MOG

With the June 24th release of the groundbreaking Pixies album "Doolittle" on Rock Band, a little internet stir has arisen.  Some are understandably stoked, others perplexed (how does one exactly sing along to Tame?), and some, the most vocal internet majority no doubt, antagonist.   Sigh.  Kids-These-Days....am I right?  But then I think back and realize I was one of those kids and had to have my own mini come-to-pixies discussion with one far wiser than myself. Just like any band that redefines music and spawns a million interpreters, it's hard to know what was so thrilling when it's all been done since then - ad nauseaum.  So, without further ado - and because there's never been a better time for it - a primer on the Pixies.

There's a documentary on the Pixies (the band name does not contain "the", It's just Pixies. I know this, but it drives my internal grammar-o-tron insane) called loudQUIETloud.  It's the perfect summary of how the band blew minds and reshaped popular music, even if they were never, by typical measuring sticks, popular.  Helmed by Frank Black (born Charles Thompson IV, now Black Francis) co-vocalist/bassist Kim Deal, and guitarist Joey Santiago, Pixies had everything that all history making bands need - odd recurring Mythologies (Incest, Death, Fetishism, and UFOs, just to name a few), an almost unnerving New Sound (scratching, yelping guitars, Blacks throat shredding vocals, even when quietly singing), almost effortless Pop Sensibilities, and internal Power Struggles (Black and Deal) that keep a band constantly on the edge of chaos and, inevitably, collapse.

Gigantic and Vamos:

I'm gonna treat this like one of those audio books...when you hear the "ding, please turn the page...er play the video above.  *DING! Pixies were an almost perfect, messy storm, and for those that discovered them as they were discovering themselves, it was like a revelation.  The music was angular and abrasive - (check out Santiago playing guitar with a beer can on Vamos...insane!) - but made sense.  But really, it all comes down to Black.  With his voice, he could have sang anything and it would have been ground-breaking, but he had the Holy Grail all history making bands need, he was a masterful songwriter.    Not a poet like Morrison, or a mystic like Lennon,  Black was abrubt - the stories he told were minimalistic but powerful.  The words he chose almost felt like a stream of concious jumble...but always unwrapped themselves into perfect vignettes.  Take Gigantic, a perfectly simple, blushingly raw story of race-mixing sexuality - made even more inviting (and taboo) as told in Deal's young-girl voice.

Gouge Away:

Pixies, and Black himself, were all about conflict - rough lyrics against soft sounds, soft lyrics sung harshly - but always the attempt was made to keep the listener on the edge of uneasiness and familiarity.  Look at the lyrics for Gouge Away - the familiar and frightening juxtaposition of love and betrayal with a biblical twist thrown in:

gouge away
you can gouge away
stay all day
if you want to

missy aggravation
some sacred questions
you stroke my locks
some marijuana
if you got some

gouge away
you can gouge away
stay all day
if you want to

sleeping on your belly
you break my arms
you spoon my eyes
been rubbing a bad charm
with holy fingers

gouge away
you can gouge away
stay all day
if you want to

chained to the pillars
a 3-day party
i break the walls
and kill us all
with holy fingers

gouge away
you can gouge away
stay all day
if you want to

Velouria:

It's been said that Pixies weren't a band many people listened too - but those that did all started their own bands.  You'd be hard pressed to find a mainstream pop, punk, or grunge band from the last 10 years that didn't cop a part of their sound from Pixies.  Cobain publicly stated that Teen Spirit was a blatant attempt to make a Pixies song - and their sound is directly responsible for bands such as Modest Mouse (just listen to the guitar on Vamos), Weezer (Velouria), early Radiohead, Sublime....the list goes on, indefinately.

Where is my mind?:

Though never a real success stateside (they had a fairly strong following in Europe) Pixies had a way of connecting to the primal human experience that few philosophers or prophets, let alone musicians, ever could.  Listen to "Where is my mind" and feel that twing of knowing exactly what the song is saying without knowing what it is about.  To me it's a sad realization that even sexual relationships can create less of a connection than the primal pull of nature's beauty - and no matter how long and hard you try to look for it, you'll never find again that one moment you experienced true wonderment.  But that's me. What does it mean to you?

Debaser:

In the end, the Pixies are important because they stripped so much away - leaving the listener raw, vulnerable, and reborn.  In the song, Monkey Gone To Heaven, Black laments over the seemingly impossibility of God, and that we are nothing more than animals desperately hoping for something more.  As for humans, that's an eternal debate, but Pixies make clear that music doesn't need to be more than it is -  it need not be spiritualized or philosophised or diefied.  Music is as raw an emotion as sexuality, fear, or joy. Music is debased, music is primal.  And it is within us all.