? It's a documentary, yeah. It's a documentary on his life, yeah. I wasn't familiar with Plant Man and the solo stuff that he did after Pavement, so that was really fun to get a chance to see. Interesting. Yeah. I'm not super familiar with that. Yeah. Me neither. It's really a poppy song, too. It's goofy, but it's sort of like, I don't know, it's really sort of mainstream-y, you know? All right you have to send it to me later yeah i'll do that yeah sure there's also this oh the movie like no no no no you can't do that obviously the song right yeah i was like wait a minute no i can't do that um but there's also this live action movie sorry like if i'm digressing too much that's okay we're here to talk live action with these actors like doing the yes yeah what do you think yeah have you seen any i'm i'm very excited about it um my understanding is that uh Tim Heidecker and Jason Schwartzman are playing two of the guys who started Matador. Their names escape me right now.

Track 1:

[28:08] And it's just kind of like, I think the original concept that I read about a couple of years ago was that it was going to be half documentary about the reunion shows. And then the other half was kind of like a retelling of how Pavement came together with actors. Um that's what i read at one point i'm not sure if maybe that has changed but um yeah i'm super excited about that because i love a lot of the actors that are involved with that um so yeah i can't wait me too uh like i want a release date and i want a trailer date like when are we going to get that man yeah and the guy who's playing marshmallows he's got this marshmallow chin in cuteness you know so um let's go to songs who are rated too high you know like since we are kind of or what do you think yeah absolutely drive the boat man drive the boat fin fin fin at 24, that's not in my top 70 for sure uh what do you guys think not in your top 70 nope, I was a little surprised to see that one that high also um.

Track 1:

[29:27] Yeah, by the time we get to number 20, by the time we get to number 24, you're sort of thinking, oh, maybe we're not going to hear Finn, you know, because it certainly shouldn't be much higher than that. I wouldn't put it inside the 20, but it would be in my top 40 for sure. For sure, for sure. Yeah. It's hard in rankings like this to not compare to other songs, because when I think of my favorite songs on Brighten the Corners, Finn isn't one of them. So I think that sort of mentally impacts how I view the list. I did think that just because of how incredibly influential and popular that single was, I did think that Cut Your Hair would be higher than 21. Me too. That was so surprising, wasn't it? People are sick of it. It's just that, right? People are sick of it. If that's the case, how come Harness Your Hopes is on the top 50? It shouldn't be. No, it would have been much higher if it hadn't gotten the resurrection.

Track 1:

[30:41] I think it would have been higher. Let me ask you, Alison, when you listened to Brighton & Cornish for the first time, was it the original 12-track album? Album i believe so i i didn't listen to um the full extended version that they released in like 2008 until a couple years ago i think so and that's your that's your favorite album jd am i right about that it is my favorite yeah and you but it floats it floats because i love crooked rain i love i don't you can't count watery but yeah i think because i got the deluxe edition and And then it's followed by the hacks and then it ends with like harness your hopes and roll with the wind. So I just kind of took it, you know, cause I was so new into the band. So I didn't really take fin as this end song. So it was kind of, I think that might have, you know, uh, interesting. It does work really well as like an end to the album, which was the intention, I believe. So, yeah. I still think it was I still think it was Anna SM.

Track 1:

[31:49] Flirting at that point with the idea I think so interesting point yeah, it would have been a good way to end it have you guys heard the 94 version there's like a live 94 version it's slightly more fast tempo no I kind of like that better they played it And like 94 life, it started on YouTube. Yeah. Oh, shit. It's like in Oklahoma or something. Maybe I'll play it during this podcast. I'll intercut it.

Track 5:

[32:27] We'll be right back.

Track 5:

[32:44] People, see where they're at Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Yeah, No one has the blues No one has the blues No one has the nights ¶¶, I don't want to be called in the middle Look what you say to me.

Track 5:

[33:55] No one has a clue No one has a clue No one has a clue No one has to do it, baby.

Track 1:

[34:27] What about Fight This Generation? What do you guys think about that? I thought that could have been higher for sure. That's one of my favorites. yeah one of my favorites can you tell me what you love about that song can you articulate it um i think that i like it um from like a mood perspective it feels like, uh it could be a soundtrack to a movie or something um the change about halfway through the song where Malthus is doing that riff and then the tempo kind of picks up. And then there's like this moment when Malthus's voice kind of cracks a little bit. And I think it's just like the coolest thing ever. It's when he goes like, fight this generation. I always thought it was funny a little bit, but it's, it's so cool. It sounds, it sounds really cool to me. So that's definitely like a top 10 song for me.

Track 1:

[35:33] Yeah, it feels like the part in the movie where something bad or scary is about to happen, but like in a really awesome way. So because I only real. Oh, sorry. When I went to see traditional techniques, the tour for that, it was just him by himself and his MacBook and that lovely blue guitar. And um he he played a version of fight this generation and it was so cool it was so low-key, uh like i struggled at the beginning to figure out what it was i was really high but i mean i was i was listening to it and i was like what is this i know this song i know this song and then all of a sudden you know when when when you hear sweet yardley it's like oh yeah all right cool and then it just makes you want to jump up and down right after that after we get that you know that we get sort of lulled into submission and then all of a sudden it's just like wham smack you over the head yeah yeah i definitely think that uh major leagues is a little high for me personally that was never never uh a favorite of mine i don't know it just like never really clicked with me. I love the music video, but it's just not my favorite song.

Track 1:

[36:58] But yeah, definitely. Going back, really, Malkmus is an underrated vocalist for sure. The way he can draw out his shit and just crack his voice and do whatever. It's like the next generation Lou Reed, but just a little cuter and a little more nuanced or something. And Lou Reed is probably my favorite artist besides Malkmus. So you know yeah he has a really he has a wide range like more than than a lot of other rockers that i could think of um he makes choices he makes choices that just aren't common as well, like if if there's two paths and one is the past that's the path that is well traveled,

Track 1:

[37:49] he often goes on down the other path and i don't think he does that to be you know um different or far out or whatever i think it's just he's really good on that other path he's really good but yeah he was also very lucky to team up with spiral and oh my god yeah and gary in the beginning and then mark and and bob and steve you know like yeah i mean on his own he would have been great but just Just imagine Paul McCartney on his own. He would have been good, but not.

Track 1:

[38:23] It's all a matter of chance, but what a great... So, hot take, Stop Breathing No. 28 doesn't crack my top 70 at all, you know. Top 70, he says again. There's actually, like I said, there's this version on the Crooked Rain, LA's Desert Origins Deluxe CD, the No. 2 CD, from a session recorded in early 93 at Gary Studios.

Track 1:

[38:50] The gritty version, do you remember that one? if you guys go and listen to the the second cd of the the deluxe version of crooked rain you can hear like a more gritty version of uh is that the egg eggshell version no no that's that's the actual version is the heaven is a truck this is like oh right yes you're right this is the first first question on that song and he's saying like stop he's instead of saying stop breathing he starts saying start breathing start breathing and then start bleeding and then he says dad now i know that you broke me and i'm like wow okay yeah that's uh i don't know maybe i've listened too much to the the first one you know but like i really i really love that session you like all my friends ls2 the the original elevate me later and you know that's a great great great session soon yeah i love that we have access to some of the um i don't know the sessions that didn't make it to the albums and you can see how the song progressed as they were writing it so yeah how the lyrics changed and sort of the arrangement could change over time and what do you guys think about all my friends being at number 64 i think that's a gem oh sorry that's not 50 oh god damn Yeah. Sorry.

Track 1:

[40:13] Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. You guys remember that one? Everybody's going. Yeah. Yeah. I feel, I feel that. Would that be in your top 70? That would be in my top 25. Okay. If, if, if they had taken those two first minutes, you know, and not gone into the second three minutes where it breaks down, because I feel like they started as this one. Of the best starts ever. Everybody's going out tonight, everybody's hanging out tonight, it's all right. Such a teenage nostalgia. And then when he starts shouting, I need it, I need it, and his voice breaks and the guitar is playing top.

Track 1:

[40:58] That's for me, it's one of the best shit I've ever heard in my life. But unfortunately, it digresses from pure genius Genius onto like a sub-part track. So that's why it's top 25 and not like... In your top 10. Yeah, definitely. I don't know. How do you guys feel about that song? I like that song a lot, but I don't know... I don't know that I have a lot of feeling about it one way or the other as to where I'd put it on even my personal list. And my personal list doesn't go much higher than 20 just because that would just make my head explode. That's why I feel like when you're saying top 70, I'm like, holy shit. Yeah, I tried just going through all of the songs and just putting them just for fun. And, you know, the top five are really easy. Top 10, fairly easy. Top 20. then the top 30 40 you can start interchanging them how you feel 50 60 70 they change between days i'm not saying that but i'm like throwing it out just like i say you know yeah i definitely think as we move from here into the top 20 it's gonna get really difficult because i um even just like looking at the way these are ranked sometimes it's like difficult for me to see how i would tier them because if i start thinking about them or i hear them then i might change my mind i don't know yeah about some of these well let's talk about this a little bit more then yeah allison um.

Track 1:

[42:27] Let's investigate a little bit more about what would be inside your top 20 what are you anticipating what are you looking forward to where do you think things will land based on what you've got so based on where we are um there's definitely some of my favorite tracks that are kind of missing from uh the list so far um and yeah i'm just curious what there is uh from there I'd love to see every song that they ever released on a list and then work back to see what's missing. Because looking at this, even just from 100 to 21 right now, there's a lot on there. So it's taken me a minute to think about what's missing. But yeah, I'm definitely hoping to see a lot more of like the early days in the top 20, just because I, you know, it makes me excited to think that people are appreciating like that era of pavement for sure. Like the early piece.

Track 1:

[43:40] Yeah, yeah, definitely. Always excited to hear people talking about those and listening to those. So, yeah. Yeah, between those and Slanted, which have been, you know, not represented very well so far in this bottom 30, I have to think we're going to, you know, start to peel that layer, right? Like, we've got to see some Slanted stuff in this top 20. Like, numerous, numerous songs. More crooked. Yeah. Definitely. Where does Summer Babe land for you guys?

Track 1:

[44:19] I definitely think it could be pretty high up for me. I mean, yeah, I love that song. To my top 15, absolutely, with a bullet. Yeah, top 10, definitely. It actually made things easy for me. I just downloaded the whole discography and put it into iTunes and fucked around with it for like two days. And that really, really put it into perspective. Because it's a lot when you see the list, it really jumbles up your mind. I was like, oh, you know, getting like kind of disoriented. So yeah, for sure.

Track 1:

[44:48] Yeah yeah summer babies on there what do you guys think about my friend i know never mind i was gonna go back into the what about our our singer is that is is that not in the top 50.

Track 1:

[45:00] No i don't think so no okay okay okay what about grave architecture that's number 32 two for me it's top 50 what do you guys think top 15 top 50 okay yeah i i think it belongs up here for sure that's such a catchy song oh yeah yeah that's a really good example of like the vocal register change like it hurts so rad and i'm fucking glad i i love that that's actually the part that really turns me off because i think the beginning when he says come on in that's also one of the best vocal melodies ever it's like three words and the way malchmus says these three words come on in it's one of the like top beginnings and songs ever but i feel like it kind of digresses for me with that pulled so red and i'm glad so yeah it's interesting to hear like different yeah you guys are so diametrically opposed there that's funny yeah yeah it is it is i i'm curious like in terms of where we're going um what i haven't seen that i was really surprised to not have seen yet is that we haven't seen um silent kid on here yet so yeah i'm definitely.

Track 1:

[46:21] Yeah me too i a couple years ago made a list of like my favorite songs of all time and that was on there, like pavement aside, that's definitely one of them. So I'm curious if that will show up. Did I ask you just for fun, where do you guys rank Blackout? Are you happy with 20? Where would you put it? Did you already tell me? No, I didn't tell you. I think it's fine at 20. Yeah, I think it's fine. You would have it higher? Like I said, top 5 definitely, all time. What about you, Allison? I'd probably I mean, it's a great song. But again, it's like thinking about other songs, it probably would get bumped down from 20 if I had like, all the song titles in front of me, right?

Track 1:

[47:11] Yeah okay cool but it's a great song yeah yeah definitely so what else are you looking for in the top 20 avar have we seen rattled by the rust no we haven't seen rattled by the rust no, rattled by the rust i mean frontwards definitely elevate me later one of my all-time favorites, you know i know rain still life is going to be there gold sound is going to be there the more obscure songs that I would love to have seen that are not on there are like, Passat Dream from Bread in the Corner the Spiral song that for me is also like kind of the like Lorehatter Scars it kind of brings out eons of kind of human civilization if that means anything it just like opens up my soul the way like how do you guys feel about that one Where's that? I like, yeah, I really like those two Spiral songs. And we've seen, I like a lot of Spiral songs, but I'm thinking from that record.

Track 1:

[48:14] We've seen Date with Ikea already, right? Where did it land? Yeah. 38. Do you guys think Pass a Dream is going to be there or not? In the top 20, what do you guys think? Which one? I don't know. Pass a Dream. dream it could be i mean a lot of this has surprised me yeah um yeah go on um i was gonna say i bet you like we'll see a little bit more of the wowie zowie songs too because like grounded's not on here yet um it doesn't look like father to a sister of a thought is on here so i'm i'm I'm curious if those will get pretty high ranking as we go on. Western homes. What do you guys think about that one?

Track 1:

[49:04] The closer to what we saw i'm not in love with yeah i'm not in love with it i'm not in love with it i think it's a fun song but it's not like a favorite song no of mine i never liked it but then i went back to the album before this podcast and he's like your western homes are locked forever it's like summing up this paranoia that's building up at the you know turn of the century kind of and the way it's i don't know i love that ending of the album for me you say with the eclectic while we saw it definitely agree there it's like a and kennel district at 23 what do you guys think about that did you like it that high i'm glad to see it there because i feel like and i'm talking about this like i don't know but i feel like unless we get painted soldiers, but painted soldiers is in the top 100 i think um yeah i don't know that we're gonna see another other spiral song like i'm more i feel like kennel district might be yeah his biggest might be the last spiral song we see i you know again i'm not tipping my hand but it's a really great fucking song and i'm trying to think are there spiral songs on record because preston school of industry is great um.

Track 1:

[50:22] Uh oh fuck what one am i thinking about what's the one that uh he and sm do the like the duet on like where they're back at four circa 1970 that's right 1768 yeah i think that's in the top 100 yeah that's 62 i i would knock that up to to a top 50 definitely me too i love that one love that one again especially because we've got both of them right we don't have very many where you get to hear no you know so yeah it's pretty rare i can't really think of another well there's maybe a couple but yeah i i love kennel district that's definitely my favorite spiral song, it's a great song i feel like if we were to ask a lot of people they would say that's their favorite spiral song and that's to me is the harbinger of like doom you know that that it's going to be the last spiral song i just think it's insane there are 100 songs on there and And Pass a Dream. There are so many subpar pavement songs on this top 100. And that to me is a real... I'm upset about that one. It's not on the top 100?

Track 1:

[51:26] No. Let me look and see if it's on the whole list here. That's what I'm saying. I'll tell you where it is. Because the whole list goes up to 121. Ah, really? Oh, wow. There was enough songs. So Western Homes. What about Perfume V at 58? Did you guys think it is? Yeah, yeah. Even if it's not, it's almost in the top 50. How do you guys like that one? I love that song. I think it probably, it's a good spot for it.

Track 1:

[51:56] Definitely like close to top 50 at least. It's a great song. Yeah. Okay. So I'll tell you what 100 through 105 was. Okay. So number 100 was Baptist Black Tick. number 51 or 101 was stare no sorry 101 was baptist black stick 102 was stare number 103 was pass a dream uh number 104 was platform blues and number 105 was from slate tracks maybe maybe okay so there you go i'm think jackal's the lonesome error that has to be in the top 20 What do you guys think?

Track 1:

[52:36] Jackals, false grace, the lonesome era. That's a spiral song. That's spiral singing. I got one holy life to live. That's peril. Yeah. That's not the top 50 for you. What about you, Alvin? Oh, no. You said top 20. I wouldn't be in my top 20. I said top 20. Yeah. Yeah. I think probably not top 20, but it's definitely up there. Okay. Okay. Cool. cool that's like that's like top top 10 for me probably i love that one that's what keep going, I was going to say, I kind of feel similarly about Fame Throwa, because that's some of my favorite drumming that Gary did. I thought that would be way up there.

Track 1:

[53:21] I thought it would be in the top 50 for sure. Where did that end? 79, yeah. I don't know there's something about some of these songs like I've been talking about maybe like an acetate about eons you know like the eons of human existence kind of like you know and like Jackals, Loretta Scars Our Singer like I feel like You fucking love Slanted don't you There's this energy, and like I said if I had to pick the best top five songs of an album I said like Blackout, Grounded, Motion, Pueblo, and Father of a Sister of a Thought. I could maybe pick five of Slanted. But these 10 songs for me, I don't know. I think it's why I love Pavement so much. It's to me on another level that no one has ever reached.

Track 1:

[54:16] Yeah. Agreed. And that's why we're all here. We love this band. What about Camera? that's not on the list camera is on the top it's on the whole list but is it it might be the last song camera yeah camera is so that's 120 119 118 okay yeah how do you guys like that one that's my top that's a top 40 for me oh i fucking love his voice in that song when he really when he's really squealing yeah you know i like that yeah but would it be in my top 50 no probably not though there are a lot of songs left though for me if i try to rack my brain i have a hard time kind of filling it out with the songs that are here it's going to be well so what you're saying is it's going to be a surprise and you're going to keep tuning in so that's good to hear yeah yeah Yeah. So I really want to thank you for joining me tonight to have this discussion, this roundtable discussion. Any final thoughts? Excited for the top 20. All right. Well, we'll kick into that next week. We'll see what our predictions. Yeah, we'll see where our predictions end up. Coming on Monday, song number 19.

Track 1:

[55:34] And we'll see who's, yeah, that's going to be a good one. That's going to be a good one. It's going to be surprising. My take from this is just like, made me realize just how much I fucking love Pavement. Like I said, I knew it was my favorite band. And I'm sorry if I've been going way too into the nitty-gritty of the shit that obscure stuff, but it really blew my mind for the last two days, really going back to these songs and being like, wow, okay, they really... And after all the music I've gone through throughout these years, after I listened to Pavement, they're still just always up there. And thank you for doing this, JD. Thank you for your work. Oh, thanks, man. Awesome, awesome. Thank you. Awesome it's a lot that means really really you know yeah it's just so cool to see like other pavement fans and just know that they're still you know super relevant inspiring yeah yeah yes yeah and it'll make a nest like how close are you talking to muskmus you think oh me yeah i did you did oh you didn't listen to the yeah you gotta listen to the whole hear it i didn't hear it which Which episode is that? I want to say it's, Oh God, I don't know. I don't know what happened, but I know that it happened on Valentine's day. It happened on Valentine's day of 2022.

Track 1:

[57:00] I think. Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Okay. Yeah. I fulfilled my destiny. Yeah, absolutely. Awesome. So anything you guys want to plug, anything that you have to plug, any projects that you're working on or anything online or anything like that. Allison, you mentioned you play drums. Are you in a band? I, uh, stay tuned. I don't have anything to plug just yet, but, um, yeah, hopefully we'll soon. Yeah, actually have a band that's going pretty good that I hope I can plug soon. Oh, awesome. I have a podcast called peeling the onion where I'm interviewing like musicians. So that's everywhere, like on Spotify and YouTube and stuff. So how many episodes? Yeah. Like seven. And I've talked to great people, like talk to looper low. The other day you know really he was awesome i talked to steve albini like february 20th so i was really lucky to get that one in and it's been like a lot of i'm talking to people i really admire you know what i mean so yeah i really taken the time to do like my homework so it's been a lot of fun for me because i love music as you guys can hear you know so cool so peeling the onion find that on podcast networks everywhere yeah and it sounds like a good one might be the One of the last interviews was Steve Albini, right? Yeah.

Track 1:

[58:23] Yeah. It's very sad because I was asking him like, so because I knew that he wanted to quit before he lost his hearing, you know? And he said like, I'm going to go on for like 10 more years. And, you know, like, you know, and it was just, and I know people who knew him personally and he was a really genuinely nice person and just such an influence on music overall. All like you guys know you know yeah so awesome yeah really nice to meet you guys you guys are really cool nice to meet you guys too yeah great to meet you too yeah all right stay cool that's what we got for you this week and wash your goddamn hands.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the Pavement Top 50 Countdown, jD is joined by Jessica from Ann Arbor to reveal track 20 and discuss her Pavement origin story.

Transcript:

Track 2:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50. Today, we're talking all about number 21, Cut Your Hair. Russell, talk to me about your relationship with this song. I love this song for a few reasons. One, I think because it's ubiquitous. And when I talk about pavement to the rest of the free world, people are like, I don't remember that band. And if I say cut your hair, people are like, yeah, I remember that. Hey, this is Westy from the.

Track 3:

[0:41] Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown. hey it's jd here back for another episode of the top 50 countdown for seminal indie rock band, pavement week over week we're going to count down the 50 essential pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots i then tabulated the results using an abacus and speed, just speed how will your favorite song fare in the rankings well you'll have to tune in to find out So there's that. This week I'm joined by Pavement superfan Jessica from Ann Arbor. Jessica, how the fuck are you doing? Super fucking good. I love it. I love it. This is exciting. When people fire back an F shot at me, that's like my favorite thing. It's validation to a degree. I was wondering if you were going to say like, hey, motherfucker, since I heard that maybe you haven't had a lot of ladies yet. I haven't. I said that to, I will promise I will say that in the future. Us ladies can be motherfuckers too. Yeah, yeah. Well, let's get right into it, Jessica from Ann Arbor. Let's hear your Pavement Origins story. Okay. She's opening a tome right now, folks. I know, I didn't want to go back into childhood, but it probably is high school-ish. Okay.

Track 3:

[2:11] So that would be late 80s, early 90s. And I lived in Michigan, which I do again. And I liked a lot of like alternative music, but it was kind of hard to find out about it. Right. Back in the day before the internets. um so one way was i read a lot of like british music magazines like enemy and melody maker um and i would read little tidbits which comes into the first time i met pavement so um.

Track 3:

[2:53] Oh, and I loved R.E.M. That was like my number one, probably, favorite band. I like the Replacements and a lot of British shoegazy bands. But the week after high school, my best friend and I decided to move to Athens, Georgia. And we were 17. And we just picked up and left. And we ended up living across the street from Michael Stipe. That's pretty fucking cool. That was like a dream come true. We were 17 for a while.

Track 3:

[3:24] So it was like this Disney world for music lovers because there were so many cool bands. But it was a little bit hard to get into stuff like bars and things the first few months. But we met a lot of people and that helped. And then we turned 18 and then we could get into more things. things but there was like cool bands playing for four dollars like five or six nights a week it was really cool we go dancing a lot and stuff um but we had tickets to go see u2 that we bought in michigan before we left so we went back for that but then we had to drive back, because we heard pavement was playing at the 40 watt in essence really this was in 92 okay so we went to the u2 show which was pretty awesome and um wayne from uh no guards from wayne's world was like satellite linked into that show and played drums for something on mtv, So that was a random place to be. But we had to drive back to Athens, and it was like 12 or 14 hours. And we went like straight to the show.

Track 3:

[4:42] And it was crazy and wild and sweaty. And Gary is a band. And he was doing handstands and headstands and hanging from the rafters. And it has since been put on YouTube. So now I can watch my 17-year-old self's view of watching them. But we really wanted to talk to them because we read in Enemy or Melody Maker or that they were going to be on 90210, Beverly Hills 90210, but that they, Stephen got in a fist fight with one of the guys, one of the actors. Oh, my gosh. And so before I even heard what they sounded like, I was like, I like these guys. They beat up somebody on 90210. So that was the first thing I asked them. And it was a rumor that Scott started about Stephen. than, I think, just to fuck with the UK press or something. Which sounded, that was a pretty cool thing, too. And, yeah, that was an awesome show.

Track 3:

[5:52] And, yeah, I was hooked. I think that summer before that, so right after high school, is I think I got Slandered Enchanted was the first thing I heard. You got that in real time, basically. I think so because we volunteered to work for this local free magazine to review bands, and they gave us a lot of free stuff. And I think that that's where we got that. I don't know if we bought it or not.

Track 3:

[6:28] And then I moved back to Michigan. and i had we went to high school with jim but we weren't really friends but then we worked at a store together and then we somehow started talking found out we liked a lot of the same music, and then that's jen will be coming up on a future episode just so you know, crazy jen and she's like the super fan uber fan i'm like a robin to a batman i would think because she worked at a super cool record store and so she had all the seven inches before, and cool promo things and she knew like you know label owners and promoters and people who ran clubs and all kinds of stuff so even at you know she was a year older than me so we're still like you know well 18 19 year olds and um.

Track 3:

[7:27] Oh, she had the inside track. So she would like make me tapes of all her cool seven inches. So I had like, you know, the peel sessions and we had all these weird bootlegs. And then I think I went to England the year before that, but then I went again and got a lot of weird bootlegs, including some pavement ones.

Track 3:

[7:54] And um then we went to see them together um and she is better remembering this so she had to kind of fill me in we saw them in chicago and we've gone all over the place to see them we've gone on lots of road trips because they're very important to us yeah and um but chicago is was only about four hours away and um um we also somewhere in there i think she she wanted to remind me and i guess i'm filling in some gaps that we um we wrote them some weird fan letters, somewhere in here somewhere in like 93 or 94 which i used to do with a lot of bands and i became friends with a lot of bands from writing really weird fan letters and sending really strange presence um we would just like really exaggerate things like she says that we found a danzig fanzine or something and we just changed the words around to something but we would just pretend we were like insane for them like we would say that we would, crawl a hundred miles over broken glass just to smell their shadows.

Track 3:

[9:11] Knows just like really over the top weird stuff um we weren't um obviously serious um and we would just put weird toys and um gadgets and odd things and just send gift boxes to bands we liked and it always made an impression um so yeah um it's a good icebreaker if you're shy too. Jen always thinks that I was better at talking to people in bands, but I'm super duper duper duper shy either. I have to overcome like being terrified. But if you have like a funky present or something silly to do or say, then it makes it easier. And they always enjoyed that. And I think that first time we gave them some weird thing we got from a truck stop was a license plate with a Confederate flag on it, which I'm cringing at now, and it said, Ass Kickin' Southern Rock. And Westy put it on his drum kit, and that made us excited.

Track 3:

[10:22] And then we, I think we saw him in Detroit like the next day or the next week or something. And they let us go to the sound check, and that was very exciting. And yeah, we always tried to be like in the front row, laughing and screaming and dancing. And it was very fun. And um they they gave us cool things too like one time they gave us some stephen keen paintings that were like left over from something um really.

Track 3:

[11:01] We got some cool stuff um and then once we got through with like kind of like we you know gush a little bit about what songs we liked or um stuff then they would we would just like kind of act like regular people with them and we'd like go out to dinner with them or go walking around with them and it was pretty cool i bet holy crap that's fucking dynamite, it was groovy those were the salad days we made them last for a few years too, talk to me about that after that refreshing sip of water i hope it's not moonshine it's uh just Just agua. I'll try not to slurp too much in the microphone. Let's see. I had to write down some of these things because I have these big blank spaces.

Track 3:

[11:56] So let's see. And I'm blind because I'm old now. I'm almost 50. Me too. And let's see. Okay. Okay. I had to get some help with Jen and the internet. All right, so let's see. Then we saw him in Detroit. Oh, apparently they did two shows, an early show and a late show. That was in 94.

Track 3:

[12:21] So we saw him in May and October. So at this point, we'd seen him like five or six times. Then we went to see him in Cincinnati.

Track 3:

[12:32] And I'm trying to think. We went to this, like, we would just go to the dirtiest, nastiest places that were like out in the middle of nowhere. We could have got killed and we were in jen's like old subaru that backfired all the time and pretty sure we got a flat tire once um and it was mostly like big scary drunk guys at these shows and then it was just us little girl um but um oh i know we made shirts for them i think, i don't know if jen has or will talked about but she wanted me to tell you we made these um homemade shirts and they were on um baseball kind of shirts with like you know three-quarter sleeves they were green they're very kind of 70s retro and um our old gym teacher had a t-shirt shop so we um would go and just make weird collages and then print them out into iron-ons and then he put them on and then we do lettering and i would like sew on sequins stuff and so like yeah they were very 70s looking like they would say like you know pavement rules or pavement is number one and they would have some like album art on it or some pictures of them and or just random stuff and they really liked those and i think they signed our shirts we wore them a couple times and scott really liked him so we made him one.

Track 3:

[13:59] And, um, there's a picture of us wearing ours in the, um, in the pavement documentary. Oh, really? In slow century? Yeah. Yeah. It's the back of us though. Cause I think, I think, I think Scott took that picture and owned it, but we had our own pictures of our faces, which we still have. Jen has most of them.

Track 3:

[14:24] Um, but yeah, I made one for, well, we both made it for Scott, but yeah. Yeah, she was, I sewed on like a million like individual sequins on part of his shirt. And he liked that one a lot. And we would still, we'd give him weird presents too. There were these cool stores. There's one in Cincinnati and one in Chicago. They were called Big Fun and Uncle Fun. And they had like really weird retro toys and just weird stuff from Europe. Up like we got these really tiny harmonicas that were the box had made in occupied japan they were so tiny or and we just give them like spark guns or toys or trading cards or just weird stuff that we could find um and then you know they started knowing us every time we'd show up they'd be like hey i'm here um and that was kind of cool because then we'd know like the the sound guys and the tour managers too. So even if it was somewhere, cause I went to see him in England quite a few times. Oh, that was, so yeah, I lived in England for a couple of years in London. Um, and, um, saw him there and that was very different, you know, and then I saw them as they got bigger and bigger cause we saw them in pretty little clubs and then like bigger clubs and some theaters and stuff.

Track 3:

[15:51] Um, and, But it would be weird, because sometimes in London, there's other people in big, fancy bands back there, backstage.

Track 3:

[16:01] And I would just kind of sit quietly and be like, this is exciting. And for some reason, this isn't a very musical memory, but I remember I had been in England for a couple of years, and I missed a lot of American stuff. Yeah. Just like the, I don't know, I missed Taco Bell. And weird American stuff. And Bob had some Tic Tacs and for some reason I thought they were American and they were nowhere else. And so I got really excited and I was like, America Tic Tacs! And then we had a Tic Tac fight, um backstage um but.

Track 3:

[16:42] Mostly we were just i would just kind of rock out love the shows we got very excited if they ever dedicated songs to us which they would every once in a while like you know if it was like our 10th show or our 10th year or something or our 20th show um we went a lot of road trips around america i'm going to see them and um yeah it was always an amazing time i bet they became your buddies yeah do you still talk yes um it's not quite as rock and roll now i play online scrabble with bob pretty much every day you do that's my most rock and roll mom story that i have that's pretty cool that's what nerdy we are that's very cool amazing he is he's like a sweet teddy bear they're all so nice yeah um i've had and i've had a lot of good talks with all of them and um so it's pretty cool when you um well they always I say, like, don't meet your heroes, but almost every band I've met has been awesome, and, um.

Track 3:

[18:01] Uh i've known a lot of them for 10 20 30 years now that's very cool and so i didn't see him quite a bit during the breakup times i saw um steven and the jicks a couple times, in the early 2000s in preston school industry and that was fun because me and jen had kind of lost touch she had moved out west and i moved to england and it still wasn't really good internet days and so we were like connecting through pavement like scott would say hey yeah she's in colorado now and she has a chihuahua i would be like tell her i said hi if you see her before me.

Track 3:

[18:51] Um it was they're like um we kind of think of them as our big brothers i bet yeah i mean and the fact that you got to see them and their rise to prominence right like that's that's pretty cool, but i have to say you know since they never got like mega gigantic they never became like stuck-up assholes so no no yeah they've always been the same um and so i didn't see him like a of reunion-y stuff like in the like 2010s thing i think i might have been having a baby somewhere in that time gotcha and being a mom and being kind of boring um, so the last time i saw them um jen came out here and we saw him in detroit, oh that's cool at the masonic temple when was that 20 2022 or yeah yeah okay and so So that had been like basically 30 years of us going to see them off and on. And I got front row for that one, so I was very excited. And she had seen them earlier on in the tour, so she got to tell them that we were going to have our reunion. And it was pretty cool. They dedicated some songs to us, and that always makes you feel like a super fan.

Track 3:

[20:14] So yeah it was pretty groovy yeah I bet what's your what's your go-to record these days, um Jen and I were kind of talking about this I think I think, Probably Slanted and Crick and Rain are like my comfort records. Yeah. But it was when I was kind of a teenager, so there's kind of like an angsty, whole different world that I was taking them in. But it still feels like my comfort. Those are my comfort albums. albums um but i definitely have like favorites on all the um ones past then plus the cool thing was is we got to hear um songs that ended up coming out like years later earlier on and we had like different names for them because we didn't know what they were called or they would be on, a bootleg or something and yeah we had our own names for them that we had to unlearn.

Track 3:

[21:23] Um like i think we called grounded i think jen was saying we call it the sedan song okay just because he said something about the sedan in the parking lot maybe i don't know we just pick one word and be like oh that's that one um we may not have even known some earlier song names or we just make up our own we did a lot of singing to the um stuff we liked once where they were like singing back and forth, like call and response, like, yes. Uh, Circus 1762. We love singing that one in the car. So, um, so, um, I can definitely play those first two albums and all the like, uh, pre singles and stuff, um, solidly, but I kind of pick and choose what I listened to on the later albums. Okay. What I'm in the mood for. Yeah, I can see that. Well, what do you say we flip the script here and talk about song number 20? Are you down with that? I'm down with that. Well, let's do that. We'll hit that right after this break. Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening.

Track 2:

[22:34] And now on with a countdown. 20!

Track 3:

[24:49] This week on the show, number 20 on the countdown. I'm pretty excited about this one. It's Blackout. This is the ninth song from Wowie Zowie to make the cut on the top 50. Pretty good showing for Wowie Zowie, I would say. What do you think, Jessica, from Ann Arbor? I think it is a very solid pavement song. Yeah. Like, I think it belongs in the top 20 to 30. Okay. Because, I don't know, it hits all the right pavement beats. It's kind of pretty. It's kind of dirty.

Track 3:

[25:28] It's got weird lyrics. I'm not sure what it's about. No, it's really tough with us out there. Yes, I mean, sometimes it sounds so like, I don't know. You know, it's, what's it called when you're just saying words? I call it word salad. Word salad. That's what I call it. I'm so lyrical. Yeah, like just, yeah, because sometimes they don't make any sense. You just get little images. That's right. They give you vibes, right? Yeah, or moments. I definitely feel like they have this world and there's some characters in them. You know like loretta's in there somewhere right um um i don't know that one feels like kind of like i don't know a guy in high school or college or starting job or something he's kind of lost, i don't know if there's a real whole story there but i get little snippets right things stream of consciousness that's what i think i was thinking stream of consciousness yes Yes. Or he just gets little, you know, words that rhyme. Little phrases here and there. Or they just sound groovy. Is that the one that has...

Track 3:

[26:49] I always thought it was Dirty Scots, but then I saw somewhere that maybe it was Sturdy Scots. And I always liked that because I like a lot of Scottish everything and Dirty Scots.

Track 3:

[27:04] I did, I don't want to ramble on a thing. I just thought of a David Berman thing. Oh, sure. Dirty Scot. I never saw Silver Jews, but love, love, love them. But when I was living in London, David Berman did like a reading at this little dirty bar called Filthy McNasty's. I don't know why Dirty Scott's made me think of that. And that was the one and only time I saw and met him in person. He was very nice and shy. I had tickets for Purple Mountains, but obviously we know how that turned out. Yeah. Yeah, pretty terrible. Yeah.

Track 3:

[27:48] Back to the song for a moment. I'm sorry. No. What is your relationship with this song? Like, do you have any sort of relationship with this song? You mentioned that Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, and Planted are your sort of go-tos. Is this a song that you'll pick and choose from Wally's Alley? Or do you pass it up? Or what's the deal? It's a thumbs up for me. Because there are a few that I kind of go like, eh. i'll listen i don't think there's anything i skit really ever um and i kind of like that all the albums have like songs that are like making me feel like i'm gonna cry one minute and they're so slow and sad and then the next minute i'm like jumping up and down and screaming something stupid with them um and that one's more in the like mellow um slow sad thing and i'm yeah i'm I'm a sucker for that kind of song. That's good. I think it's pretty. It is pretty. It's got a great melody. Yeah. It's a good solid one. Yeah. I'd put it on a mixtape for somebody. Okay.

Track 3:

[29:00] If I was introducing to them a system pavement. That's the highest compliment you can make to somebody, you know? Like, we get that. We get that because of our era. But it is such a high compliment, right? I'm going to make you a mixtape. I remember I burned somebody a CD once, like a mixtape on a CD. And it just wasn't the same. Just wasn't the same. It isn't. It was so hard because you had to fit them into, you know, the side. and I didn't like leaving too much space. I put little parts of movies and shows and like weird little snippets of people talking. Oh, that's badass. I have gotten compliments many years later from many of my high school friends that I did make really good mixtapes. So I kind of need to borrow them from them because they probably were pretty good. People like send me pictures of the track listing and I'm like, ooh, I forgot about too much of those bands. I'm going to go look them up now. Oh, that's great.

Track 3:

[30:02] Yeah, mixtapes. The children today, they won't know. No, they just really won't. Well, cassettes are starting to come back in a weird way. So maybe they will. Maybe they will. I will say I have a 12-year-old daughter now. And right after we went to see Pavement in 2022, I took a few videos and I was watching a couple on my phone and she came in the room and said, Hey, I know that song. It was Harness Your Hopes. And I was like, I was like, no, you don't. Cause you're 10 and no, you don't. And I don't think I've ever played this around you. And she goes, yeah, I do. And then she like said a couple of lines and I was like, what are you talking about? And then obviously it was TikTok. Yeah. And that blew my mind. And it's made a comeback again. I know. She told me the other day. As we're recording this. She goes, oh, pavement's blowing up on TikTok again. And I'm like, what? Is it the same thing? And she's like, no, it's something with baggy pants and spinning. Yeah. Which she sort of explained to me. Even Mark did it. I saw that. I saw everybody was giving it a little go. Yeah. I'm impressed. Me too. So fun. I kind of love that, though.

Track 3:

[31:20] Well, it makes sense that they would make a comeback. That was a random song, but it's a random song. It's very odd and quirky and funky. And when you look at its numbers on Spotify, it's incredible. Like the number of downloads or streams it has versus the next song. It's mind-blowing. It is mind-blowing. I hope some of the children explore some more pavement because they would have such a grand old time.

Track 3:

[31:58] They are obsessed with the 90s right now, so maybe they will. Yes. I have impressed my child with some of this stuff. Yeah. I think she's even impressed about this. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. Well, I've really enjoyed my time with you today. Ditto. Yeah, this has been a lot of fun. It's always good doing this gig right now.

Track 3:

[32:22] The first time around, I was solo. I did every song in the catalog solo.

Track 3:

[32:27] Wow. And that was really tough to do because you're sort of talking to an audience that you don't know if they're even there. Uh this time around with the top 50 it's been so great getting to meet people like i've met you know at this point i've met 30 people or 39 people uh-huh yeah 39 people 39 people 29 people whatever anyway you get the point and where are you in the world i'm in toronto canada oh i've been to toronto a bazillion times oh that's great lots of bands there ah any good venues that you can rhyme off um massey hall massey hall is great yeah that's why i saw pavement twice there oh i think i saw damien rice there okay um i think i saw arcade fire there um that would make sense travis okay from scotland um david gray i had a friend i lived with in england and then she lived in glasgow and then she went back to toronto so i would go see her a lot and we go see a lot of the bands that we loved so i love toronto i would live there in a second i wish i could kind of it was a little bit warmer but um uh it's been a spectacular this year we have we had no snow yeah we had three days of snow like through the whole winter so all right And I'm changing my mind, though.

Track 3:

[33:56] Something awesome. Especially if something happens in November. I said that the last time the creep got in, but...

Track 3:

[34:06] Yeah, well, you know, you guys have your shit to deal with, for sure. We have our shit up here, too. Yeah. Listen, I will let you know when this episode comes out, because as I mentioned, we are recording this deeply in advance, because I'm a bit of a flake. And I want to make sure I've got all these in the can before I flake out. And that's what I'm trying to do. You sound like you're on top of things, man. I'm impressed. I'm trying. I'm trying. I'm trying. I'm trying. I'm trying. I'm trying. All right. Be well. Stay swell. And wash your goddamn hands.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the program, jD is joined by Russ Romandini to unveil song 21 on the Pavement Top 50 Countdown.

Transcript:

Track 1:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 2:

[0:02] So here we go with Texas Never Whispers. Aiden from Vermont, what are your initial thoughts about this song? Texas Never Whispers is a really cool song. Full disclosure, before you sent me that this would be the song that we were going to be talking about, it honestly wasn't one of the tracks off of Watery the Mystic that really jumped out at me. But after um after you sent it and i knew that we were gonna have to chat about it um i listened to it a little bit deeper and i i definitely found like a new appreciation for it hey.

Track 1:

[0:38] This is westy from the rock and roll band pavement and you're listening to the countdown.

Track 3:

[0:46] Hey it's jd here back for another episode of our top 50 countdown for seminal indie rock band and Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots. I then tabulated the results using an abacus and an air fryer. Seriously, is there anything this machine doesn't do? How will your favorite song fare in the rankings? You'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that. This week, I'm joined by Pavement superfan, Boston Russ. Boston Russ, how the fuck are you? I'm fan-tastic. and ready to rock. This is great news because it would be a hell of a podcast if you were not ready to rock. That's right. That's right. Thanks so much for having me on. Oh, it's my pleasure. Thanks for doing this. You guys do all the heavy lifting on these, so this is fantastic for me. Let's get right to it. Let's talk about your pavement origin story. Sorry. I think my Pavement Origins story goes back to 1994.

Track 3:

[1:50] I'm a little late. I'm kind of a late comer in some respects. So back in 94, a good friend of mine, so I got to give him some props. His name was Sean McGovern. We called him Slappy and a few other things. He was in a band in the Boston area called Beeswax. There's some other bands in our area called Beeswax also, but he was in with a few guys. And they did AK-47 and a couple other songs. Sadly, he passed away a couple years ago. He got sick. Oh, shit.

Track 3:

[2:23] But back in 94, we were good friends, and we hung out a ton, and he just one day gave me this bag of CDs. He left it in my car. He's like, listen to these. And so Crooked Rain was there, and so I put it on, and Silent Kid comes on, and I'm just like.

Track 3:

[2:41] Who are these guys? And, you know, I played the album some. And it was just, like, I go back and I look at that time. And, like, the album release times were just, like, really, like, fast-moving parts of my life. It was, like, the end of college almost where Crooked Rain came out. It was, like, the end of my junior year. And I was doing a radio show. And I don't know. I, like, never quite linked up to, like, really featuring them prominently. And then wowie zowie comes out like two weeks before i graduated college and you know and get into like the summer in 95 and it's just like it like just blurred and so it's like i heard it like a little bit but didn't like totally like dive in not until bright in the corners came out in 97 and that like i just could not stop playing that album like just word great record and word out and And I wanted to see them in concert. I had been to a bunch of different shows for bands, like Foo Fighters. I got to see Foo Fighters when they were together for two weeks in 1995. Holy shit. They were together. Nobody knew who they were. This is my same friend. So Sean says to me, we got to go see this band play.

Track 3:

[3:55] Eddie Vedder's wife is doing a percussion band.

Track 3:

[3:59] And Eddie Vedder is going to play with Mike Watt. And Dave Grohl is going to show up. and do, he's going to play with his new band. And I was like, he's like, you got to go. And it was like this rainy Sunday afternoon. We go to this club called Avalon. So if anybody knows Boston, knows the 90s, we wore Avalon out. I mean, it was like one of the best places to go for rock bands. And Foo Fighters was the middle band. Grohl comes out on lead. And you're like, because you're like, oh, Dave Grohl, new band, going to be a drummer, right? He comes out on lead and does like, and he's holding his guitar tower in hand and it was like that one moment where it's like best ever or total train wreck and he did this as a call comes in with the first lines you know just his voice butter and from there it was it was crazy so like you know i followed like a lot of these bands and went to a lot of these shows and just didn't quite i kept missing pavement and then they broke up and i got old you and me both brother you know and it's like oh and they got together in 2010 and but my My son was like a year old, and I had really moved far from Boston at that point and totally missed the tour. And I was like, ugh, you know, and just kind of feeling like stuck. And so I would listen to, you know, Pavement a lot during the 2010s. They were a big part of Spotify, and I would play them. And I don't know, a couple of years ago...

Track 3:

[5:26] I was just saying to myself, it would be really great if these guys would really do a tour. Yes. And then it happened. And they came to Boston, and I got sick. No fucking way. I got sick at the end of September. I totally missed the announcement that they were coming, and then got sick, and I couldn't get tickets, and I skipped it. And I was just like, I'm totally beside myself. And I was like, all right. This is okay, because we're going to make up for it. And so, we come to the end of the calendar year in 22, and then one of the best things happened to me. My wife, her best friend calls her up and says, guess what I have? And my wife says, what? And her best friend says, I have an extra free ticket to see Taylor Swift. And my wife is a huge Swifty. All right. Okay? Huge. And, you know, but her best friend lives in Tennessee. And we're in Boston. And her best friend says, the ticket's for Tampa Bay.

Track 3:

[6:41] Oh, my God. So, because that's where her best friend mom lives, right? Right. So, she's just like, well, I'm going to go from Tennessee to Tampa and go to the show. Do you want to come with me? And and of course you know well i gotta tell my wife i'm like you got it's a ticket of the year i'm like this this is like you got a free ticket to this like yeah you have to go right you have to go so of course like she could i you know she got the ticket we just got her i got her a flight and you know she goes down there and has a ball right they drive they do like a 1300 mile road trip from tennessee to tampa and back they go to the smoky mountains they have like the best time ever right so right after that the ticket um you know i got out of the plane ticket, the pavement in iceland announcement comes oh yes and i'm like pavement iceland and i turned 50 and i'm like she's like, You have to do that.

Track 3:

[7:40] That is a great wife. Yeah. She is fantastic. And I'm like, I do have to do this, don't I? She's like, I think you do. And I'm like, it's three shows. I'm like, they'll play all the songs. They have to play all the songs just to vote because it's three shows in a row. Yeah. So I went ahead and I ended up booking the trip. And so this was like you know late late i think the release was like late january so like early february it was like a couple of weeks after they released the thing i i got tickets but i still got like fifth row and i got second row for like the last show i got really good tickets they were they were a little slow to sell out of the gate but and thankful for me because you know i'm like so i just i got a flight the flights were very reasonable and so got a flight and just said we're doing this thing. So as the year ticks by, I'm getting ready, getting ready, getting ready. And then I think it was sometime in late June, my birthday passed and all this, getting ready for the trip. And then I get the big announcement that says, in Iceland, they're going to do a walking tour with the band. I did not know this. yeah they put out a walking tour with the band so uh steve and bob participated in the walking tour.

Track 3:

[9:02] Um so um oh and and spiral also of course um so it was the three of them and then you would buy a record and and buy the tour uh the walk tour so 90 minutes around reykjavik um and there was a host and then they would go ahead and talk about, you know, they would just talk about the musical history of Iceland, and then you could walk around and get to meet the pavement guys. That's fantastic. There were 50 tickets, went on sale at noon. My hand was like on that button, and I was number 21. That's amazing. I could not believe I got a ticket. It and i i you know again i was like is i'm like is this hyping up to be the best trip ever i'm like sounds like i'm like what's happening here and so now we're leading up to the trip the trips at the end of july they did the shows at the end of july so sometime in july i'm on reddit i'm on the pavement channel and um sky posts up and he says who's going to iceland let's form a group, so I'm like great I'm like how about me I'm like I'm going he says hi I'm Mike from DC and I'm like I'm Russell from Boston.

Track 3:

[10:26] So, I jump in. Another guy, Steve from Milwaukee, jumps in and says to me, so, what do you think the weather's going to be like? I'm like, maybe like a mild Boston winter. Unfortunately, to me and Steve, that meant two different things. Sorry, Steve. Because I ended up considering that to be a little chilly. But I went a little cold. So, it was pretty funny. And so, slowly, this little group of people forms on Reddit and then goes over to WhatsApp. So the day comes, finally go ahead and fly out. Do the flight, no problem, get there. And then when you fly into Keflavik Airport, it's about 45 minutes from Reykjavik, you go and take a bus. Okay. And so, guy sits across from me, he's also from Massachusetts. His name's Curtis, and I strike up a conversation with him. And halfway through the conversation, He's like, by the way, are you here for pavement? And I'm like, yes. He's like, what gives me away? He's like, you know, you're a certain age, traveling by yourself. He's like, me too. I figured you were here for the shows.

Track 3:

[11:35] And I'm like, I'm on the bus and I'm not even there yet. And we're already way off and running. So we get to the Thursday show, and the moment of truth comes, and I'm walking down to Harpa Concert Hall. It's a huge glass structure. It's beautiful. If you ever see the pictures online, it was amazing. Beautiful place to play. And so I'm walking, and I'm within sight distance of the concert hall. I've already spent the day there. Reykjavik's beautiful. People are nice. Everybody's very relaxed.

Track 3:

[12:16] And guess who walks right by me is Mark Eibold. Really? Yep. Just walking to the venue. I'm walking to the venue. He's walking away from it. He's probably going out for maybe a quick bite to eat or something. something, you know, we got a little, we had, you know, time before they went on. He walks right by me and I'm like, Mark. And he turned around and I told him hello. And I said, you know, I was here for the shows and everything. He took a quick picture with me and, you know, and that was that. But I got to meet him and I was like, all right, I got to meet Mark. He is the elusive one. He is, he is elusive. And so, but I got to meet him and got a photo and, I mean, super nice. You know, it was like 90 seconds tops, you know, because I just didn't want to take up his time. I mean, you know, he's getting ready for the show and everything. So I was happy for that. And I went up to the concert hall and everybody just started to meet. And it was funny because I think it was Mike in the group said, Yeah.

Track 3:

[13:23] Okay, so here's the moment of truth. How are we all going to know, you know, who each other are since we don't know each other? Good call. So I said, all right, I'm going to go stand by one of the tables. I'm wearing bright blue pumas. You can't miss me. Because I'm also wearing this, like, bright vest. I tend to wear bright clothing sometimes. And so, like, I got this vest and I got this, like, hat and pom-pom and this whole getup. Can't miss me. I mean, I'm like screaming and everybody's dressed in like black and Reykjavik. So I'm like, I really stick out.

Track 3:

[13:57] I'm like, can't miss me. And so I think like the first guy that comes over is Steve and Steve's like, Russ. And I'm like, hi. And so that just kind of like broke the ice for everybody and people started to gravitate over. And, you know, like we're having a couple of beers. We're talking at the shows, you know, and just met some like really great people, you know, the merch tables there. And we're talking, you know, other people got tickets for the walk on Friday and it was amazing. And so one of the guys, Eric from New Jersey, Eric says to me, I said, you know, I got Crooked Rain with the tour. I said, but I really wanted Wowie Zowie. He's like, why don't you just buy it at the merch table, bring it with you tomorrow. They'll just sign it. I'm like, genius. Yeah. So I did that, and that ended up working out very well, because they signed both albums. So solid piece of advice from Eric. And so we did the show, and it was fantastic. They started off with Grounded, which is one of my favorites. Damn. And it was really great, because when they just break into Grounded, it's like...

Track 3:

[15:15] I made it, you know, and, you know, the, the, the months leading up to that were a little difficult. My mom was pretty sick. She's, you know, had, she had some tough moments last year and, uh, it was just like really emotional. I was like, holy crap. I like, I really did it. I mean, this was like 30 years in the making. Yeah. And I just, it was, you know, and it's like when you see that like pavement in Iceland thing and it's like, you look at that and it's like a lot of times you just look at those types of things and then it's like, oh, it should do And you don't end up doing it, you know, for all the reasons to not go and for all the reasons to go. And it's like, I'm here, here.

Track 3:

[15:59] And it was just amazing. I bet. It was just really great. They did Summer Babe. And, you know, by then, we're like, we're all friends. And, like, we're all yelling all the lyrics to the songs. And, you know, everybody's just, like, carrying on, having a good time. And, you know, go out to the bars after we're out late, having drinks. And everybody's, you know, really just getting to meet each other and have fun and, you know, learn where everybody's from. I mean, people came from Los Angeles, Jersey, D.C. There were people from Europe, Berlin, and England, and all these places. All these people just converged, and they all came by themselves. Really? Yep. Most people weren't by themselves. They all came by themselves. Wow. And so there was this group of people that had all come by themselves. And now it was like we started to become like this little unit. So now Friday... Friday was like really one of the highlights of the trip because we had the pavement walk and it was really, it was just great.

Track 3:

[17:19] I'll send you a copy of this picture, but like, so I bring Wowie Zowie and I mentioned how I like to dress up in bright colors and my whole get up for the day basically matched the album cover. And i didn't plan it that way but i had like you could see like my hooded sweatshirt and i wore this like green hooded sweatshirt and this you know in a shirt and my vest and hat and everything were all like blue and green and so and i had green puma sneakers like the old you know uh the old sneakers all like i'm like blue and green head to toe right and so i show up the next morning and everybody's looking at me and i'm like hey wowie zowie everybody just couldn't believe it and so you know steve west and spiral come up to me and they're like how you doing and i'm like i'm like i'm so glad to be here and they took a picture with me like right away they were like the nicest and um it was great i got to meet uh bob nastanovich and and his wife carly um who who I get to be really good friends with. She was absolutely amazing. So there's more interacting to come. So we go on the pavement walk.

Track 3:

[18:40] And it's hosted by a guy from Iceland. And so one of my favorite jokes on the whole trip gets set up, right? So we're walking through Iceland, and he's like, oh, this is where Bjork lived, and this is where this was, and this is what happened here and all of these spots. And then we get to this condominium.

Track 3:

[19:04] And, you know, he's standing in front of it and gets everybody up there and says, now this, this is, used to be the rock and roll club. He's like, it looks very clean now, but back in the late 80s and early 90s, this is where we would come and we would write songs, we would play songs. This was the club. This was it right here. This is the spot. He's like, this was everything right in this spot. He's like, and we used to. And then he said the thing that just made my eyes go like big bug wide open. And he said to me, we used to get blackout drunk. And I'm like and then there was like this kind of pause which I love because it just kind of sets me up and I have this sense of humor and I just kind of raised my hand and I said.

Track 3:

[20:11] Did you say that you got blackout drunk here? And he's like yeah and I said and, But this is your old club, right? And he said, yeah. And so I said, so now that it's closed on weekends and shut for good, would you consider this your own personal Hall of Fame? And Steve West is kind of looking at me and then all of a sudden just looks straight down to the ground like really hard. And you hear like three people chuckling in the background who get the joke and i'm sure the people got it but like you know maybe it wasn't their their sense of humor um and i just felt like i'm like he and he didn't get the joke which just to me made it like that much better it made it even better and i was just like you know it was great and so my my friend steve comes up. He's from the Midwest and has this very straight sense of humor. And he's like.

Track 3:

[21:24] Your joke earlier, that was good. Which I loved. He's just like the perfect straight man. It was so good. It was so good. And so we go on the rest of the walk and I got to meet Bob a little bit more. I got to meet Carly. But then I got probably about five minutes to walk with Spiral. And I got to tell Spiral like how much I loved Date with Ikea which is just like probably, it's definitely in my top five I think I submit it as like number three on my list because I just love that song they're just like songs that just really resonate with me it always makes me smile I love playing the John Peel version because it's just it's quicker and it just really hits every time and it's just funny because like.

Track 3:

[22:15] I became part of like team Spiral, right? Because like when I would go to the shows, I would stand like on Spiral's side. Like a lot of people buy tickets and stand to the left where Malk is. Yeah. But I like to stand to the right because I can see Spiral, I can see Bob, and I can see Mark and Steve very easily. And I can still see Malk and, you know, and Eyebold and everybody else. But like, you know, Mark's, you know, Moloch stands so far over, you know, but a lot of people gravitate over there. So it's good. And, you know, so, I mean, it was just, just amazing. And did you get to hear them play Date with Ikea? They did. They played it Friday night. They played it. I said, he's like, yeah, he's like, but we'll play it. He's like, we'll play it. And you get to hear it. And, and then, so we went and we went back and they did autographs. We got to meet them. They were just fantastic. They were all just so nice. I mean, everybody was generous with their time. I mean. That was my experience as well. Like, just so gracious and so accommodating. Yeah.

Track 3:

[23:31] Um, and so it was like, okay, where do we go from here? We did the Saturday show. I did like all, you know, I did some tours. I did Blue Lagoon, which is now like closed, you know, and those are heartbreaking every time we see like the volcano eruption stuff. And, you know, I feel for the people in that area. Cause like, oh, the people were so nice. I mean, just walking around Reykjavik, it was like, so, it was just so great. Cause everybody was like so relaxed. I mean, I was walking down the street one day and I had some napkins kind of coming out of my pocket and somebody comes up to me and he's like, your money. And I'm like, oh, thanks. It's just napkins, but thank you. You know, like, you know, and like, you know, where I live, it's like, everybody would be like, boop, I'll take that, thanks, and keep walking, you know, or let it fly away and, you know, all that. But, you know, we just had this crew and we would get, you know, we got together for drinks on the last Sunday and, you know, and people said their goodbyes and stuff. And it was just, it was great. But everybody's like, so who's going to Brooklyn? Because the tour wrapped up in Brooklyn in September. So in like six, seven weeks later, a lot of us went to Brooklyn.

Track 3:

[24:52] Jesus Christ. So because they had put the announcement out that the tickets were going to come out. And I told my wife, I'm like, I got to do one more. I just feel like I'm really called to just, I got to go to the last show. Got to go to the last. So I bought two tickets and I called, I have a twin sister. and I called my twin sister Andrea and I said.

Track 3:

[25:17] Because she used to go to all the shows with me. And she took me to Foo Fighters for our birthday. Like one of her birthday presents to me, we went to see Foo Fighters in Laconia, New Hampshire. Turned back the clock and it was a great time. So I said, well, you did Foo Fighters. I said, come to Brooklyn with me because she loves going to New York. I said, come to Brooklyn and let's go to Pavement. She's like, all right, let's do it. So I bought the tickets. And then we were coming up to the shows, and the only song I didn't hear in Iceland that I absolutely had to hear was Elevate Me Later and couldn't stop talking about it. Um so we get to um we get to brooklyn uh the.

Track 3:

[26:06] Week of the it was monday september 11th was the first show and everybody did the first show and i had friends there like and now everybody's like totally into it people know each other and and my friend eric the guy from new jersey was unbelievable and basically was just like posting in the chat like okay they're doing this song now Now they're doing this song. Now they're doing this song. And like some people would like post videos into the chat. Somebody tried to do a little live. I mean, like, I mean, the time that people were investing in sharing the information with everybody else was just wild. So I'm just like, I was like, I'm getting a ticket for Wednesday because it wasn't sold out yet. And I was like, I'm buying a ticket for Wednesday. And I worked it out with my sister where we were going to take the train together. And then she's like, I'll just buy a bus ticket. You meet me there and I'm like, I'm going, I'm going out on the train a day early and I'm going to the Wednesday show too. So I get to the Wednesday show and, um, cause now it's like, I'm in it now. Now it's like a minute. So I got tickets for the last two shows. I had to. And, um, I'm like, it was like really just called to do it because I got there, you know, I met up with Steve and Mike and, and everybody and, and, and it was wonderful seeing everybody, um, and met new people too, like, uh, Wes from Chicago, who was really great. And he ended up cutting some videos and some other folks.

Track 3:

[27:36] But they ended up doing Elevate Me Later on the Wednesday show. It was the only time in the whole tour, the whole year and a half tour, that they played Elevate Me Later. Holy shit. And they did. You were there for it. I was there for it. I couldn't believe it. Because they wrote it out as LS2 on the play sheet. Yeah, yeah. And I was like, are they going to play it? Because and my friend Wes is like well there's like two versions of it he's like so he's like I think so but maybe and then like they kicked into it and I'm like that's my entrance song, and it was like I was like in a hyper trance for like the first 20 seconds of it because like I couldn't believe they were finally playing it and it came out great it was amazing Rebecca Clay Cole, who was there doing the organ work on the tour, her voice on the backing vocal was just awesome with everybody else. It's a great version. It really needs to be on Spotify.

Track 3:

[28:38] Well, I hope we get some live records at some point from this tour. They were taking video and all kinds of stuff. So I am hoping that they do some live work with it. And if we get that out, produce, it would be super great. Um, so I mean, it was really great. Uh, I mean, um, we, you know, at, at the end of the Wednesday show, uh, we went to the bar across the street and we were having beers. We kind of closed that place down and then a spiral runs out and, um, you know, and he's just like booking it for his Uber. Right. Cause I mean, you know, there's still like, you know, probably 20, 20 of us there hanging out and he's like, yeah, Hey, I'll see you guys. And I'm like, hey, Spiral, it's me from Iceland. And he's like, wait, I remember you. And I'm like, knock back. And I'm like, oh, my friends heard that. And it was just like frivolity because it was just, it was too crazy. And I gave him a high five. He gave me a quick hug and he jetted off into his Uber. And I'm just like, my whole night was made. I guess so. You know, and then like it couldn't get any better except Steve Malkmus walked out and was hanging out on the corner waiting for his Uber. And he's just standing there and he's talking to like you know somebody else he was with and we're all standing there like diagonally across the street from Malk and he's just standing there and another friend of mine says.

Track 3:

[30:07] Russell, what do we do? And I'm like, we go up to him. And so like, I just started walking across the street and then like, I just like went right after, you know, and, and patiently waited for him to finish this conversation. And I'm like, hello. And I'm wearing my Reykjavik t-shirt, except it says Reykjavik in Japanese. And one of our other friends is Japanese in the group. And when she saw me and she walked into the bar, she was the only person who laughed at me because she's like, Like, your t-shirt says Reykjavik.

Track 3:

[30:35] I mean, the moments were just, like, amazing. They were all, like, it felt like every moment was like that. And then, so, like, Stephen was the only person I hadn't met. And, you know, again, super gracious, took some photos, you know, and, you know, I didn't take too much of his time because, you know, the rest of my friends all got time to meet him before his ride showed up. And that was that. You know, we did the Thursday show also. And, you know, we got to say goodbye to the band and to everybody else. And it was something else.

Track 3:

[31:09] And, you know, one last story that my friend Mike from D.C. is very fond of. So when we got back from Iceland, I had the picture with me dressed up in the Wowie Zowie outfit. And I have a picture. When we did the record signing, it was at 12 Tonar. Which is one of the record shops in Reykjavik. So in the back, they have this wall with graffiti, and it's all color. So I'm in my color outfit, and it's all color. And it's this really cool photo that came out, and you could see everything, the sneakers, the whole nine yards, right? And so I posted it on Twitter, and I said, you know, I posted it to Bob and Carly and Spiral, and said, thank you so much for everything. And Spiral wrote back and called me a legend. And that just like broke my friend Mike. He's like, he's like, hold up, hold up, hold up. He's like, do I have that right? He's like, did you call Spiral a legend or did he call you a legend? I'm like.

Track 3:

[32:18] He called me a legend. That's amazing. And Mike is like, why? Why did he call you a legend? He's like, what don't I know about you, Russell? And I'm like. I wear bright colors. Yeah. I mean, you know, I just, I'm like, I don't know, Mike. You know, I'm thankful he did that, you know. Oh, God, that's amazing. It was just, it's wild. It's out on the interwebs, you know, and it makes me smile. There are just so many pieces that made me smile. At me on Twitter. At me on Twitter with the photo. Oh, yeah, absolutely. I would love to see it. Yeah, I'm happy to share it. So a quick shout out to the whole crew here. So Steve, Mike, Eric, Liz from England, Sasha, Chiaki, Curtis, Chris from Berlin, Manny and Liza, Wes Stevens, Tony, Bacon, and a very large shout out to the man from Reykjavik himself.

Track 3:

[33:21] Elvar, Elvarsson, who was, you know, we all became friends with Elvar when we were in Reykjavik, and he was the only person in our group from Iceland. And I love his name because, Because in Boston, we always swear at people. And Elvar's name is Elvar, Elvar's son. So he's son of an Elvar. I mean, in our best Boston. And he's such a bright personality, a wonderful guy. He does a podcast called Peeling the Onion. So a shout out to him. And if anybody's out there, it's on Spotify. And he covers a lot of punk rock origins and stuff. So huge shout out to Elvar. And to all the people who were there for Iceland and Brooklyn, my sister, of course, you know, and my family for putting up with the time while I'm away and the incessant playing of the pavement. And, you know, but my son has now kind of become kind of a fan a little bit. Done good work. Yeah, we're driving around. You know, he has his pavement favorites too, which makes me smile. So it's, you know, some good dad work there. So I'm trying. I'm trying.

Track 3:

[34:39] Well, what do you say we flip the record here and play song 21 and then come back and have a little talk about that? Sounds good. I'm ready for a B-side. All right, let's do it. We'll be back after this.

Track 1:

[34:53] Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening. And now on with a countdown. 21.

Track 3:

[38:08] Today's song is the second song from Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain to appear on the countdown thus far. Today, we're talking all about number 21, Cut Your Hair. Russell, talk to me about your relationship with this song. I love this song, you know, for a few reasons. One, I think because, you know, it's ubiquitous. And when I talk about Pavement to the rest of the free world people are like, I don't remember that band, and if I say cut your hair people are like, yeah I remember that and I think it's great that there's a song that helps people kind of make that connection.

Track 3:

[38:57] Even though their relationship to the band isn't as deep as ours right um i also love it because like 90s russ had the best hair now for those you know for all my friends and family that know me my my hair is gone now and for all my recent friends all they know is you know russ has no hair but 90s russ and my 90s friends or people People that grew up with me know that like in college, they used to call me Mr. Perfect Hair or the guy with the hair. And my hair kind of came off to the left and it would – on the side, it came all the way around and it didn't move.

Track 3:

[39:43] It did not move. And it would just come down in the front and it was always perfect no matter like when you saw me. I could roll to the cafeteria at 8 a.m., and it had to be just right. It was always on. And people used to try to do all kinds of stuff to mess it up, and it was his own airtight defense system. It was awesome. It was part of me. You wouldn't see me without it. I didn't have the confidence back then to not have it. Be just so um it was just you know it was part of kind of life in my 20s so like you know the hair was it was just that was it wherever i was i was always able to make sure like i could find an outlet and uh blow dry my hair and uh and make it just so so it was um it was hilarious uh so So, you know, I love the song, and the song is just...

Track 3:

[40:53] You know, it's everything about, you know, kind of just like that, being perfect. It's like, you have to be so packaged and so, you know, you have to have that image just so. You know, like back in the day when we had the Andre Agassi commercials, image is everything. And that's what Cut Your Hair says to me. It's like, image is everything. Thing like if you're gonna go far as a band like you know like you have to have like this whatever it is packaged image that record company wants you to follow in order for your career to advance and and you can't really be yourself you know um that's how i i see the song is it's almost like It's a song of conformity. If you don't fit the image, you won't move forward. And it's interesting that Cut Your Hair is on Crooked Rain, which really propelled their career.

Track 3:

[41:59] Absolutely. And kind of got them to the point where the next record really could have put them up and over. And they come out with Wowie Zowie, which is really, people say it's equivalent to Weezer Pinkerton. Right. Yeah, I can see that. Which I loved, and it really kind of got a very cool reception. You know but like if you look at the like how everybody rated it it was like this album's amazing and i'm like well yeah that album is amazing the same thing with like wow he's out where you like it you know if as people reviewed it a lot of people didn't like it and some people like really loved it but when you come back and listen to wow he's out where you like it, You know, it was growing your hair. They made the record they wanted to make, even though it didn't quite conform to what the record companies necessarily wanted.

Track 3:

[43:03] You know, and they made that art what they wanted it to be. And so that's kind of like what Cut Your Hair kind of means to me, you know? I love it. Tension and Fame, South Korea.

Track 3:

[43:23] I mean, you know, it's a fun song. It's, you know, it's really light and peppy. You know, it's a song when you go to the show, you know, you're going to hear it, you know, more often than not, you know. And if they, when they played four shows, I think they left it out once, you know, maybe twice. But when we got to Brooklyn, they were really playing like real deep cuts. I mean, we got to hear like, they emptied the cupboards in Brooklyn and that was great. We got a lot of, hearing Half a Canyon and Pueblo and those kinds of songs were really great. But, you know, cut your hair, you know you're going to hear it. But, you know, like, it's fun. And sometimes it can be that song where it's just like, oh, you know, I don't know if I want to hear it because it is so popular, you know, and it is, you know, uniquely Pavement. And it's, you know, like, I want to hear other songs. But it was really interesting because when you gave me the opportunity to come on and talk about it, and I'm like, it really is a great song. It is a great song. You know? And...

Track 3:

[44:42] You know, I saw out on Reddit, I think it was last week, there's now a beer named after it called The Second Drummer Drowned. Dude, interesting story. The guy who posted that, I just said nonchalant, I said, oh man, it's too bad you couldn't ship one here. And then he DM'd me, got my address, and he is shipping one to me. That is outstanding. It is so fucking cool, and I believe his name is, oh shit, I think it's Mark. I will amend this at some point and make sure that he gets the shout out he deserves. But this leads me to an interesting question for you talking about, you know, this song and the fact that some people can dismiss it because it was their popular hit. It had, you know, it was on MTV rotation, like the music video.

Track 3:

[45:44] So is this song at 21, is it properly rated? Is it overrated? Is it underrated? What do you think? 21, we're into the great tracks now. Not to say that the whole 50 isn't great, but we're starting to get down to the nitty gritty. Be i have to i'm gonna say i was surprised when you told me that i when i was at 21, i did not expect to see cut your hair here me neither but i understand it in a way and so i will you know i'll share a little bit of my own um you know submission i ranked elevate Elevate Me Later, number one, for a very specific reason. I wanted the points for it because I wanted it to be somewhere in the top 50 because I love it. And so when we say, okay, it's going to be the top 50 countdown, I think about the math behind it and goes into it. So I think that Cut Your Hair kind of gets knocked down a little bit because...

Track 3:

[47:02] Everyone just assumes it's going to be there. Oh, that's a good call. Okay. So it's kind of like that old Simpsons episode where Bart Simpson, and this is like season one where Bart Simpson runs for class president against Martin Prince. And everybody thinks Bart's going to win and nobody votes for him. And only Martin Prince wins two to nothing because him and his only friend voted for Martin Prince. So it was two nothing Martin Prince. That was it. And Martin won. And everybody's like, nobody voted for Bart. So I feel like cut your hair as Bart. I mean, nobody really voted for it because everybody would just count on it being in everybody's highly ranked list. And here it is at 21.

Track 3:

[47:40] You're probably bang on the money, man. You know, that's an interesting take. I hadn't really considered that, but I think that's a very solid take. I mean, because I ranked some other songs a little bit higher because I wanted to make sure they made the cut. Yeah. And I put Elevate Me Later number one because I asked for it so much amongst my friends. It's tied to me now. And every time I hear it, I put it on right before we came on just to hype me up because it always makes me smile. but Grounded and then Date With Ikea were my top three. And Date With Ikea, for me, that was properly rated because I love that song. And having that time with Spiral, those few minutes with him in Reykjavik is something I will never forget. Of course. It's tied to it between that and the Twitter thing and the fact that he remembered me in the shows and Brooklyn and all that, I'm definitely like Team Spiral and everybody ribs me for that, good-naturedly, because it's just funny. And, you know, but I think that's- He's a gem, man. He's a gem. He's come on five times. Really? Yeah. He's been on five times. Amazing. Amazing. Yeah. I get it. I mean, they've all been great, you know. And a special shout out, too, to Carly, who's Bob's wife.

Track 3:

[49:10] We chat occasionally on Twitter and say, hi, how are you? And even during the shows, she would say hi to me and she'd say, hey, I love your energy. And like she was taping, she was videotaping the shows on her phone. And she's like, you know, at like certain intervals, she would just like hand me her phone. She's like, you tape this. And so like, I'm like watching the concert and I'm like holding up her phone, making sure I get good footage for her. It was hilarious. I mean, like the stuff that just happened was just like, I'm like, how am I even doing this? Like, why? Like, you know, why have I been chosen to kind of be in the middle of all of this? I had a very similar vibe when I did my UK trip. I had a very similar vibe. It was just like, who am I? What fucking planet is this right now? Right, right, right. This is my favorite band, and I'm following them around, and I'm getting backstage, and they know me. Like, this is so cool. Right, right. It's like, this can't be happening. That's right. And the whole Iceland trip was like, you know, like people talk about like, oh, I had this trip and everything went wrong. The Iceland trip was everything went right. Everything that could have happened that, you know, that could have turned into a positive turned into a positive. And even the little setbacks I had, like, were so quickly resolved, usually by the kindness of strangers or some good fortune.

Track 3:

[50:38] It was just amazing how well everything went, and really both trips. I mean, it was the time. I had a wonderful time. Well, you were owed it, I think. And after missing them a few times, I'm glad you got to resolve your story that way. Is there anything other than the Icelandic Gentleman's podcast that you want to plug while you're here? Um no I I think I just want to plug my friends one more time for everybody in those groups you know Steve, Mike, Eric you know all those guys everybody is like just the nicest you know it's like just a quick story like you know Eric bought merchandise for us in Brooklyn and then shipped it home to all of us Wow. And he's like, just Venmo me.

Track 3:

[51:37] Like, that kind of generosity of his time and trust and everything else. Just top shelf. And everybody was like that. Mike was like that. Steve was like that. I've had a good fortune to see Steve a few times, and we've been able to hang out. And even though he's out in the Midwest, we've been able to connect a few times. Oh, that's brilliant. You know, just all the people just, it made it so great. And it just turned into this giant snowball of good that just kept rolling downhill and just kept getting better, bigger. More people came into the fold. Everywhere we went, more people came in. It was amazing how welcoming everybody was and all the people that we met, how great they were. Keep in mind if you ever do a reunion. Oh, 100%. I'll hit you up on Twitter. And I'm sure we'll wind up somewhere at some point. That would be awesome. You know, what I'd really love is like.

Track 3:

[52:39] One more like place where like iceland where they played three shows yeah you know brooklyn they played four shows like they're doing a few south america shows it's kind of tough but it's like one show in one location at a big festival and like it's hard to like kind of do that but if they played like three shows somewhere where we could just show up and and like kind of recreate them take over and recreate the magic and yeah and make some new stories and spend that time I'm, I would just, I would love that. And I, you know, I don't know. It seems like it's going to be a while, if ever, before they really say, we'll, we'll do that again.

Track 3:

[53:17] We'll see. We'll see. Like, I don't know. Like, I think SM is getting ready to release. And maybe by the time this comes out, he will have made an announcement of some sort. So we'll get some new Jicks material, SM and the Jicks, or maybe another, like his last two records have been just him so maybe it'll be just him but i wouldn't be shocked if we see them on the road again because it's uh it's fun for them it's relatively lucrative you know like the the touring market is is a good thing and they've got a loyal fan base you know they do i mean my here's my call this is just this is my take um another person i got to meet on the the Iceland trip, was his daughter, Sunday, who's – Sunday's about 15 years old now. And she was super nice. And I connected with her a little bit because that's my son's age. So, like, I got the whole thing, you know, I understood kind of, like, where she was coming from because that's my son's age.

Track 3:

[54:22] And, you know, my dad –, piece kind of raised up when we talk about, are they going to hit the road again? I think when Sunday goes to college, I think that at that point, we'll have a chance for them to maybe come back out. But I get the feeling like he'll do the dad thing. She'll get through high school. His wife is obviously, we know she's an accomplished artist. She has her career. He'll make time for her. There'll be that balance of family and everything else. And then when So when Sunday's off to her next adventure, everybody will probably say, one more ride.

Track 3:

[55:04] That'd be great. So I'm thinking maybe 2027, we'll gas up the truck and we'll make it count, I think, by then. Well, if they wait until 2029, that would be 40 years, right? Yeah. 40 years since the band formed. I hope they don't go that long, but you know. Yeah. I hope so too. Yeah. You know, um, and that's where like kind of the, the old guy in me says, let's get out there before we can't. Yeah. Well, on that note, on that, uh, harrowing note, um, uh, it's been a pleasure to have you on, uh, Boston Russ. Uh, this has been a delight. I'm so glad your story turned out the way it did. That's the kind of feel-good stories we do here on Meeting Malcomus. So, you know, kudos to you. That's what I got for you this week. So tune in next week for song number 20. That's right. We're in to the top 20. In the meantime, wash your goddamn hands.

Track 1:

[56:12] Thanks for listening to Meeting Malcomus, a pavement podcast. Podcast, where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email, jd at meetingmalkinist.com.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the Countdown, jD is joined by Ayden Flanagan to reveal song 22 and to share his Pavement Origin Story.

Transcript:

Track 1:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 2:

[0:02] So here we go with Texas Never Whispers. Aiden from Vermont, what are your initial thoughts about this song? Texas Never Whispers is a really cool song. Full disclosure, before you sent me that this would be the song that we were going to be talking about, it honestly wasn't one of the tracks off of Watery the Mystic that really jumped out at me. But after um after you sent it and i knew that we were gonna have to chat about it um i listened to it a little bit deeper and i i definitely found like a new appreciation for it hey.

Track 1:

[0:38] This is westy from the rock and roll band pavement and you're listening to the countdown.

Track 3:

[0:46] Hey it's jd here back for another episode of our top 50 countdown for seminal indie rock band and Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots. I then tabulated the results using an abacus and an air fryer. Seriously, is there anything this machine doesn't do? How will your favorite song fare in the rankings? You'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that. This week, I'm joined by Pavement superfan, Boston Russ. Boston Russ, how the fuck are you? I'm fan-tastic. and ready to rock. This is great news because it would be a hell of a podcast if you were not ready to rock. That's right. That's right. Thanks so much for having me on. Oh, it's my pleasure. Thanks for doing this. You guys do all the heavy lifting on these, so this is fantastic for me. Let's get right to it. Let's talk about your pavement origin story. Sorry. I think my Pavement Origins story goes back to 1994.

Track 3:

[1:50] I'm a little late. I'm kind of a late comer in some respects. So back in 94, a good friend of mine, so I got to give him some props. His name was Sean McGovern. We called him Slappy and a few other things. He was in a band in the Boston area called Beeswax. There's some other bands in our area called Beeswax also, but he was in with a few guys. And they did AK-47 and a couple other songs. Sadly, he passed away a couple years ago. He got sick. Oh, shit.

Track 3:

[2:23] But back in 94, we were good friends, and we hung out a ton, and he just one day gave me this bag of CDs. He left it in my car. He's like, listen to these. And so Crooked Rain was there, and so I put it on, and Silent Kid comes on, and I'm just like.

Track 3:

[2:41] Who are these guys? And, you know, I played the album some. And it was just, like, I go back and I look at that time. And, like, the album release times were just, like, really, like, fast-moving parts of my life. It was, like, the end of college almost where Crooked Rain came out. It was, like, the end of my junior year. And I was doing a radio show. And I don't know. I, like, never quite linked up to, like, really featuring them prominently. And then wowie zowie comes out like two weeks before i graduated college and you know and get into like the summer in 95 and it's just like it like just blurred and so it's like i heard it like a little bit but didn't like totally like dive in not until bright in the corners came out in 97 and that like i just could not stop playing that album like just word great record and word out and And I wanted to see them in concert. I had been to a bunch of different shows for bands, like Foo Fighters. I got to see Foo Fighters when they were together for two weeks in 1995. Holy shit. They were together. Nobody knew who they were. This is my same friend. So Sean says to me, we got to go see this band play.

Track 3:

[3:55] Eddie Vedder's wife is doing a percussion band.

Track 3:

[3:59] And Eddie Vedder is going to play with Mike Watt. And Dave Grohl is going to show up. and do, he's going to play with his new band. And I was like, he's like, you got to go. And it was like this rainy Sunday afternoon. We go to this club called Avalon. So if anybody knows Boston, knows the 90s, we wore Avalon out. I mean, it was like one of the best places to go for rock bands. And Foo Fighters was the middle band. Grohl comes out on lead. And you're like, because you're like, oh, Dave Grohl, new band, going to be a drummer, right? He comes out on lead and does like, and he's holding his guitar tower in hand and it was like that one moment where it's like best ever or total train wreck and he did this as a call comes in with the first lines you know just his voice butter and from there it was it was crazy so like you know i followed like a lot of these bands and went to a lot of these shows and just didn't quite i kept missing pavement and then they broke up and i got old you and me both brother you know and it's like oh and they got together in 2010 and but my My son was like a year old, and I had really moved far from Boston at that point and totally missed the tour. And I was like, ugh, you know, and just kind of feeling like stuck. And so I would listen to, you know, Pavement a lot during the 2010s. They were a big part of Spotify, and I would play them. And I don't know, a couple of years ago...

Track 3:

[5:26] I was just saying to myself, it would be really great if these guys would really do a tour. Yes. And then it happened. And they came to Boston, and I got sick. No fucking way. I got sick at the end of September. I totally missed the announcement that they were coming, and then got sick, and I couldn't get tickets, and I skipped it. And I was just like, I'm totally beside myself. And I was like, all right. This is okay, because we're going to make up for it. And so, we come to the end of the calendar year in 22, and then one of the best things happened to me. My wife, her best friend calls her up and says, guess what I have? And my wife says, what? And her best friend says, I have an extra free ticket to see Taylor Swift. And my wife is a huge Swifty. All right. Okay? Huge. And, you know, but her best friend lives in Tennessee. And we're in Boston. And her best friend says, the ticket's for Tampa Bay.

Track 3:

[6:41] Oh, my God. So, because that's where her best friend mom lives, right? Right. So, she's just like, well, I'm going to go from Tennessee to Tampa and go to the show. Do you want to come with me? And and of course you know well i gotta tell my wife i'm like you got it's a ticket of the year i'm like this this is like you got a free ticket to this like yeah you have to go right you have to go so of course like she could i you know she got the ticket we just got her i got her a flight and you know she goes down there and has a ball right they drive they do like a 1300 mile road trip from tennessee to tampa and back they go to the smoky mountains they have like the best time ever right so right after that the ticket um you know i got out of the plane ticket, the pavement in iceland announcement comes oh yes and i'm like pavement iceland and i turned 50 and i'm like she's like, You have to do that.

Track 3:

[7:40] That is a great wife. Yeah. She is fantastic. And I'm like, I do have to do this, don't I? She's like, I think you do. And I'm like, it's three shows. I'm like, they'll play all the songs. They have to play all the songs just to vote because it's three shows in a row. Yeah. So I went ahead and I ended up booking the trip. And so this was like you know late late i think the release was like late january so like early february it was like a couple of weeks after they released the thing i i got tickets but i still got like fifth row and i got second row for like the last show i got really good tickets they were they were a little slow to sell out of the gate but and thankful for me because you know i'm like so i just i got a flight the flights were very reasonable and so got a flight and just said we're doing this thing. So as the year ticks by, I'm getting ready, getting ready, getting ready. And then I think it was sometime in late June, my birthday passed and all this, getting ready for the trip. And then I get the big announcement that says, in Iceland, they're going to do a walking tour with the band. I did not know this. yeah they put out a walking tour with the band so uh steve and bob participated in the walking tour.

Track 3:

[9:02] Um so um oh and and spiral also of course um so it was the three of them and then you would buy a record and and buy the tour uh the walk tour so 90 minutes around reykjavik um and there was a host and then they would go ahead and talk about, you know, they would just talk about the musical history of Iceland, and then you could walk around and get to meet the pavement guys. That's fantastic. There were 50 tickets, went on sale at noon. My hand was like on that button, and I was number 21. That's amazing. I could not believe I got a ticket. It and i i you know again i was like is i'm like is this hyping up to be the best trip ever i'm like sounds like i'm like what's happening here and so now we're leading up to the trip the trips at the end of july they did the shows at the end of july so sometime in july i'm on reddit i'm on the pavement channel and um sky posts up and he says who's going to iceland let's form a group, so I'm like great I'm like how about me I'm like I'm going he says hi I'm Mike from DC and I'm like I'm Russell from Boston.

Track 3:

[10:26] So, I jump in. Another guy, Steve from Milwaukee, jumps in and says to me, so, what do you think the weather's going to be like? I'm like, maybe like a mild Boston winter. Unfortunately, to me and Steve, that meant two different things. Sorry, Steve. Because I ended up considering that to be a little chilly. But I went a little cold. So, it was pretty funny. And so, slowly, this little group of people forms on Reddit and then goes over to WhatsApp. So the day comes, finally go ahead and fly out. Do the flight, no problem, get there. And then when you fly into Keflavik Airport, it's about 45 minutes from Reykjavik, you go and take a bus. Okay. And so, guy sits across from me, he's also from Massachusetts. His name's Curtis, and I strike up a conversation with him. And halfway through the conversation, He's like, by the way, are you here for pavement? And I'm like, yes. He's like, what gives me away? He's like, you know, you're a certain age, traveling by yourself. He's like, me too. I figured you were here for the shows.

Track 3:

[11:35] And I'm like, I'm on the bus and I'm not even there yet. And we're already way off and running. So we get to the Thursday show, and the moment of truth comes, and I'm walking down to Harpa Concert Hall. It's a huge glass structure. It's beautiful. If you ever see the pictures online, it was amazing. Beautiful place to play. And so I'm walking, and I'm within sight distance of the concert hall. I've already spent the day there. Reykjavik's beautiful. People are nice. Everybody's very relaxed.

Track 3:

[12:16] And guess who walks right by me is Mark Eibold. Really? Yep. Just walking to the venue. I'm walking to the venue. He's walking away from it. He's probably going out for maybe a quick bite to eat or something. something, you know, we got a little, we had, you know, time before they went on. He walks right by me and I'm like, Mark. And he turned around and I told him hello. And I said, you know, I was here for the shows and everything. He took a quick picture with me and, you know, and that was that. But I got to meet him and I was like, all right, I got to meet Mark. He is the elusive one. He is, he is elusive. And so, but I got to meet him and got a photo and, I mean, super nice. You know, it was like 90 seconds tops, you know, because I just didn't want to take up his time. I mean, you know, he's getting ready for the show and everything. So I was happy for that. And I went up to the concert hall and everybody just started to meet. And it was funny because I think it was Mike in the group said, Yeah.

Track 3:

[13:23] Okay, so here's the moment of truth. How are we all going to know, you know, who each other are since we don't know each other? Good call. So I said, all right, I'm going to go stand by one of the tables. I'm wearing bright blue pumas. You can't miss me. Because I'm also wearing this, like, bright vest. I tend to wear bright clothing sometimes. And so, like, I got this vest and I got this, like, hat and pom-pom and this whole getup. Can't miss me. I mean, I'm like screaming and everybody's dressed in like black and Reykjavik. So I'm like, I really stick out.

Track 3:

[13:57] I'm like, can't miss me. And so I think like the first guy that comes over is Steve and Steve's like, Russ. And I'm like, hi. And so that just kind of like broke the ice for everybody and people started to gravitate over. And, you know, like we're having a couple of beers. We're talking at the shows, you know, and just met some like really great people, you know, the merch tables there. And we're talking, you know, other people got tickets for the walk on Friday and it was amazing. And so one of the guys, Eric from New Jersey, Eric says to me, I said, you know, I got Crooked Rain with the tour. I said, but I really wanted Wowie Zowie. He's like, why don't you just buy it at the merch table, bring it with you tomorrow. They'll just sign it. I'm like, genius. Yeah. So I did that, and that ended up working out very well, because they signed both albums. So solid piece of advice from Eric. And so we did the show, and it was fantastic. They started off with Grounded, which is one of my favorites. Damn. And it was really great, because when they just break into Grounded, it's like...

Track 3:

[15:15] I made it, you know, and, you know, the, the, the months leading up to that were a little difficult. My mom was pretty sick. She's, you know, had, she had some tough moments last year and, uh, it was just like really emotional. I was like, holy crap. I like, I really did it. I mean, this was like 30 years in the making. Yeah. And I just, it was, you know, and it's like when you see that like pavement in Iceland thing and it's like, you look at that and it's like a lot of times you just look at those types of things and then it's like, oh, it should do And you don't end up doing it, you know, for all the reasons to not go and for all the reasons to go. And it's like, I'm here, here.

Track 3:

[15:59] And it was just amazing. I bet. It was just really great. They did Summer Babe. And, you know, by then, we're like, we're all friends. And, like, we're all yelling all the lyrics to the songs. And, you know, everybody's just, like, carrying on, having a good time. And, you know, go out to the bars after we're out late, having drinks. And everybody's, you know, really just getting to meet each other and have fun and, you know, learn where everybody's from. I mean, people came from Los Angeles, Jersey, D.C. There were people from Europe, Berlin, and England, and all these places. All these people just converged, and they all came by themselves. Really? Yep. Most people weren't by themselves. They all came by themselves. Wow. And so there was this group of people that had all come by themselves. And now it was like we started to become like this little unit. So now Friday... Friday was like really one of the highlights of the trip because we had the pavement walk and it was really, it was just great.

Track 3:

[17:19] I'll send you a copy of this picture, but like, so I bring Wowie Zowie and I mentioned how I like to dress up in bright colors and my whole get up for the day basically matched the album cover. And i didn't plan it that way but i had like you could see like my hooded sweatshirt and i wore this like green hooded sweatshirt and this you know in a shirt and my vest and hat and everything were all like blue and green and so and i had green puma sneakers like the old you know uh the old sneakers all like i'm like blue and green head to toe right and so i show up the next morning and everybody's looking at me and i'm like hey wowie zowie everybody just couldn't believe it and so you know steve west and spiral come up to me and they're like how you doing and i'm like i'm like i'm so glad to be here and they took a picture with me like right away they were like the nicest and um it was great i got to meet uh bob nastanovich and and his wife carly um who who I get to be really good friends with. She was absolutely amazing. So there's more interacting to come. So we go on the pavement walk.

Track 3:

[18:40] And it's hosted by a guy from Iceland. And so one of my favorite jokes on the whole trip gets set up, right? So we're walking through Iceland, and he's like, oh, this is where Bjork lived, and this is where this was, and this is what happened here and all of these spots. And then we get to this condominium.

Track 3:

[19:04] And, you know, he's standing in front of it and gets everybody up there and says, now this, this is, used to be the rock and roll club. He's like, it looks very clean now, but back in the late 80s and early 90s, this is where we would come and we would write songs, we would play songs. This was the club. This was it right here. This is the spot. He's like, this was everything right in this spot. He's like, and we used to. And then he said the thing that just made my eyes go like big bug wide open. And he said to me, we used to get blackout drunk. And I'm like and then there was like this kind of pause which I love because it just kind of sets me up and I have this sense of humor and I just kind of raised my hand and I said.

Track 3:

[20:11] Did you say that you got blackout drunk here? And he's like yeah and I said and, But this is your old club, right? And he said, yeah. And so I said, so now that it's closed on weekends and shut for good, would you consider this your own personal Hall of Fame? And Steve West is kind of looking at me and then all of a sudden just looks straight down to the ground like really hard. And you hear like three people chuckling in the background who get the joke and i'm sure the people got it but like you know maybe it wasn't their their sense of humor um and i just felt like i'm like he and he didn't get the joke which just to me made it like that much better it made it even better and i was just like you know it was great and so my my friend steve comes up. He's from the Midwest and has this very straight sense of humor. And he's like.

Track 3:

[21:24] Your joke earlier, that was good. Which I loved. He's just like the perfect straight man. It was so good. It was so good. And so we go on the rest of the walk and I got to meet Bob a little bit more. I got to meet Carly. But then I got probably about five minutes to walk with Spiral. And I got to tell Spiral like how much I loved Date with Ikea which is just like probably, it's definitely in my top five I think I submit it as like number three on my list because I just love that song they're just like songs that just really resonate with me it always makes me smile I love playing the John Peel version because it's just it's quicker and it just really hits every time and it's just funny because like.

Track 3:

[22:15] I became part of like team Spiral, right? Because like when I would go to the shows, I would stand like on Spiral's side. Like a lot of people buy tickets and stand to the left where Malk is. Yeah. But I like to stand to the right because I can see Spiral, I can see Bob, and I can see Mark and Steve very easily. And I can still see Malk and, you know, and Eyebold and everybody else. But like, you know, Mark's, you know, Moloch stands so far over, you know, but a lot of people gravitate over there. So it's good. And, you know, so, I mean, it was just, just amazing. And did you get to hear them play Date with Ikea? They did. They played it Friday night. They played it. I said, he's like, yeah, he's like, but we'll play it. He's like, we'll play it. And you get to hear it. And, and then, so we went and we went back and they did autographs. We got to meet them. They were just fantastic. They were all just so nice. I mean, everybody was generous with their time. I mean. That was my experience as well. Like, just so gracious and so accommodating. Yeah.

Track 3:

[23:31] Um, and so it was like, okay, where do we go from here? We did the Saturday show. I did like all, you know, I did some tours. I did Blue Lagoon, which is now like closed, you know, and those are heartbreaking every time we see like the volcano eruption stuff. And, you know, I feel for the people in that area. Cause like, oh, the people were so nice. I mean, just walking around Reykjavik, it was like, so, it was just so great. Cause everybody was like so relaxed. I mean, I was walking down the street one day and I had some napkins kind of coming out of my pocket and somebody comes up to me and he's like, your money. And I'm like, oh, thanks. It's just napkins, but thank you. You know, like, you know, and like, you know, where I live, it's like, everybody would be like, boop, I'll take that, thanks, and keep walking, you know, or let it fly away and, you know, all that. But, you know, we just had this crew and we would get, you know, we got together for drinks on the last Sunday and, you know, and people said their goodbyes and stuff. And it was just, it was great. But everybody's like, so who's going to Brooklyn? Because the tour wrapped up in Brooklyn in September. So in like six, seven weeks later, a lot of us went to Brooklyn.

Track 3:

[24:52] Jesus Christ. So because they had put the announcement out that the tickets were going to come out. And I told my wife, I'm like, I got to do one more. I just feel like I'm really called to just, I got to go to the last show. Got to go to the last. So I bought two tickets and I called, I have a twin sister. and I called my twin sister Andrea and I said.

Track 3:

[25:17] Because she used to go to all the shows with me. And she took me to Foo Fighters for our birthday. Like one of her birthday presents to me, we went to see Foo Fighters in Laconia, New Hampshire. Turned back the clock and it was a great time. So I said, well, you did Foo Fighters. I said, come to Brooklyn with me because she loves going to New York. I said, come to Brooklyn and let's go to Pavement. She's like, all right, let's do it. So I bought the tickets. And then we were coming up to the shows, and the only song I didn't hear in Iceland that I absolutely had to hear was Elevate Me Later and couldn't stop talking about it. Um so we get to um we get to brooklyn uh the.

Track 3:

[26:06] Week of the it was monday september 11th was the first show and everybody did the first show and i had friends there like and now everybody's like totally into it people know each other and and my friend eric the guy from new jersey was unbelievable and basically was just like posting in the chat like okay they're doing this song now Now they're doing this song. Now they're doing this song. And like some people would like post videos into the chat. Somebody tried to do a little live. I mean, like, I mean, the time that people were investing in sharing the information with everybody else was just wild. So I'm just like, I was like, I'm getting a ticket for Wednesday because it wasn't sold out yet. And I was like, I'm buying a ticket for Wednesday. And I worked it out with my sister where we were going to take the train together. And then she's like, I'll just buy a bus ticket. You meet me there and I'm like, I'm going, I'm going out on the train a day early and I'm going to the Wednesday show too. So I get to the Wednesday show and, um, cause now it's like, I'm in it now. Now it's like a minute. So I got tickets for the last two shows. I had to. And, um, I'm like, it was like really just called to do it because I got there, you know, I met up with Steve and Mike and, and everybody and, and, and it was wonderful seeing everybody, um, and met new people too, like, uh, Wes from Chicago, who was really great. And he ended up cutting some videos and some other folks.

Track 3:

[27:36] But they ended up doing Elevate Me Later on the Wednesday show. It was the only time in the whole tour, the whole year and a half tour, that they played Elevate Me Later. Holy shit. And they did. You were there for it. I was there for it. I couldn't believe it. Because they wrote it out as LS2 on the play sheet. Yeah, yeah. And I was like, are they going to play it? Because and my friend Wes is like well there's like two versions of it he's like so he's like I think so but maybe and then like they kicked into it and I'm like that's my entrance song, and it was like I was like in a hyper trance for like the first 20 seconds of it because like I couldn't believe they were finally playing it and it came out great it was amazing Rebecca Clay Cole, who was there doing the organ work on the tour, her voice on the backing vocal was just awesome with everybody else. It's a great version. It really needs to be on Spotify.

Track 3:

[28:38] Well, I hope we get some live records at some point from this tour. They were taking video and all kinds of stuff. So I am hoping that they do some live work with it. And if we get that out, produce, it would be super great. Um, so I mean, it was really great. Uh, I mean, um, we, you know, at, at the end of the Wednesday show, uh, we went to the bar across the street and we were having beers. We kind of closed that place down and then a spiral runs out and, um, you know, and he's just like booking it for his Uber. Right. Cause I mean, you know, there's still like, you know, probably 20, 20 of us there hanging out and he's like, yeah, Hey, I'll see you guys. And I'm like, hey, Spiral, it's me from Iceland. And he's like, wait, I remember you. And I'm like, knock back. And I'm like, oh, my friends heard that. And it was just like frivolity because it was just, it was too crazy. And I gave him a high five. He gave me a quick hug and he jetted off into his Uber. And I'm just like, my whole night was made. I guess so. You know, and then like it couldn't get any better except Steve Malkmus walked out and was hanging out on the corner waiting for his Uber. And he's just standing there and he's talking to like you know somebody else he was with and we're all standing there like diagonally across the street from Malk and he's just standing there and another friend of mine says.

Track 3:

[30:07] Russell, what do we do? And I'm like, we go up to him. And so like, I just started walking across the street and then like, I just like went right after, you know, and, and patiently waited for him to finish this conversation. And I'm like, hello. And I'm wearing my Reykjavik t-shirt, except it says Reykjavik in Japanese. And one of our other friends is Japanese in the group. And when she saw me and she walked into the bar, she was the only person who laughed at me because she's like, Like, your t-shirt says Reykjavik.

Track 3:

[30:35] I mean, the moments were just, like, amazing. They were all, like, it felt like every moment was like that. And then, so, like, Stephen was the only person I hadn't met. And, you know, again, super gracious, took some photos, you know, and, you know, I didn't take too much of his time because, you know, the rest of my friends all got time to meet him before his ride showed up. And that was that. You know, we did the Thursday show also. And, you know, we got to say goodbye to the band and to everybody else. And it was something else.

Track 3:

[31:09] And, you know, one last story that my friend Mike from D.C. is very fond of. So when we got back from Iceland, I had the picture with me dressed up in the Wowie Zowie outfit. And I have a picture. When we did the record signing, it was at 12 Tonar. Which is one of the record shops in Reykjavik. So in the back, they have this wall with graffiti, and it's all color. So I'm in my color outfit, and it's all color. And it's this really cool photo that came out, and you could see everything, the sneakers, the whole nine yards, right? And so I posted it on Twitter, and I said, you know, I posted it to Bob and Carly and Spiral, and said, thank you so much for everything. And Spiral wrote back and called me a legend. And that just like broke my friend Mike. He's like, he's like, hold up, hold up, hold up. He's like, do I have that right? He's like, did you call Spiral a legend or did he call you a legend? I'm like.

Track 3:

[32:18] He called me a legend. That's amazing. And Mike is like, why? Why did he call you a legend? He's like, what don't I know about you, Russell? And I'm like. I wear bright colors. Yeah. I mean, you know, I just, I'm like, I don't know, Mike. You know, I'm thankful he did that, you know. Oh, God, that's amazing. It was just, it's wild. It's out on the interwebs, you know, and it makes me smile. There are just so many pieces that made me smile. At me on Twitter. At me on Twitter with the photo. Oh, yeah, absolutely. I would love to see it. Yeah, I'm happy to share it. So a quick shout out to the whole crew here. So Steve, Mike, Eric, Liz from England, Sasha, Chiaki, Curtis, Chris from Berlin, Manny and Liza, Wes Stevens, Tony, Bacon, and a very large shout out to the man from Reykjavik himself.

Track 3:

[33:21] Elvar, Elvarsson, who was, you know, we all became friends with Elvar when we were in Reykjavik, and he was the only person in our group from Iceland. And I love his name because, Because in Boston, we always swear at people. And Elvar's name is Elvar, Elvar's son. So he's son of an Elvar. I mean, in our best Boston. And he's such a bright personality, a wonderful guy. He does a podcast called Peeling the Onion. So a shout out to him. And if anybody's out there, it's on Spotify. And he covers a lot of punk rock origins and stuff. So huge shout out to Elvar. And to all the people who were there for Iceland and Brooklyn, my sister, of course, you know, and my family for putting up with the time while I'm away and the incessant playing of the pavement. And, you know, but my son has now kind of become kind of a fan a little bit. Done good work. Yeah, we're driving around. You know, he has his pavement favorites too, which makes me smile. So it's, you know, some good dad work there. So I'm trying. I'm trying.

Track 3:

[34:39] Well, what do you say we flip the record here and play song 21 and then come back and have a little talk about that? Sounds good. I'm ready for a B-side. All right, let's do it. We'll be back after this.

Track 1:

[34:53] Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening. And now on with a countdown. 21.

Track 3:

[38:08] Today's song is the second song from Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain to appear on the countdown thus far. Today, we're talking all about number 21, Cut Your Hair. Russell, talk to me about your relationship with this song. I love this song, you know, for a few reasons. One, I think because, you know, it's ubiquitous. And when I talk about Pavement to the rest of the free world people are like, I don't remember that band, and if I say cut your hair people are like, yeah I remember that and I think it's great that there's a song that helps people kind of make that connection.

Track 3:

[38:57] Even though their relationship to the band isn't as deep as ours right um i also love it because like 90s russ had the best hair now for those you know for all my friends and family that know me my my hair is gone now and for all my recent friends all they know is you know russ has no hair but 90s russ and my 90s friends or people People that grew up with me know that like in college, they used to call me Mr. Perfect Hair or the guy with the hair. And my hair kind of came off to the left and it would – on the side, it came all the way around and it didn't move.

Track 3:

[39:43] It did not move. And it would just come down in the front and it was always perfect no matter like when you saw me. I could roll to the cafeteria at 8 a.m., and it had to be just right. It was always on. And people used to try to do all kinds of stuff to mess it up, and it was his own airtight defense system. It was awesome. It was part of me. You wouldn't see me without it. I didn't have the confidence back then to not have it. Be just so um it was just you know it was part of kind of life in my 20s so like you know the hair was it was just that was it wherever i was i was always able to make sure like i could find an outlet and uh blow dry my hair and uh and make it just so so it was um it was hilarious uh so So, you know, I love the song, and the song is just...

Track 3:

[40:53] You know, it's everything about, you know, kind of just like that, being perfect. It's like, you have to be so packaged and so, you know, you have to have that image just so. You know, like back in the day when we had the Andre Agassi commercials, image is everything. And that's what Cut Your Hair says to me. It's like, image is everything. Thing like if you're gonna go far as a band like you know like you have to have like this whatever it is packaged image that record company wants you to follow in order for your career to advance and and you can't really be yourself you know um that's how i i see the song is it's almost like It's a song of conformity. If you don't fit the image, you won't move forward. And it's interesting that Cut Your Hair is on Crooked Rain, which really propelled their career.

Track 3:

[41:59] Absolutely. And kind of got them to the point where the next record really could have put them up and over. And they come out with Wowie Zowie, which is really, people say it's equivalent to Weezer Pinkerton. Right. Yeah, I can see that. Which I loved, and it really kind of got a very cool reception. You know but like if you look at the like how everybody rated it it was like this album's amazing and i'm like well yeah that album is amazing the same thing with like wow he's out where you like it you know if as people reviewed it a lot of people didn't like it and some people like really loved it but when you come back and listen to wow he's out where you like it, You know, it was growing your hair. They made the record they wanted to make, even though it didn't quite conform to what the record companies necessarily wanted.

Track 3:

[43:03] You know, and they made that art what they wanted it to be. And so that's kind of like what Cut Your Hair kind of means to me, you know? I love it. Tension and Fame, South Korea.

Track 3:

[43:23] I mean, you know, it's a fun song. It's, you know, it's really light and peppy. You know, it's a song when you go to the show, you know, you're going to hear it, you know, more often than not, you know. And if they, when they played four shows, I think they left it out once, you know, maybe twice. But when we got to Brooklyn, they were really playing like real deep cuts. I mean, we got to hear like, they emptied the cupboards in Brooklyn and that was great. We got a lot of, hearing Half a Canyon and Pueblo and those kinds of songs were really great. But, you know, cut your hair, you know you're going to hear it. But, you know, like, it's fun. And sometimes it can be that song where it's just like, oh, you know, I don't know if I want to hear it because it is so popular, you know, and it is, you know, uniquely Pavement. And it's, you know, like, I want to hear other songs. But it was really interesting because when you gave me the opportunity to come on and talk about it, and I'm like, it really is a great song. It is a great song. You know? And...

Track 3:

[44:42] You know, I saw out on Reddit, I think it was last week, there's now a beer named after it called The Second Drummer Drowned. Dude, interesting story. The guy who posted that, I just said nonchalant, I said, oh man, it's too bad you couldn't ship one here. And then he DM'd me, got my address, and he is shipping one to me. That is outstanding. It is so fucking cool, and I believe his name is, oh shit, I think it's Mark. I will amend this at some point and make sure that he gets the shout out he deserves. But this leads me to an interesting question for you talking about, you know, this song and the fact that some people can dismiss it because it was their popular hit. It had, you know, it was on MTV rotation, like the music video.

Track 3:

[45:44] So is this song at 21, is it properly rated? Is it overrated? Is it underrated? What do you think? 21, we're into the great tracks now. Not to say that the whole 50 isn't great, but we're starting to get down to the nitty gritty. Be i have to i'm gonna say i was surprised when you told me that i when i was at 21, i did not expect to see cut your hair here me neither but i understand it in a way and so i will you know i'll share a little bit of my own um you know submission i ranked elevate Elevate Me Later, number one, for a very specific reason. I wanted the points for it because I wanted it to be somewhere in the top 50 because I love it. And so when we say, okay, it's going to be the top 50 countdown, I think about the math behind it and goes into it. So I think that Cut Your Hair kind of gets knocked down a little bit because...

Track 3:

[47:02] Everyone just assumes it's going to be there. Oh, that's a good call. Okay. So it's kind of like that old Simpsons episode where Bart Simpson, and this is like season one where Bart Simpson runs for class president against Martin Prince. And everybody thinks Bart's going to win and nobody votes for him. And only Martin Prince wins two to nothing because him and his only friend voted for Martin Prince. So it was two nothing Martin Prince. That was it. And Martin won. And everybody's like, nobody voted for Bart. So I feel like cut your hair as Bart. I mean, nobody really voted for it because everybody would just count on it being in everybody's highly ranked list. And here it is at 21.

Track 3:

[47:40] You're probably bang on the money, man. You know, that's an interesting take. I hadn't really considered that, but I think that's a very solid take. I mean, because I ranked some other songs a little bit higher because I wanted to make sure they made the cut. Yeah. And I put Elevate Me Later number one because I asked for it so much amongst my friends. It's tied to me now. And every time I hear it, I put it on right before we came on just to hype me up because it always makes me smile. but Grounded and then Date With Ikea were my top three. And Date With Ikea, for me, that was properly rated because I love that song. And having that time with Spiral, those few minutes with him in Reykjavik is something I will never forget. Of course. It's tied to it between that and the Twitter thing and the fact that he remembered me in the shows and Brooklyn and all that, I'm definitely like Team Spiral and everybody ribs me for that, good-naturedly, because it's just funny. And, you know, but I think that's- He's a gem, man. He's a gem. He's come on five times. Really? Yeah. He's been on five times. Amazing. Amazing. Yeah. I get it. I mean, they've all been great, you know. And a special shout out, too, to Carly, who's Bob's wife.

Track 3:

[49:10] We chat occasionally on Twitter and say, hi, how are you? And even during the shows, she would say hi to me and she'd say, hey, I love your energy. And like she was taping, she was videotaping the shows on her phone. And she's like, you know, at like certain intervals, she would just like hand me her phone. She's like, you tape this. And so like, I'm like watching the concert and I'm like holding up her phone, making sure I get good footage for her. It was hilarious. I mean, like the stuff that just happened was just like, I'm like, how am I even doing this? Like, why? Like, you know, why have I been chosen to kind of be in the middle of all of this? I had a very similar vibe when I did my UK trip. I had a very similar vibe. It was just like, who am I? What fucking planet is this right now? Right, right, right. This is my favorite band, and I'm following them around, and I'm getting backstage, and they know me. Like, this is so cool. Right, right. It's like, this can't be happening. That's right. And the whole Iceland trip was like, you know, like people talk about like, oh, I had this trip and everything went wrong. The Iceland trip was everything went right. Everything that could have happened that, you know, that could have turned into a positive turned into a positive. And even the little setbacks I had, like, were so quickly resolved, usually by the kindness of strangers or some good fortune.

Track 3:

[50:38] It was just amazing how well everything went, and really both trips. I mean, it was the time. I had a wonderful time. Well, you were owed it, I think. And after missing them a few times, I'm glad you got to resolve your story that way. Is there anything other than the Icelandic Gentleman's podcast that you want to plug while you're here? Um no I I think I just want to plug my friends one more time for everybody in those groups you know Steve, Mike, Eric you know all those guys everybody is like just the nicest you know it's like just a quick story like you know Eric bought merchandise for us in Brooklyn and then shipped it home to all of us Wow. And he's like, just Venmo me.

Track 3:

[51:37] Like, that kind of generosity of his time and trust and everything else. Just top shelf. And everybody was like that. Mike was like that. Steve was like that. I've had a good fortune to see Steve a few times, and we've been able to hang out. And even though he's out in the Midwest, we've been able to connect a few times. Oh, that's brilliant. You know, just all the people just, it made it so great. And it just turned into this giant snowball of good that just kept rolling downhill and just kept getting better, bigger. More people came into the fold. Everywhere we went, more people came in. It was amazing how welcoming everybody was and all the people that we met, how great they were. Keep in mind if you ever do a reunion. Oh, 100%. I'll hit you up on Twitter. And I'm sure we'll wind up somewhere at some point. That would be awesome. You know, what I'd really love is like.

Track 3:

[52:39] One more like place where like iceland where they played three shows yeah you know brooklyn they played four shows like they're doing a few south america shows it's kind of tough but it's like one show in one location at a big festival and like it's hard to like kind of do that but if they played like three shows somewhere where we could just show up and and like kind of recreate them take over and recreate the magic and yeah and make some new stories and spend that time I'm, I would just, I would love that. And I, you know, I don't know. It seems like it's going to be a while, if ever, before they really say, we'll, we'll do that again.

Track 3:

[53:17] We'll see. We'll see. Like, I don't know. Like, I think SM is getting ready to release. And maybe by the time this comes out, he will have made an announcement of some sort. So we'll get some new Jicks material, SM and the Jicks, or maybe another, like his last two records have been just him so maybe it'll be just him but i wouldn't be shocked if we see them on the road again because it's uh it's fun for them it's relatively lucrative you know like the the touring market is is a good thing and they've got a loyal fan base you know they do i mean my here's my call this is just this is my take um another person i got to meet on the the Iceland trip, was his daughter, Sunday, who's – Sunday's about 15 years old now. And she was super nice. And I connected with her a little bit because that's my son's age. So, like, I got the whole thing, you know, I understood kind of, like, where she was coming from because that's my son's age.

Track 3:

[54:22] And, you know, my dad –, piece kind of raised up when we talk about, are they going to hit the road again? I think when Sunday goes to college, I think that at that point, we'll have a chance for them to maybe come back out. But I get the feeling like he'll do the dad thing. She'll get through high school. His wife is obviously, we know she's an accomplished artist. She has her career. He'll make time for her. There'll be that balance of family and everything else. And then when So when Sunday's off to her next adventure, everybody will probably say, one more ride.

Track 3:

[55:04] That'd be great. So I'm thinking maybe 2027, we'll gas up the truck and we'll make it count, I think, by then. Well, if they wait until 2029, that would be 40 years, right? Yeah. 40 years since the band formed. I hope they don't go that long, but you know. Yeah. I hope so too. Yeah. You know, um, and that's where like kind of the, the old guy in me says, let's get out there before we can't. Yeah. Well, on that note, on that, uh, harrowing note, um, uh, it's been a pleasure to have you on, uh, Boston Russ. Uh, this has been a delight. I'm so glad your story turned out the way it did. That's the kind of feel-good stories we do here on Meeting Malcomus. So, you know, kudos to you. That's what I got for you this week. So tune in next week for song number 20. That's right. We're in to the top 20. In the meantime, wash your goddamn hands.

Track 1:

[56:12] Thanks for listening to Meeting Malcomus, a pavement podcast. Podcast, where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email, jd at meetingmalkinist.com.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

jD and Brian Glaser get together this week on the Pavement Top 50 Countdown. They of course discuss Brian's Pavement origin story and then they reveal and talk about track 23 on the countdown.

Transcript:

Track 1:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 2:

[0:02] A stone-cold classic. This is the eighth song on our list from Pavement's penultimate album, Bright in the Corners. At 24, it's in. Jamie, what are your initial thoughts about this song? I think I remember really liking it kind of when I, you know, when you buy Bright in the Corners, you put it on, you go through the album, and it feels like a sensible, good closing song. The name kind of gives it away.

Track 1:

[0:30] Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band, Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown.

Track 3:

[0:38] Hey, it's JD here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for Seminole Indie Rock Band, Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that you selected with your very own Top 20 ballads. I then tabulated the result, choosing an abacus and a woman named Helen, who frankly looked kind of lost. How will your favorite song fare in the rankings? You'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that. This week we're joined by Pavement superfan, Brian from New Jersey. Brian, how are you doing, motherfucker? I'm doing alright. How are things in Canada? Things are just dynamite. the sky is bright blue the clouds are nice and fluffy it's sunny you know i'll take sunny even if it's a little bit below zero just uh rather than that gray shit that just you know ruins everything yeah how about you everything's great here yeah it's you know it's uh it's the weekend just getting to hang out i'm getting to talk about pavement yeah that's pretty good right, Well, let's do that then. Let's get your Pavement Origins story.

Track 3:

[1:52] So my Pavement Origins story, I feel like it is the most down-the-middle, ordinary one. But it's also, from listening to your podcast, it's essentially the inverse of yours. Okay. So I was a college radio DJ in the early 90s. And our college radio station, the music director, would call us into his dorm like once a week or once every other week uh all the djs would come in and he would have all of the recent releases and we would hit play and just see what was happening and what we might want to play on our radio shows and stuff like that and i remember.

Track 3:

[2:32] Slanted and enchanted dropping into this gathering and you know he hits play on summer babe um and And it was amazing. You know, I'm also, I'm a drummer, so I'm listening to this. And this great song, one of the hooks is the hi-hats. Yeah, that hi-hat wiggle or whatever you want to call it. What do you call that? I don't know. Wiggles as good as anything. But like, think of another song where like part of the hook is, you know, a little hi-hat flourish. So that blew my mind. And then, you know, Trigger Cut comes right after that. So I went from never hearing of this band to, you know, I'm in my, I'm probably like 19, sitting in a college dorm, listening to Slanted and Enchanted, and I am a billion percent in. Like, it's everything I like.

Track 3:

[3:30] It's everything I love. So, I was then just like, I was there for each record coming out, and I bought them as they came out. And I went to see the Crooked Rain tour, and I saw them on Lollapalooza, and I saw the Brighton the Corners tour. And I think by the time Bright in the Corners came out, I was a music journalist in Philadelphia. And I'm pretty sure I wrote a review of Bright in the Corners for somewhere.

Track 3:

[4:03] I bought Terror Twilight. So I bought all of them when they came out. I did not see – I missed the Terror Twilight show. I went to the other night of the matador anniversary show because the other one was headlined by Yola Tango and they're my number one I don't miss them uh and a buddy of mine went to the other one said that the pavement show that was when he had like the uh Malcolm has had the handcuffs dangling off of his microphone stand to show his displeasure um Um, And then, you know, after that, it just, it went from being a present tense thing to pavement went into past tense and I bought the reissues when they came out. Um, but I wasn't, when they got back together and we're playing in central park, I think my son had just been born. So I didn't go see that, but they were really just kind of a past tense thing for me. And then kind of two additional things happened. The first was the pandemic.

Track 3:

[5:16] And just because of the kind of music guy I am, when we got sent home to work remotely, I listen to music when I work from home and I like to set little projects or parameters for myself to make it interesting. I'll be like, today I'm only going to listen to songs that this drummer is on or whatever I'm going to do. Oh, cool. And since I thought we were just going home for like a month or two, I was like, I'm only going to listen to stuff I have on vinyl. No CDs, no streaming. It's just going to be vinyl. It'll make me stand up every 20 minutes and, you know, it'll just be like a fun little parameter because I have a bunch of vinyl, but it's not the biggest part of my collection. And the only pavement I had on vinyl, I had this extra live LP that Matador sold along with the Bright in the Corner, Nicene Creed's reissue.

Track 3:

[6:20] It's okay. But I also had Terror Twilight, which I had listened to. I bought it on vinyl, I listened to it, and I was like, eh, there's no spiral songs on here. It feels kind of clean. It just didn't connect. But by that time, I was listening to your podcast, and this was the only one that under my rules I could really listen to. So i listened to the shit out of terror twilight you know in 2020 so it had you know it'd been out and somewhere in the back of my head for a while but i really engaged with it um and so now i'm like all in on terror twilight all these years later and you know then they came back for their latter-day reunion shows. And my buddy and I turned 50 as they rolled into Brooklyn. And so we're like, and he lives not far from King's Theater, so we're like, we're going. And we went to one of the King's Theater nights in Brooklyn. And this is like the fourth or fifth time I've seen them. And, and, Suddenly, this was the best I'd ever seen them play.

Track 3:

[7:33] This is what I'm hearing. This is what I'm hearing about 2022. It was amazing. I guess I would describe when I went to those shows during the initial run, everyone was playing their parts as best they could, which was very good, but they were all just kind of doing their part of the band. Yeah. On this tour, they were together. I thought so, too.

Track 3:

[8:26] Enchanted in college when it came out. and we're looking at each other like we couldn't believe that this was the best pavement show we'd ever seen that's amazing it just didn't seem possible um right you know because that's not what reunion tours are for no not typically um and then i'll just add you know as part of my origin story it's been it's made me have a different extension of my origin story listening to you and the other people you have on the podcast who generally seem to have come in around Terror Twilight or even after the initial run.

Track 3:

[9:05] This may sound pretentious or silly or whatever you want to say, but it felt like you're not as invested in the narrative that popped up around Pavement in that initial run and that every record that came out was colored by the Pavement story. Does that make sense? Yeah, I think so. You know, because I think, especially with like Wowie Zowie Bright in the Corners and Terror Twilight, when those came out, They were part of like a reaction to what had happened the year before with them. And it was hard to listen to those just sort of on their own merits because you were listening to them as part of the narrative.

Track 3:

[9:50] And it's fun, like getting the chance to listen to them, not like that, sort of inspired by the way you're hearing them and your experience with them and the other people that you talk to. And it's really, it's changed my relationship with a lot of the records and a lot of the songs. Oh, wow. Do you have a specific example of a song? Well, I think I'll give an album example instead. The narrative of Bright in the Corners when it came out was, A, they got the shit back together after the wowie-zowie being all over the place. And also, everyone, maybe especially people who are music journalists, were very into the R.E.M. Connection because of the production. So I was sort of talking myself into hearing REM in that record, you know, because I'd heard Unseen Power, The Picket Fence, and I knew that they had REM's producers and all that. So I was like, I listened to it as their REM record. I've never thought of that. That's great. Yeah. Great. Well, and now I can just listen to it as, you know, here's some amazing Spiral Stairs songs and here's the band really playing together. Like that one might be the closest to how they're sounding now.

Track 3:

[11:18] That's a good call. Yeah. Yeah, I think so. So yeah, so that's an example of how it's changed here, getting out of the narrative. I'll also say something that colored my initial run through Pavement, and I don't think I've heard you talk about this before, is when they were at their initial peak, they were this huge and overwhelming influence on like indie rock so like i remember i was at maxwell's the week that crooked rain coming out not seeing pavement but just another band with you know two distorted guitars and a slacky attitude or whatever and in between all their songs they They talked about Crooked Rain.

Track 3:

[12:08] That was their stage banter. It was so... Are you serious? Yeah. It was just when Pavement did something, this small but invested community talked about it. And I remember getting the CD to review from this band called Number One Cup that no one's ever heard of. They didn't last very long. I think they only put out like one or two records. And the first song on the album, I remember kind of digging it, but feeling like it felt really familiar. So I'm playing it a few times. And I realized you could sing the lyrics to Summer Babe to this song. And they were essentially just making Pavement songs. They were completely ripping them off. Well, I don't think they were ripping them off. I think they were influenced too heavily. That's so nice. But that's the thing is like Pavement was this huge influence because-

Track 3:

[13:17] A lot of the other things happening at that time were, strangely enough, when you go back and listen to the Pavement catalog, was a lot noisier than Pavement.

Track 3:

[13:29] Archers of Loaf, Sonic Youth, Super Chunk, all that stuff, those are louder and punkier than Pavement for the most part. I'm not saying Pavement had a clean sound or anything like that. No, but Crooked Rain is pretty straightforward, you know, and then, like you said a moment ago, Bright in the Corners is, I don't understand how that didn't sell a jillion copies, you know? I know. It's such a good record. Not that the other ones aren't, but it's like mainstream good. Yeah i i mean i think my if i'm putting my critic hat on i think the answer to that is they chose the wrong single um stereo is a weird single right um i don't think anyone hearing that would be like get that right on the radio and you know this is my new pop thrill here right maybe start with shady lane yeah uh start with shady lane something like something like that, could have done it, but also I mean, honestly, cut your hair was a fluke, and I think it created this idea that Pavement could have hit singles, and maybe that just wasn't true.

Track 3:

[14:50] That's fair. Do you think it's true? Do you think they could have been a hit singles band?

Track 3:

[14:59] There's just some song every once in a while you hear it's not like father to a sister of thought um like i can see that being in like, like on a tv show like playing in the background near the end of the show and you know they're wrapping things up but no i suppose you're right few and far between there you know there's a There's a few that you can look at and say, okay, yeah, yeah, this has got the makeup of a mainstream hit song. But you're right, not many, because they were doing things that were very different than the mainstream. Very different. Yeah, and I remember going to the Lollapalooza when they were on the main stage. And you've seen the videos of people throwing mud at them and stuff like that. But part of the problem was that stage was just too big for them at that point. They can do it now, but I don't think they were ready for that.

Track 3:

[16:03] And you saw that show, you said, right? Not the one with the mud. I saw them in Camden, New Jersey on the Lollapalooza, you know, on that tour. And was it apparent there as well? Like it just. Yeah. Cause you know, I, I was sitting out on the lawn. It's, you know, it was touring those kinds of sheds where there's the seats up front and then a big lawn in the back and it's a summer day and you got your little pick a a mcbasket and your blanket and all that and it didn't really translate that far back in.

Track 3:

[16:35] A way that you know like cypress hill and sonic youth and even back who were on that tour like it translated into the bigger venue and they didn't wow that is wild stuff and i mean i don't mean that as a criticism no i think it's just you know it was the superpowers they had at the time it was you know it was more intimate um and it was you know again i don't think they had whatever it is that they've gathered up with age wisdom whatever you want to call it at this point where they can go out and you know jam on the hex or whatever for 10 minutes um and really make it work i don't think they had that in their arsenal yet no i suppose you're right.

Track 3:

[17:32] Yeah touring wasn't wasn't their strong strong point you know and yet it was fun and yet every show you saw or every every show that i've ever heard people talk about was amazing you know Because of the venue and because of the context and that good stuff. Yeah. And I mean, it could also be that part of their target audience is, you know, guys like me, guys like you who are, you know, ready to have that rush of emotion from, you know, from the experience that, you know, in our 20s or whatever was just kind of maybe we weren't mature enough for or open enough to. Yes. Yes. Well, should we flip the side here and talk about song number 23? Let's do it. Okay, we'll take a quick break and we'll be back with song number 23.

Track 1:

[18:35] Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening. And now on with a countdown.

Track 3:

[21:47] Well, there it is on the Top 50 Countdown. Song number 23 is the Spiral Stairs Gem, Kennel District. Brian from New Jersey.

Track 3:

[21:59] Give me the goods. This is ridiculously underrated. I'm going to say this one's top five. Well, or I'll caveat that. Either this or Date with Ikea, which in my mind, they're kind of, they're like, fraternal twin songs um you gotta have a spiral song in the top five like the pavement founding documents say this is a band founded by sm and spiral stairs and if that top five is all, coming out of malchemist i think you've done something wrong you know and if you're gonna have a spiral song in the top five i i would do this one um it's it's amazing i mean it was It was a lot of fun on the reunion tour. Yes. And that's, you know, I remember the night I went to King's Theater, they did not play Summer Babe and they did not play Here, but they played Kennel District. And I remember having like my little list of songs in my head that I was going to be bummed if I walked out and they didn't play. And that was one of them. But they tore it up. It was like it was a highlight of the show. Wow. Yeah, that's great.

Track 3:

[23:17] And, you know, one of the things, you know, I mentioned earlier, I'm listening to this a little bit as a drummer. One of the things I hear in the song, and I'm curious if you hear this too, I think it's a Gary drum beat in this tune.

Track 3:

[23:34] Really? Yeah, it's got that little off-kilter stumble. It's not evenly distributed beats. It kind of lurches a little bit as it's going forward. I hear it as Westy playing a Gary beat rather than playing Westy style on this. You know, there's something to that, because in my conversations with Spiral, and then the tracks that ended up, I think, on the Nicene Creators edition, where it's just Gary and Spiral doing songs. Maybe it was around Terror of Twilight time, actually, where it was them doing songs. And, uh...

Track 3:

[24:30] You know scott's always had a a pretty big place in his heart for gary you know so i wonder if you know in in creating the song even he was like westy can you give me something garyish you know yeah that's interesting it's there and you know i think the other reason i i love the song is like even though this is you know halfway through the catalog in in wowie zowie i don't know I know that this would have been completely out of place on the early EPs. So it's got that overdriven driving guitar. It's got the Gary beat. It's got the distorted vocals, but then the sing-along or shout-along refrain that carries you out. Like, it's, you know, if you place this next to, you know, on the same seven inches debris slide, I don't think you'd be like, one of these was recorded many years later, and I can hear it so clearly. You know, I think they're akin. It's got a little bit more sheen, obviously. Yeah. Yeah, but it's like the ingredients and the style are classic pavement rather than ladder pavement or whatever you want to call it. Right, right.

Track 3:

[25:56] Yeah, I think if you have a beat on what it could be about. No, like this. Like any pavement song, too tough, right? Right. It's too tough. And this one is even like I was doing a little internet trolling for the lyrics. Like the internet doesn't even agree what these lyrics are. Oh, really? Yeah. I mean, I found, you know, especially the first line of the second verse, you know, I found the one I've got up on my screen right now says, I can't believe she's married to Roe, like fish egg Roe. I have too. And there's no way it's that. And I remember just in Googling a little, I found a couple other theories, but I find that hard to believe that's the lyric. Yeah, me too.

Track 3:

[26:53] Maybe that's why he's so incredulous. You can't believe it. Yeah, maybe. I also know that there's a lot of songwriters, and you've talked to Spiral a lot, so maybe he's given you some more insight into his process. But I know when you hear from a lot of songwriters, they talk about laying down the track first and just kind of putting some nonsense sounds or lyrics over it. And then some people will sit and write something very considered and serious when they go to do the lyrics. And then some people be like, oh, I almost said the word robe there. I guess I'll just stick with it. I wonder if that's what happened here.

Track 3:

[27:37] Yeah, because it's an interesting song because you're right. I don't quite know what it's about, but it makes me feel something. Because of the chorus. Um whatever you want to call it why didn't i ask why didn't i ask why didn't i ask and then going out there's something really like almost painful about that question you know like you really feel for the protagonists here like yeah what the fuck man why didn't you ask and what were you asking about and why is it important to you and all the rest but at the very least can Can you answer me the question? Why didn't you ask? Right. And then the delivery with the guitars, the beat, the buildup, you're not only singing along about regret, but you're doing it with your fist in the air. You're just like, you're all jacked up about regret. And there's nothing not to love about this song. Yeah. It's a good one.

Track 3:

[28:47] And I'm kind of curious. Chris, I know you've talked to Spiral a lot. Based on the sort of relationship you've built up with him over the last few years, do you have a sense of what he goes for in his songwriting, like how he's expressing himself? Yeah.

Track 3:

[29:09] It's really changed, I think. I think that his vocal has become much more of a tool. He used to sort of sing with that almost break, almost that pubescent break when he sang, and now his voice is sharp. It is right on. So I think he takes advantage of that a little bit more when writing a song, not lyric wise, but when he's writing a song in general, like he can be more melodic. And that's nice. Like that medley attack is a great record. It's a really good record. I'm going to listen to it today because it's really good. And then of course i i just can't help but draw the parallel between terror twilight and let it be.

Track 3:

[30:02] With paul and john completely shutting george out of the process and then george turns around and comes out with all all things must pass and it's holy shit it's a double record filled with some of the best songs you've ever heard and he had that in him and spiral came out with psoi and And while it's not all things must pass, it's holy shit, you were sitting on all these songs and you couldn't put one on fucking Terror of Twilight? You know? Yeah. And you know, I think one of the reasons I didn't connect with Terror of Twilight at the beginning is...

Track 3:

[30:39] Spiral to me is that the actual analogy i would use is lee ronaldo in sonic youth oh okay when you have those sonic youth records like you know obviously thurston and kim are the marquee and core sounds in there but like daydream nation without eric's trip and without hey joni it's not the masterpiece that it is without those and the lee ronaldo songs like Like they fit in the band, but they're a little off to the side of the rest of it. And, you know, it's super melodic and it's fun, but it's not what Thurston and Kim do for the rest of the record. And you're always like, when that, you know, when Moat or Disappearer pops up, I think those are his two on Goo.

Track 3:

[31:29] When those pop up on Goo, you're like, yeah, here we go. We're hearing Disappearer now. Now um did do i have that right that disappears the you're asking the wrong dude i'll have to do a sonic youth uh podcast at some point i mean initially that was my like i had a blind spot with early pavement i had a blind spot with the eps um like the three eps and so i thought well i'll do a podcast where i listen to each ep and you know talk about the ep and i was like well why don't i just do it like song by song you know and then that way i get to listen to everything thing and that's that was the genesis of this little beast yeah and i think you know with sonic youth you'd have the same experience where you know you're moving along and it's the songs you're used to and then this this gem pops up that's you know of a different color and a different tone a different palette and i think that's what spiral brings to these pavement records yeah i would agree with that and the shows like when you get that spiral break when kennel district comes out or date with ikea you're like yeah fuck yeah here we go we're doing this now yeah and we'll get back to that that malchmus thing but it's a great um like i i don't want to say interlude because that's not maybe it's like a great counterpoint.

Track 3:

[32:50] Yeah there's a bit of yin and yang right yeah absolutely sorry well uh i'll just repeat that my dogs are both in here yeah there's a bit of yin and yang right yeah absolutely, and you know being a fan of the Spiral songs doesn't make you less of a Pavement fan or even less of a Malchemist fan it's just, he's one of the main ingredients again it's this band was started by SM and Spiral Stairs so without him it's not Pavement right, I couldn't yeah I couldn't agree more.

Track 3:

[33:27] Well, Brian from New Jersey, do you have anything that you would like to plug or discuss with people on the World Wide Web? I guess the only thing I'll plug, I was playing drums in a band here in New Jersey that is now defunct. It went away with the pandemic, but we have stuff up on Bandcamp and everywhere. It's called Diecast Cars.

Track 3:

[33:52] Diecast Cars. Yeah, like the toy cars for kids. It would appeal very much appeal to fans of pavement we are noisy and a little sloppy but a little poppy and a little rocky and all that kind of stuff and uh the the guitars are loud and and we also have the one of the guitar players you know didn't write as much as the other but he's like he's the spiral the ronaldo of a die-cast cars and that he's got you know two or three things in the what we have on the band camp page and their gems um you know not not to take away from the other guy but you know when they come up you're like okay we're getting we're getting into a different frequency for a few minutes and then we'll we'll go back to that other one cool well check out diecast cars on band camp everybody it's been great talking to to you today brian from new jersey uh you've you've got some wild theories and um some theories that i can actually cleave on to and uh kennel district again at number 23 so this is a lot of fun man too low a lot of fun so uh take care and uh we'll talk to you soon brian and everybody else wash your goddamn hands thanks.

Track 1:

[35:17] For listening to meeting malchus a pavement podcast where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you if you've got questions or concerns.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Jamie Parkins joins jD as his guest on today's episode of Meeting Malkmus. Jamie reveals song number 24 and tells jD about his Pavement origin story.

Transcript:

Track 2:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 1:

[0:02] Song number 25 is our first entrant from the masterpiece, Watery Domestic. It's Shoot the Singer, One Sick Verse. David from New York, what are your initial thoughts about this song? Shoot the Singer, I think it's probably one of Pavement's most perfect songs. If you just listen to it, it's such a beautifully textured song. And the production is pretty unique, I think.

Track 2:

[0:30] Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown.

Track 3:

[0:38] Hey, it's JD here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for Seminole Indie Rock Band, Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential pavement tracks that you selected with your very own Top 20 ballots. I then tabulated the results using an abacus and a bag full of M&M's with the brown ones removed a la Van Halen. How will your favorite songs fare in the rankings? Well, you'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that. This week I'm joined by Pavement superfan, Jamie from Watford. Jamie, first of all, fucking great name. Second of all, how the fuck are you? I'm very good, thank you for that. it's the uh english variant of the name not the not the scottish variant but i'll take it thank you well that's my name as well so yeah there we go yeah so um let's get right into things like let's not beat around the bush here let's jump right into your pavement origin story yeah wow um, I guess I've been very lucky. So I was trying to tot up how many times I've seen pavement. I think it's 10, maybe 11. Wow.

Track 3:

[1:53] And then, you know, I've seen Preston School of Industry a couple of times, I've seen Steve and the Jicks. But how I fell into pavement, I think, was just serendipitous.

Track 3:

[2:04] So I was 15, I happened to be at a friend's house, and he said.

Track 3:

[2:09] Got a spare ticket for a concert tomorrow. Morrow i'd never really been sort of to a concert i think you know i've been to a couple right at that age when you're 15 you're sort of you know you you're an age where perhaps you don't need your handheld anymore and he said got a ticket for a bank or pavement yeah i'd never heard of them um and i was just starting to get into what we would call in britain kind of indie so pre-brit pop but kind of indie music so bands like carter census things mega city four these might these might mean things to some of your listeners particularly in the uk um i was like yeah great free ticket um it happened to be my birthday the next day um so i borrowed a tape you know good old uh sort of probably what it would have been a 60 minute cassette and listened to slanted for you know over and over again ahead of the gig right because you don't want to turn up at a gig and not not know anything about the music and so that was um august 92 at the marquee in um in london and I didn't know what to expect didn't know what I was walking into certainly didn't know that I was going to become like a you know a big fan of this band wow so what do you remember about the show the actual show so I guess by because of the fact I was 15 and I wasn't drinking um I should I probably remember more than than you know I would from a gig like three years ago um.

Track 3:

[3:37] So this is going to sound, it's going to sound a bit crazy, but, and, and having listened to the other pods, like there's a common theme here, which is just how open the band are. Right. And how welcoming and accommodating they are. And, you know, I don't, I think they always realize their sort of size and everything. Right. Then they're not, they're not filling out stadiums and they don't, you know, they don't need to be standoffish at all. So we went to the gig. I've no memory of, of, um, uh, the support band, but that's primarily because somehow Somehow, me and my friend managed to end up backstage at the Marquee. We were drinking Port Band's Red Stripe Lager.

Track 3:

[4:14] And next thing you know, we're talking to Gary. This is Pete Gary when he's handing out like salad and handing out plates of food. And it's pretty grotty. It's actually from a black bin bag, which is not particularly exciting or alluring. But you're there going okay this is the drummer of the band that we're about to see he's handing out food we'll have a quick chat um i i have a vague memory but i don't know if this is just like history playing tricks but i have a vague memory of either steve or spiral one of the two wearing a football top um a luton town football top which for me is a watford fan that's like one of our big rivals so i don't know again if i'm sort of making this up but i have a memory that that might have been, you know, like, why are you wearing that top? You know, and that started a conversation.

Track 3:

[5:09] And then next thing I know, Gary's handing my friend a bottle of water. So because we were thirsty, it wasn't a bottle of water, obviously, because it was Gary. It was a bottle of vodka. And just all it's just like, this is, this is insane. And the gig hasn't even started yet. And then the concert itself was just fantastic. I mean, you know, 15 years old, um, marquee is quite a famous London venue. You know, I think the stones have played there, you know, it's, um, it's a typically small venue with a low roof and, um, sweat dripping off the ceilings. And it's the sort of perfect place to see a band that's kind of, you know, on that upward curve. Right. Yeah, absolutely. So Jamie, talk to me about, uh, your sort of your go-to record. Do you mention that slanted was the first thing you heard and you listened the shit out of it? Um what was two-part question what was next for you and you got to live it all in real time so that's spectacular uh but what is your go-to record now so there's two separate questions there, yeah i mean stunted was definitely like the the gateway drug as they say um.

Track 3:

[6:17] And I was lucky you're right right I was there you know every Monday when the new album came out buy the next album you know play it to play it to the nth degree two years later the next album watch them on the following tours that support those albums so I was really really fortunate I feel very very lucky um yeah uh watery domestic I mean that was a pretty fast follow wasn't it from yeah um from slanted I think I think like a lot of people have been on your thing today that was like their high point i think just musically i think you know in the case of four songs they just nailed it they nailed it yeah but i would say the album that i come back to the most is definitely uh crooked rain crooked rain i think i don't know if it's about the age like you know i was what i would have been 17 18 then you know you're kind of really impressionable music i think it also it follows on from watery domestic really nicely there's a kind of um There's a continuity of their style. Gary is, you know, there's still bits of Gary drumming on Crooked Rain, I think, if you kind of go deep into the sleeve notes and stuff like that. So I think, for me, that's the album that, you know, like I'm rebuying my LP collection, for example, and that was the first one I got. Oh, wow. Yeah. I got slanted first. Yeah. It's an expensive habit to start again, right? Jesus, is it ever? Wow.

Track 3:

[7:43] So, you've seen a bunch of shows, like 10 or 11 shows. You've got Crooked Rain as your record. Is there anything else you want to share about your Pavement Origins story? What else? I've got a couple of thoughts and things I'm happy to share. I don't think they're a great festival band, is my take. Seems that way. I've not seen them. Is it Benicassin? And what was the one they did on their tour back in the famous one? Yes, right. I saw it in Porto and it was really good. They were really good there. There just i think the two times i've seen them at reading festival um and i've seen them at v festival in the uk and that kind of mid-afternoon slot open air i don't think it suits their aesthetic i don't think it suits the way that their music kind of fills the room um whereas you know i saw their last gig at brixton the the night that they kind of quit with the with the handcuffs and all of that sort of you were there yeah i'm not knowing obviously like you know, there's no social media, right? You, you kind of, you know, did I notice the handcuffs on the microphone? No. Um, um, did they look tired yes um and then you know maybe two weeks later you're reading in the music press that you know that that was their last gig and that they're moving on to different things you know.

Track 3:

[9:06] So at the time i didn't i didn't add up the add up everything i was seeing but um kind of with hindsight you didn't go oh yeah maybe mount must have kind of checked out a little bit and um so yeah i mean but you know as a fan right it's kind of cool to be at their so-called final gig and then they do it again and again and again right they come back.

Track 3:

[9:29] The um it's a shame i think we're at some of the same gigs in london then because, uh i was i was at two of the gigs last year in london or no it's not last year is it god two years ago now two years ago man yeah i'd hoped to go to manchester but um i had to sell that ticket in the end so i i took myself twice to london so i kind of thought two out of four is not bad i could have done i could have done four but you know there's bills to pay that's That's right. Yeah. Well, I love those London gigs. I thought they were, the Roundhouse is a great venue. It was really awesome. If no one's ever been, you know, it's a really interesting venue, right? And I thought they did it justice and the venue did them justice in a way. Yeah, I think so. It was great. I saw three out of the four. I missed opening night because I was in Liverpool. Right. Well, then we were definitely, that's weird, right? Because we were definitely, if you missed opening night so did i so we're at the same gigs oh that's so what a small world, well should we settle in and listen to track 24 yeah let's do it halfway through right sort of 24 halfway through the 50 or so yeah that's right yeah so let's do that we'll play the song right now and uh we'll be back on the other side hey.

Track 2:

[10:45] This is bob mistandovich from pavement Thanks for listening, and now on with a countdown. 24.

Track 3:

[16:18] Well, Jamie, here we are at song 24 on the countdown, a stone-cold classic. This is the eighth song on our list from Pavement's penultimate album, Bright in the Corners. At 24, it's Finn. Jamie, what are your initial thoughts about this song? I think I remember really liking it kind of when you buy Bright in the Corners, you put it on, you go through the album, and it feels like a sensible, good closing song. Um the name kind of gives it away right to the degree and i'll be honest i'm not one for analyzing lyrics and like if you're not one for analyzing lyrics then you've got no chance with pavement lyrics right because mountainous goes all over the shop um but listening to the album recently again i've got two things about the song one is i think the album is really interesting i think lyrically it might be pavements most interesting album i think like mountainous seems to be having a lot of fun like you know i wrote down a few of the you know just on different songs right we know we went dutch dutch on shady lane you know a voice coach taught me to sing he couldn't teach me to love all the above on transported range i just think he seems to be having a lot of fun lyrically um and they kind of flow and um you know there's elements of rhyming in there which you know paper and haven't always done but the more i've listened to this song i've got to be honest and i don't know if this is not going to make me very popular given that people voted for it but i'm kind of ambivalent about this song the more i listen to it yeah oh yeah yeah i I know, sorry. No, don't be. You're in the podcast here now, right? No, no, no.

Track 3:

[17:47] I'm curious to know why. I was listening to it again today to give it its dues and give it a fair chance. I think my issue with the song, first of all, it's not a bad song, right? I think, you know, I don't have many pavement songs that I would put down as being bad. I think my issue with it is that it's really slow to build up and maybe that's deliberate.

Track 3:

[18:09] But when you've heard the guitar solo, which is great and you love the guitar so at the end and it closes out the album and it's you know take the name right it's the fin it's the end the first half of song you're just like come on let's just get to the good bit um and i kind of feel like and so the first time you hear the song you're probably thinking this is lovely i'm enjoying the experience but once you once you've had the good bit i actually find the the the kind of first half of the song uh quite slow quite quite interminable um i know sorry sorry um i went and listened to uh a live version um from their recent tour thinking you know do they play at a different speed is it you know is it different and the kind of feeling was the same again and don't think it works if you play it mid gig as well because it kind of it drifts the guitar solo kind of fades away and and if you listen to it.

Track 3:

[19:06] It doesn't just finish it kind of goes and goes and goes and you can keep hearing the song all the way to the end. And it just gives the impression that like, I think it, you know, am I reading too much into it, but it feels like Mount must, you know, by this point he'd had enough in pavement and maybe this is coming out. He's talking about things that, you know, walled gardens, he wants to get out. You know, is this his way of saying it through music? Because I think terror twilight is the most mountainous and the jigs type album. Yeah. And so I wonder, you know, and I think, maybe someone on your show had already said it that it was the one where the rest of the band had the least amount of writing credit like so i always think terror twilight is almost like his first album was into the jigs and this is almost like him kind of closing out on pavement um and i'm sure that i'm definitely probably reading way too much into it but that's kind of just my it just feels a little bit like yeah this is the end i get the feeling really like the guitar solo but but why are you taking so long to get to it? Sorry. You heard it here first. Shall I publish your email address in the show? So you can get, I'm thinking I've blown any chance of an invite back for the top 10.

Track 3:

[20:17] But yeah, I think, I think if you're a super fan, right, you're going to like some stuff more than the others. Absolutely. And I think, you know, I've got to, I've got to be fair. I just, I, I didn't vote for it. I'm kind of, like I said, I'm kind of ambivalent towards it. Like, you know, So the Hex, which is maybe a slightly similar sounding song, kind of takes you on the same journey, is infinitely better. And I don't know the rest of this countdown, but I'm guessing that the Hex is probably in the top 10 or so. I would have imagined that a lot of fans would vote for that. I'll never tell. Yeah, I know. I know you want to keep us guessing. That's right. Right so i i guess then it's pretty clear that you think this song is overrated on the list at 24, where would where would you put yes um well does it um probably i mean look to be honest could i count 50 songs you know like do i have the energy to do probably not um but like you know when I think of things and you know this is me showing my you know earlier favouritism maybe but silence kit um.

Track 3:

[21:34] Heaven as a truck uh frontwood you know these are all songs that would you know get way in front of uh of finn um and you know that's the earlier stuff right um uh so yeah i i think it's probably for me it's probably overrated in the in the countdown but um that's the beauty of music right we all have our opinions and you know some people this means something probably very different to what it means to me absolutely you're a big fan of this album right i think this is your favorite album yeah do you definitely you're definitely thinking this guy jamie's a complete jerk i'm not inviting him back no not at all no this is meant to be water cooler fodder you know like this yeah yeah yeah you know jamie's crazy it's absolutely at 24 or you know i'm totally with jamie it's overrated you know like that kind of thing uh it's meant to be it's meant to be fun so i'm glad you had some fun with it do you do you get people commenting is there a way in which Where do we see what people's hot takes on this is?

Track 3:

[22:35] Twitter, Facebook, you know, all the usual suspects. I've got to get back into Facebook. I'll have to see what people say. Yeah. Well, it's been great talking to you, Jamie. Yeah, and likewise. I've really enjoyed the series so far. Thank you for doing it on behalf of all of us weird pavement fans. It's appreciated. Well, it's my pleasure. It's my pleasure. And getting to meet cool people like you is always fun, too. Yeah, and maybe there'll be another gig, right? We could hope. Maybe they've got some tax bills to pay. I saw Spiral is selling some of his equipment at the moment. So, you know, maybe they've got some bills to pay and they'll do another series of gigs. That'd be good. That would be cool. Maybe we'll see each other there. All right, brother. Talk to you soon. Thanks, JD. I will do. I love it. Thank you. Cheers, man. Wash your goddamn hands.

Track 1:

[23:27] Thanks for listening to Meeting Malcomus, a pavement podcast where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email. JD at meetingmalkmus.com.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the podcast jD welcomes David Fieni to the show to discuss his Pavement origin story and then they crack the top 25 with song number 25 on the countdown!

Transcript:

Track 2:

[0:00] Previously on the pavement top 50.

Track 1:

[0:02] This week we are celebrating song number 26 fight this generation what do you think of this one jeremy from the falls this is probably it bridges like the the best run i think that pavement has on any album.

Track 2:

[0:21] Hey this is westy from the rock and roll band pavement and you're listening to the countdown countdown.

Track 3:

[0:29] Hey, it's JD here back for another episode of our top 50 countdown for seminal indie rock band, Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots. I then tabulated the results using an abacus and a bong made out of a kumquat. How will your favorite song fare in the rankings? Rankings you'll need to tune in to find out so there's that this week i'm joined by a pavement super fan david from new york dude how the fuck are you i'm fucking great i'm psyched to be here chatting with jd oh that's cool another uh pavement super fan yeah yeah absolutely are you uh are you did you make your pre-order for the box set or are you going to i'm going to i'm just like Like, it's crazy because it's like one of those things, I think a little bit like you, I've started, I sort of came to Pavement when, that was like my shift to CDs. And I got all of their stuff on CDs. And then I only started getting the vinyl in the last couple of years. Yeah. And so literally just before this, I ordered my last piece, which was Watery Domestic. What a cool, yeah, Watery Domestic. And then the singles thing looks just freaking amazing.

Track 3:

[1:50] It does yeah i'll order it uh the shipping to canada is obscene though it's like 60 bucks u.s to ship to canada which is like that's not right that's probably 80 bucks uh a canadian you know so it's like it's like half the cost of the product yeesh i don't know so david let's uh not beat around the bush here let's get right into things you mentioned compact discs and your collection. Tell us about your Pavement Origins story and getting those compact discs. Well, J.D., when I was four years old, Billy Corgan murdered my parents.

Track 3:

[2:31] Actually, that's not true. So I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, and I was right in the – I would have been – if I wasn't such a prick and, like, took myself too seriously, I would have been right in the midst of, like, the beginnings of pavement. Wow. But all the people around me were, like, saying, you know, I was reading stuff, how great pavement was. And I was like, oh, fuck that shit. I'm not going to jump on the bandwagon, the indie bandwagon. And so I didn't really get into them until maybe 1996. Okay. Which is, you know, they're still – they're peaking as they usually did. And so I don't remember if it was Bright in the – no, it was Crooked Rain was definitely the thing that kind of just sucked me in for life.

Track 3:

[3:19] And then Bright in the Corners. And I'll tell you a quick story about in 1997, I went to Rolling Stones concert. Pearl Jam opened up the Oakland Coliseum. And I drink a lot. And I got about an hour of sleep. And the next day I had, because of lack of sleep, I asked the girl out in my class that I had a hard crush on to go out for coffee. We talked for like three hours. And then I actually ended up marrying her. I've been married for 24 years with her, to her. But after that coffee, I rode my bike over to my friend Walter's house, and he was playing some records, and he put on Slanted and Enchanted. And I have like the strongest memory of listening to here on his little dinky turntable. So I got into the band like 96 and 97. I saw them at – where was it? The Warfield.

Track 3:

[4:16] Where's that? And that's in San Francisco, yeah. And then I saw them in 99 for Terror of Twilight. And I've seen Jicks and Pavement and stuff since then. And I did see them in Philadelphia this last time around with my friend Seth. So that was freaking amazing. Loved that. So, yeah, I mean, they're kind of like a second wave band for me because I was into stuff like R.E.M. and The Replacements and Husker Du and all of this stuff. And then I got into Pavement and it's kind of like a, you know, it's something that stuck with me. And it's definitely a pretty hardcore relationship. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. I know exactly what you mean. So talk to me about your first real-time record then was Bright in the Corners, right? If you got in in 96, Bright in the Corners comes out in 97. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's funny. I think, yeah, it must have been Bright in the Corners.

Track 3:

[5:20] And that's still... I mean, the thing is about the records is like I think that each of them has been a favorite at a different time, including including Terror Twilight, which when it came out, I just I love that record. It's obviously it's like a shift in a different direction in some ways, but it's it's so fucking brilliant. And I just can't, you know, I love all of the all of the records. I'll tell you, I'll come back to that later, but there was an interesting hole in my collection until fairly recently that I'll tell you about. All right. Yeah. So you saw them in Philadelphia on the reunion tour. What did you think this time out? Dude, it was like bliss for me. I was just, I was like smiling the whole time, which is probably exactly the opposite of what I did the first times I saw them when I was, you know.

Track 3:

[6:20] I thought I was fucking cool or something. But this time I was just grinning the whole time. And, you know, I know you've seen a bunch of the shows. People are singing along, which is like not a super pavement-y thing, but it totally was great. And also a cool thing was that my friend Seth, he has his son and some friends of his. They're all into pavement, and they're like this new generation coming up. And so they were there. And that's obviously so cool because it makes me think of like, oh, when I was growing up and I was into like the bands from the 60s or something, you know? Yeah. Like it's like a cycle, you know, that goes on. What do you think pulled him in? Was it osmosis from his old man or was it Harness Your Hopes or what's the deal? Yeah. Yeah, well, you know, I think it's people who want music that doesn't suck, that's not corporate music, that is just fucking cool and original. And it just, you know, there's a thing that Malcolm has said in this, I think recently, someone asked him, like, why are you going to make another record? And he's all, no.

Track 3:

[7:33] He said, the songs exist in the present, which I love that. I mean, it's such an obvious, simple statement, but it's also true, right? The songs exist in the present. And so each time you sing it, that song is going back out. Each time you play a record, it's existing right in that very moment. So it's like, I just think there's the music just, the music stands out. Maybe, you know, maybe the whole Harness Your Hopes thing kind of brought in a few people. But, you know, it's just, it's a good, it definitely made me slightly hopeful for the future.

Track 3:

[8:10] Harness Your Hopes definitely harnessed my girls, my two girls. Oh, yeah. They're both big TikTokers, and I guess that's where they saw it. But my daughter will brag to me that she's got Pavement in her playlist. I think she's got one other song, but I don't know the song. Yeah. I'm guessing it's something like Major Leagues or something. That one, I guess. Yeah, my 12-year-old daughter loves Harness Your Hopes, but she listens to Pavement. I put stuff on. I make playlists for her, and so she gets into that stuff. You raised her well. I know, at least in that respect. Yeah. So what is your go-to record at this point? I know you said that they're all, you know, they've all taken a turn as your favorite, but if you're feeling nostalgic and you want to hear something, which one do you go to?

Track 3:

[9:02] Um, I don't know. You know, I think maybe Crooked Rain is going to be the one. Crooked, both Crooked Rain and Bright in the Corners. Fellow Bright in the Corners lover. Is this right? Yeah. There's not that many of us.

Track 3:

[9:18] It's a great record. it is a great record but you're right crooked rain is what is it it's it's almost like it feels timeless like it doesn't feel of the 90s yeah to me uh production wise the low the low fineness of it um it just doesn't have that same 90s production you know that we're that we were so inundated with uh from seattle you know yeah that's right i mean the whole issue of production is is like such an interesting thing to going from like gary yeah as the producer yeah and um and then through the different iterations of different folks and obviously terror twilight has its own story but yeah i mean i think that's part of it like and you and you go back to those early like demos and stuff and it's just they are just fucking around with sound a lot of the time right and um yeah i was listening to i was listening to the because they're streaming the the singles collections you know they are yeah yeah i was listening to that today and so i was just like a song like a song i don't like just put on is it the k dart song or internal k dart internal k dart yeah which is like It's like.

Track 3:

[10:38] It's not like a fully formed human, you know, being, it's like a sonogram, but it's still beautiful, because you can hear spiral and SM, like kind of experimenting with sounds and how they're going to play off each other and just textures and stuff. And so, you know, that stuff is, is, is really important, obviously.

Track 3:

[11:03] I love your analogy. It's a sonogram. That's brilliant. It will be fully formed at some point, slanted and enchanted. But early on, on Demolition Plot, it wasn't necessarily. You're right. It was more foggy, primordial ooze, I call it. I like your sonogram-ness. That's very cool. So is there a single in the box set, one of the seven inches that you're looking most forward to?

Track 3:

[11:34] I don't know. I have to look at it again. But I think it'll be, you know, the singles have a number of songs on each side, as far as I understand. So I'm looking forward to kind of just having a different, because it gives you like a different entry point into the catalog, right? Yeah. Because you're listening to these singles, and then some of the B-sides, and then some of these other tunes. And so, yeah, it was interesting listening to the Summer Babe. It sounds like the vocal is mixed differently from what I'm used to. I mean, the whole thing. I guess they're all remastered, aren't they? Well, I think they are. But on the Summer Babe 7-inch, that's the one with Baptist Black and Mercy Snack, I think. I think so. It's not the winter version. That's the designation. On Slanted, it's the winter version. This is the original, you know, the original. As far as I understand. Right, that makes sense, because it was the single that came out right before. Yeah. Yeah. So it might have had a little bit more work on it on the winter version. So good ear. Good ear on you. Do you want to get into this and flip the record and talk about the song number 25? Let's do it. All right. right let's do this we'll be back right after this hey.

Track 2:

[13:04] This is bob nastanovich from payment thanks for listening and now on with a countdown 25.

Track 3:

[16:28] Song number 25 is our first entrant from the masterpiece, Watery Domestic. It's Shoot the Singer, One Sick Verse. David from New York, what are your initial thoughts about this song?

Track 3:

[16:43] Shoot the Singer, I think it's probably one of Pavement's most perfect songs. If you just listen to it, the textures, it's such a beautifully textured song. And the production is pretty unique, I think, for them. It has this really, I think it must be, this is the Water Domestic is where Ibold and Bob join the Spiral One SM and Gary. And I don't know exactly who's playing on what and all that, but I'd like to think it's Mark. And that bass, it kind of has this kind of cool buzzing sound. It reminded me of Us from Piglib, but then I listened to it, and it doesn't really play out. But it's just a cool kind of – the bass is kind of – has a beautiful sound. It also has – and I don't think I even noticed this until listening to the song a bunch in prep for this. It has a really – what sounds very much like a really perfectly kind of mixed acoustic guitar in the back, but really kind of mixed in just so and you know and that's just like one of the things so like and they have the the verses that have this beautiful kind of more kind of relaxed mellow.

Track 3:

[18:08] Tone and you hear again like really nice interplay with spiral and and malchmus and then you get to i don't know if they're really choruses but it's like slow it down song is sacred and you know Those two – and then the distorted guitar comes in, and it's really such a cool contrast with the –, and then it goes back to the sort of more little chill verses. And then it has that outro, which is freaking – it's so good. It's just – it's a cool thing because it –.

Track 3:

[18:45] So, again, one of the lines that stands out in the song is, slow it down, song is sacred. And you hear Malkmus sing, and his vocalization is super, it's really beautiful on this song. I think it's one of his best, really, performances in some way. And it's really kind of, there's like an urgency to it that is not always there, but that's not what you want for every song. And in the end, it kind of is like, it doesn't technically slow down, but it kind of is like he's slowing it down and trying to get more out of the song. And he wants to stay in the music and there's the la da da da da da da and um which made me think about so this is shoot the singer it's a song that has references to music in its title and, maybe a little bit in the song and then it made me think of other songs like cut your hair has that kind of you know the non non words but vocalization right right so a lot of the and And that's another song that's about music. So it's like I feel like there's a few others that I can't remember now that have. So Pavement songs that sort of have like music themes or songs about songs or whatever, they seem to often go into that, you know, la, la, la kind of shit, which is really cool. It's kind of like pure music without, you know, without words or something.

Track 3:

[20:02] I don't know. This song, I just, it's such a beautiful song. And obviously Water Domestic is, you know, such a, like, masterpiece. And I, dude, I owe you, like, a massive, I owe you massively because I, super fan that I am, you know, I've seen them a bunch. And I had everything. And I was into, I had gotten, like, Westing and all of that stuff and listened to that stuff before I discovered in the last, like, five years. Don't fucking mock me, dude. Watery Domestic. And it was because listening to Meeting Malkmus. So somehow I had seen that fucking rooster, right? I had seen that rooster, but I had never, I had never like listened. I mean, I think I must have heard a song or two, but I was like completely oblivious. And so that's like such a joy to just discover what's. What a cool thing to find that. Yeah. It's and it's, you know, in large part to your, you know, your podcast. So thank you. Well, I'll take the feedback. I love it. But I think that it's important, because I came to Pavement late as well, as well as your situation with this record.

Track 3:

[21:23] To me, it's an absolute bonus to, in the midst of loving a band.

Track 3:

[21:35] Uncovering something that you didn't know about, and you're listening to new music that is old, if that makes any sense. Yeah, right. And it's right in that sweet spot, right in the pocket of slanted and crooked rain, right? So, what a fertile period. Yeah, it's peak.

Track 3:

[21:52] It's total peak pavement. And it's interesting, too, because it's like Gary's last stand, and you listen to it. And I think in some ways, all the love in the world to Westy, right, who just is great. I love him. But like in a certain sense, like Gary, at least at this period, his playing was more like pavement-y. You know what I mean? Sure. It's a little bit more rickety, slapdash, and kind of I hate to say slacker or whatever, but it kind of like it really fits in. Of course, they kind of, Westy kind of you know it's a it's a slightly different direction but i mean i love i love you know i love them both but you know this so this so that ep so it's the cool thing is like i have no nostalgia about the record i just listen to it it's right now it's happening and i you know get into it but um i feel like it's a song that has two standouts and that's front words and Shoot the Singer. Yeah. But they're set up perfectly with Texas and Lyons, Linden, right? Because it's just such a perfect little sequence. You can't get a more perfect EP out there.

Track 3:

[23:12] And, yeah. So the other thing that I wouldn't mind mentioning is, so I grew up 50 miles away from Stockton. Gee whiz. And so, like, it's hot and boring. And, like, those songs, like, Lions Linden especially, but also, like, Summer Babe and a few others, they totally evoke that landscape of, like, bored people.

Track 3:

[23:40] Kind of just like, you know, like suburbia. It's kind of like a little bit almost beyond suburbia in some ways. It's kind of this, you know, every street a straight line, all of that stuff. And then there's the Delta and the girl mixing a cocktail with a cigar, all that shit, you know? So it's like very evocative of that whole landscape. Escape yeah i mean i i can't say enough about this ep uh like you mentioned their standouts but i would have it's sophie's choice yeah to pick yeah to pick the number one and i would include lions linden and texas never whispers in in that yeah for sure um it's just so goddamn good And even when you listen to Lux and Redux and you get Greenlander and I forget the other two right now because I'm an asshole, but even those outtakes from Watery are spectacular. Yeah. Oh, I know. Greenlander is another one of those sleeper ones that's such a freaking cool song. Yeah. Definitely. Where do you think in the scheme of things this song was rated 25 so right at the halfway point.

Track 3:

[25:04] Do you think it's overrated, underrated, perfectly rated? What do you think? I think – I'm glad it's not any lower. Me too. Because I would put this in the top 10, 15 for me for sure. Of course, it changes all the time, like whatever. But I think 25, it's fine. I'm not going to go on a rampage. I'm not going to go on a rampage, J.D., against your fans. Did you vote? I didn't vote. You know, I saw the call, and then I meant to, and then I didn't. So many people have reached out and said, oh, man, I missed this. Yeah. There was enough to make this 100% valid, let me tell you. Yeah, yeah.

Track 3:

[25:55] Dude, that's what I got. How about you? Is there anything you want to plug or mention? Listen to the Bug Club, man. They're amazing. They opened up for a pavement in the UK a few dates, and I got into them from that, and they've just become one of my favorite bands. The Bug Club from Wales. I don't know, that and Permanent Ceasefire. That's about it. Okay. Well, that's cool. I like giving the tips. That's nice. That's what we've got here. Song 25. Stay tuned next week when we cover song 24. In the meantime, thank you so much, David from New York, and be sure to wash your goddamn hands.

Track 1:

[26:39] Thanks for listening to Meeting Malcolmists, a pavement podcast where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email. JD at Meeting Malcolmists dot com. You.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

We're taking a brief break from counting down the Top 50 Pavement songs this week. Instead, we offer you PodList IV.V thanks for all of submissions and a special hat tip to Tim from Portland for coming up with the track listing,

Track Listing:

Shady Lane - Lonely Penguin

Painted Soldiers - Malkralph

Passat Dream - CARP Recordings

Zurich is Stained - Sam Lambson

Perfect Depth - Scouting for Cuppas

Shoot the Singer - Copeto

Haunt you Down

Heaven is a Truck - Dark Shandy

Shady Lane - Strong Computer

Summer Babe - Forearms

Type Slowly - Marchica

My Radio - Negative Players

Box Elder - Christopher Catin

Fin - S.W.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the pod. jD welcomes his buddy, Jeremy from Niagara Falls on to discuss his Pavement origin story and reveal song 26!

Transcript:

Track 2:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 1:

[0:02] Stephen, what are your initial thoughts about this song, The Hex? The Hex, well, it's a really cool song. I think it's completely different to anything else that Pavement does. I think it's very unique. It's got a style which isn't really there in any... I can't think of any other song that looks like it.

Track 2:

[0:19] Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown.

Track 4:

[0:25] Hey, it's JD here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown. For seminal indie rock band, Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballads. I then tabulated the results using an abacus and a girl named Shannon that might have played bass in an indie rock band. Sigh. So there's that. This week, I'm joined by Pavement superfan, Jeremy from Niagara Falls. How's it going, motherfucker?

Track 3:

[0:54] It's hot. It's hot.

Track 4:

[0:56] It's really hot.

Track 3:

[0:58] It's been hot all week. Yeah. So sorry if there's fan noises in the background. They're here to cheer me on.

Track 4:

[1:04] Yes, of course they are. And that's very good that they are doing that for you because it will give you adrenaline and strength that you need and require to get through this next question. Jeremy, from the Falls, what is your pavement origin story?

Track 3:

[1:20] Story um my origin story for the band pavement is a little um stranger than most i i did not come to them by way of their music i i came to them by way of uh discussions about just how cool their uh their albums the the song names were, so i before i ever heard a pavement track which was years uh uh it was it was uh i had a friend who was in a band named uh cindy and they before they were called cindy they they were racking their brains about what they wanted to call themselves and we just got in this deep discussion one night i have heard we started talking about i don't think i've heard of king cobb steely, There's probably a good, I bet a good amount of this audience would really dig King Cub Steely because it's kind of in the same vein. But they had awesome song names.

Track 3:

[2:21] Luckily, I keep my feathers numbered for just such an emergency. That's a song name, Time Equals Money and Money Equals Pizza and Therefore Time Equals Pizza. Just stuff like that. And we got talking about it. And I was like, yeah, that's really cool. and we're talking about the band Head. Lowercase and an uppercase. Head with a lowercase h. That's right. And an uppercase, yeah, just because it was the 90s. And then my friend turned to me, he's like, I just wish that I could have an album title as good as Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain. And he just, he went on for like half an hour on that. I was like, that is a really cool album title and who is this band? And he's like, Pavement, check them out. And of course, being the 90s, I mean, being dirt poor, I couldn't. That's right. That's the only way you could do it. I couldn't purchase an album. Because they weren't being played on the radio.

Track 3:

[3:15] Well. That's right. And it was pre-internet. And yeah, they weren't being played on the radio. But, and this is, I like hearing the stories of people out here saying like, yeah, my first experience was like I got onto a torrent site and I ripped all their albums over the course of like a week or however long it used to take. But before that we used to have this thing and it doesn't exist anymore rarely does that's right of uh compilations you remember yeah and there was a big one in the 90s it was really big because of the secret hidden track that i think everyone only bought it for the secret hidden track it was called no alternative and nirvana did uh of uh at the very end wasn't listed everyone who was there It wasn't listed, but they did – it's sappy, but it's also called Verse Course Verse. It was an unreleased track, and it kicked. It was so good. But also on that album was Matthew Sweet, Goo Goo Dolls, and Pavement did Unseen Power and Picket Fence. And who was the second one you named? Goo Goo Dolls. Yeah. Goo Goo Dolls? You know, like rather funky band until, you know, Twister. No, it's not Twister. Until that Twister song.

Track 3:

[4:41] They did a song on the Twister set. No, it was the Asteroid one. No, it wasn't the Asteroid one. Fuck. Oh, yeah. Dude. It's called Angel or something like that. No, they did a song on the Twister set. It's like Alanis Morissette did a song. On the record, you came uninvited. Yeah, anyway, this is riveting conversation for somebody who tuned in for Pavement. I know.

Track 3:

[5:13] Beastie boys was also on the alternate and breeders did a really good live live track but but really it was like you could get uh like that was if you did not have a lot of money and you wanted to hear and this is backwards thinking because nowadays you'd be like why would you buy a whole album for one song well everybody did everybody bought it for that nirvana song and uh and then you got a little a little sampler of all these other bands that you could get into And that was my first. Hold on, let's talk about this for a second. So what did you think of On Scene Power? Yeah. It was good. And in comparison to everything else on the album, it's like, oh, this is top ten. This is really fresh and inviting. And I dig the sound. It was kind of rare. It wasn't overproduced. and it didn't have that, you know, that pastina. Am I using that word correctly? You know, patina. Sorry, patina. It's fucking boiling. It's hot. Did I mention it's hot? It's like 55 degrees in Canadian. 55? Celsius. But yeah, I think it's like 40. I was like 55. Your skin would be melting.

Track 3:

[6:35] Anything after 35, I'm like, it's all the same. I like the heat, but it's not like this muddiness. Yeah. I can't handle it. Really? Yeah, it's the thing. It's not the heat, it's the humidity. No, oven's dry heat. Anyway. Yeah. Again. But yeah, no, I really, I like the sound. And I was also big into Sonic Youth, but I had a bit of a bone to pick with Sonic Youth because their stuff never really seemed to get me to the place where I was like, yeah. Yeah and it felt like pavement was like they got it it was it was kind of this it's like a visceral, sort of song yeah but it's it's it rocks i totally know what you mean you know i mean yeah i've been i've been uh nose deep in in pavement's catalog for almost five years now so, like i mean obviously i enjoyed it prior to that but you know just looking at it week after week week after week you know it's it's been asked me to name a fucking song um title though and i'm usually stumped or or where it falls on a record and there's people that will be able to do oh yes it's right after this and before this and it's like i just can't do that i'm just because that's part of the culture though that's part of like the like we when we lost physical media, like it's like remembering your best friend's phone number do you even know it now i don't Oh, I know my wife's. I don't know my wife's. I don't know my kids.

Track 3:

[8:03] Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, so that, like that compilation. And then you'd think I would have rushed out and I would have bought, you know, a pavement album, but I didn't because a scant few years later, the Brain Candy soundtrack came out and being the massive kids of all fan I was. Okay. All right. Is R. I was and I still am. Yeah. And will continue to be. And you know who was on that soundtrack oh matthew sweet fuck me really, he followed yeah he follows you around doesn't he yeah but pavement like painted soldiers is, like it's in my top five songs it's in my top 15 for sure no my top 10 and it's the best spiral There is. Other than the unreleased Preston School of Industry. For sale, the Preston School of Industry. But yeah.

Track 3:

[9:09] And another breakout track on a soundtrack album that has like... They are? Yeah. They play Butts Wiglin'. Yeah. They might be Giants, I think, did a track. Uh, stereo lab and like a real, Oh, and of course the odds were on there, but yeah, it's kind of five. I think there was even a GBV guy by voices song on there. I think that might, it was by first exposure to guided by voices. I got into a lot of music through compilations, something that does not exist. And I wonder how we can rectify this. Yeah.

Track 3:

[9:57] Well, we have to change the industry one person at a time. Starting at this moment in time. And this is the... It's 66 degrees. Good things are forged in heat. This is... Hey, listen. This is the closest I've ever recorded an episode to drop date. Like, most everything else is done. Oh, yeah? I did it in the spring. You know? So, this is... What is the date? It's June 20th. And this goes out on the 28th. Yeah. Or whatever next Monday is. Wow. Look at me. Look at me knowing fucking calendars. 24th. Okay. Fair enough. Yeah. Yeah. Sure is. Yeah. It's sooner than you think. That's right. No. Into that editing bay. This one doesn't get edited. This podcast doesn't. But yeah. Oh no. All my secrets. Okay. Back to the matter at hand here. There's a lot of... So if you haven't noticed, Jeremy and I are buddies and we're doing some catch up at the same time that we're um that we're doing this so that's why we're getting a little distracted i apologize for that and i hope this is acceptable for your pavement listening uh enjoyment yeah it's a forgiving crowd have you ever listened to the episode of meeting malchus called uh hate mail.

Track 3:

[11:17] Oh you should look that i haven't heard that one i got a hate mail letter oh yeah i just decided to do an episode on it because it is like a screed it is like it is like martin luther knocked you know nailed something to my door you know and it was like it was like oh deep cut wow yeah now it was type was it written or was it typed oh then you know it's serious yeah listen to that one oh wow if you're just getting into to this because of the top 10. There's a whole other podcast out there where I go through each of the songs. It's called Meeting Malchmus. That's the feed that you're on right now. And there's lots of good... I can only hope that this generates at least one more hit. It might. So from there, you finally buy a record? Or do you get into the torrents?

Track 3:

[12:11] I bought, oh, and this is shameful, and now I wish you do edit it. I bought Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain through another form of dead media, the Columbia House Records Club. Dude, Columbia House was money. It was so good. It was so good. It was. 12 CDs for a penny? You're paying 30 bucks afterwards, but hey. And it was one of those auto ship deals. That's where they got you. That's where they got you on the lazy. It just shows up, right? Because it was $30 a hit, and you would be like, fuck. But if you played your cards right, you won. The house did not always win, but they must have won enough.

Track 3:

[12:51] Yeah. I mean, and you could send them back and say, you know what? Liz Fair just isn't my cup of tea. I'm going to exile Guyville. Yeah, this one, I think it was her follow-up. I was like, eh. Never sent me Matthew Sweet. So Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain. Do you know where the title comes from? It comes from, apparently, it comes from Purple Rain, Purple Rain. And Stephen just liked the rhythm of that. Or it may have even been David Berman who suggested it. And, yeah.

Track 3:

[13:26] If I'm wrong, shoot me an email. JD at meetingmalchmas.com. Would love to hear from you. So you put that one on the old CD player, I'm guessing. Not a turntable. about this point and yeah it starts with silent and that song just melts your brain like right off the bat it is i i that album for me is like a textbook like this is how you start an album like this series of songs like this is how you do it this is how you you break it in so you lay the frown the foundation for the listening experience you're about to undertake and man i yeah i listened to that album a lot. It's a masterpiece for sure. I will fully admit, I thought he was saying Silent Kit for the longest time. I thought it was about drummers. Well, nobody really knows. It's got multiple titles. People will say Silence Kid, and people will say Silent Kid. People will say Silent Kit, and people will say Silence Kit. So I think on the liner notes, it's Silence Kid. So, yeah. Oh, interesting. Yeah. Did you ever get a chance to see them live?

Track 3:

[14:45] So, jury's out on that. It was the 90s. I was young. I got around a lot. And a friend of mine was like, no, I don't think we do. We did see them. And I was like, I distinctly remember being at, like, the Cool House. Did you go to Lollapalooza in 95? At one point.

Track 3:

[15:08] Okay. No, I've never been to a Lollapalooza. I was just going to say, because they played that, and that might be something that you saw and forgot. Because I can't imagine, you are going to generate some hate mail. That you saw them live and you don't fucking know that you saw them live? What kind of fucking planet is this? This is so different than the other interviews I've done for this program. I know. I know. But you know what? If I did, I enjoyed it. Well, there's that. that and if i didn't then you know so there's that i i guess i never will do we want i mean somebody had to somebody had to remind me that i've seen wean like several times and somebody was like you know i was like oh i wish i could i wish i could see wean and they're like you've seen like eight times like oh that's oh yeah that's a really shitty superpower to have dude, i know i know i have a very bad short-term memory but my long-term memory is near You're fucking impeccable still. Well, see, my short-term memory was bad at the time. You didn't, yeah. See, I don't create new memories. Yeah. I have a very difficult time creating new memories. Yeah. I still have them, but yeah. Oh. Yeah. It's ever since I got zapped. Okay. What do you say we flip the record over and start talking about song number 26? You up for that? Yeah. Let's do it. We'll be right back after this.

Track 2:

[16:34] Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening, and now on with a countdown. 26!

Track 3:

[21:05] This week, we are celebrating song number 26, Fight This Generation. What do you think of this one, Jeremy from the Falls? This is probably, it bridges the best run, I think, that Pavement has on any album, starting with AT&T, going right through to the end of Wowie Zowie. I started AT&T, I just listen to these tracks over and over again. And Fight This Generation is definitely a staple in that run. Yeah, I think so. And it's a staple of their live show as well at this point. Even when I saw Malcolm on the Traditional Techniques tour, he played a guitar and computer version of it. And it was really quite fucking cool. Oh, really? Oh, I would have loved to have seen that. There's got to be a video of that. I'm sure there is on the old YouTubes. Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised. Yeah. Like, I love the demo version in that enhanced Wowie Zowie release. Oh, right. Yeah, yeah. Nice and Critter's Edition. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Track 3:

[22:24] But yeah, no, this track does that thing that I like so much in every song I hear it in, where you start listening to it and then halfway through it turns into a different track also. Absolutely. Two different songs mashed together for sure. Yeah. So in listening to this again for this I couldn't believe this track is only like four, it's under four and a half minutes. This feels to me like an epic six, seven minute long track but it's not. It's a tight 4.23. Yeah. Tight 423. That's funny.

Track 3:

[23:04] I mean, long for a pavement track, but it feels like, it feels a lot longer. Doesn't it? Doesn't it? Maybe I'm just thinking of the demo version. It does because, okay, so not in a bad way for me. No, no. No. But because it feels like two different songs, I think that might give you the illusion that it's long. Yeah. You know? Plus the repetitive outro, like just that jam at the end. That always feels too short. And yet it feels like a day. It feels like a good day. Punching in, punching out. You're friends with the coyote. You're not friends with the coyote. Or the sheep rather no i, you know so there's been like three matthew sweet references and now like two looney tunes all right well um what else do you have to say about fight this generation, This, um, like all, all lyrics are interpretive. Yes. Like, and, and I, and I hesitate because I've listened to everybody else talk and they're so. Erudite.

Track 3:

[24:27] That's a great word. And I think that's what I'm trying to say. But they, they, they're very, they, they've got very strong opinions and they're very, they're very knowledgeable and they've obviously put a lot of pen to paper and sorted this out and, you know after 18 cups of coffee and and i i'm still i grapple with this one because it's like seeing shapes and clouds and you know you know that old um oh man it's a charlie brown comic from years ago uh and and they're like all sitting on the grass and they're looking at the clouds and the one one i think linus is saying like oh look that's like that cloud looks like washington crossing the delaware and and that one looks like uh rodan's the thinker and and that cloud looks like the the the stoning of saint peter and and they're like what do you see charlie brown he's like i see a ducky and a horsey but you know so i think you can i think you can do that with this track i mean just the the title alone evokes like uh an emotion yes and and the The way that it's, like, the way the song is constructed, how it starts off in 3-3, moves to 4-4 time in there, you get the sense of, like, there's two sides clashing. I'm still trying to figure out, like, for you.

Track 3:

[25:55] Wait a minute. 3-3. There's no 3-3. 3-4.

Track 3:

[25:59] At the beginning? Yeah. There's no 3-3. Oh, yeah.

Track 3:

[26:09] I'm not a music student, but it sounds pretty waltzy to me. Anyways, what is this song about to you? What viewpoint do you see this from? Because I think there's a couple different ones. Is this punching up or punching down? Oh, I don't think it's punching at all. I think this is a jumping up and down song.

Track 3:

[26:36] Um it's just anthemic and it's just you can get behind the the idea of fight this generation but i don't think any of the other stanzas um support any information about which generation it is who's doing the fighting you know that sort of thing and to me that's what makes it an anthem because you know the kids listening to it right now can feel like they're fighting the gen xers whereas like we were fighting boomers you know um but is it ever like the gen xers fighting the millennials well i suppose a few years ago it may have been because that's that's where i kind of landed on it's like it's the song itself feels cyclical in the way that it's it's like you could probably put it on repeat and it's just this constant like the the themes in it are are such such that it is like there's always going to be this realization, like the fight is part of the progress. It's part of the identity. So therefore it has to exist, but you're in it on one side and then you're on the other side of it. So you're constantly at odds with the generation before you and the generation after you. Absolutely. Yeah. It's very funny that that's the way it's turned out, you know, or keeps turning out.

Track 3:

[28:04] It's like Battlestar Galactica.

Track 3:

[28:08] New or old the new one all right the good one the really good one i liked the old one as a kid but it doesn't hold up well the old one had a robot dog and yeah and action figures yes i had a star buck with one arm did it come that way no no i pulled it off i wanted to make him a star wars was villains so that's what i did so listen it's been great talking to you today about your pavement origin story uh fight this generation and uh you know just a basket of other things uh hope uh you enjoyed yourself i know i did and uh that's what we've got for you this week next week we'll we're getting into the top 25 man so we we start to kick out the top 25 next week we're halfway way fucking home. Can't wait to hear it. I'll talk to you then. Wash your goddamn hands.

Track 2:

[29:05] Thanks for listening to Meeting Malcolmists, a pavement podcast where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email. JD at MeetingMalcolmists.com.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

jD hangs with Stephen on today's episode of the Top 50 Countdown. First, as usual, he shares his Pavement origin story and then reveals song 27!

Transcript

Track 1:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50. You can exhale now because track 28 is Stop Breathing. Amir, what are your initial thoughts about this song? I love this song. It appears in my Top 20 that I sent you. I think it's number 14 there. So it's half of your number. Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and.

Track 3:

[0:22] Roll Band Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown. Hey it's jd here back for another episode of our top 50 countdown featuring seminal indie rock band pavement week over week we're going to count down the 50 essential pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots i then tabulated the results using an abacus and some fucker named gene how will your favorite song fare in the ratings well you'll have to tune in to find out. So there's that. This week, I'm joined by Pavement superfan, Stephen. Stephen, how the fuck are you? I'm very good, JD. How are you? I'm doing quite stellar, in fact. It's a good day to be breathing and upright, you know? It is. It is. Spring's in the air. You know, winter's gone. Things are looking up. Funny enough, it's snowing here today. First, you know, we've passed spring. We didn't get any snow at all. And then, you know, it turns into spring and all of a sudden we've got snow. So, you know, who can fucking tell?

Track 3:

[1:30] No, no, but yeah, thanks for having me on. It's like we said before, just before we started, I've been listening to the whole countdown so far. And, you know, it's been great. It's a nice little pick me up on the Monday morning when it drops. And it's a good feeling to think that, you know, there's going to be one a week for the whole year pretty much. So, yeah, I've been really enjoying it. Well, thank you so much. That means a lot. So let's get, you know, let's make this about you now and let's get right into your Pavement Origins story. Yeah, okay, yeah. So, I mean, I'm 42 now and I got into Pavement when I was about... Sort of 15 16 so it was basically when uh terror twilight came out.

Track 3:

[2:19] When i was a teenager i was really into radiohead at the time i mean i still am but uh, they were they were my band at the moment so i was obsessively into everything that they did and i would read all the interviews and you know get every release and bootleg and ep and thing that came out uh from that band and i remember i was on holiday once and uh i picked up a music magazine in the airport on the way over and there was a a big article in there about pavement and the terror twilight release um and i'd kind of heard of them a little bit uh i kind of knew off them but it was always but they were always sort of mentioned in the same breath as um, the fall and john peel and things like that and so yeah in my mind i kind of built them up as a kind of scary alternative loud punky i don't know abrasive sort of band that was sort of unlistenable, um and i kind of remember at the time also around that time in the 90s um blur brought out their uh.

Track 3:

[3:27] Self-titled album the one that has song two on right graham graham coxson was going around on the interview circuit and saying oh yeah this this this album's influenced by you know really really hard understandable american bands like like pavement and i was like oh okay yeah so this in my head i kind of built them up as um something a bit difficult and then i read this saw this article in um this music magazine it must be key magazine or enemy or something and they just came across like a really nice bunch of guys and i thought right when i get back from holiday i'm going to buy that record it sounds really good also so yeah the other thing was that the main draw at that time was uh the radio head rich sort of connection godrich yeah so he he nigel godrich produced it they had johnny greenwood playing harmonica for some reason on uh platform blues and on billy and so i bought the album purely on that uh that sort of thought really i'd never heard any of their songs didn't know anything about them and i remember getting home putting putting the CD on, and the first song is Spit on the Stranger. So that was the first Pavement song I'd ever heard. Wow. And it's got such a lovely, warm introduction, and those sort of synth pops, and the vocal, and the melody. I thought, wow, this is great. This isn't what I was expecting at all. I was expecting something really hard, and almost the kind of stuff that you hear on Westing.

Track 3:

[4:51] Yes, yes. And so, no, I loved it. I got really into that album. them i loved uh every track on it really um uh especially carrot rope loved carrot rope but i don't i don't quite i don't quite get the kind of uh the sort of online hate that that song gets i think that's a great song um but yeah from terror twilight i then kind of worked backwards and picked up all the cds in kind of reverse order i got i think bright in the corners next, text uh and i kind of worked backwards uh crooked rain wowie zowie was hard to find i think in those days i couldn't find it so it took me it took me about a year or so to track that that cd down.

Track 3:

[5:33] Um so yeah i wonder why that is i don't know i think it it was in the 90s it was kind of like, you know there wasn't the internet wasn't so prominent you couldn't you almost didn't know what a band's back catalogue was. You had to kind of track it down and search it out in record stores and read about them in magazines and, uh yeah so for whatever reason that that record was hard to hard to track down but uh yeah so it's by the time i went to university i think i had all the albums, uh but then unfortunately they broke up yeah so i kind of missed the boat on the on the sort of original incarnation uh uh but then the the sm debut came out which is absolutely, that is my absolute favorite album by anybody of all time. It's really fucking good. Yeah, it's so good. I mean, I still listen to that album now. Like it's, what was it, 24 years old, is it? 23 years old or something, as we speak. Yeah, pretty close. I think I listened to it last week. I still get something from that album. Me too. I do. I listened to it for like three days in a row, Les, two weeks ago. Listened to it for like three days in a row, just straight. It's still got it, hasn't it? Every song on there is fantastic.

Track 3:

[7:00] The sort of guitar work, the melody. And I think sometimes with... It's quite a poppy, immediate album. And sometimes those sorts of albums don't really have the longevity. But for whatever reason, this one does. It's really got a lot going on. Um so so yeah so then so from that i i kind of so from 2001 onwards i kind of picked up all the, mountainous solar stuff as it came out uh uh but none of them really grabbed me like the debut did um up until um traditional techniques so yeah that that that's another one that's really got under my skin that album it's a great one um i think it came out i think it came out just at the beginning of lockdown yeah it was 2018 yeah and it might it might be something to do with that you know sort of being trapped in the house with this with this new record and i listened to it every day for for a long time over over lockdown uh but yeah that that's that's a really good one as well yeah um and it was around that sort of time that um.

Track 3:

[8:14] That i uh found your podcast and uh yeah oh wow it was it was kind of the traditional techniques album that made me kind of think oh i need to get a bit more into to revisiting some of the other mountainous stuff that i've not really got into the first time around and i found your podcast and the uh uh the mountainous conundrum podcast yes yes the guys did yeah that was great so uh yeah kind of that that period that lockdown period for me is kind of synonymous with listening to a lot of pavement podcasts, listening to traditional techniques, and sort of going back and re-exploring some of the other Mount Masolo stuff.

Track 3:

[8:55] But yeah, so yeah, I didn't catch them live. Well, I saw Mount Masolo a few times when he was touring the first album at festivals and little venues, and that was really cool. Here's one for you. I saw Radiohead, and opening for Radiohead was SM and the Jicks. Oh, really? What year was that? Yeah, that was Hail to the Thief, when they were touring for Hail to the Thief. Yeah, 2004, something like that. Oh, that'd be cool. That's about right, yeah. So they were doing, were they doing Real Emotional Trash or something at that time? What were the Jicks doing?

Track 3:

[9:40] Whatever came after Pig Lib. uh pig lip okay cool yeah no the one after pig lip uh shit i can't i can't think of what it was face the truth i've got it up here somewhere uh face the truth, Or Real Emotional Trash, one of those two. That's pretty cool. Yeah. So did you get a chance to see Pavement live ever? I did. Well, when they regrouped in 2010, I seem to remember. Yeah. And they did a series of shows down in London. But it was the week I was getting married.

Track 3:

[10:19] Tough to escape that. So I didn't go, but I thought about it. It was almost like you know travel down to london come back get married the next day and i thought no it's not that's not gonna work so i'll uh i'll skip that but then i thought yeah wise uh but then i caught them on the um on the most recent tour and that that tour was fantastic that really.

Track 3:

[10:40] You know i was completely obsessed with that tour it was so good where did you where did you see the manchester uh yeah so i saw them in leeds um and manchester uh and then the following year, they played a little one-off uh festival in the uk called blue dot and they were headlining right yeah yeah and that was really cool um yeah you got some of the uk gigs didn't you yeah i saw every every stop except for leeds oh no that's a shame yeah oh so you're at manchester yeah yeah that was a good one i thought yeah too yeah that i remember on that one they, they opened with major leagues didn't they which i think which is a bit i always think that's a bit of an odd uh odd intro song it doesn't really get things going in the same way it sort of set the mood for the night like it was a more mellow show for sure definitely definitely it's but still great still a great song yeah, but yeah no but then so the funny thing about the Leeds gig was um.

Track 3:

[11:52] I went with my brother and we went for some food beforehand and a couple of drinks. And we're in this Indian restaurant. And the waiter comes over and says, oh, are you guys going to the pavement gig later? Because he must have seen our T-shirts and things like that. Well, oh, yeah, yeah. And he goes, oh, the band ate next door just an hour ago. So there was another slightly more upper class Indian restaurant next door. And he's like, oh, no, they just ate there recently. and so i was like really really buzzing from that i was like oh yeah we've eaten in the restaurant next to the one that pavement ate in so we finished up there and we're walking up to the venue and the doors opened i think at seven and it was probably about you know one or two minutes to seven o'clock and we're walking up through the town center and as we're walking, we kind of notice that we're kind of walking in step with this other group that are kind of walking in this at the same speed and in the same direction you know it's a bit awkward when you're kind of trying to overtake each other and uh i thought hang on they've got they sound like american accent and um so i look over and it's uh it's bob and spiral walking up walking up to the venue um and bear in mind that the doors are just about to open so they're just like strolling up through the city center like they've got all the time in the world.

Track 3:

[13:15] And I was like, oh, you know, I don't normally, you know, don't normally do this but i'll have to i've got to say something you know and i've had a couple of pints by this point so i was feeling a bit more uh confident but uh so so as we got to the traffic lights i stopped them and said oh sorry guys you know just got to say hello you know you're a big fan and they were really really nice guys just stopped and we sort of stood there by the road and chatted for about five minutes or so and you know they were in no rush at all to to get to the venue or start the gig or anything like that um yeah so really really nice um, really nice guys uh and then and from that point yeah it was just a great gig uh yeah yeah oh that's so fun that you got to meet them they're so gracious right yeah no really good guys and just yeah just chatting like you know like it was like it was nothing you know yeah and you know asking where we were from and you know uh they were talking about how they'd played at the same venue with sonic youth like back in the 90s and you know and stuff like that just really yeah it's really nice little little moment um and then managed to to meet them a second time um at the blue dot festival uh the year after wow uh because they and i don't think this was really.

Track 3:

[14:40] Picked up online that much but on the first event of the day at the festival it was on the poster described as a listening party, And I thought a listening party with pavement and it was a sort of event curated by Tim Burgess from the charlatans. Okay. He does these sort of online listening parties where he plays an album and people listen along live and, you know, that sort of thing. And so I thought, okay, that's probably just, you know, in a tent somewhere, they're probably playing a pavement album and maybe talking about it on stage, that sort of thing. So I thought, well, I'll head over to that before, you know.

Track 3:

[15:20] Before we go and see any bands. And so I head over to this tent, turn the corner, and the entire band are in this tent, up on this little stage. And it's probably about, I don't know, maybe 200 people on sort of chairs. It's like a sort of wedding tent, you know, like chairs. And they're playing Wari Zari through the speakers. And they've got this interviewer on stage, and she's just talking to them about the album as they play it through, like track by track.

Track 3:

[15:50] Um and you know so you got like a sort of track by track rundown of every wow it's like it's so surreal to sort of turn the corner step into this tent and you know mount merson the rest of them were all on stage and they're doing that kind of track by track blow by blow rundown of every every you know every song on the rise alley i was just i was just like i wish i wish i had a bit of paper to write some of this stuff down or to remember what they're saying because it was it was really good really good sort of um director's commentary yeah exactly it's like you know those sort of um uh on tv here on say like you know on like a friday night we might get, a sort of behind the scenes documentary on some 80s band or something and they're sitting at the mixing desk and they're talking about how they recorded this album years ago it was like that but for a band you actually like and for an album you know um an album you're actually really invested in um yeah so that was really cool, uh and then yeah so what's your go-to record these days uh these days i would say it's um yeah uh because i think it's got the most variety sure does uh it's probably like the best.

Track 3:

[17:10] Single if you were to sort of say what if you were to give one record to somebody and say this This is what pavement's like. I would say it's Wari Zari because it's got the louder stuff, the quieter stuff.

Track 3:

[17:21] It's really eclectic.

Track 3:

[17:26] Yeah, when I was younger, it was Crooked Rain that was always the one that I would go to. But I think now it's Wari Zari.

Track 3:

[17:37] Well, what do you think there, Stephen? Should we flip the record and talk about song number 27? Let's do it, yeah. Alright, we'll be back right after this.

Track 3:

[23:35] It's the fourth song from Terror Twilight on the Countdown. Song number 27 is the fantastic The Hex. Stephen, what are your initial thoughts about this song, The Hex? The Hex. It's a really cool song. It's, I think it's completely different to anything else that Pavement does. I think it's very unique. um it's got a style which isn't really isn't really there in any i can't think of any other song that looks like it it's um you know it's kind of it's kind of slow kind of lurching, atmospheric um it's got a kind of it's almost a kind of proggy kind of vibe um Um, uh, but yeah, no, no, it's really, it's really cool. Um, I love the guitar solo. It's, it's absolutely brilliant. Did they play at any of the live shows you went to? They did. They did. They did, uh, at Blue Dot. Yeah. I was, um, they, they didn't take leads on Manchester and I was really hoping they would. Uh, and yeah, and then they, they played it at the last one. So I was happy. Yeah. Really happy with that. They really open it up live. Don't they? Oh, it's great. Yeah. Yeah, really cool song live.

Track 3:

[24:57] It's one of those kind of jammy songs. You know, you can tell it's come from a, you know, a band session rather than something that's been kind of written in advance.

Track 3:

[25:10] And in fact, you've got the, there's that other version of it, isn't there? And then the Hex. Yeah, and then the Hex. Yeah, that's on the B side. and that's i think that was part of the bright in the corners sessions yeah i believe so yeah yeah yeah and so that that version is pretty cool as well but that's much more it hasn't really got that kind of haunting sort of vibe to it it's more kind of crunchy and rocky it kind of i don't think it really emphasizes that sort of guitar line so much it's more straight into the kind of chorus and then like Magnus is doing the kind of scatting yelling bit over the top, it's quite a cool version. Yeah. So you can kind of see how that kind of rocky jam that they started with sort of evolved into this kind of more atmospheric, proggy song and I'd imagine quite a lot of that is probably down to Nigel Godrich. I bet you're right. I bet you're right. Because it's really dense as well, isn't it? Yeah. Whereas a lot of Pavement songs tend to be sparse production-wise, the whole Terror Twilight is so rich and atmospheric. Yeah. This song is a great example of that. Definitely, definitely. It's almost kind of claustrophobic. You can kind of get lost in it.

Track 3:

[26:33] Yeah, it's a really cool song. um in fact yeah on the on the nigel gottrich uh sequence i think he puts it at number two, so he obviously thinks it's like uh you know should be up there at the beginning i do think it works a bit better at the end as a uh you know as a sort of finale rather than pin it right right up there at the beginning yeah i like the sequence that that they put together for uh terror twilight uh i think i like it a little bit better than the gottrich sequence but it's cool that we have both. Definitely, yeah. Yeah. It changes the record. It does, it does. It's funny how a sequence can change the feel of something. Yeah. But like I was saying before, Spit on a Stranger is just the perfect opening for an album, I think. It's spot on to put that at the beginning.

Track 3:

[27:28] But to start off with The Hex, it's pretty dense. It's pretty yeah um but yeah no yeah really cool so do you have a handle on what this song is about, well i was having to think and yeah i mean i've been listening to this song a lot, over the past few weeks in preparation um and trying to get a sense of what's what's going on but to me it feels kind of it's kind of in some ways it's a bit radio heady because i think it's it's kind of, it's kind of a bit about um existence and alienation and feeling sort of lost and uh like some of the lyrics um, He's talking about, you know, sort of been reeling around a parking lot, being, you know, being lost in life and not knowing where you're going.

Track 3:

[28:27] There's some great stuff in the lyrics. That line about the epileptic surgeons with their eyes X'd out. You know, it's pretty creepy stuff. Yeah. You know, attending to the torn up kid. so you can kind of imagine this sort of you know you can kind of read that as someone who's sort of physically broken or someone who's maybe emotionally torn up like you know life has just got too heavy and right broken them down and you've got these sort of zombie, twitching surgeons attending you know attending to this kid um so pretty pretty sort of nightmarish childish kind of stuff um i love that line about the uh the secondary stumbles because the cadence of the count has led him astray i just love the sort of syncopation of that line it's it's brilliant um and then you've got uh uh the the sort of section about the architecture students which i love that yeah that's got to be one of his uh one of his best lines definitely It's, yeah, really funny. It kind of.

Track 3:

[29:50] Yeah, he has these lines like the bit about, you know, the architecture students with the itch they can't scratch, and, you know, the surgeons in the second verse and songs like Grounded where he's sort of taking a pot at doctors and it seems like he's got this kind of.

Track 3:

[30:09] He likes to sort of take the pot shots at the professional classes, I think. I think, you know, he's there from the sort of creative side, the artistic side and he's looking at the people that are kind of dedicating their lives to these sort of, you know to these professional and technical endeavors and he's sort of you know taking little pot shots at that I think that's I think that's great. I like that that's good but yeah it's kind of, it reminds me of a lot of like a Radiohead song something from OK Computer or something where it's talking about the state of the world and alienation and being lost and these sort of little nightmarish, the janets uh here and there um really good really good stuff um the the line about the swallow at the beginning is pretty cool as well i mean i think so too yeah i mean i think that's him kind of in some ways kind of showing off a little bit about some you know his knowledge about migratory birds which you know you can see that so it's quite humorous on that on that side but also i think it's kind of talking about um so so the line is uh swallow answer to your inner voice and please return god installed that radar in your pointy little beak so please return so it's kind of like it's a bit you know you could see it one way it's about nature about migratory birds or you could or you could see that it's something to do with kind of like destiny and fate.

Track 3:

[31:39] These creatures are kind of, you know, they're drawn back. They've got no sort of free will.

Track 3:

[31:47] And you can maybe see it like, perhaps it's kind of, maybe like a broken relationship and he's, you know, his partner's broken up with him and gone off and he knows they'll come back because they're drawn back with this sort of instinct, this kind of fate. You know, you can't escape this kind of instinct that's within you. Um good yeah so it's all yeah there's i think there's a lot of stuff in there like that which is i think i think different to to your average pavement song it's a lot more downbeat a lot darker a lot sort of um.

Track 3:

[32:24] A lot more sort of oppressive um and and that together with the whole sort of rhythm with the thing and the kind of sort of lurching piano guitar line that sort of just you know that sort of those sort of bass notes and then sort of that sort of descending guitar part all the way down yeah um yeah really cool really cool nice stab nice stab on the sm lyrics though because Because, for real, he's really tough to nail down, right? Like, it's really tough to figure out what he's saying because it does change so much. It is like phraseology, in a sense, you know? Like, just throwing out neat, syncopatic phrases and bits of thoughts and bits of ideas, and then you get this structure, you know? Very cool. Yeah, definitely. It's more about the kind of image. which, you know, it's kind of poetry in that sense, isn't it? Because it's more about the image it creates in your head than anything literal, you know? Yeah.

Track 3:

[33:28] How do you feel about the ranking of this song? Is it properly ranked? Is it 27? Should it be higher? Should it be lower? Yeah. I mean, not wanting to question the abacus, but I think it could be higher. I think uh i was just looking at my my uh submission to you and i think i had it at 13, that sounds more about right like just outside the top 10 i think it's one of the one of the one of the greats definitely i mean it's different i can i can understand why it's lower because i think i don't think it's a pavement song in that sense i think it's more of a it's not really really representative of what what they do it's quite unique um it's more of a shows you that sorry i apologize okay it all well it also shows you that terror twilight just doesn't have the same love that you know that other pavement records have you know like people like some of the songs are held back because you know people like a lot of people have terror twilight is number five. The rest of the records are interchangeable. You know, like, oh, I have Slanted at number one. Oh, I have Crooked at number one. Oh, I have Wally's Alley at number one. But most people have Terror of Twilight around five, it seems.

Track 3:

[34:50] Yeah, no, I can understand that. And I think maybe because this was the first record that I got, you don't come to it with all that sort of baggage, really. That's right. You can kind of see it as an isolated record rather than in the context of everything else. But no, I think it needs to be higher. Just for the guitar solo alone, it's like, it's so, so, so good.

Track 3:

[35:16] It's almost kind of a bit Pink Floyd-y, a bit kind of prog-y. It's probably like the cleanest guitar solo that he does really like most most of the guitar stuff he does is kind of you know sort of intentionally sloppy and and you know distorted and he's hit you know hitting these off key notes on purpose and you know like like the um like the solo on thin which is another absolutely fantastic solo but that's all like you know that's that's completely all over the place which you know in a really good way but uh in a great way yeah Whereas this solo is much more tightly controlled and sort of almost like classic rock. You know, it's really nice. Interesting. Classic rock. Okay, I can see that. Yeah, I could see it on the, you know, downside of the moon or something like that. Yeah. I was just listening to Dark Side before we got on the call. Yeah. Nice, nice. Yeah.

Track 3:

[36:16] Yeah. Well, man, it's been great having you on to talk about your origin story and the hacks. Is there anything that you want to plug or anything like that? No, not really. No, I don't really have much internet presence or produce anything creative. Well, that's cool. That's cool, nevertheless. No, no, no. I really appreciate your time. And I thank you so much for doing this. No worries. it's no it's been it's been a lot of fun i was i was looking forward to this for a long time and you know like i said i've been enjoying the countdown so far uh and uh looking forward to see what seeing what comes up at the top i'll never tell yeah well i'll tell in december but yeah all right steven thanks so much talk to you soon watch your goddamn hands.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the ole Pavement top 50 podcast, jD welcomes Amir from Providence to talk all about his Pavement origin story and to breakdown song 28!

Transcript:

Track 1:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50. Oh, I love this song so much. It's a song, I hadn't, it wasn't on my first wave of songs to study, even though I knew we were going to play it. But it wasn't, like, you know, there were other songs I felt like I had to nail more. So this was towards the end. I said, okay, let me get into this type slow jam. Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band.

Track 3:

[0:24] And you're listening to The Countdown. Hey it's shay d here back for another episode of our top 50 countdown for seminal indie rock band pavement week over week we're going to count down the 50 essential pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots i then tabulated the results using an abacus and the kid from the sixth sense wait a minute am i dead how will your favorite song fare in the rankings. You'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that. This week, I'm joined by pavement superfan Amir from Providence. Amir, how the fuck are you? Hello, I'm calling from Providence, Rhode Island, and I'm very fine. Life is good. Excellent. That is good news. It's great to have you here. Let's just not beat around the bush. Let's get right into this. What is your Or pavement origin story. So that's a long origin story. So I live in Providence, Rhode Island, as I mentioned. By the way, cheers. This is local. Cheers. Watery domestic beer from Rhode Island. Narragansett Atlantic-like lager. So...

Track 3:

[1:37] A little plug for Atlantic Light Lager. Yeah. But anyway, yeah, that's very watery. Anyway, so I was not born here. I was born in Moscow, not Moscow, Idaho. Moscow, Soviet Union, which is more or less the same thing as Russia. And I grew up there in the 80s. And I loved music since I was, I don't know, since I remember myself. I started playing piano when I was four. So I listened to a lot of music it was also the 1980s were an exciting time for rock music in Russia because Russia was like after many decades of like complete censorship it was starting to open up and, rock music suddenly became legal so it was possible to listen to that, if you if this makes you curious I recommend everybody listen to the Wind of Change podcast It's just an amazing story. Oh, it's amazing. I've listened to it. Yes, it's brilliant. So, but, yeah, so I started, like, loving rock music when I was, like, a child. But we are a Jewish family, so we moved to Israel in 1991.

Track 3:

[2:52] And even though Russia was opening up back then, Israel was, like, always a very open country, open to everything. So we had MTV, or more precisely, we had MTV Europe, which is not exactly the same thing. Uh mtv like in the united states and mtv europe it's not exactly the same thing mtv europe has a lot of uh uk uh bias and uh like because it broadcasted from the uk uh and uh it's it also tried to incorporate some other european music like italian or german but it was mostly like very uk biased so that's when i was growing up mtv was uh important it was like there was no youtube YouTube kind of replaced MTV now but MTV was important culturally like hugely important not just for myself but for a lot of other people, but initially when I started like watching it it was kind of boring at least during the day but then during the night it got much more exciting because they started like after midnight, they started playing much more interesting stuff and there was a show called Alternative Nation I think it was every Tuesday on MTV Europe and they played stuff like Sonic Youth and Pavement and European what you would say alternative bands, like whatever alternative even means.

Track 3:

[4:18] I tried to figure out what does it even mean that it's alternative? Is it a certain guitar sound? It actually doesn't mean much at all. It's just rock music that is cooler than Bon Jovi. Well, what's funny, it was alternative to the mainstream and then it became the mainstream. Exactly. Like, if you look back at this, like, it was totally the mainstream. Like, Nirvana was alternative, but it was already quite the mainstream back in 1992. And by now, it's completely mainstream. But, you know, whatever. Names of things are sometimes funny. So, yeah. And they mentioned pavement occasionally. Now, initially, they mentioned, I didn't really dig it. Like I remember, I definitely remember they showed Cut Your Hair, of course. They never showed it during the day. They showed it late at night.

Track 3:

[5:12] I didn't really understand it. I was like, it just looked weird. And these days, I look at the Cut Your Hair video, and now I'm a Dan and I have children, and they look at it and they just think it's funny with the gorilla and the lizard. Yes. And I was just overthinking it totally. Like I was 15 years old. why what does what does this mean i was totally overthinking it um but yeah they should cut your hair and they i remember they showed the gold sounds video um maybe also yeah rattled by the rush like the weird the weird version with the bathtub okay didn't really understand like what's the deal with that so i did love like i did love a lot of other alternative bands like i loved sonic youth i loved therapy if you if you heard that's a band from northern ireland uh i love the, alternative, rock band, whatever that means.

Track 3:

[6:03] Anyway, so then I graduated high school. And as pretty much everybody else in Israel, I got drafted to the military. Now, what you don't hear, you often hear about the Israeli military on the news. What you don't hear about the Israeli military is that most people there, they don't do combat and wars and stuff like that. It's just, I work with computers And that's like what most people do. They work with, you know, cars, equipment, computers, whatever. I worked with computers. And I had a friend there. And that friend was much cooler than I am. He's probably still to this day much cooler than I am. And he had many more CDs than I had. And he knew alternative music like way better than I had. I did know Sonic Youth. Sonic Youth, which is another Samuel band. I did know Sonic Youth much better than he did. But other than that, he was like the huge expert. He taught me about cool bands like Mogwai and Mercury Rev and a bunch of others. And he taught me about pavement.

Track 3:

[7:08] And he gave me the Wowie Zowie CD to listen. Interesting. And I was immediately hooked. That was just incredible. So like from the first seconds of We Dance, oh my God, how did I miss that? We Dance is such a brilliant song. I'm just thinking about this. I will make this really weird comparison, but it kind of makes sense to me. Because like I mentioned that I play piano. I played piano for many years, like almost 40 years now. Oh my God. I'm old. And I...

Track 3:

[7:43] There's another band called Guns N' Roses. There is. Which is nowhere near as cool as Pavement. Nowhere near. But that's like the not-alternative thing that they were showing a lot on MTV. And I couldn't feel like, why are so many people excited about this band? And then I saw November Rain, which, ooh, it has piano. Piano is classy. So it's classy. It doesn't... No, I'm not comparing. I'm not comparing Guns N' Roses to Pavement, but We Dance had the piano, piano is classy. And so I heard like, Ooh, that's a much like, that's such an interesting song. And I absolutely loved it. And I loved the rest of the album as hectic and eclectic as it is and extremely long. I saw it described somewhere as three six-song EPs or six three-song EPs. That's probably the... That's an interesting way to look at it. Yeah, I saw it described like that somewhere. It's a very weird album, but it's so great. It's absolutely like all of it. I love it. And then I heard the rest of it from that friend. And he gave me like Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, and Brighten the Corners.

Track 3:

[9:10] And later I just bought them all myself. So slanted, of course. So I have them all twice because they released them with the usual version and then the Lux and Redux and all those. LA Desert, they expanded. So I have them all twice.

Track 3:

[9:27] Yeah. And yeah, so that's kind of my pavement origin story. And yeah, and I became a super fan, I guess, around 98 or 99. Wow. So you got to experience Terror Twilight when it came out. That one you got to experience, right? In real time? Yep. What did you think of that at the time? It was very different. I did love it. I loved all the songs. I listened to it a lot back then.

Track 3:

[9:57] It's very different it's very different from if I really have I don't want to but if I really have to pick a favorite album it would probably be Crooked Rain Crooked Rain I really love them all but Terror Twilight is very different, has its own style unlike Wawizawi which has like 20 different styles but yeah, Terror Twilight definitely has a certain and particular.

Track 3:

[10:25] Integrated feel to it. Yeah, I would agree. So did you ever get a chance to see them live? Yeah. So first time I saw something related to Pavement, it was not Pavement. And it was not Malcolm's solo. It was a show in Israel, in Tel Aviv, in 2004. It was a tribute show, like a bunch of local Israeli bands played a tribute show to Pavement and Malcolm's. Really? It was pretty brilliant. Yeah. Israel has like a very varied music scene. Okay. Rock of all kinds of styles and jazz. I know nothing about it. It's not that known around the world, but it has a very rich, vibrant music scene. Mostly sang in Hebrew, but occasionally in English. So that show had bands singing mostly in English. Like I remember a band that I really loved, they performed Gold Sounds.

Track 3:

[11:27] And here, I think, uh, that's like, that, that's how I, that's how I found out about that show that like, there was a band that I, that I love. They, they, that band used to be called blush and lure back then. And they sang in English later. They changed the name of the band and they started singing in Hebrew, but, but back then they were singing in English and, uh, yeah. So they performed two songs there. I think it's definitely gold sounds and probably here. Here and uh yeah there was a bunch of other bands and like some of them did like very similar versions to the original some of them completely reworked them as like punk songs some of them translated the lyrics to hebrew like there was a i think it was father to a sister of thought they completely translated it to hebrew that was that was fun so anyway uh yeah that was a cool show. The second time I saw something pavement related was in 2010.

Track 3:

[12:23] 2010, that was the first big reunion in New York, in Central Park. That was a brilliant show. It's actually possible that you and I went to the same show. Yes, I know. Yeah. And yeah, I absolutely loved it. I think, like you mentioned a couple of times on your podcast, that, how did you describe it? That they seemed tired or something like that?

Track 3:

[12:48] Yeah, they just didn't seem into it. You know, the same way they did on this newer tour. Maybe, um, maybe I, I was absolutely excited about this. Oh, me too. At least, at least the part, they also seemed like very excited. Uh, the Stanowich was like ecstatic, uh, eyeballed, uh, who is like, usually very like quiet and, uh, serious. He was actually quite chatty on the stage. I remember, like, I remember him speaking to New York and how cool, like he's, he's from New York and how cool New York is and how cool Queens is. He, he mentioned Queens. I don't remember what he's, what did he say exactly, but like, he's like, are there people from Queens or something like that? Like he looked. I don't remember that. Yeah. And he's, he mentioned something like that. So anyway, um, yeah, it was, it was a fantastic show. Such a fantastic show.

Track 3:

[13:43] Heckler Spray, Summer Babe. Oh, wow. In the Mountain Desert. Uh, just a fantastic, fantastic show. So is the record that you go back to now, like, is it Wowie Zowie when you have a hankering for Pavement, or is it your favorite, Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain? I would probably say, it's so hard to say, I would probably say Crooked Rain and Slanted, but I love them all. I love them all. I listen to them all. There was a third Pavement-related thing I saw, and that was Malkmus.

Track 3:

[14:18] Malcolm's solo I think it was in 2012 or 13 it was the it was it was.

Track 3:

[14:26] Oh, I'm, I'm blacking out. Which, uh, which, uh, the album with, uh, uh, Senator, uh, which, which album is that? Mirror Traffic? Yes, that one. Uh, yeah. So that was, that was a brilliant show. Uh, that was a really brilliant show. Towards, towards the end, he did, uh, uh, something like, uh, funny, uh, Faith No More impersonation. Really? yeah like towards the end of the show he played he played a couple of famous so he played here and i think uh speaks he remember and uh at one of the songs towards the end they were like the jigs were getting all uh uh in a good mood and uh jamming and at some point they just started started playing um what's the famous faith no more song epic yeah yeah they just I started playing that. That's so cool. Yeah. Anyway, it was a brilliant rock and roll show. So yeah, so these are the three Pavement-related shows I attended. Nice. Well, what do you say we take a quick break and come back and talk about song number 28? Let's do that. Let's do that. Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement.

Track 1:

[15:43] Thanks listening. And now on with a countdown. 28.

Track 3:

[20:18] Song number 28 on the countdown comes from Crooked Rain. Crooked Rain, amazingly, it's the first song from their sophomore effort to appear on this list. You can exhale now because track 28 is Stop Breathing. Amir. Yeah. What are your initial thoughts about this song? I love this song. It appears in my top 20 that I sent you. I think it's number 14 there. so it's, half of your number I know maybe I should have rated it even higher it's like it's a brilliant song it's kind of special I made a bit of homework so it has the, it has if I'm not mistaken I learned music for many years but maybe I'm mistaken about something but almost all Pavement songs have the quadruple rhythm 1, 2, 3, 4 okay this one is Because the correct term here is probably the six-eighths rhythm. Oh, okay. One, two, three, one, two, three, one, two, three, one, two, three.

Track 3:

[21:27] So there are not a lot of pavement songs in this rhythm. On the studio albums, it's just Our Singer and Stop Breathing. And half of Fight This Generation, the beginning of Fight This Generation. Oh, okay. The rest, and well, there's also 5-4 equals Unity, which begins in 5-4ths. And then I think actually the chorus is also in 3-4ths or 6-8ths. And the rest of the pavement, well, in all the kinds of B-sides and bonus tracks, tracks uh there are a bunch of uh um six eighths uh songs uh mercy snack kentucky cocktail so stark sagano stray fire um and yeah that's about it you did do your homework i did do my homework there's also kneeling bus uh also known as rugrat which is a very weird beat that i couldn't completely understand a very very cool one uh but it's like it's neither four neither three but yeah so that's so it's pretty.

Track 3:

[22:36] It's pretty unique relatively unique in that regard it's beautifully placed in the track list at the third third spot kind of a different mood between like the big rockers the, uh elevate me later and uh cut your hair yeah so that one has a different mood it has very beautiful uh guitar sound uh throughout the song and especially of course towards the end, um so yeah i absolutely love the song one of the best they the pavement has very, pretty much no songs that uh i would like say that they are bad but this this one is really one one of the best so what's your relationship with this song uh crooked rain crooked rain you said is your favorite record so what do you remember about the first time you heard this song or.

Track 3:

[23:33] Something like that so so this was the this was the second album i heard uh after wavy zowie and it's relatively much more uh much more of a straightforward rock straight absolutely relatively, compare it compared to wawi especially the first song like it gets a bit weirder towards the end but uh the beginning of it it's like it's a relatively very straightforward i agree.

Track 3:

[23:58] In a classic rock album i i i heard somewhere that uh malcolm called it like disparagingly classic rock like he said that silent kid is a is a classic rock song in like in a not very good way, but he's wrong well it's maybe he was just sarcastic i don't know it was Because Silent Kid is a brilliant song. And Stop Breathing is a brilliant song. It has this really, really beautiful guitar sound and this beat. And it may be, oh my God, this is such a cool rock band with cool melodies. And they do all these things so easily. And it sounds like they were just having fun. But the song, it's kind of somber, kind of solemn, kind of serious. Yeah, I agree. Relatively. It has this special atmosphere. Nevertheless, it feels like while they're playing it, they're having a lot of fun with these guitars. Like, that's a really special guitar sound, especially towards the end. And it gets stronger and stronger.

Track 3:

[25:08] And oh my God, it's just so beautiful. It's just so inspirational. Yeah. What do you think the song is about? I have no idea. I barely ever listen to lyrics, to be honest. In music, I mostly listen to the melodies and the playing and the arrangements.

Track 3:

[25:31] Volley. Like, volley has a... It's kind of a... Like, it probably refers to both things. Like, both to the volley in sports. ports and in the war. And that's kind of a menacing word. It's struck by the first volley. So that gets you in a kind of a tragic mood from the start. And then it says, stop breathing. And there's also this alternative version on LA Desert Origins where he says, start bleeding, like stop breathing and then start bleeding. Really? Yeah. I gotta re-listen to LA Desert Origins. My memory is so shit. Oh, well. Yeah. It's like the comment there is that it's from Louder Than You you think, 1993, and it's probably, I don't know, maybe it's a demo, maybe it's not a demo, maybe it was at some point intended to be released. But in the chorus there, he says, stop breathing and then start bleeding, which makes it even more menacing. Yeah.

Track 3:

[26:46] Yeah. So there's this menacing song, and right after it, there's Cut Your Hair, which is very fun. The exact opposite. The exact opposite.

Track 3:

[26:55] But menacing, you know, my attitude to music is embodied in a poem that I really love. It was written by a jazz musician who's very old, but he's still alive, I think. His name is Oliver Lake, a jazz saxophone player. And he wrote a poem. And in the poem, he mentions names of many musical artists that he loves. and they're very different artists.

Track 3:

[27:26] And he's like, and the poem is built like a conversation between himself and the waiter in the restaurant. And then he says, put all the meals in one, put all my meals in one plate. Don't ask me what kind of music I play. I play the good kind. So I like, I actually, I don't care very much about the genres of music and I don't care very much about the mood of a particular song. Like some songs are happy and some songs are sad and some songs are scary like these are all important things but uh eventually i i i judge all songs by like this is the good song or is it not a very good song and uh this song is is of the good kind uh yeah that's that's the really important thing like it like it definitely has a mood uh definitely has a very identifiable probably intentional mood and it's probably placed intentionally in that sequence uh on the album but it definitely has this character.

Track 3:

[28:25] So this is going to be I think I know the answer to this because.

Track 3:

[28:31] You've already told me what you rated it on your list but do you think this song is properly rated overrated underrated on the top 50 28 is lowish, I would be very unpleasantly surprised if it was not in the top 50 at all um i like i would probably rate it a bit higher uh maybe it's not my number one song but it's like it's pretty like it's pretty high it's pretty high on my list it's a great song it is absolutely there's nothing to shake a stick at unless it's a complimentary uh stick shaking your dick fun fun fact about uh the tennis part uh the so the song is like you mentioned it uh You mentioned that you read it from those notes that Malthus had in his own songs. And he mentioned tennis himself, so we have it from himself.

Track 3:

[29:28] I checked it. So I edit Wikipedia quite often in English and in Hebrew and occasionally in other languages. And I checked what is actually Malthus' relation to tennis.

Track 3:

[29:41] And the English Wikipedia mentions that he loves playing golf and tennis, but he doesn't, Here's where it gets funny. So Wikipedia editors, good, serious Wikipedia editors, try to fact-check everything. And the fact-check in Wikipedia is done by adding footnotes. You may have noticed that Wikipedia has lots of footnotes. So I checked the footnotes. So where it mentions that he plays golf and tennis, it had two footnotes. Both of them were not very good. One of them was a completely dead link. the other one didn't say anything about any sports so I found another source like it's actually a tennis website where he speaks about actually loving tennis so yeah so there's another confirmation that he loves tennis that other tennis website mentioned the song yeah so I improved the English Wikipedia article about Mr. Stephen Maltmes and now it has a better footnote for the tennis information, So, yeah, that's a kind of thing I do for fun. Cool.

Track 3:

[30:50] Well, it's been really great talking to you today. I'm curious if you have anything that you want to plug or mention for people to look at on the internet or anything that you've created, anything like that. Well not much I'm kind of I'm trying I'm trying to I moved I lived in Israel for many years and I moved to Providence a few months ago my wife is doing an academic project here so we all moved together with the kids.

Track 3:

[31:21] But I love as I mentioned I love Israeli music I'm, there's not much to plug I'm trying to start a band that would play covers of Israeli songs which is challenging in the united states i it's i'm slowly finding some people to do that but there's not much to say about this right now uh but uh you know you can you can find in the future there might be a band that we can look for hopefully and uh then i would maybe um i would i would probably i would probably mostly play uh covers of israeli music or maybe in the loop on that amir maybe an occasional pavement song what's that keep me in the loop on that shoot me an email when you get it going and I'll talk about it on the pod. I haven't tried that. Maybe an occasional pavement song. Yeah, that would be cool. Well, like I say, it's been a blast spending this time with you today. I really appreciate you doing this heavy lifting on a podcast that is ostensibly yours.

Track 3:

[32:21] So, thank you very much for that and make sure to wash your goddamn hands.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the pod I'm thrilled to be joined by Rebecca Clay Cole motherfuckers! We talk about her Pavement origin story, to joining the band on key, and breaking down song number 29!

Transcript:

Track 2:

[0:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 1:

[0:02] At track 30, we have Spit on a Stranger. What the hell do you make of this song, Devin? I'm really glad I got this song because I love this song. And the thing about this song is that there's a real tension within the song that truly appeals to me. because I believe that musically and in the verses, this is the most romantic song that Pavement has ever recorded.

Track 2:

[0:31] Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band, Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown.

Track 3:

[0:39] Hey, it's JD here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for Seminole Indie Rock Band, Pavement. Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that you selected with your very own top 20 ballads. I then tabulated the results using an abacus and all my fingers on my left hand, except for my thumb. Fuck you, thumb. How will your favorite songs fare in the rankings? Well, you'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that.

Track 2:

[1:06] This week, we're joined by Pavement superfan, well, not Pavement superfan, Pavement superstar, Rebecca fucking Clay Cole. Rebecca, how the hell are you?

Track 4:

[1:17] Hello, I actually, I'm a fan. I don't know if I'm a super fan, because I've met some super fans. And I don't know if I have the level of technical knowledge. But I'm a fan and in the band. So nice to meet you.

Track 3:

[1:30] Nice to meet you as well. You definitely have the technical knowledge. I saw you guys play on the 22 reunion tour eight times, I think. And it was tremendous. I had so much fun. I was at the Fonda show. I saw two shows in Toronto and then like six shows in London.

Track 4:

[1:48] Oh, great.

Track 3:

[1:49] Or not London, but UK.

Track 4:

[1:51] Cool.

Track 3:

[1:52] So very, a lot of fun.

Track 4:

[1:54] A good range of shows there.

Track 3:

[1:55] Yeah, I think so. I was pleased. I wanted to go to Iceland really bad, but that didn't fall on the cards.

Track 4:

[2:02] Well, maybe we'll be in Iceland again someday.

Track 3:

[2:04] That would be cool.

Track 4:

[2:05] Join us if that happens.

Track 3:

[2:07] I will do that. So let's get right to the punch here and talk about, this is sort of funny to be talking about something, Sort of funny to be talking with somebody in the band about their Pavement Origins story, but obviously you came late to the band, and we'll talk about that. I really want to know what it's like to join a band that's an established band, but hasn't been on the road in a while. I want to know that as well, but I really want to know your Pavement Origins story.

Track 4:

[2:36] My Pavement Origins story. Well, I think the first time I was aware of Pavement was when they were opening for Sonic Youth. It was maybe Sonic Youth Mudhoney Pavement at Red Rocks.

Track 3:

[2:52] Oh, really?

Track 4:

[2:53] They were the first band to play and I had never heard of them. I hadn't heard of much because at this point I think I was six months in Denver. And before that I'd lived like on a farm and on an island. So I had no cultural touchstones at all for a teenager. I was really, I wouldn't say ignorant, but I just sort of formed my own musical education. I'd never been to a punk show. There were no punk shows in the Virgin Islands, you know, or in the farm in Kentucky. So all of that is to say some friends took me to Red Rocks to see this show. And Pavement was the first band. So that was my first introduction to Pavement.

Track 3:

[3:29] And what did you think?

Track 4:

[3:31] I did not understand it. I didn't understand it at all. But Gary was in fine form, and I remember not spending a lot of time behind his kit. And I just was confused what the performance was. I didn't understand it. I didn't have the language to understand it at the time.

Track 3:

[3:49] That's phenomenal. And Red Rocks, to boot. I've never been, but it's supposed to be just a fantastic venue, right?

Track 4:

[3:59] Maybe Pavement can play it again with me.

Track 3:

[4:02] Oh, that's awesome.

Track 4:

[4:04] I'll just plant that seed out there to the universe.

Track 3:

[4:06] Yeah.

Track 4:

[4:07] We'd like it to grow.

Track 3:

[4:08] So where did it go from there? Did you... At what point did you click? Did it go, oh, yeah, I get this?

Track 4:

[4:17] You know, not much later. Maybe a year or two later, I was... I found myself joined into an indie band. And this was 90... 94 maybe okay um 93 94 95 for sure um and so pavement was of course i should maybe it's not and of course but it was just like a touchstone you know it was like they were one of the coolest bands doing it and someone that everyone in my scene looked up to very very greatly and so i saw them touring wawi zawi they had my friends the apples and stereo opening for them for a section of that tour and so I got to see that show with Apple's opening which was great um so yeah I would say Wowie Zowie was that era where I like I definitely remember thrifting for my first set of stage clothes for the Minders like listening to that cassette going to the thrift store with my friend Tammy oh.

Track 3:

[5:12] That's a cool memory.

Track 4:

[5:13] Getting ready for our first gig yeah.

Track 3:

[5:15] That's so cool what What was the name.

Track 4:

[5:17] Of the band? The Minders.

Track 3:

[5:19] The Minders. Is there anything out there that people can find?

Track 4:

[5:24] Yeah. Check it out.

Track 3:

[5:26] Yeah, I will definitely check that out. Yeah. So from there, we fast forward a number of years, and it's now 2021, I'm guessing, when you got the call, or was it early in 2022?

Track 4:

[5:43] I actually, Steven had asked me in 2020, 19.

Track 3:

[5:50] Oh, right. Because they were going to go on the road in 2020.

Track 4:

[5:54] Because the Jicks were at Primavera, I think.

Track 3:

[5:59] Okay.

Track 4:

[5:59] If I'm not mistaken. This is how I remember it in my time. I'm friends with Joanna. She played briefly in The Minders. And we're just really close in addition to that. And the rest of the Jicks. I'm friends with all the Jicks. But anyway, Stephen had asked me about 2020 and not to tell anyone. And so I hadn't. And so then somehow, because they were in Barcelona, he must have mentioned that I was doing it or that it was happening or someone in Barcelona. I don't know. But I got a lot of angry texts from the jigs like, why didn't you tell us?

Track 3:

[6:30] Oh, man.

Track 4:

[6:31] It's like, well, I was asked not to say anything to anyone. It was really hard. I'm glad someone knows now.

Track 3:

[6:37] You're a person of your word. That's great.

Track 4:

[6:39] In this one case, I was, yeah. Usually I'm that terrible gossip. it so.

Track 3:

[6:45] That happens and then obviously covet happens so that doesn't that doesn't you know pan out but 2022 comes around and you guys all assemble in portland to um to jam and to rehearse like a shitload of songs.

Track 4:

[7:04] What was what.

Track 3:

[7:06] Was that like for you how much prep work did you have to do going into that.

Track 4:

[7:11] Um I took it pretty seriously and I did a lot of prep work I pretty much took the three months before those rehearsals were just me rehearsing for rehearsals and I set up my my rig basically the same rig I use live I set up a version of that in my living room, with a mixer and an amp and like you know tried all sorts of different keyboard configurations and tried to figure out what I wanted to use live. And then from there, sort of figuring out, you know, there was programming a lot of sounds. It was important for me to learn the catalog in such a way that, that my goal was like if steven just played any riff like kind of randomly started noodling it that i would be able to know like the song its title where to find it in my notes like does it have keyboard and do i have that part ready to go or percussion or vocals or anything so that was sort of the level i wanted to be prepared for practice the first full band rehearsal which i I think, actually, I think I met my goal. I took, I had extensive notes.

Track 3:

[8:16] You posted them on social, right?

Track 4:

[8:18] I think Bob posted that picture first.

Track 3:

[8:21] Yeah, yeah.

Track 4:

[8:22] I was surprised you wanted to, like, but yeah. Those were the distilled notes. I mean, like, some songs have pages and pages where I've just painstakingly, like, transcribed, you know, using music notation, like, how the part looks on the sheet so I could read it and understand it that way. Other notes are a little more esoteric and squiggly. So yeah, that was the prep, three months of that. And I got, of course, by the end thought I wasn't ready at all. And then I showed up to practice and realized I was pretty ready.

Track 3:

[9:00] So you walk into the room. I'm sorry to keep painting these pictures. But you walk into the room, and this is an established group of people. Although they haven't seen each other in 10 years probably or close to or some of them haven't seen each other. How difficult is that to insert yourself or be inserted in something that is already established like that?

Track 4:

[9:25] And something I love. Not just like something that it's established for me in that way.

Track 3:

[9:32] Yeah.

Track 4:

[9:33] It was sort of heavy actually. I made it heavy in the preparation I guess. Like, I was nervous. I was very nervous about, uh... I mean, it sounds silly to say now that I've spent some years with them, but I was just hoping everyone would like me. Not like personally, necessarily, but what I'm bringing to the songs. Was everyone in the band equally on board with having a keyboard player? Am I stepping on any parts? At first, I was concerned, does Bob still want to play some keyboard lines?

Track 3:

[10:06] Oh, yeah.

Track 4:

[10:07] I wasn't quite sure how it had all come to be. And so I just, I, I, I walked in to not timidly, but just like trying to get a read before I really started asserting myself. But I, but then I forget my filter only lasts for a little bit. And then it's like within an hour or two, I think it was fine.

Track 3:

[10:27] Oh, that's so cool to hear. Yeah.

Track 4:

[10:29] I forget to be nervous. And then I'm just myself for better or for worse.

Track 3:

[10:33] No, that's great. great so from there we go to LA and we go to the Fonda show which I gotta tell you that show like kicked all sorts of ass that was so good you guys played so long and such a varied like we didn't know going into it that the set list was going to be as varied as it was um you know we We knew that you guys had practiced a lot of songs, but it just, it was surreal. What was it like for you?

Track 4:

[11:06] Surreal.

Track 3:

[11:07] Surreal as well.

Track 4:

[11:08] I mean, we'd done all, we'd done the rehearsal in Portland and, you know, the team, you know, for musical building, but also for me, some team building, like who are these guys exactly? And like, and then we did some practice in LA on a soundstage before the Fonda as well. And I was nervous. It wasn't even like I was nervous. I was just unsure. I was really unsure what to expect. I now had practiced with them for like eight days, and I had watched so much YouTube of them live. But I hadn't been on stage to feel, like I wasn't sure what I was going to feel on stage, if that makes sense, like how it was actually going to feel to perform the music.

Track 4:

[11:48] And like rehearsal and performance are two different energies. Strategies, just wasn't sure what I was going to get from the five guys as far as all that went.

Track 4:

[11:56] And I also was really unsure what I was going to get from the crowd. It's like, I was like, yeah, I have eight days of practice with them. Like, I feel pretty good that they like my contribution. But now the question is, like, does anyone else like the contribution? Is it going to work?

Track 4:

[12:12] Will it be unfavorably compared? I had a lot a lot of that swirling in my head i was and it was uh yeah i wouldn't say nerves both under and overstates the situation it wasn't like i was shaking in my boots but it felt heavier than that it was like too heavy to be shaken in my boots but then steven did this really cool thing and maybe he could tell i was nervous i i will also say i don't think i was the only one with jitters i think they also hadn't played out in over a decade together so a lot of those questions maybe they're asking themselves as well um but steven rallied us really classic but and maybe like a little maybe it seemed pat to say it now but at the time it felt really good but he was just reminded us all that we practiced hard and it was going to be fun um and it's the strangest thing jd because as we walked on stage all of that tension left and that's really gifts that's been the hugest gift for me of playing in this band I got it on the first show and it's no fear it was just like this is fun these guys are fun the energy is fun and that is how it feels on stage to play with them I learned that night the reason the tension goes away is because it's about something.

Track 4:

[13:34] More important than And like, did you execute your part properly?

Track 3:

[13:37] Right.

Track 4:

[13:38] You know, it's like, are you in the right head and heart space? And they probably don't use these words for it. This is how I'm describing it. You know, to make the music matter, there has to be a feeling there. And they all excel at that. It turns out I had nothing to be worried about. Pure joy being on stage with those guys.

Track 3:

[13:54] Okay, I'm curious about your favorite songs to play. What are some that you had a lot of fun with?

Track 4:

[14:02] I mean, they're all so fun. And I'm not just saying that, I mean.

Track 3:

[14:06] No, that's cool.

Track 4:

[14:07] They're all pretty fun to play. Even when I'm just shaking a tambourine half of one chorus or something of a song, it's like, I can't believe I get to play the tambourine on this part. They didn't just invite me up. They're paying me to come up here and play this tambourine part.

Track 3:

[14:26] That's so cool.

Track 4:

[14:27] It's just like, what a dream gig.

Track 3:

[14:29] Yeah. I love how you did Trigger Cut, like how you did the sha-la-la-la-las in Trigger Cut.

Track 4:

[14:35] Oh, yeah. So cool. That's so fun. That's really fun. And that is a fun one to play. Like, obviously, like, anything that finds just me and Bob, like, in a tambourine party is fun. Like, any, you know, the more tambourines, the better. It's always good. It's always fun. That's just, there's never a night where I look up and see Bob playing tambourine and don't immediately get completely lifted.

Track 3:

[14:57] Oh, that's so cool.

Track 4:

[14:59] So anything where I'm doing that is fun. Working out something like Embassy Row was kind of fun because we, like, practiced the beginning part and, you know, then it rocks at the end. It's sort of like seeing those songs kind of work out in practice and then singing.

Track 2:

[15:13] Yeah, yeah, I get that. So what do you think? Should we get into the track, song 29?

Track 4:

[15:24] Let's do it. So it ranks 29 of 50?

Track 2:

[15:27] That's right, yeah. We'll be back on the other side with Rebecca Clay Cole. Hey, this is Bob Mastandovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening, and now on with a countdown. 29!

Track 3:

[21:05] There it is, the sixth song from Bright in the Corners on the Top 50 Countdown, also the sixth song on the record. This week, we're talking about song 29, the fantastic, the jammy type Slowly. Rebecca, what is your relationship with this song?

Track 4:

[21:21] Oh, I love this song so much. I mean, it wasn't on my first wave of songs to study, even though I knew we were going to play it. But it wasn't like, you know, there are other songs I felt like I had to nail more. So this was towards the end. I said, OK, let me get into this type slowly jam. And putting on the hat of Stephen playing that piano part and like figuring out where he put his hands and why for that song on that recording was like. I feel like a little peek behind the curtain there to the mind of the man.

Track 3:

[22:02] Wow.

Track 4:

[22:03] Because I play the piano most. That's my primary instrument. And so thinking about how he was approaching the piano on that song was cool. And I scored every note out. There's a score that I've written of everything he does. Because everything he did was so cool. And I wanted to be sure to capture not all of it verbatim, just understanding where he was coming from with all of those parts. So by the time we played it live, I had that sort of intimate relationship with it where I had been in my headphones on an edible and just flying high and really getting into the, was that a 32nd note rest or a 16th note rest? Really too over-processed on that probably, but in a fun way for me because that's how my brain works. And so by the time we put it live and I got to sort of use some of that and throw some of that out, it just kind of became a song in the set I always liked to see. I always like to see Types Lully in the set.

Track 3:

[23:09] That's fantastic. I like to see it as well. Bright in the Corners is one of my favorites. So I'm glad to see it's represented a lot on this top 50 list. And there's definitely more to come from Bright in the Corners. What do you think in terms of this ranking do you think it's properly rated overrated underrated like you seemed surprised when you said 29 out of 50 a and I don't know what that what that surprise meant.

Track 4:

[23:39] Yeah, I guess I don't know either, because I don't know what's 50 to 30.

Track 3:

[23:46] Right.

Track 4:

[23:46] So that's one of the things. So I don't know what came behind it. I can probably guess half of what's ahead, at least. But I don't know. To me, I think of it as a live track.

Track 3:

[24:00] Oh, OK.

Track 4:

[24:01] A song that was built for live. And I don't know if it was. but it just takes it takes so much life on on the stage um that it's almost like one of those songs that was made to do that when.

Track 3:

[24:18] You guys got it prepared to go on the road did you know you were going to do the jams in it or was that sort of like organic on the road the.

Track 4:

[24:29] Jams are organic they had jammed that song before so it wasn't a surprise at all that they'd be jamming and And the song as it is on the record is a bit of a jam. I mean, I did count it out measure for measure for the purpose of my scholastic exercise, but I knew we weren't going to deliver that just like that on stage. If I had to get out the sheet music to make sure I could make sense of it, I mean, no, you know, it's not worth that. So I knew there would be jams and the jams changed. Changed you know it was it's the for me type slowly is the most me i get to be on stage with pavement oh wow because i'm not yeah well it's a jam and so and there's a lot of freedom in the jam for me on the piano because the part was free to write it was very free freely written kind of thing and in and out play when i want don't play when i want stop playing the piano and just shake something else for a while or play one note and whatever I do kind of seems to work I don't even think Stephen has me in his monitor so it's not like but in my mind maybe he does but in my mind it's like you know the guitars and me and then I'm and sometimes I'm with the rhythm I'm kind of I get to jump into everyone's show on that song like I'll be with Mark for a couple minutes.

Track 4:

[25:51] Then I'll jump over and watch Steve West and then it's like what's Bob doing and then oh yeah yeah, Stephen's doing something cool. Let me pop over. Let me get my attention back over to the guitar and see what's going on. And Spiral will come over and jam. So for me in the set, that's like my most, I'm not really thinking about it as a pavement song, monolithic and unchangeable. I think about it as like a pavement song in the now that's still being kind of designed.

Track 3:

[26:17] Oh, that's a really cool way to look at it. Live music is, there's a singer that I've heard say that a song isn't finished until you play it live. You know, like you've got it written and performed, but until you take it on the stage, it sort of hasn't fully gestated.

Track 4:

[26:38] I think that might be true. Yeah. A song like this might never gestate. It might never be done. It's just a grower.

Track 3:

[26:47] Yeah, that's a good way to think of it.

Track 4:

[26:49] You know, it's always going to evolve live. Like, I'm sure the next time we play it, there'll be something that's not. Everyone takes different positions. musicians and yeah and then sometimes steve west will think it's time to end type slowly, and it's not or sometimes we're like we could totally end it like why hasn't it ended or and sometimes i'm the one out there like i'm still playing and it's like oh crap we're already to the next verse and i'm still oh the clouds like it just is so loose like that i love it you could never do it the same way twice which is probably why i love it so much that's.

Track 3:

[27:23] Very pavement as well Wow. It seems very pavement. Yeah.

Track 4:

[27:27] On brand.

Track 3:

[27:28] Is there anything else you want to say about Type Slowly?

Track 4:

[27:35] Um, no, there's nothing I really want to say about Type Slowly. I was wondering if you were going to ask me about Slowly Typed.

Track 3:

[27:42] Oh, I didn't even know. I didn't.

Track 4:

[27:45] But you didn't. So no, we don't, we don't have to talk about Slowly Typed.

Track 3:

[27:48] Well, now that you've opened the door. I would like to hear your thoughts.

Track 4:

[27:52] I mean, my only thought about Slowly Typed is that it shows the way that the scaffold that song hangs on now into that live jam that it's played on, I think, is how it was meant to be. Or how it does its boast power. The Slowly Typed version is, not going to ever be a nine minute epic live jam okay maybe i mean maybe i don't know maybe i'll throw that challenge out for the next round of shows but yeah um so i just think that's sort of an interesting thing to think about like i actually looked when i was doing all my homework for this tour i thought okay let me go see like if there's any like live slowly typed nine minute jams i can find on YouTube. And I couldn't find any, only the type slowly jams.

Track 3:

[28:40] It's, it's wild how YouTube has changed things, right? Like, I mean, the fact that you can just go and like, look at these shows to, to do your notations and to do the things that you want to do very neat that you didn't have to sort of fly by the seat of your pants.

Track 4:

[28:54] I mean, it felt like I was flying by the seat of my pants. But no doubt it was helpful. Like, because you listen to something on record, and it's like okay that's on record a record that was recorded 30 years ago and this band has probably played it live 500 times since then so they don't remember their body memory of the song is probably not like the recording version it's like some live version somewhere that i need to go find and there were a couple other songs not type slowly where i was sort of playing it true to the record and it would be like don't do that i'm like but it's like exactly this is exactly the parts too much or it's you know and i'm like and then i realized it's just oh yeah right because it hasn't been there for 30 years. So it's good to go back and look at the live versions of things to just sort of watch, kind of like what you just said about how a song, it doesn't really go until it's performed for an audience. But if you've performed that song for 30 years, it might have traveled somewhat from the recorded version.

Track 3:

[29:51] Yeah, I would guess so, now that you've said it. It wasn't something I considered before, but now that you've said it, It's like, yeah, that seems pretty clear.

Track 4:

[30:02] Yeah, I found that to be on a lot of songs. So YouTube was a really great resource. I would just be like listening to something. I'm like, there's no way Bob played this live on the keyboard. But I know he played the keyboard. So then I'd go back and watch the live version and watch what he was doing on keyboard and split the difference between Stephen's part recorded and Bob's part live.

Track 3:

[30:21] Oh, okay.

Track 4:

[30:21] But use that YouTube as a, it was a great resource for me. And it still is. I learn a lot of songs in general. So it's usually a little goldmine of knowledge.

Track 3:

[30:30] Are you always are you always finding yourself noodling and learning stuff yes yeah yeah i can't.

Track 4:

[30:39] Really not think about it.

Track 3:

[30:41] Just listening to you talk so far it's like yeah you seem to have that very analytical you know sort of uh view of things right um like to to to do this which is yeah i think.

Track 4:

[30:55] I'm more analytical than a lot of uh musicians or at least my creative flow is in an analytical way I like math, I like charts I like spreadsheets, and that just really helps me get into my own flows of things even when I was trying to figure out I went over to a friend of mine's studio when I first started learning these pavement songs and I was just like help, I don't even know where to start, there's like maybe a hundred songs, I just didn't even I'm like how do I even and start it.

Track 3:

[31:29] Yeah.

Track 4:

[31:30] And he was like, make a spreadsheet. That's what you do. And I totally did that. I made a spreadsheet with the album, the song. Does it have piano? Does it have percussion? Does it need me to go find some kind of synthesizer sound? I don't know what. Just like I made a spreadsheet, and that's how I, yeah, I'm pretty analytical. Yes.

Track 3:

[31:50] That's a pavement first, I would think, a spreadsheet.

Track 4:

[31:55] Well, for the music, maybe. Maybe. Maybe there's... No, I bet there's got to be a set list spreadsheet.

Track 3:

[32:01] Oh, okay.

Track 4:

[32:03] That's a lot to keep track of. Yeah.

Track 3:

[32:05] Maybe not.

Track 4:

[32:05] Maybe Bob does it all from his heart and head. But maybe if I were him, I would... But then again, I'm the one that loves the spreadsheets.

Track 3:

[32:14] Right. Yeah. Well, Rebecca, it's been dynamite talking to you. You know, especially seeing as it's tough to... It's been tough to hear from you these last couple of years, like to read in magazines or stuff like that. I haven't, you know, I haven't seen a tremendous amount of pavement information with you included. So this is really special to me. I'm really thankful that you decided to stop by and do this.

Track 4:

[32:44] Yeah, thanks for asking. It's fun to talk about it because it's just like a really fun experience that I've gotten to have. And I'm like the luckiest music fan on earth, I think, in certain ways.

Track 3:

[32:54] Oh, that's a great way to wrap it. That is great. Thank you so much.

Track 4:

[32:59] Thank you. Good luck with the rest of the countdown.

Track 3:

[33:01] All right. Wash your hands. Wash your goddamn hands.

Track 2:

[33:05] Thanks for listening to Meeting Malcolmists, a pavement podcast where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you. If you've got questions or concerns, please shoot me an email. JD at Meeting Malcolmists dot com. Oh.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Devin Faraci joins jD today on the podcast. Beyond listening in on Devin's Pavement origin story, you'll hear him wax nostalgic about song 30.

Transcript:

Track 2:

[1:00] Previously on the Pavement Top 50.

Track 1:

[1:02] At 31, give it a day. What do you think, Scott from North Dakota?

This is a gem, and I love it so much. I love the whole EP.

This would have been something I did not discover until well after I knew all of Wowie Zowie, all of Bright in the Corners, and it wasn't something I easily could have. have it.

Track 2:

[1:27] Hey, this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band Pavement, and you're listening to the Countdown.

Track 3:

[1:34] Hey, it's JD here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for Seminole Indie Rock Band Pavement.

Week over week, we're going to count down the 50 essential pavement tracks that you selected with your very own Top 20 ballads.

I then tabulated the results using using an abacus and 28 grams of the best weed you've ever smoked, along with some drifter named Larry.

How will your favorite songs fare in the rankings? Well, you'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that.

This week I'm joined by Pavement superfan Devin from LA.

Devin, how the fuck are you? I'm doing pretty good. I'm doing pretty good. Really glad to be here.

Amazing to be on the World Wide Web talking about Pavement so many decades after I first started listening to them. Well, let's get right into that then.

Let's go back a few decades and get your Pavement Origins story.

You know, I have a lot of Pavement history. I started in around 92.

Oh, wow. Yeah, so Slanted and Enchanted.

And I'm pretty sure it was Summer Babe Winter Version that was the first song that I heard, I have to guess.

Track 3:

[2:50] And it was a weird time in my life I was a college student, I had been kicked out of college. Oh, shit. I had earned a 0.0 GPA.

And not for cool reasons, mind you.

I think that it was 1992, and my college had what they called a VAX computer system, which was the early internet.

And I was on the early internet all night playing multi-user dungeon games and did not go to school.

Track 3:

[3:24] So I got kicked out of college for playing video games. Really ahead of my time.

It's like big Gen Z energy, I feel like.

And I was living with my dad in Illinois, who was living in the suburbs, and it was the most miserable year of my life because the alternative rock world that I had been in back when I was living in New York City had exploded.

And I was stuck in the Chicago suburbs and I couldn't drive.

And all of these amazing things were happening and I was not part of any of it.

But there was a cool record store. And so I discovered Pavement and I have loved that band ever since.

And, um, yes, that's my original pavement experience trapped in the suburbs of Chicago, New York city kid trapped in the suburbs of Chicago, uh, watching the world explode into cool alternative rock shit all around me, but so, so far away.

Track 3:

[4:24] So what was it like when you walked into that record store? Was it the album cover that got you?

Had you heard of the band through like zines or anything like that?

Or was it just like a random purchase? I probably had heard it from a magazine, probably Alternative Press, if I had to guess back then. I read that shit religiously.

And I might have already heard the song, but I'll tell you, man, when I heard that album, it was like somebody had finally recorded music that was aimed directly at my particular personal brain.

Wow. You know, just sort of the discordant, weird lo-fi sound they had on that first record, especially back in the day.

But with melodic pop sensibilities, it was incredible to me.

It really was incredible.

And Malkmus' voice just really was, I mean, just got me, just nailed me.

Track 3:

[5:15] Yeah, it's very, I mean, they're very unique in a, in a world at the time where things were not yet starting to sound the same, but, and our guys were signing everybody out of Seattle.

They could, you know, this bright beacon of hope from Stockton, California, um, really shone a light for a lot of people.

I wish I could have been there at the time, but I didn't catch on until the late nineties.

So yeah no i was pretty happy to be there which means that i got to experience some pretty cool pavement stuff in real time um you know the greatest t-shirt i ever owned was a pavement t-shirt it had two fried eggs on the tits yes uh it's one of the great t-shirts of all time but i also have two really memorable i've seen pavement a few times but i have two very memorable pavement concert experiences all right share them uh so one of them was at the tibetan freedom Freedom concert in New York City.

And there were two stages. And I forget who was up against Pavement on the other stage at the time, but nobody came to see Pavement.

And so it was this big stage at Randall Island in New York City and Pavement playing.

And it was like me and 30 guys.

Track 3:

[6:30] Are you serious? There was nobody there. I got right to the front. Like it was incredible.

They were really playing to like the sparsest crowd you could imagine.

It was, I honestly forget who was up against them, but that was packed.

Um, and, and, and the pavement was, it was dead. It was just incredible.

Um, which I'm sure wasn't great for the band, but for me, uh, was a delight.

I mean, just an absolute delight, but the greatest pavement concert experience I've ever had.

Track 3:

[7:00] They did a secret show at CBGB, which is a very small venue and also disgusting and very historic.

And so I got tickets to this secret CBGB show, and I honestly forget what album this is, so I don't remember what they were playing.

But the big memory of the secret CBGB show is the band had been on for a minute.

And then Keanu Reeves entered CBGB wearing a tuxedo with a woman in a evening dress, evening gown of some kind, like they had just come from an award show or something. It looked like.

And every time the band finished a song, Keanu Reeves would yell, Freebird, which is something I know.

Track 3:

[7:52] Uh, for maybe the younger listeners don't realize that there was a period in rock music history where people would go to concerts and yell free bird at the bands in between every single song.

And I will tell you that shit did not fly with a pavement crowd.

Uh, the pavement crowd was not excited to hear this.

And so that was a very strange experience, but what it made it even stranger was years later reading an interview with the band.

And they talked about that night. And they talked about how Keanu Reeves had tried to come backstage and meet them. And they turned him away.

Because the other thing people have to remember is that in the 90s, Keanu Reeves before The Matrix was not cool.

He had started making a bunch of like really crummy movies and sort of for Gen X, Keanu Reeves sort of had crossed a boundary that we did not necessarily like.

And so he was not cool at the time.

That's why when he was cast in The Matrix, it was kind of a joke.

Like, you know, you couldn't believe that that guy was going to be in this movie.

So they didn't let him come backstage.

Track 3:

[8:54] And then they talked about, after the show, they were leaving the venue and they were walking somewhere and they walked past this very famous downtown restaurant, Veselka, which is like the heart of the village.

There's a documentary out about it right now, actually. But anyway, they were walking past Veselka and there by himself sitting in a window, sadly eating Ukrainian food, was Keanu Reeves.

And they felt terrible that they had turned him away from backstage.

Oh, that's a fantastic story.

Yeah. Jesus.

Keanu Reeves yelling Freebird. I can't believe it. It was unreal.

And a friend of mine, who's actually now a music executive, heckled Keanu at the show.

As Keanu was leaving CB, my friend yelled, Dogstar, love that band, which was Keanu's band at the time, his bad band at the time. So, yeah. Yeah.

So are there any records that you cleave to now, or do you go back, for nostalgia's sake, to Slanted?

Track 3:

[10:11] Man, you know, it's a great... I mean, I gotta say, for me, Crooked Rain.

Crooked Rain is the peak, I think. And I love every Pavement record.

But Crooked Rain is the one that I just find myself drawn to again and again and again and again.

Again um you know and that was the album you know where they started getting like videos on mtv which was a truly bizarre experience too uh you know when cut your hair debuted on 120 minutes and made its way into regular mtv programming uh was very strange because this was such an odd band uh for the time you know and and and crooked yeah crooked rain is i mean i love all of them Wowie zowie's amazing, bright in the corners.

But it's crooked rain.

Track 3:

[10:59] Yeah, I think so. I just went for a walk earlier this morning.

It's unseasonably warm here in Toronto.

And I went for a walk and I just had a hankering to listen to Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain.

So I threw it on and walked until it was over.

And I just forgot, even though I know deep in my bones that it's a great album, like I had forgot just how cohesive it is and how big it sounds.

And really it sounds completely different than slanted right yeah i know it's a total step forward but i think what's amazing you know so in the 90s i was a real diehard flannel guy you know i had my real deep opinions on selling out and for crooked rain they went much more rock oriented slanted than they had been on, on, uh, slanted.

And, um, but it worked like there was no sense of selling out.

Uh, it was more like a band fulfilling its promise.

Um, even though I love the lo-fi stuff, you know, uh, you know, Westing by Musket and Sexton. I love that. Like that, love that noise. Give it to me.

Uh, but, uh, but yeah, I mean, Crooked Rain, it just, it feels like a band blossoming into what they can be.

Track 3:

[12:18] Oh that's nice i like it yeah is there anything else you want to share about your pavement origins i mean i guess just that.

Track 3:

[12:33] Pavement is a really special band to me you know partially because of um, Where I was when I found them, you know, I was so trapped in the suburban hell that I just didn't understand and I was not part of, you know, this was the era when I had, um, like a blue undercut.

Like I had like that top knot thing going on the sides and back of my head shaved and my hair was dyed a little blue and I wore ripped jeans and flannels.

And when I was walking to work in the suburbs along the side of the road where they had no sidewalks, I had a car drive past me and throw a beer can at me and shout the F slur at me as they drove by.

So I'm not saying that I'm an oppressed person, but I'm saying that I was living in an environment that was not friendly to me and my kind of people.

Track 3:

[13:27] And I heard this band and it was like somebody talking directly to me.

And so as a result, it has always been just an important band to me.

And because I am still partially that Gen X, quote unquote, hardcore, never sell out kind of a guy, I love that Pavement never sold out.

I love that Pavement never ended up becoming some kind of a big, massive band that like the worst people you know got into. to.

Pavement has gotten more well-known and it has a great legacy, but it's closer to the way that the Velvet Underground used to be.

The Velvet Underground has sort of crossed over.

People know the Velvet Underground now, but there was a very long time where you could say to somebody that you love the Velvet Underground and if they got it, you knew they were a cool person that you were going to like.

Pavement has that right now.

If I tell somebody I love Pavement and they They actually know Pavement.

They don't just know two songs or something.

Track 3:

[14:35] Then I know, oh, that's a person who I can be friends with. That's a person who gets me. Because part of the deal is that Pavement...

It's not just this amazing music, but there's a thing I love about Pavement, which is that the kind of brain that I think it takes to really appreciate Pavement, because so many of the lyrics are close to nonsense, but not nonsense.

And it requires a brain that's willing to engage with that.

And I think it's sort of like really fun and smart at the same time that it can be incredibly dumb sometimes.

But, you know, that's, I think, the defining line for Pavement for me.

Those lyrics that, like, have silly things in them and have nonsensical things in them, but very often they add up to something that is emotionally true that you can really understand, even if you can't understand it as language necessarily.

And also every now and again drops in bizarre stuff that's like smart people stuff, you know?

You know, how many bands have songs about how the kids that made acid couldn't get laid?

I mean, like, you know, that's like an amazing thing to drop into the middle of a song out of nowhere.

So, you know, yeah, so that's my Pavement, yeah.

That's nice. I like it. Well, what do you say we take a quick break and come back to the other side and talk about song number 30?

Sounds good. All right, let's do that.

Track 2:

[16:01] Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening.

And now on with a countdown.

Track 1:

[16:09] 30.

Track 3:

[19:08] Song number 30 on the countdown comes from Pavement's fifth and final album, Terror Twilight.

It's also the third song from this album to make the top 50 thus far.

At track 30, we have Spit on a Stranger.

What the hell do you make of this song, Devin?

Track 3:

[19:29] I'm really glad I got this song because I love this song.

And the thing about this song is that there's a real tension within the song that truly appeals to me, because I believe that musically and in the verses, this is the most romantic song that Pavement has ever recorded.

100%. Like some of these verses are things that you would say at a wedding.

Track 3:

[19:58] And then you get to the chorus and there's the you're a bitter stranger.

And it's obvious that it's about a breakup of some kind, but it has those that tinge of love in the verses.

And again, musically that I think make it really beautiful and really melancholic in a really incredible way.

The song, you know, you're a bitter stranger, but the song is not bitter.

Uh which i think is amazing and i just tender yeah i love the the the the tension within it i just it's it's so good because it's not an obvious tension like if you just listen to this song and don't pay attention to the lyrics it's just a beautiful lovely song that uh if you catch a couple of the verse lyrics you go that's really gorgeous you know um and then and then we listen to the whole thing there's like a lot more going on i i i adore this song yeah it's a it's a it's a standout on terror twilight for sure not just because it's a single it it just i don't know it just pops off that record um what's your relationship with the song do you remember hearing it for the first time or do you remember what that was like.

Track 3:

[21:10] I don't remember hearing it for the first time. I can't remember if this was a single before the album came out or not. I don't recall.

I believe it was. So I probably heard it as a single.

I'm sure I heard it on the radio or I bought the single before the album came out. But I don't really recall.

I remember when this came out and this album came out that this was a song that I fixated on pretty intensely at the time. This was kind of a track I kept going back to again and again and again and again.

And I just I just fell immediately in love with it.

It's funny, because now, with many years gone by, and the world having moved on and learning more about the making of this record.

Track 3:

[21:58] There's something beautiful about this being the opening track on their final record, because now I know behind the scenes, they were in the process of breaking up.

And so in some ways, this is a song about that process in some ways, you know, and that speaks to what the band was going through.

So I think that's a cool thing that has kind of grown on me over the years.

But like this is definitely a song that i have from just again from the very beginning, just latched on to i just think that some of those lyrics are just so beautiful and i just think that they're so lovely because i think that they're beautiful in a way uh.

Track 3:

[22:41] That feels relatable. It's not over the top.

So it's like, however you feel, whatever it takes, whenever it's real, whatever awaits, whatever you need, however so slight, whenever it's real, whenever it's right.

I mean, that's like a beautiful everyday idea of what love is, right?

It's a beautiful everyday piece of it. And then again, obviously, the choruses get a little different.

But I really just keyed into that because this is not a band that traditionally had a lot of songs that I would have felt super romantic about.

This is not a band that has a lot of songs that I would say, oh, I would love to play this for someone to let them know how I feel about them.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not a lot of those.

But this is one that does have- You're not going to play Debris Slide.

Track 3:

[23:31] Uh, but this is, this is one of those. And, and so, yeah, it's always been a very special song to me. What do you think about the production values on Terror Twilight and this song specifically?

When you think back to putting on Slanted and Enchanted and hearing that real lo-fi and that crushing riff and that drum riff as well on Summer Babe, and then flash forward like seven years, eight years, and you've got this song that is, like you said, melancholic and beautiful.

But so lush as well. Yeah, it's a very thick production. It's very crystal clear.

Track 3:

[24:14] I mean, I think it's really important for me, because of how I experience pavement, I experience them in real time.

The gap between 92 and 99 is enormous.

I mean, just sort of like what the world was like and what the music scene was like.

And so in 99 was the year of the second Woodstock.

That's right. And so we're looking at a world with all of this new metal and stuff, which, as a guy who had been a big...

Track 3:

[24:46] I was a metal and punk guy, you know, when I was younger.

And when grunge broke through and heavy rock hit the radio airwaves and MTV, I was like, we won.

We did it. Like, this is incredible. This is really great music.

And then that all turned into Nickelback and Linkin Park and stuff like that, which I hated.

And so by 99, I felt like we had lost the war.

A lot of what I was listening to was more electronic at that point.

You know, a lot of the bands I liked had sort of moved in that direction.

And this gorgeous, gentle sound felt like an evolution that I could roll with because the rest of the world had become so ugly in so many ways.

The rock music scene had become so gross.

And so as a result, this album sounding this way, I think, feels alternative to what was happening then.

Ah that's nice yeah i would i would say you're bang on the money because uh this was the time where pop music really reared its head you know with the spice girls and n-sync and backstreet boys and then on the flip side of the coin mainstream wise hip-hop was finally you know crushing through so rock really was left behind and the flag bearers for it were pretty trash Yeah.

Track 3:

[26:03] You know? So for this band to come out and release Terror of Twilight at the time that they did, you're so right.

It was maybe the last battle, but it was a battle nevertheless.

And also, I mean, again, I mean, for me, I mean, I'm going to be very personal here. You know, when I first heard Slanted and Enchanted, I was 19.

And, you know, seven years later, I'm heading to my late 20s and I'm about to be 30. And a lot changed.

Changes in that decade, you know, a lot changes.

And I had begun a process of growing and changing in a lot of different ways and that the band grew and changed worked for me.

I didn't need them to stay what they were, I think is the thing.

Track 3:

[26:51] Yeah, and it just leads to like, what would a sixth album have looked like?

I'm so pleased that, you know, despite two reunions, they haven't ventured down that path.

We're just left with these five great records and multiple EPs that stand the test of time, quite frankly. Yeah, no, I agree.

I have the controversial opinion that I'm really glad when bands don't do new records or I'm not going to say, I don't know how to say this in a way that I'm not going to get in trouble for, but like, it's not good that John Lennon died, but I'm glad the Beatles didn't get back together for Live Aid and then release some terrible late 80s record. Do you know what I mean?

Like, so I obviously it's horrible. Like, it's terrible that John Lennon was shot dead.

But I'm glad that today I don't have Kurt Cobain on Twitter because I'm afraid of what he would be saying.

And so as a result, sometimes it's good when things just end.

Track 3:

[27:54] And these days, people don't let things end. And the fact that the band Pavement has let Pavement be a thing that exists in this one decade.

Decade uh i mean it still exists because they do reunions but like it is of that decade they're not out here trying to do new songs for soundtracks or shit like that i really respect that and i like that me too i i couldn't agree with you more i think um there's a time and place element to it all like you said uh i discovered them when i was uh just approaching 30 probably just approaching So I got to go back and zip through it, but through my 30s.

And it was a similar type thing that you experienced because you know that the difference between 30 and 40 is enormous as well.

And so by the time I got to really experience Terror Twilight in a way that it was meant to be experienced after, you know, um, pouring through the other four records, it, it did live up to that for me.

Track 3:

[29:02] It's so funny. We're such old motherfuckers and the band's a bunch of old motherfuckers.

And this is honestly, especially the early records are young people music, but it still really holds up as an old guy.

I mean, like Crooked Rain is young people music. They're over there talking shit on other bands and stuff like that.

I mean, like, that's what you do when you're a young little snobby hipster.

Uh and here we are i'm 50 man and uh i still listen to the exact same tracks i listened to when i was 19 um so either i haven't grown at all in any acceptable or understandable way or perhaps this music is eternal and speaks to us at every stage of life oh i'll take the latter then.

Track 3:

[29:46] Yeah absolutely well devin it's been absolutely a thrill to have you on and you know to talk Walk through song number 30, Spit on a Stranger.

I'm wondering if you have anything you need to plug or you would like to plug.

Yeah, so I have a couple of podcasts that I do, and I have a Patreon where I do writing about pop culture stuff.

So you can go visit that, patreon.com slash cinema, sanga, S-A-N-G-H-A.

And you can go join and get access to the writing and get access to my numerous podcasts that happen over there where i am being told today my sound quality is pretty good i'm very happy to hear this because this is my number one concern in life is how my sound quality is so yeah it's great thanks so much thank you for having me i really appreciate it all right wash your goddamn hands thanks.

Track 2:

[30:40] For listening to meeting malchus a pavement podcast where we count down the top 50 pavement tracks as selected by you.

If you've got questions or concerns please shoot me an email JD at MeetingMalchemist.com.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Today on the show Scott joins jD to talk all about song number 31, don't worry we get to his origin story too!

Transcript:

Track 1

[1:02] At track 32, we have the song, Grave Architecture. Come on in. Sorry.

I was trying to stick that in, yeah. Oh, damn. I stepped on it.

That's okay. I should have prepared you.

What are your initial thoughts of Grave Architecture? This was a funny one that

when you said it to me, I have a long,

like I think I said before, I think the album that I really kind of really felt

like really grabbed me was was wowie zowie and um and yeah this song is like

the come on in like right away like oh yeah,

hey this is westy from the rock and roll.

Track 3

[1:41] Band pavement and you're listening to the countdown,

hey it's jd here back for another episode of

our top 50 countdown for seminal indie rock

band pavement week over week

we're going to count down the 50 essential pavement tracks that you

selected with your very own top 20 ballots i

then tabulated the results using an abacus and an old pair of socks you know

the kind that have toes in them how will your favorite song fare in the ranking

you will need to tune in to find out so there's that this week i'm joined by

pavement Pavement superfan, Scott from North Dakota.

Track 3

[2:19] Scott, how are you doing, motherfucker? I'm doing well, and you, sir?

I am excellent. I'm always excellent when I get to talk Pavement with somebody. Absolutely.

Track 3

[2:29] So tell me a little bit about yourself. So, you know, grew up in Minnesota,

a small town, but not that far from the Twin Cities.

And it's small towns. You don't things come slowly.

And I was I don't want to say a late adopter to pavement, but I graduated in

1996 from high school and I was all about the grunge movement.

You know, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, all of that. And I didn't know much about indie

rock at all or any indie anything until I went to college.

I had heard of Pavement when I was in high school. I had friends who were into

them, but I was so set on grunge that it's like, this is what we're going to listen to.

And I kind of wrote them off at first without hearing them because I for whatever

reason, I was like, oh, Pavement.

It's like going to be heavy, more industrial, you know, maybe like East German

KMFDM or, you know, something really that I might not enjoy.

Yeah. And then I was completely wrong about that.

A friend, a friend had, I was just riding with a friend and he had,

it was right when Brighton the Corners came out and we were just riding in his

car and I was like, what is this?

And he's like, this is pavement. And I was like, no.

Track 3

[3:46] And I was like, this is not what Pavement sounds like. And it literally from

there was just a beeline to the store to pick up everything I could get my hands on.

And, you know, it was, it was, would have been my last, you know,

two years of college, give or take.

Track 3

[4:01] And it was obviously Pavement was up there. And then right at that same time,

Built to Spill, Modest Mouse, all these, you know, other indie bands.

But Pavement was the one that I was just like, oh my God, where has this been my whole life? Oh, yeah.

Track 3

[4:45] On the internet so you just had to go and buy and

see what happened and i picked up

terror twilight which divisive record you know for some people for me absolutely

loved it there's so much same stuff in there that was just jangly and interesting

and different and fun but also i mean,

It's hard to explain, but I remember growing up as a kid, and radio was all we had.

And every song was about love, and it was just straight up hitting you over the head with it.

And here was something that you had to go decipher these lyrics,

and you could decipher them in a thousand different ways.

And if you got sick of the lyrics, you could just go and listen to the music itself.

Track 3

[5:35] And that was just something that I had been looking for forever.

So that would have been roughly like 1998, 99.

And I was living in Minneapolis. I got an internship and I got to see them on that last tour.

So the first time- In 99? Yeah. I got to, I saw them.

I remember this too, because they played two dates and I only could go to one

because the other date I was seeing Slater Kinney.

They were like back to back nights. So I was an intern at the time.

So, you know, I was working during the day and then as much as I can,

I'd go to First Avenue where the show was.

And I remember very little because it was, again, 1999.

Track 3

[6:17] But I remember they opened with Here, which I thought was just such an odd opener

because it's just such a chill, just laid back, you know, didn't come out with a big punch.

And it just set the tone.

And i i remember um what i remember about that gig is steven or malchmus had

uh like uh christmas lights but they weren't around his microphone stand and

that was that was just about it for,

stage presence and again this is the first time i've seen this band uh when

i'd only seen pictures before that i actually when i looked at them i didn't

know who the singer was and i thought i I thought, uh, I thought Mark was the singer.

Cause he stands in the center. Yeah. I was like, oh yeah, that he's gotta be

the singer and nope. You get there and I'm like, oh, okay.

Track 3

[7:08] And you know, I, I remember, you know, buying after that, you know,

the, the major league EP or the single with, with the additional ones.

And, you know, I got very into them and then they went away and I was like,

oh, well, this sucks, you know?

And they never were far from my playlist.

They were always there. And...

Track 3

[7:35] It was the first band that I really remember going, oh, I won't get to see these guys again.

And that was frustrating because I had felt like I had only gotten into them

a year or a year and a half before.

And yes, could I have gotten to them earlier? Sure. If I had been born in a

bigger town with better radio, with better, you know, a college town,

maybe where that could have been a lot, a lot more easily found.

But, uh, you know, growing up in rural Minnesota, you got AM radio,

you got farm reports, and then you got pop radio.

So it was very difficult to find those, but yeah, that's, that's kind of my

beginning with the band and, uh, just becoming infatuated with them.

Track 3

[8:16] So question yeah um oh shit it slipped my mind oh no what was the question oh

the question was so did that lead you to sm solo work or psoi or anything like

that yeah uh i was and and that's,

what we'll get to that uh we'll get to i have some linkage there but that's

okay um yeah i i I immediately went out and followed the solo work,

which again, the first record just blew me away.

And I listened to it on just repeat forever.

And I would say at least with the solo stuff, the first four albums, I just ate up.

Um, and after that, it wasn't because I thought the music was any different.

It's more that I just got older and I was listening to less new music.

And that's something I've been. Weird how that happens. I hate it though.

You know, I, I, I'm finally, I finally figured out that if, you know,

and it took me till here that if you keep listening to new music,

if you make time for it, it comes right back the enjoyment,

you know, and I've tried to set aside and, you know, just shut the TV off and

listen to music for an hour and it's really helped.

Track 3

[9:30] I do that every morning, every morning I get up around five 30 and I listened

to at least one record, um, you know, or a playlist or whatnot.

And that sort of sets the tone for my day.

Yeah. See it. And I'm, uh, I'm an accountant and a teacher by, by trade.

So I teach at a local community college, but I do taxes on the side and this

is busiest time of year for me,

but I can can pour through you know

six seven albums in a sitting you

know just having the music on while i work and just

pound away and pound away and work work work work work and the

music will still just kind of seep in and upon you

know second or third listenings all of a sudden i'm going back and i'm like i

gotta hear this song particularly again because there's something in

there and that that's really helped but long story

longer uh yeah those solo records were and and

whether it was you know technically him or him with the jicks

and i saw him i don't know

a couple times on those tours when he would come through

minneapolis and again loved it loved it

absolutely loved it um yeah and you know he did it in store uh at the electric

fetus in minneapolis a pretty famous record store for minneapolis and uh i remember

being intimidated because that just the stuff you read oh he's he's He's aloof.

He's kind of standoffish, you know, but he's, he's very intelligent.

Track 3

[10:55] And he played, I don't know, three or four songs off whatever record that was.

And then you sign up and you shake hands.

And he talked to me for like five

minutes and he couldn't have been more gracious with everyone in line.

And I was like, Oh, this is, this is great. You know, they say,

don't meet your heroes. And I'm like, well, no, this was, this was fantastic.

This was a really nice situation so yeah i've only ever had good experiences

but i'm like you very nervous because he's just so goddamn cool you know like

that's like you can't you can't plan for that intangible right the coolness factor you know.

Track 3

[11:35] It's it's difficult to relate to especially for

me i'm cool and underqualified oh yeah i didn't and

i'm just like like grew up southern california

you know playing tennis and you know doing doing all these things and you know

but also with skateboarding and then you know he was in bands like still when

he was in high school and stuff and it's all these stuff that you know i had

kids like that in high school too but i felt the same way i'm like ah these

guys are cool and i mean i I took piano lessons forever,

but I never translated that into,

you know, thinking about, oh, you could be in a band or you could do something.

And it was just like, nope, it's piano.

It's nerdy. It's never going to work. And it's like, eh, you know.

Ben Volz would argue with you. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. That's very true.

So what's your go-to record at this point? Is it Brighton still?

Like, because that was your first or.

No. Obviously it changes over the years. Uh, for, for the longest, for the longest time.

It was crooked rain, crooked rain, just because it is a masterpiece.

Yeah. It, it, and again, just out the, out the gate, just how,

just how the shambling start of that record and then, you know,

the, the, the cowbell kicks in and just.

Track 3

[12:51] Yeah i still

get goosebumps from that and for a long time that was it and

my least favorite not least favorite but i thought

wowie zowie for the longest time was there's

so many weird songs on there like you take

you take a song like half a canyon which i adore but.

Track 3

[13:11] It is weird it is out there and he's

just you know screaming and it's kind of nonsense and

i find myself now going to wowie

zowie um because it is so i

mean just starting off with we dance

which is again just this kind of slow burning kind

of almost ballady at points yes and

then just the rest of that record with you know grave

architecture and pueblo and and grounded and

uh you know those are just the ones off the top of my

head but again uh at&t and

it's top to bottom and it's a little bit

longer record which i like as well

um yeah when you've only got five lps to

sort of satiate yourself now there's lots of eps

too but yes five main lps along is

nice right right right which again

just to i always have liked that in in uh i'm a modest mouse fan as well not

that you know we need to get into that but their first modest mouse's first

two albums were like both 74 minutes and wow this is also back yeah this is

also back when like a cd would cost 15 to 18 dollars and.

Track 3

[14:26] I didn't have a lot of money so you know

i would buy these records that had so much music on it

um when i could and i just appreciated that

but that longer album uh and it really ebbs

and flows as well which which i love and it can go

from just something that's really simple and straightforward forward to something

that other bands it might end

up as a b-side or on the cutting room floor because it is

that different but absolutely love that

record now that's that's my go-to yeah yeah it's

a good one and it harkens back to those original three eps with some of the

more you know minute and a half uh like noise art sort of um gems that are on

there which which again um,

You know, getting into watery domestic and all of that, you know,

like the first time I heard like forklift, I'm like, what is this?

And you compare that to, you know.

Track 3

[15:27] Anything off the later stuff and it's a weird transition but

you know a lot of bands do that uh you know

they're they start off you know either fast and punky or

weird or they don't know what they're doing and the songs are like

a minute and a half but you can still sense the structure

there you can sense that this could be you know building to

something and like a lot of those

first i don't go back to a ton of the

stuff prior to slanted i think because

of that because i didn't find out about a lot of

these i didn't have access to them you know you couldn't download

them most of it was out of print uh you'd be

lucky if you could find it in a second hand bin um and

if you did hooray you know uh really hunting for records and uh yeah i don't

those are the ones i don't revisit a ton but there are also so many gems in

there as well that i'm like you really need to do give that give that a better

chance it's nice that it's on vinyl now too yes the westing compilation is on

vinyl that's a treat absolutely yeah.

Track 3

[16:30] Because those eps are especially sight tracks is tough to get your hands on

yeah yeah and i i i don't i don't buy as much vinyl as i used to but i used

to have a big problem of going on to ebay and just any seven inch i could get

my hands on you know know,

um, like anything that I could really, really knock down.

And, you know, if it's a reasonable price, I bought it because why not?

And I've, I've, I've tapered that a little bit, but I have, I don't know if

I'm missing like at least a U S single.

I'm not sure. I can't, I can't remember. I haven't looked in a while,

but, um, I, I grabbed as many of those as I could, uh, just because I couldn't

get them anywhere else. Right. Right.

Track 3

[17:15] Yeah. Did you, did you go to any of the reunion shows like in 2010 or in 2022?

Yep. Uh, in 2010, um, they played at a terrible venue in Minneapolis called

the Roy Wilkins auditorium, which is, um, it's an auditorium that was built,

I don't know, in the twenties or thirties.

It's, it's just concrete. The sound is miserable.

Track 3

[17:38] Um, it has a huge main floor, which gives

you room to spread out which was fun and they

opened with cut your hair which i was

like yep perfect perfect you know just get it

let not get it out of the way but so tongue-in-cheek that i i just loved it

and i got to see them there and then i went to pitchfork fest that year as well

uh to see them so i got to see them to twice there where was the pitchfork fest

in chicago yep Yep. Yep. In Chicago.

And I'd been to that a couple of times. Well, I lived in Minneapolis and I had

my, uh, I was, I was seeing someone whose brother, uh, lived,

he was going to grad school down there.

So we had a free place to stay, which makes, oh, look, yeah,

Chicago is reasonable now. Yeah.

We can drive down, we can take the L and, uh, just have a great time.

And you know, it's a festival, so you're far away.

Track 3

[18:33] But I, you know, had my stupid little digital camera

i still have videos somewhere you know

of that but no wow well it

was one of those things where it's like this is a band that was so important

to me at when they were a band

like in a two three year period and like there's

still stuff i'm listening to it's still always going back

to it but now they're coming back and again it

was it was a thing i'd never thought would

happen so it's like that the pixies were never going to happen just like

the replacements were were never going to happen and those happened so

i was yeah ecstatic never yeah

exactly exactly so what do you think we get to track 31 uh give it a spin and

come back on the other side and talk about track number 31 sounds like a plan

all right we'll be right back hey this is bob mistandovich from pavement uh thanks for listening.

Track 1

[19:27] And now on with a countdown down. 31...

Track 3

[22:09] Well, there it is, track 31, Give It a Day, the first track from the Pacific

Trim EP, also available on the

Sorted Sentinels edition of the Wowie Zowie reissue. This is a great song.

Track 3

[22:49] At 31 give it a day what do

you think scott from north dakota this is

a gem and i

love it so much i love the whole ep because

again this would have been this would

have been something i did not discover until you know

well after i knew all of wowie zowie

all of right in the corners and it wasn't something

i easily could uh you know have

it and they they

said we're not going to waste this time so they came together and

i mean the whole the whole ep itself less than 10

minutes but it is so much fun

the entire time and give it

a day itself like i i don't

i love lyrics i love knowing the lyrics and i

don't often put too much thought into that but when you go read i mean about

the people that are in the song you know referencing uh increase mather and

and john John Cotton and Cotton Mather and the Puritans.

And it's like, it's almost like was somebody reading a book about the Puritans

and the Salem Witch Trials and these people. And we're like, you know what?

We can actually, I just read something about this. We can throw it together.

Track 3

[24:09] And it's just top to bottom, just lick after lick after lick and the poppiness

and the looseness of it. And yes, I mean. Total pop jam.

Track 3

[24:20] Total pop jam. I mean. and the melody is infectious

and it it's one

of those two where it clocks in i got wikipedia i'm

looking at here but it clocks in at 237 and i'll find myself listening to just

that song for like 10 15 minutes in a row because it's it's and and every time

you know whether it's the chorus whether it's the very beginning where the lyrics

start right away whether it's the the last the last line of the song,

what did you do to him to make him think.

Track 3

[24:51] Which again, it's, it's kind of like the, I think it's at the end of crooked

rain, crooked rain, or maybe it's the other one where it just kind of trails off.

It's like almost a sentence, but not. Yeah. And, and.

Track 3

[25:04] Top to bottom, just fun. And again, on that EP with followed up with Gangsters

and Pranksters, which another gem that's just very, very fun.

Track 3

[25:15] They were in a fun mood, weren't they? yeah and

and it does and this is this is the kind of

thing too where it does it it brings me to some

of his early solo work that

there's just fun songs in it

and these are fun songs it's not you know there's a certain way i feel when

i hear grounded or you know we dance that it's almost like this not solemn but

i'm not happy when i'm listening to it like if if grounded comes on at a certain time, it cripples me.

And this will never cripple me. This will always pick me up. And I love that in a song.

You can just put it on and be happy. Do you remember Nike used to have this

app that you could have on your phone and you could program a power song.

So if you were running and you got to the near end, you could click right to

your power song and it would drive you through the finish line.

My power song happens to be Walking on Sunshine by Katrina and the Waves. Wow, that's amazing.

Because it's so bouncy and so fun. But I could easily see it being Give It a

Day because it's also very bouncy and fun.

Now, obviously, the lyrics are darker, but the way he's singing them,

the cadence of the way he's singing them, like the phrasing is just sublime.

Track 3

[26:41] And again, like you said, there is a ton of dark, you know, connotations in

there that unless like, again, I went and looked up Wikipedia cause I was like,

I know these names and I think they have something to do with this.

And then I read about it and I'm like, oh yeah, this is a, this is a,

I mean, this is a dark part of American history.

And it's just like, no, it's just, just, you know, eyes and eyes and teeth to

teeth, but mine are rotten underneath.

It's like just the wordsmithing. ah yeah i love it yeah and the funny thing

is he probably some of it like melodically.

Track 3

[27:19] Came up with it on the fly you know like uh like in that in that session like

i don't know how many days they they recorded but i don't think it was many

i thought they said it was four okay i mean even to come up with anything and

one and they did again i learned this reading but they the the, uh,

no more Kings, which is on that schoolhouse rock record.

Oh, they did at the same time, I guess, which that was news to me.

So, um, but that's, I mean, that they got that much done in that little time.

And yes, there were only three of them, you know, uh, spiral and,

and Mark weren't there, which, which again, kind of leans me into his solo work a little bit.

Cause there are things that, you know, you look at Jenny and the S dog,

which is, you know, just a gem.

You know, it tells this story and same thing here.

We got this really light and poppy and just repetitive, like a song that you

can repeat really quickly and easily.

But if you dig into it, it's like, oh no.

Track 3

[28:22] So yeah, I'm with you. I'm with you. 110%.

Is there anything else about the song that you want to discuss? Yes.

I think it's, I think it's interesting that there's only one chorus.

Yeah. It's, it's just in the middle and it's just, it's repeated and,

and how he does it and how he staggers that I've always loved,

you know, cause it's, it's like, it's all, it's each one is slightly different.

Yeah. And the last one just kind of fades out and it's like,

could we have added another section to that? And would that have added or taken away from the song?

Cause I, I, I'm not a huge short song person because I like,

I get to the end and I'm like, I got to hear that again. I got to hear it again.

Track 3

[29:11] But if you give me something that's 12 or 15 minutes, sometimes I can,

I can just kind of get lost in it.

Right you know certain things you know like old mogwai

and you know old old other stuff that is

a huge just really dense chunk

of material that i can't see trimming down but

if you added to this would it take away from it as well

i think i don't know but the one thing i can i

can venture a guess on is if it

had another 45 seconds this would be

like a single like a like i i don't know

if it would have been a smash hit single but to me it's got single

written all over it it's it's so catchy it's so

goddamn catchy yeah yeah and again

so that's this uh that you said this is 31 31 so is it properly rated in your

book or should it be higher rated should be lower rated it it's it's tough it

i always find that tough with with any band ranking them when you look at eps and you you know,

maybe split singles because it's, it's not an album release.

And this is, I mean, someone quoted that, Oh, it's right here.

It isn't much more of a, than a throwaway, but an extremely enjoyable one.

Track 3

[30:26] And yeah, I think, I think where it is, it's, I don't think it's overachieving.

I think it's really close.

I don't know if, I don't think it would make my top

20 just because i was so ingrained on

the lps for so long and i i mean i didn't

even have an actual copy of this until uh the

the expanded edition of wowie zowie came out um

i had heard it plenty of times but i never had owned a copy so i didn't have

the repetition with it like i did everything else so i think it's pretty close

i think for it to for it to be a two minute and 37 second song that is just

enjoyable front to back. No, all killer, no filler.

I think it's pretty close to where it should be. Nice.

Well, that's what I've got for you. I really want to thank you so much,

Scott, from North Dakota. Yeah. Do you have anything you want to plug at all? Not really.

Track 3

[31:22] I just did a music enjoyer that, you know, I'm so happy that these guys did

another reunion tour as well, which now that I had, well, I had time and a little

bit of money, so I got to see them three more times on this tour, which.

Oh, brilliant. Just, yeah, I got to see him in St. Paul and then I just went

to Chicago for two shows.

And again, what, what amazed me about those shows too, is the,

you know, the first tour they went through the set list, I guess, didn't move that much.

And about the only song I didn't get to hear that I wanted to three nights in

a row, they didn't play frontwards and I was dying to hear frontwards.

They played it the night before and the night after. character um but

night to night to night i think the

set switched because huge sets too

they're playing three and a half hours yeah and i think

the songs changed almost 50 percent night to night to night which if i'm gonna

do themself oh my god if i'm gonna go three nights in a row and i'm gonna get

you know sure i'm gonna get maybe cut your hair all three nights which is fine

it's not my favorite song but you know i got pueblo i got grounded twice i got uh folk jam which

i love folk jam just such a weird funky little song and i get the hex yes we

got the hex the fuck out of that right oh my god and that's that's the thing like i used to think.

Track 3

[32:45] Finn was my favorite closing song and going back and listening to the hex with

the guitar solos like i love finn because i love how it fades out and just keeps

fading and fading and i just keep

turning up the volume until it's absolutely gone.

And the hex is just this beast of a sprawling thing and just do,

do, do, do, do, do, do. Oh yeah. Yeah.

Love that. So, um, and the, the last night I.

Track 3

[33:16] I treated myself. Uh, I literally was orchestra pit front row center.

Oh, I was like, I, I'm a single guy.

I don't have anything, you know, outside of, you know, I don't,

I don't have kids or anything to spend money on except myself.

So I can be, be a little bit, uh, no, no, no, whatever, but absolutely worth it.

Uh, just being right up front and hope, hopefully whatever these guys keep doing,

they keep doing it. but they seem to be enjoying it.

They're obviously due for a break and to get back to, you know,

Preston school industry and Malcolm's solo stuff and whatever the other,

and, you know, and the Stanovich doing horse stuff.

Track 3

[33:57] You know, they, they have other interests, but that they've been able to do

this for now, you know, two years.

Yeah. That's fantastic. Dan, I couldn't be happier with it.

If I had, if I was a man of unlimited means, I'd be going to South America for

sure. Absolutely. Yeah. Yep.

I mean, luck, luckily for me, it happened during its, well, um,

it was in Chicago. And again, I teach, I get two personal days a year.

I used them both in September because of course I'm not going to miss pavement.

So for the rest of the year, I had no personal days. I'm fine with that.

Absolutely fine with that. No problem at all. You, you, you did,

you did well and you did well today too.

I really want to thank you so much. Yeah, this was awesome.

So take good care of yourself and make sure to wash your goddamn hands.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

On this episode of the Pavement Top 50, jD has a lovely conversation with Zac from Amhearst about his Pavement Origin Story and song number 32

Transcript:

[1:02] Bob, what do you think about Transport as Arranged? Jamie.

I just think that, I think Transport as Arranged, when the record was made in

Kernersville, North Carolina with Mitch Easter,

was just kind of viewed and the feel around it was that, okay,

that's another song that definitely should be on the record.

But isn't the kind of song that it you know maybe should be a single or something

like that it was just it was just a song that was like really solid and good

hey this is westy from the rock and.

Track 3

[1:41] Roll band pavement and you're listening to the countdown hey it's jd here back

for another episode of our top 50 countdown for seminal indie rock band pavement

week over week we're we're going to count down the 50 essential pavement tracks

that you selected with your very own top 20 ballots.

I then tabulated the results using an abacus and gluten.

Just joking, there's absolutely no gluten. Zero.

How will your favorite song fare in the rankings? Well, you'll need to tune

in to find out. So there's that.

This week, I'm joined by pavement superfan man, Zach from Amherst.

Dude, how the fuck are you?

Track 3

[2:21] I'm okay. How are you? I'm great. Thanks for asking.

It's good to be here with you. No, it's great to be here.

Yeah, I'm excited to be a part of this. Well, let's not dilly-dally.

Let's get right to it and go to your pavement origin story.

Yeah, I've listened to a few and sometimes they have really good stories,

but But mine's like, I think I was home from break from college or something.

And, uh, my brother and sister were like playing a mixed tape of things and,

and, uh, cut your hair came on and, uh, yeah.

And, um, and it was apparently it was being played on their radio station all the time.

So, uh, you know, and so at the time we would just constantly make copies of

whatever. So I had like crooked rain, uh, just sort of stuck in my car forever and just wore it out.

Track 3

[3:16] Um, but you know, it was kind of in the mix and then it was really more,

uh, wowies, always when it kind of took off, um, for me, um,

that was the first tour I saw them like that was, uh, you know,

but, um, so you got to experience it in real time.

Yeah. A little bit. Yeah. Yeah. Not quite slanted. And so I'm not,

I'm not that. No, but, but wowies alley. That's, that's pretty cool. Yeah, yeah.

Um, so, so, um, on that tour, when you went to that tour, what, what were you thinking?

Track 3

[3:48] Well, I, so I, you know, I was, I was just obsessed with going to shows and seeing bands.

Um, and, uh, I was pretty psyched to get a ticket from Ohio originally.

Okay. And, uh, so I was pretty psyched to get a ticket in Cleveland,

which was still like two hours away from where I lived.

Um, and I was taking my little sister and, uh, yeah, it was just,

we were really excited. My dad even went along because he was worried about

taking my, I don't know, 14-year-old sister to the big city.

So yeah, I got to see them with Come and Dirty 3 in the Algorra Theater or Algorra

Ballroom, one of those in Cleveland.

Track 3

[4:34] But yeah, I just listened to Pavement nonstop

at at the time and um yes yeah

just it's like one of those like that's how

i always picture them they're just that's that night um and

i've seen them plenty of times since but uh yeah what

other shows have you seen uh so i you know i saw that one and then like that

summer i saw him at lollapalooza um it was before the infamous west virginia

mud fight um but But it was like when they came on right after Sinead O'Connor,

she was still on the tour at the time.

And then I saw them like, you know, so what was after that? Like Bright in the

Corners. I saw him a couple times on that tour.

Dude. Yeah. And then I saw him.

Track 3

[5:22] There's like one or two other times in there. And then I, like,

I remember that I did the one that really sticks out to me.

That was, uh, I saw their last North American show before they,

well, when they sort of, we thought they split up the first time. Right.

Um, for terror twilight in Cincinnati, Ohio at Bogart's.

Yeah. So yeah, I saw that. And then we thought, Oh, is this the end?

And you know, and then it was like maybe a couple of weeks later,

he did that infamous show somewhere in England where he's like,

Yeah, the Burstyn Academy. Yeah, he had handcuffs and everything.

So I saw him right before all that. And then I've seen him, like I saw him twice

on their first reunion tour.

And then I saw him once, like the year before last.

And I haven't been able to make any of the others since, but yeah.

So I've seen him a few times. Oh, yeah, you've seen him a lot.

That's great. And different eras as well.

Yeah, yeah. Very cool. My first time was the first reunion, right?

So that was my first time seeing them. Well, their reunion shows were like,

they're just so tight and so together.

Track 3

[6:28] Some of the early shows, they were sort of a mess. Like, I remember once watching

Stephen kicking Steve West off the kit and to show him how the part was supposed to be played.

What? Because they kept starting the song, and he kept screwing it up.

So he's like, no, no, no, no. And he went back there, and he played the part.

And then he went back behind his mic and got his guitar. And then I guess Steve played it.

The right way holy shit i've never

heard that story yeah that was uh in

columbus ohio that i think that was a brighton the corners tour i think yeah

damn so what are your what are your go-to uh tracks these days go-to records

rather so it always kind of like changes but i i tend to

be like between crooked rain and wowie zowie back and forth um i just uh like

i crooked rain is like a perfect album like perfectly see well i think pavement

secret is that they sequence every album perfectly.

Track 3

[7:33] Sometimes the songs, like sometimes there's weird stuff in between and sometimes

the songs are hits, but like, it's just perfectly sequenced.

And Crooked Rain is just a perfect record.

I think Wowie Zowie is just like bizarre and all over the place,

but still like well sequenced.

And then the only, my only issue with Wowie Zowie is that I think it finishes

with like three or four closers.

So it's like you hit one of those like last three or four tracks and you're

like, oh yeah, that was great.

Oh here's you know well that's a great way to close and then they have another so yeah.

Track 3

[8:07] That's awesome was there anything else you want to share about your pavement origin story,

oh um i don't like i just think you know this was like pavement was a band that

like like sort of binded my brother and sister and i together um we just uh

that's sort of weird sets of humor summer they're sort of strange like sports

fans um we all have like weird interactions,

with them here and there that we just kind of um i

don't know we're all awkward socially awkward and so like it so

you know i don't know we just kind of like um this is

oddball group that just always spoke to all of us and

sort of held us all together that's really cool that

you're into it with your brother and sister are they

both younger than you or yeah they are

yeah my brother's like a year and a half younger my sister's

like uh five five and a half years younger so you got to show them the way well

they i mean like i said they introduced me at first but then um this was a band

we kind of all like became obsessed with kind of together um so yeah that was

fun yeah Yeah, that's a lot of fun. Cool.

Well, shall we take a quick break and come back and talk about track number 32?

That sounds great. All right. Well, we'll do that. We'll see you on the other side.

Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement. Thanks for listening.

Track 1

[9:33] And now on with a countdown. 32.

Track 3

[13:53] Song number 32 on the countdown comes from Pavement's masterpiece,

well, one of them, Wowie Zowie.

Track 3

[14:37] At track 32 we have the song grave architecture come on in yeah sorry let's

try to stick that in yeah oh damn i stepped on it that's okay i I should have prepared you.

What are your initial thoughts of grave architecture? This was a funny one that,

that when you said it to me, I have a long, like, I think I said before,

I think the album that I really kind of really felt like really grabbed me was, was wow.

And yeah, this song is like the come on in like right away. Like, Oh yeah.

Humanity. So it always sticks with me that way. Yeah. Yeah.

It's always very cool when you can bring something cool into school right yeah,

well and actually um i i didn't mention this before but i'm actually a fourth

grade teacher ah and periodically i'll have pavement playing when the kids come

in but um like what's this i'm like don't worry about it's pavement,

um but i guess back to the song uh so it's

it's kind of that um it's kind of like i

always felt the song was kind of jazzy kind of like the.

Track 3

[15:48] Uh five minus four equals unity from

crooked rain like it has a bit of that you know

you kind of like groove to it um and then almost from the beginning he's going

you know saying grave architecture and that whole like the jerky uh sort of

segmented way um mouth like uh sort of phrases things and songs especially when

he's He's live and he's playing around with it.

You know, that's always like, that's how I sing half the songs I sing along to.

So I just, that one always, that always touched me. But yeah,

I don't know. I just love the song. It just grooves.

Like, yeah, you can just kind of sway back and forth and just kind of take it in.

Track 3

[16:34] Yeah. And then I thought a lot about what it meant.

And a lot of these songs, I kind of put my own. I'm sure this is not what they think.

But I always think of when I hear this grave architecture and walk the marble

malls, I think of the monuments and the buildings in our world that were built

by the, say, super rich in their name and are sort of left there as their monument.

And the rest of us sad folk don't have anything like that.

And so, they sort of left their imprint everywhere.

And so, you walk through it and it's imposing everywhere.

And they're almost like graves, literally, only to maybe their money, to their wealth.

Um you know he even says like

stiff the crypt so i'm like already it's like still graves

are in my head um yeah there's

just a bunch of like little things like that in the song um

that i really appreciate yeah little breadcrumbs right

yeah yeah yeah yeah because nothing is ever straightforward with that sound

oh no no and that's i think it's probably why we all love them i think so too

yeah you have to do a little bit of digging a little bit of investigative work

um not the first song I don't think it's a song that he mentions architecture either,

which is interesting.

Yeah. Oh, what was that? Oh, it was that, I'm terrible at song names.

You're just going to have to name it. Oh, shit.

Track 3

[18:02] I thought I'd written it down, but I guess I hadn't. I'm so bad at song names.

With an itch they cannot scratch.

Track 3

[18:11] God, what song is it? Is it The Hex? Oh, yeah.

When I was trying to research a little bit, I read that same line.

I'm like, oh, yeah, that's right.

But yeah, he mentions art throughout, art and architecture and all these sorts of things.

He's married to an artist.

It's a huge piece of him or part of him.

And then I think the history, I believe he was like, was he like a history major

at Virginia or something?

I'm not sure. Okay. Uncool and underqualified to the bitter end.

No, that's all right. Half the stuff, like I said, talk out my ass still.

Track 3

[18:52] But, you know, but then there's like later there's lines, you know,

you know, it's like, you know, found on shady ground.

And I sort of, that's reminding me of hollowed ground and sort of like as opposed.

Like there's a little bit of critique in here.

You know, I always hear her too. There's like, um, and needs the talent to breathe.

Um, I always said that I still sing it this way as breed needs the talent to

breathe, which I'm sure it was breathed, but I also know that sometimes Malcolm

S plays with words that way.

And so I always just think like, oh yeah. Okay. So you could breed,

there's more of you pass on your wealth when you're not building,

you know, or whatever it is. Oh, I like that. Yeah.

So yeah. Yeah. So it was, it was fun to, to be able to kind of revisit a song

that actually does, I have thought about and have loved for a long time.

Yeah, I always get worried when I do these that, you know, somebody's going

to get matched up with a song that they just don't vibe or resonate with.

But that's so cool to think that you took this one, you know,

and talked about it in class.

Yeah, I won't tell you how old I am, But yeah, when I was in college, sure.

Track 3

[20:11] And yeah, I remember my girlfriend at the time was just like,

I don't know how he knows all this stuff.

And I'm talking about Sonic Youth and Velvet Underground and trying to like make it all connect.

And somehow I thought Pavement was important. I mean, they are in retrospect,

they're super important in all this.

But at the time, they probably, I mean, they could have not been important. They just were. Yeah.

Well, they're important to a lot of us. Oh, for sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. So where do you think this song lands on the countdown? It comes in at 32.

Is it properly rated? Is it overrated? Is it underrated? What do you think?

I mean, you know, I think somewhere in the middle makes sense.

Because I think once you start naming other songs, you're like,

oh, yeah, I like that one better.

So I think somewhere here in the middle makes sense.

Yeah. Yeah, it seems about right to me. Honestly, I have to confess, I did not submit a list.

Well, that's fine. I know, I got really busy, and so I felt bad.

And also, if I rated them, if I ranked them, I would just change my mind the next day.

Ah, I think so, too. So I think 32 just sounds great.

Track 3

[21:28] Yeah. Well, is there anything else you want to mention about grave architecture?

Texture any memorable live performances of it or i mean you know i.

Track 3

[21:40] Honestly, I go back to that first show. I remember these kids made the band t-shirts.

They ironed on pavement.

They were wearing homemade t-shirts.

Every song in that set was just perfectly placed. Grave Architecture had its spot.

I remember just even fans were out. We were all shouting out what we thought would come next.

It just all made sense. And Grave Architecture is just like,

I just think it fits perfectly on Wowie Zowie.

If there's one thing, like, I know it's all over the place, but there's a few

tracks that really tie it together.

And I think Grave Architecture is like, and I think it's right in the middle

of the album, if I remember correctly.

And so it's just, it just fits and it just works.

Um i think even when i look at the the image

of the album cover like just something screams to me like grave like this whole

album is grave architecture i think in a lot of ways even if it's not maybe

my favorite or the best song in the album it just it just is the album it is

wowie zowie interesting yeah i notice over your over your left shoulder you've got that,

wowie zowie oh and you've got the bright in the corners and crooked rain as

well yeah and i've got to slant it over there i only have like four the steve

king the guy who did the painting yeah um he did like like recently well he

started selling things on ebay and so i was able to.

Track 3

[23:08] Uh score like a set of four of these um like

they're great and it was like super reasonable he even

like people kept outbidding me he's like don't worry i'll make

it work and so he made sure that i got these

four paintings um and then they even put out

an art book of all of his stuff recently yeah it's just low

I don't know if you've seen it you probably have like it's just loaded with

like a bunch of um pavement artwork um a

bunch of those um have you ever seen the they made I

think it was for Brighton the Corners they made like these signs that

stand up freestanding signs and it's painted in

his style like he's done it um and they were like yeah they were sent out to

different record stores around the country as part of the promotion for Brighton

the Corners and um there's a few people that still have them they're like every

once in a while you see one online but yeah his paintings are great they're like super affordable,

yeah so yeah,

wowie zowie got me into his art so yeah yeah I love it I think it's great.

Track 3

[24:11] Well, speaking of great, it's been great talking to you today and I really appreciate

your time and I really appreciate you doing this.

It's a lot of heavy lifting on your end. For me, it's like a vacation,

like I'm used to doing these alone.

So to have somebody to bounce things off of, somebody as passionate as yourself,

that's a lot of fun. So thank you very much.

Oh, yeah. Thanks, J.D. Thanks for having me. Do you have anything that you need or want to plug?

Man i wish i did i used to blog a lot like i used to have a blog where i actually

i was breaking down each pavement song and i only got like 30 or 40 you're like way better,

at this than i am and then i started doing a blog that was called um uh well

it was the original title was building coalitions through beer and pavement

now it's just called beer and pavement um but i don't i haven't updated it in

forever but some people might know it some people might I might not care,

but that's it. I don't have time.

I have kids and I teach, so I don't have time. Yeah. You're busy as hell.

Track 3

[25:16] Well, once again, thanks so much. And, uh, we'll talk to you on the flip side.

All right. Thank you. And wash your goddamn hands.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This is so fucking cool. Bob Nastanovich joins me this week to talk about a whack of shit including song 33!!!!

Transcript:

1:00] Loretta Scars. Alex from Portland, how are you feeling about Loretta Scars?

It's a great song. I've got all kinds of thoughts on it, but it's on Flannid

and Enchanted, which is a great album. it's,

Slanted and Enchanted is the least varied album in my opinion like,

most of the songs on it are kind of of one vibe and this is definitely no exception

I think it's a great vibe I enjoy it Hey this is Westy from the Rock and Roll Band.

Track 3

[1:40] Pavement and you're listening to The Countdown Hey it's It's JD here back for

another episode of our top 50 countdown for Seminole indie rock band Pavement.

Week over week we're going to count down the 50 essential Pavement tracks that

you selected with your very own top 20 ballads.

I then tabulated the results using an abacus, a bicycle pump,

lotion, and some biscuits for Kevin, my homemade from uni.

How will your favorite songs fare in the rankings? Well, you'll need to tune in to find out.

So there's that. This week we're joined by

pavement superstar bob fucking nastanovich

bob what is up no

okay cool and you're aren't you a toronto person

sure am yeah how are things

there bright blue sunny skies today

about five degrees celsius so that's

like spring weather for us especially yeah that's nice

yeah we've got I don't

mean to show you up Jamie but it's 63

degrees Fahrenheit here with a light breeze and a bright sunshine oh man here

in Paris Tennessee you know like a typical winter day here is kind of gray and

44 but it's especially nice.

Track 3

[3:03] Today which is pretty awesome that sounds about right

that sounds like good you know good walking weather

so yeah how are you doing all right with this

project so far so good i'm like

like people are lining up to do it uh like

i'm caught up through march uh i've

got to do some interviews this week with people so

basically people seem to be like i

was like i don't know how people respond to a top 50 that

they have to listen to every week but i

don't know my numbers are good and um like good

for me you know yeah they'll get into it yeah i

think so and like just a little bit of water cooler debate right

what's that bud just a little

bit of water cooler debate yeah exactly you

know like what if what are you fucking thinking greenlanders like

greenlander was 46 six and

you know people were really pleased that

it made the top 50 but then there's another cohort that are like that's crazy

it should be at least in the top 30 you know or whatever so no that is so weird

i mean i don't um i do know people that love greenlander and i um ineffectively insisted.

Track 3

[4:18] On trying to get

it played live in iceland and that would have been cool yeah and um he we sound

checked it and it sounded just fine for about 70 seconds and malchus was.

Track 3

[4:43] Like i don't want to do that one you know and then um with him you know his attitude was so.

Track 3

[4:53] Sterling in 2022 and 2023 that um you don't and he was willing to play so many,

different songs because in the past like specifically in 2010 um i just think

it's uh i mean i remember his attitude back then was sort of uh.

Track 3

[5:18] It's going back to a more juvenile style of songwriting for him, which is more direct,

but I guess maybe it kind of reminded him of certain aspects of his life.

I mean, especially the earlier stuff, pre-Steve West, seems to give him a certain

amount of actual PTSD, which is a word I never use.

Track 3

[5:48] Self-reference um just because of um

the stress caused by gary like

i sat next to him when we watched the screening of gary's documentary and

um it he did

not i mean it's a great documentary have you seen it

i did yeah it's a great documentary and

i don't think they really could have done a better job and um

i mean i would have been wildly pleased

with it i know gary was um so cool

that he got to see it before he passed at least right i

can't i can't believe he lived that long i mean no

way you know i mean i mean for

him to make it to 70 um should give us all belief that we can do it too um but

he comes from really supremely great genes in terms of longevity his parents

lived well into their 90s and uh for some reason despite.

Track 3

[6:49] Every possible attempt without actually attempting suicide he basically tried

to shorten his life um man i

mean he was just what was it like when you first met him bob what was that

situation exactly like every other time i met

him um he uh

i mean at first he was kind of suspicious of me because he i mean you know very

briefly he was suspicious of me because he thought that i was like a friend

of malchmas's who could probably drum and was there to replace him so So for the first,

until a day or two in, we practiced in his parents'

house the first time we went on tour in 1990.

And when I say practice, I think we only had 12 songs and we only played six or seven shows, I think.

And when he realized that I couldn't play drums, he...

He relaxed a little bit. I mean, I think he realized that I was there to,

like, kind of carry gear and make things happen and drive and then...

You do more than that, dude. You do. I mean, back then, I actually did very

little. There's this je ne sais quoi that you bring.

Well, yeah. I mean, I developed my role over the years.

Track 3

[8:09] It's hard for me to really accept my overall importance. But back then,

there were some shows, you know, shows back then were 45 minutes or whatever.

And there were some shows where if he was on, I really didn't have to do a thing

but sort of stand there. I mean, it was, it was strange.

I mean, there was a few, there's like, there were times where I would actually be like, um,

pretty embarrassed because people in the audience must've thought,

you know, why does the, why does the guy who doesn't do anything have to stand on the stage?

And um and then also after the first time we toured europe in 92 and it was

we played like maybe 28 shows in 31 days or something and we we finished in

belgium somewhere and remco,

was doing our sound for the first time that far back he goes i didn't realize that He goes back.

The very first night we met him was about five o'clock on the day that we opened

for My Buddy Valentine and Super Chunk at the Old Ritz in New York. What a lineup.

Track 3

[9:27] Yeah. And he, uh, we played for 25 minutes and we played seven songs and, but whatever.

So we met Remco outside the old Ritz. Um, we were on a, um.

Track 3

[9:46] On a label called Big Cat, which was run by this rather scurrilous fellow named

Abbo, Stephen Abbott, who was in a band called UKDK.

And as it turned out, he was actually kind of a thief, but he knew Remco because

Remco had worked with the band Copshoot Cop.

And so he kind

of figured that this young Dutch kid should do sound for us because we needed

a sound man because we would turn up in a lot of places and we'd be so disheveled

and disorganized and unprofessional that local sound staffs would be like,

who are these assholes?

You know what i mean like back then in the 90s if you didn't sort of show up.

Track 3

[10:41] I mean if you showed up at least in the manner that

pavement did a lot of these people you know you

were really at the mercy of

people um who

you know hypothetically were

into sound garden started and if you

didn't sound like them then you could

fuck right off um and if you didn't bring

that some level of professionalism or panache um then you could really get the

shaft because people would just be like really annoyed that they had to work

with you and that's and and that's really what it's like when you have to depend

on the house unless you've got one of of those rare situations where they give a crap.

Right. So from that point on, you guys were on the road with Remco.

Yeah, pretty much.

Ninety seven percent of the time, like in 2010, like those one off things in

North America, we wouldn't fly them over.

Bob Weston did set them sound for us a few times.

Now we've got this guy named Aaron Mullen.

Track 3

[11:54] Who did a few shows this year. I mean, it's just if it makes no sense.

Financially for Remco to come over for a short stint. I mean,

obviously doing sound for pavements, not rocket science,

but Remco was proved his effectiveness generally at festivals.

Festivals um he's pretty

passionate about making sure the bands he works for

sound good because it's big time

ego gratification for him um if

like if people go around and say you guys sounded really great you know you

know and so he's he's very competitive in that regard which worked in our favor

yeah sure did you guys sounded great at the festival i went to the Primavera in Porto.

That was a fantastic show.

Yeah. I'm happy that I see Barcelona didn't sound very good.

Um, cause Remco didn't come to the practices, um, had trouble getting his visa.

So he was completely unprepared for Barcelona.

He didn't really even have Rebecca turned up.

Track 3

[13:08] And then a lot of the stuff that I'd learned because she's in the band now,

um, Which I hadn't done before, weren't even turned on in Barcelona.

And then in Porto, I'm not sure if you're aware of it,

but I showed up for sound check and the bright blue case that had all of my

bits and bobs of percussion,

some of which I'd had since the early 90s, got stolen.

Are you fucking kidding me? No, I didn't know that. No, I had no gear.

I had no gear. I didn't even have anything to mount.

I didn't have a tambourine that you can hit, and I didn't have anything to mount it on.

And I had no tambourine maracas, cowbells, whistles, all my tricks, and claves.

And thank goodness that Rebecca...

Track 3

[14:16] Was in the band because at first rebecca was just going to kind of come out there,

and do keyboard parts and either come

and go or just kind of sit there and she's a

really good i mean she's a great drummer and she's

a really good percussionist um so i said no you're

gonna do something on every song and

then we you know quickly find out found out that she can

do background vocals on anything and that's

great she can scream and obviously and

she's also very joyful performer um and she was you know she's a good very good

percussionist so thankfully i was able to use some of her stuff um that night

but it was still was not my stuff i I mean, it was very,

very, it would be like if.

Track 3

[15:11] Well, actually, I think it kind of, I mean, it would be like if,

like, guitars got stolen from a guitar player.

I mean, that actually, it happened to Dinosaur, I think maybe in Porto,

Dinosaur Jr., all their guitars got lost and they were still in Italy when they played.

Oh my god yeah so they

had to play i think they bought guitars um you

know that's so whatever i mean

i'm happy that it was me because if it

had been like anybody else

then they probably would have had a harder time i mean i was able to just you

kept it cool i'll just wing it you know what what i mean like it was funny because

nobody you know people you kind of realize the level of.

Track 3

[16:07] How, uh, you know, the, the immense level, you know, of your bandmates,

they're kind of focused on their own deal.

Like they couldn't deal with that.

My bad news. Um, only Rebecca could like only Rebecca could like,

you know, I mean, she's great.

She's great. she was really a neat addition like

really uh from the fonda

show i mean i went to the fonda show that was just

it was mind-blowing that was a that was my favorite

show of the tour like that was the first i can see why i mean it was long if

you're a big fan i mean we played tons of songs and it sounded fine and it was

small and the atmosphere was good and i mean at least 90 90% of the people in

there were way into the band. Oh, yeah.

So, I mean, it was kind of an ideal time to see Pavement because we were fresh

off the shelf and in a mode where we kind of had to give everything a go.

Yeah, it was tremendous to be a part of it and experience it.

One thing I wanted to talk to you about was Rebecca Clay Cole and you know, her, um.

Track 3

[17:29] Her contributions, I suppose, to the overall pavement experience,

like, um, is she sort of a permanent member at this point? Is she coming to South America?

I mean, of course she's coming to South America, right?

Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. No, that's it. And that's it. I mean, right now that's it. Sure. Sure.

It's 2024. You guys have been on the road for two years, man.

Yeah we haven't done anything those for a long time we haven't done anything since um cincinnati,

and um it's going to kind of be interesting because one good thing about south

america is we don't obviously haven't played there um a couple of the places we've never played and,

and we've only played three shows down there ever so we can just you know basically

play we don't have to learn 70 pavements to relearn 70 payment songs you know not that,

not that they're immensely challenging but at the same time.

Track 3

[18:35] You know i basically could make the four set lists now

and um you know

we're you know it's not going to be you won't

be hearing um greenlander no but

uh you go with the uh you go with the

essentials not the deep cuts yeah and i think we've got i think i'm in a list

of 32 that i sent out to them about six six weeks ago oh that's good yeah sounds

all right well if i come into any money i'll see you in uh i'll see you in south

america but let us know yeah yeah let us know i But,

you know, times are tough.

Well, should we talk about track number, what is it? Track number 33 on the

countdown? Okay, that's pretty good.

All right, let's do it. Yeah, that's pretty good.

Hey, this is Bob Mustanovich from Pavement.

Track 1

[19:32] Thanks for listening, and now on with a countdown. 33!

Track 3

[23:28] Okay, that was Transport is Arranged from the fourth record released February

11th, 1997, Bright in the Corners.

It's the third track on the album, and it's the sixth song from Bright in the

Corners that is on the countdown at this point.

So Bright in the Corners is representing the bottom portion of this top 50 so far.

Bob, what do you think about Transport is Arranged? Jamie.

I just think that, first of all, it's cool to hear that Bright in the Corners

got a lot of action, having a lot of love.

It is a very listenable pavement record. I love it.

And I think Transport is Arranged, when the record was made in Kernersville,

North Carolina with Mitch Easter,

was just kind of viewed and the feel around it was that, okay,

that's another song that definitely should be on the record.

Track 3

[24:33] Um but isn't the kind

of song that um it you

know maybe should be a single or something like that it was just it was just

a song that was like really solid and good and then as the song got played over

and over again on tour and over the years um i think it's become rather clear to me that,

you know, aside from kind of the more bubblegum-y songs on the record like Stereo and Shady Lane,

that it would have stood up as a truly special pavement song.

And I just think that it's, for the most part, an outstanding example of,

Of not only Stephen's songwriting ability and composing, but I just think it's

an unusually good set of lyrics.

I'm with you. When I think about like verse three, I swung my fiery sword,

I vent my spleen at the Lord.

He is abstract and bored, too much milk and honey.

Well, I'll walk through the wilderness with nothing but a compass and a canteen

setting the scenes. I mean, it just got this certain depth.

Track 3

[25:57] Of course, you know, I am the worst of my kind. I want to cremate the crush.

It's funny, some people think that that's crutch, but it's I want to cremate

the crush actually has a lot of personal importance to me because that's an

expression I used to use.

Track 3

[26:17] Really? Yeah, Cremate the Crush. I would actually say that that's a valid lyrical

contribution from my notebook that was usurped by Balchmus,

which he was more than welcome to do that.

That um cremate the crush was often used when one of your mates had um regardless of.

Track 3

[26:45] Gender orientation had fallen really really hard for somebody and it became

clear to yourself and everyone around that it wasn't going to work and it was a really bad idea.

Track 3

[26:58] And um so you had to pull your friend and that believe me that happens whether

you're You know, no matter how old you are, you know, sometimes you just,

um, I think we've all seen it in our lives.

We've seen people that fall really hard for the wrong person and rather than

just sit back and watch them go through a very vile, um, heartbreak,

um, an effort needs to be made to cremate the crush.

Um wow and that's the expression that i used um all right man like this is ridiculous

like because you see it all the time like yes obviously amongst my dude friends like dude man,

you're really barking up the wrong tree there you know

what i mean not yeah whatever whatever series of reasons um

but really transport is arranged um

as that song got played there's a a really unusually good

version of it really good recording and filming from an italian show that we

did um it's on youtube um oh i'll have to look that up mouth miss had really

really short hair um it was this really strange festival that i believe was

somewhere in the vicinity of venice um.

Track 3

[28:18] And it was one of these festivals that you turn up to in the early afternoon,

and the people are still, like, kind of making the stage, and you're sort of,

like, in this state of disbelief that any concert's actually going to happen there today.

And this was the vibe. We were just like, whoa.

Oh, you know, because usually it's like, you know, the Heineken banners are

already up and like, you know, the kids are already listening to,

you know, a band that sounds like Green Day and, you know, people are drinking

or you see the tent village.

This festival, it looked like they'd gotten the days wrong, and it was going

to happen two or three days, but somehow they whipped it all together,

and we played a very memorable version of Transport is Arranged.

Track 3

[29:13] And you know it pretty much became a staple of our

live show from the bright in the corners tour

forward um it's just has a good um mid-tempo vibe to it good lyrics good guitar

love the tone of his voice the tone of his voice is really like in a sweet spot,

i agree i just say to me it's just like a great pavement song it's always really relaxing um,

kind of in a grounded sort of way but like even more relaxing and like,

yeah i mean some people you know at times think that pavement doesn't rock and

then when we actually do rock we're just like pretending to be hardcore or pretending

to be like jokey metal or or something like that.

I actually feel like Transporter is arranged, if it's played with a proper punch,

kind of is truly a rock and roll song.

Oh, when you get to that, when you get past the solo and you guys all get into

it, it sounds so tight and it sounds.

Track 3

[30:23] Yeah, it sounds very tight and it sounds very rocky, you know,

like rock and roll. It rocks.

It's a great rock and song. it kind of stomps and but then it gets really mellow

it just has really really good dynamic and yeah I can tell you like whenever

I put it on a set list we don't,

We don't really start with it because it doesn't, you know, sometimes songs

with like kind of a very mellow lead in, it's not such a good idea.

But you can sort of stick it after anything kind of noisy.

Track 3

[31:00] And then, so then people can sort of like return to like sort of a serene vibe.

And then after a certain period of time, it kicks back in again.

So, um, I just love, um, I love that song and it's always a pleasure to see,

to put it on a list and see it coming up.

And, um, in fact, depending on who I'm talking to, if they've never heard Pavement before, um,

and I sort of get a general idea that they like rock music, then it's a song

that I would almost play first.

First um to sort of you

know give them a feel and then when i do play transporters

range they're like oh okay like yeah like 90s um

college rock or something and uh

yeah yeah which is fair special it's

more special than that but i i hear you you know

but i'm talking about complete newbiles they um

because if you play them something too

cute or i mean obviously

you know i'm in the horse racing profession and there's a lot of people that

you play father to a sister of thought and range life and other sort of country

tin songs because they you know would absolutely there's a lot of people i know

a lot of my friends um who know of pavement don't like pavement because.

Track 3

[32:26] It to them it sounds too harsh um you

know because a lot of people don't really have any punk rock background

right okay um they don't want to hear anything

like unfair or serpentine pad

or they don't want to hear anything medium fire lo-fi like debris slide or forklift

i mean like something like forklift just sounds like 13 year olds making a horrible

racket um to them like they don't see the cool in that you know yeah um you

know of course There's...

Track 3

[33:01] I mean, I haven't listened to it on vinyl in a long time, but Forklift,

you know, I remember it sounding kind of maniacal and frenzied in a very 1990s

sort of way, which was kind of cool.

But I can understand, but Transport Is Arranged kind of ticks all the boxes,

like Grounded would sound like kind of like too much, like a stoner type thing to people.

People um shady lane might sound kind of

like listless summer babes kind

of repetitive and some people might think like oh

you guys wanted to be nirvana or something

um which we certainly

did not um that didn't

look like much fun to me and uh but yeah no i just i just love the song and

i think that it's it should definitely not be a forgotten song transport is

arranged i think it It should be sort of at the forefront of anybody making

a mixtape or a tape of 10 to 15 pavement songs.

I like that. Yeah, it stands up. So then you would say on the countdown,

it's underrated at 33, right?

Yeah, and I would, I mean, for me, it would always be in my top five.

Top five? Holy shit, Bob.

Yeah, it would be in my top five.

Track 3

[34:26] Unquestionably top 10 But probably top 5 In fact people ask you know sometimes like,

You know, one lazy question by anybody is like, what's your actual favorite pavement song?

And, you know, when you say transport is arranged, you're not being entirely obvious.

And then if they've only heard 10 pavement songs or 15 pavement songs or just

the hits, then you're kind of forcing them to listen to a great pavement song

that they may have not heard before.

So it would unquestionably be in my top five um it's under four minutes i mean um,

i really am very much of the you know when it comes to a band that's a rock band in sort of the,

three minute form like pavement is i mean um you know my general belief.

Track 3

[35:23] Maybe it has to do with attention span or something like that but songs over

five minutes better be

pretty awesome for you to justify them being that

long agree um totally agree it's a

little pretentious brilliant right there's so

many great bands who have made so

many great songs and they just fall prey

to loving their groove so hard that

they do it one or two passes too many

and a song that

might have had like you know major appeal whether

it be like sort from a venom sense or from a sweetness

sense is just um loses

its effect if it's

got too much length so um i think

it weighs in under four minutes i think it's you know it's i think it's four

minutes are justified i don't think there's any wasted motion i think it's got

good dynamics and again one of malcolm's best sets of lyrics um you know and

i think you know obviously.

Track 3

[36:30] David and Stephen were both very good lyricists and, you know,

David's a poet. He was celebrated for it.

And I think that David, you know, was an influence on Stephen and sort of challenged

him from a lyric writing perspective and would get annoyed when Stephen was

being too lazy about lyrics.

And I think very much in, you know, the Stevens sense,

it's a unusually or just a very good set of lyrics from a lyricist who had at

that point very much found his way.

You know, something that had been sort of a discardable aspect of the band,

even to an extent through a lot of Slanted and Enchanted.

And then, you know, I mean, some people think that his lyrics are just garbled nonsense.

And to an extent, you know, by intent, they are, you know, fairly good.

Track 3

[37:44] Senseless but i mean you know i think of songs like um this song and from a

completely different era um lyrics like trigger cut um i just think that you

know he he's he does not get,

the he gets the respect he deserves as a guitar player but perhaps not as a

lyricist i think you know transport his range has both yeah i'd agree totally

agree what is the whole pillars of eight thing. Do you have any insight on that?

What's that? The pillars of eight. Do you have any insight on that?

No, no, no, I don't really have anything of that.

I think it probably has to do with, um, just, uh, you know, then you're falling into him.

Um, and I think you've probably seen some of his scrawlings and notebooks and stuff like that.

Um, you fall into him choosing

expressions and just simply sort

of loving words and how they look and

how they sound coming out of his mouth and then so

then using uh you know sets of a set of words like pillars of eight and putting

in a place where it's going to fit you know obviously that you know eight rhymes

with a lot a lot of things and fit you know i'm saying so yeah yeah you know he's.

Track 3

[39:06] When you're in a situation where not only are you going to have to write lyrics but,

you're going to also have them um

analyzed then i think that you force yourself to you know put a certain amount

of time into that process and i think throughout the course of um his entire songwriting history.

Track 3

[39:38] I think, you know, perhaps it's a bit freeing since Pavement ended that things

are a little bit less under the microscope.

Track 3

[39:47] But certainly in 1997, they, you know, were very much under the microscope.

In fact, this album, I remember getting really slammed by a writer at a major

music publication for the lyrics in Blue Hawaiian.

Um, they were actually misconstrued as sexist in, um, this, um,

particularly the line, the slap is a gift. Your cheeks have lost their luster.

Um, Oh my God. I would have never put that together.

I would have got there from that. You know, this slap is a gift.

I mean when I

mean then you know in some ways like um you could see how the journalist made

that point I suppose but I mean I yeah like you I never really thought along

those lines because maybe if you know the person and you know that they're not

like a misogynist creep then,

you don't even really think about them in that context but um perhaps um that

person did and I just remember, you know, when you write songs,

which I don't do, then you are just like any type of writer,

you are susceptible to...

Track 3

[41:10] To criticism and then you know then of course you've you've

reached a certain mantle when your lyrics are being picked

apart and every pick of you in detail is being brought to the fore um and but

that's like also a compliment that people you know care that much about what

you write that's um yeah but you know at the same time like you know some things that are almost

like unfathomable to a songwriter, um,

come to the, you know, come, come to the floor when, when people go over them with a fine tooth comb.

Um, but, uh, no, I've never really heard anybody moan about Brighton the Corners,

um, lyrics and, you know, maybe it's because it is like in the thirties.

Um, but I really don't think it should be a forgotten song.

I think that in some ways it's as good as Late Period,

and when I say Late Period, I would say albums four and five,

as good as Pavement was in terms of sounding like Pavement.

I mean, there isn't much of Terror Twilight,

which can be described as sort of typically pavement,

but there is on Bright in the Corners, and you definitely cannot describe a

song like Stereo as typically pavement.

Track 3

[42:40] So, yeah, no, pleasure talking about one of my favorite pavement songs, Jamie.

Me Bob it's been a pleasure talking to you period it always is anytime man I'm

basically just basking in the glorious winter sunlight here in Paris that's

spectacular yeah with my unmade bed,

And, um, I don't even know what I'm going to do.

I actually have to go grocery shopping, but yeah, a pleasure,

pleasure to talk to you and good luck with all of your endeavors.

And, uh, let me know if you need anything more from me.

Awesome. Thanks so much. Always, you know, uh, shall I remind you again that,

um, Steve West would probably be, you know, gladly help, um, help you out.

Oh, I'll ask him. Yeah.

He'll definitely do it. Cool. I can also hook you up with Rebecca if you want her to do one.

It would be cool. That would be really cool because then I could ask her that

question that you planted in my head.

Yeah, it'd be really good actually, because then, then you'd be the first,

um, prominent music journalist that tackled that question.

Track 3

[43:51] Anyways, love you, mate. And, uh, have, have a, have a great,

uh, Canadian afternoon and I'll, I'll, uh, pass on.

You've got all the Wes information, right? I do. Yeah.

Yeah. I'll pass on Rebecca's. Cool. Oh, all right. All right.

Take care of yourself and keep on flying the flag.

You betcha. All right. Enjoy yourself. My pleasure.

One more thing. Wash your goddamn hands.

Thanks for listening.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week on the program, Alex from Portland talks about his Pavement Origin story with jD before they gab about song 34!

Transcript:

Track 1

[1:00] It's Half a Canyon. Ryan, from Soundtrack Your Life, what are your initial thoughts about this song?

It's a great song. I really like this song.

For some reason, for a long time, I thought this was the last song on Wowie Zowie.

It kind of has that epic, you know? Yeah, it has that epic finale,

you know, with how it ends and just this big jam of chaos.

Hey, this is Westy from the Rock.

Track 3

[1:33] Roll Band, Pavement, and you're listening to The Countdown.

Hey, it's JD here, back for another episode of our Top 50 Countdown for Seminole

Indie Rock Band, Pavement.

Week over week, we're going to countdown the 50 essential pavement tracks that

you selected with your very own Top 20 ballads.

I then tabulated the results using an abacus and a pool cue I broke over my knee in a moment of rage.

How will your favorite song fare in the ranking? You'll need to tune in to find out. So there's that.

This week we're joined by Pavement superfan Alex from Portland.

Alex, how you doing, motherfucker? Fucking great, JD. How are you?

Oh, man, I am stellar right now. I am feeling good. Yeah.

How about you? Feeling good myself. I apologize if my vocal cords crack.

I decided to sing karaoke last night. Oh, nice.

Yeah. What'd you sing?

Rocks Off by the Rolling Stones.

Oh, wow. I went really, really hard in my Jagger mode, too.

So if I sound like a mid-pubescent boy, that's why.

Track 3

[2:50] That's great. Well, what do you say we talk about pavement? I'm so ready.

All right. Hit me with your pavement origin story.

It goes like this. So I am a millennial. I was born in 1990.

So when they were doing their initial, when they were an active band recording

music and touring originally, I was way too young to be a part of it or even know about it.

But how I came to Pavement is, I was 15. This would have been 2005.

We had a local coffee shop where I'm from, a small town in Indiana.

And you would walk down there on a given night, and there would be live music.

It was usually acoustic bands.

And we were there, me and a couple friends of mine.

And we're watching this like i don't

know kind of like weird sort of indie

band they were acoustic but they were still kind of like doing

heavier stuff and they were catchy and interesting and weird

and the lyrics didn't really make any sense and i

was fascinated like at 15 years old the shit was blowing my mind and i was like

hell yeah dude this band's great and i look over and we see Matt the cool kid

and Matt's like this mysterious kind of you know all the boys want to be him

all the girls want to be with him he's shout out to Matt that kid was just the coolest kid in our town.

Track 3

[4:17] And I remember going up to Matt after the show and

saying like man that band we just watched was really

cool and he he takes like you know a probably a

five second drag of a cigarette just goes they're just

ripping off pavement man oh wow

and i uh i had never i didn't know

who that was but of course i'm trying to be cool for cool matt so

i'm like yeah dude totally totally ripping off

pavement yeah they're they're way better so i

i rushed home i open up lime wire

of course yeah i've been pavement into

the search bar and and by the way i did want to

uh i wanted to reiterate something i wrote into

you when you were doing your old show uh in

2005 if you opened up you know

a peer-to-peer illegal downloading app

uh and you typed in pavement harness your

hopes was by far the top thing

that would come up really even on limewire even back then it wasn't even close

like it was harness your hopes with however many thousands or hundreds of thousands

of downloads And then I think cut your hair was like number two,

but it was down by quite a margin.

That's wild. So harness your hopes has been the fan favorite for a lot longer

than people have noticed.

Track 3

[5:37] I wonder if that's because people were looking, you know, if they're looking

for pavement, like the idea of a B-side is so savory, you know,

and B-sides weren't always easy to get.

Yeah it's it might just be their

like you know undisputed best song and everyone

just knows it or something i don't know but i heard

it and i just i walked away with two thoughts after listening to that which

is one this doesn't actually sound anything like that band i just heard at the

coffee shop and number two this is definitely my new favorite band the the word

blew my mind the The guitars were kind of jangly,

but also kind of grungy, which like jangle pop and grunge are pretty much my whole wheelhouse.

And they sort of combined them seamlessly into one thing. And I'm like, yeah, dude, I'm all in.

And from then on, they've, you know, my favorite bands shift,

but they've been in the top five ever since. Wow.

Track 3

[6:36] So when you when you finally decided to jump away from LimeWire and purchase

your first record, what was the CD or cassette?

What was it? What did you end up with out of the shoot? dude?

Oh, wowie zowie. That was the one that I was just like, my favorite,

you know, my favorite record is definitely wowie zowie.

So when I had the chance to purchase it, I had the vinyl.

I used to have a picture, but I was wearing, I was wearing a shirt of a band that's now canceled.

So I deleted the picture off social media, but I had a picture of me holding

up the smooth blank fourth side of that record yes if you know that record is

uh it's it's two and a half side wow.

Track 3

[7:23] Or three sides yeah yeah yeah you know

what i'm saying it's it's a record and a half yeah absolutely

it's yeah yeah i was

so fascinated by that and uh yeah i i'm i'm now a completist i've got all the

i've got all the reissues i've got all the you know lux and redux and and all

that basically everything that i could get my hands on and yeah i'm the same

i'm the same every Every time I come up with something new,

it's like, man, and we're recording this,

you know, uh, in February right now.

So we've heard of this seven inch box set coming out, but we don't know what

it is, uh, and what it will entail.

I'm very curious about it, if it's going to be a must purchase or not.

I mean, it's going to be just because I'm a completist. Even if it's not my

favorite or whatever, Terror of Twilight is my least favorite pavement album,

but you better believe I bought that thing when it came out a couple of years ago.

Yeah. Well, we waited so goddamn long for that.

Track 3

[8:31] So they really over-delivered, I thought. I thought we waited a long time for

it, but it was completely worth the wait once I put the records on my turntable.

And so, you know what else I waited a long time for and finally got in,

I think it was September of 2022, was I got to see them live for the first time.

Oh, I was just going to ask you about shows. September 2022.

So where was the venue? In Portland. Well, in Troutdale, which is like northeast

of Portland, but they have a venue out there that was big enough to kind of

suit the size of the show.

Gorilla Toss opened for them. I'm a pretty big fan of them.

We're in their like hyper pop era, which is really fun.

I think I saw them on the road with Gorilla Toss as well.

I think I'll have to ask Tim from Portland because he's got a way better memory

than me, but we saw them in Toronto.

Track 3

[9:29] And I'm pretty sure Gorilla Toss was one of the opening bands and I enjoyed it.

Yeah, yeah, I had a blast at that show. Also, one little funny tidbit,

when they played Rangelife,

Malkma found a way to work in All Cops Are Bastards into the Run From the Pigs,

the Fuzz, the Cops, the Heat.

He somehow worked that lyric into there, and the crowd went absolutely apeshit.

That was the most excited the crowd got on it. He definitely knew he was playing

to a Portland crowd. It was really neat.

That is cool. Cool. Well, I mean, he's a transplant now, right?

He's part Portlander at this point.

He's been here a lot longer than I have. Yeah.

Also, I wanted to mention another cool thing that happened much more recently,

about a month ago on my birthday, actually.

Dinosaur Jr. played Portland at the Revolution Hall.

All and what i don't know if you've been following their tour or not or if you're

even a fan um i didn't catch the band sorry dinosaur jr oh okay yeah dinosaur

yeah yeah yeah so they've been like.

Track 3

[10:48] And they've been getting like a local musician from whatever city they're playing

in to like join them for a song on stage their whole tour.

And like, I think it was I think when they were in Philly, they got Kurt Vile

to go up with them, stuff like that.

And when they were in Portland, you know, guess who the special guest was that

came out and sang a song with them.

I fucking saw that. I saw some video. Yeah. How spoiled were you that night?

It was amazing. It was like two of my favorite 90s bands getting up there and

jamming out together on one of their best songs.

And it was just a lot of fun, and I enjoyed it.

To see J and SM dueling guitars would be fucking so cool.

They're both so different, but so good, you know?

Oh, yeah. With the guitar.

Track 3

[11:45] Yeah, it was phenomenal. phenomenal also they're they're

doing uh where you've been in its entirety and that's

my favorite dinosaur album so and it

was my birthday and i was like yeah the the universe kind

of gave me this as a present like you know got

to see malchmus get up there so it was a lot of fun

dude that does sound like fun god damn it that's fun well what do you think

should we get into to track 34 i think i'm ready to get into it then let's do

this we'll be back on the other side with track 34 hey this is bob nastanovich

from pavement uh thanks for listening.

Track 1

[12:23] And now on with a countdown 34.

Track 3

[15:23] Okay, we are back. You heard it here first.

The first song from the original version of Slanted and Enchanted to appear

on the countdown, Loretta Scars.

Alex from Portland, how are you feeling about Loretta Scars?

It's a great song. I've got all kinds of thoughts on it, but,

you know, it's on Slanted and Enchanted, which is a great album.

It's slanted and enchanted is the least uh varied album in my opinion like,

most of the songs on it are kind of of one vibe and this is definitely no exception

um i think it's a great vibe i i enjoy it but uh yeah um i guess if i can start.

Track 3

[16:14] Out the gate with With my only really negative take on it. Sure.

It kind of feels like. Like the meme of like. Hey mom can we stop for summer

babe. No we have summer babe at home. And it's this.

Track 3

[16:30] They're different chords. But they're played in the exact same structure.

And the drum beats the same. It's that classic Gary Young. Boom boom.

You know. Kind of thing. But it's still a great song. I'm definitely not shitting

on it at all, and I'm ready to say all good things from here on out.

I just figured I would get that out first.

Well, hit me. Hit me with some good stuff. Hit me with your best shot, Pat Benatar.

So, when you... Okay, how do I put this?

When you're listening to the bulk of the lyrics are just, how can I,

how can I, how can I make my body shed for you? you body shed around your little scars.

If you're listening to the how can I, how can I part, it sounds like he's like

drunk or something, like he's slurring it, like he's not keeping up with the rhythm.

Yeah. So just earlier today as a fun little exercise, what I tried to do was

sing it myself in a way that would fit the meter and it's impossible.

Really? Yeah, you can't do it. There's no way. I don't know if it's because

How Can I is three beats and the song's in 4-4, but for whatever reason,

you can't really make it go with the beat.

And yet, when it gets to...

Track 3

[17:52] Make my body when he comes in on body it's

always perfectly on beat again even though he like every time he does it it

gets a little bit slower and more drawn out kind of drunker sounding uh he nails

it every time so i i really respect the way that the words are delivered from a standpoint of

like this shouldn't work but it

does right yeah i

can i can see that it's very sparse lyrically very

sparse lyrically it's funny because uh

like one of the things i love about malchmus and

it's the same thing i loved about david berman same thing

i love about bob dylan dan behar sometimes neil

young and joni mitchell is like you'll be listening to

a song and you're so like emotionally invested and

you feel the power of it and it's such

a great song and then you're singing along and you stop and you're like

i don't know what the fuck i'm singing about right now at all and that that's

most if not all malchus lyrics but yeah i would agree with that but this one

i'm like you know and i i even did the thing where i went to genius just to see what they would have.

Track 3

[19:08] To say and uh you know it's

just i think it's one paragraph that someone

wrote in that just says like the narrator clearly doesn't know how to help the

person named loretta and it's like okay thanks for the information yeah that's

really gets us nowhere but that but that's all you're gonna get you're gonna

get nowhere if you like i gave up a long time ago trying to like.

Track 3

[19:33] Grab any serious meaning from a lot of Pavement's catalog, if not all of it.

Maybe Grounded is like, you know, doctors are these rich assholes that don't

give a shit about people.

You can grab that from Grounded, but most Pavement songs don't really...

I don't think they have a meaning. I don't think that's the point.

Track 3

[19:56] Yeah, I think there's bits and phrases that you can glean something from,

you know, thematically in a song.

But few and far between is there like a narrative, which was so different when

he released his first solo record.

And all those songs had like total narratives, like protagonist,

beginning, middle, end.

And like, there's so many songs on SM's debut that showcase that he's not just

somebody who's just throwing phrases at a wall, but he's really got it.

So I don't know, you know, like he told me when I spoke to him that he can compartmentalize

Pavement and his solo stuff.

Track 3

[20:40] But there's, to me, there's a little bit of bleed. There's a little bit of bleed on some songs.

And I, of course I don't have them in top of my mind right now,

but, uh, I tend to agree with you, but I think that there are some that,

you know, yeah, no, for sure.

And, and I'm, I'm just, of course I'm overgeneralizing, but like,

so you're thinking about Loretta scars though.

Like that's the, that's the song we're talking about right now. And I mean, I,

I, I don't have, I don't know what your thoughts are

on what the lyrics could possibly mean but i've gotten nothing yeah well what

is the deal with metal scars at one point he says metal scars how can i shed

around your metal scars like is this a robot is this like what the fuck man

well if it's a robot it's probably not loretta lynn.

Track 3

[21:32] Oh right yeah only only loretta i know of so yeah it's a not a common name.

Track 3

[21:39] Or cleveland's ex-wife from family guy

i never watched family guy so you're

you're better you're much better off for it

what else

have you got on loretta scars i anything much

else i mean it's a tough this is a tough ask it

there's literally six lines you

know and then they're repeated it i like how you broke down

the music though there's about three chords

for most of it there's the gary drum beat

that he does on summer babe um we could

talk about gary's drumming though for a minute because i i understand me too

i don't i like and this has been said a million times by a million people including

people on your podcast um but you know westy is probably the more like.

Track 3

[22:33] Technically proficient and varied drummer

but gary's got this like

certain style of playing this

swag this kind of like vibe that he creates with

the way he hits the drums and it doesn't

sound like anyone else and i really appreciate that

for what it is and you can tell gary's song right

away yeah you're right you can tell a gary song right away oh

yeah and this this is a great it like

this would be a good song to demonstrate that point if i was going to play a

song for someone and be like this is gary young drumming you know yeah this

would be the one you would choose it would be it would it would be close i mean

like i said there it's the same drums on summer babe and then you've got uh.

Track 3

[23:22] What's the, what's the song after a flamethrower where it's only one like line

that he says over and over again?

I can't remember the name of the song. Yeah, me neither.

But that song is basically the same drum pattern.

So whoever's going to be listening to your podcast is going to scream at the

phone, whatever the name of that is.

And good for them. I do that too.

But, uh, yeah, no, it's, it's a good.

It's a good example of that Gary Young drum sound, and I'm not a musician,

so I can't explain it in technical terms, but because I am like a diehard music

obsessive, I know when I hear it and I know when I don't.

Gotcha. And you like it. I love it. Yeah.

I love it. I mean, I don't know if there's like a bad pavement song,

even their like fuck around, throw away B-sides are usually funny.

Track 3

[24:18] Agreed yeah i i totally agree with you you know uh there's a lot of a lot of

good stuff on the b-sides my question my next question for you though is where

does this song fit in the top 50 is it rated properly should it have been higher

should it have been lower what do you think yeah Yeah,

because I only know what like 47 through 50 are,

it's difficult for me to like, it would be so much easier for me to come up

with my own top 50 if I knew if I could like argue yours, you know? Right.

But yeah, just as far as it being fairly rated, no.

Track 3

[25:01] Yeah because i don't even know if it makes my top five

on slanted but but it's

also a great song so agree yeah

so would i put it in

the top 25 no but what i put it in the

top 50 yes so 33 sounds about

right sounds about right yeah that's what i think it's

a top it's a top 40 song because it's from

that debut record you know uh which

turned so many of us on to pavement

not me because i came so late to

the party and you you came late to the party but those

cool fucking mark kids matt it

was matt you said right yeah yeah his

his his cohort you know we're probably

into slanted like you know not him specifically but his cohort we're listening

to slanted you know when it dropped and reading zines and whatnot every every

like town every city has got at least one of those mats and probably some of them are named mark and,

yeah yeah they're they're always going to be a little bit cooler than you and

uh when you're a teenager i think you need that that's like your north star

you know and then you sort of use that as a branch to find your own way and

pave your own path and uh i'm grateful i'm grateful I'm grateful for that kid,

and I'm grateful for his little comment that made me go search out Pavement

and fall in love right away. Really cool origin story.

Track 3

[26:30] Well, that's what I've got, so I'm not sure if there's anything else you want

to say or if there's anything you want to plug.

Track 3

[26:39] Well, premature plug, but I don't know when you're releasing this,

so maybe it will be out by then.

I am starting my own podcast. It's going to be a music-obsessive deep dive,

and I'm going to attempt to connect a bunch of dots between bands.

Track 3

[26:58] Themes, record labels, the culture around it, tracing back from 60s stuff until.

Track 3

[27:05] Now, 90s, everything in between.

Uh it's gonna be sort of

like the charlie day meme where he's got

you know the he's in like the post office basement he's

going through his whole conspiracy with that's right all the

string and shit it's it's gonna be like a music

version of that so if you're

yeah if you're a music obsessive

like me and you think i'm funny

or crazy or interesting then yeah uh i'll have

jd plug this when it's ready

to go cool awesome if you don't mind of course i just volunteered you to plug

my show at some point absolutely well alex totally all right brother well that's

what i've got and that's what alex from portland has so we thank you for tuning

in and wash your goddamn hands.

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/meeting-malkmus-a-pavement-podcast/exclusive-content

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy