Stephen Malkmus, Bob Nastanovich and Steve West of Pavement were in a studio one time waiting for their good friend David Berman to arrive so a Silver Jews recording session could take place. At the last minute, Berman became unavailable. Not wanting to waste the studio time, the three guys remaining quickly recorded four songs that went on to be released together in the form of Pacific Trim, an EP made to coincide with Pavement’s Australian tour in January 1996. You can’t get Pacific Trim anywhere these days. Been out of print for ages. But the songs on there made it onto the Sordid Sentinels edition of Wowee Zowee. Alongside ‘Give It a Day’, ‘Gangsters & Pranksters’, and ‘I Love Perth’ came the EP’s longest track, ‘Saganaw’. It’s one that I don’t see any Pavement fan talk about in any great length. So I can at least try.

The song contains one of Stephen Malkmus’s more dramatic vocal performances. There’s nothing to prepare you for it either. He comes straight out of the gate, wailing the word ‘Great’, elongating the vowel sound while putting his descending scales to good use, which then segues into the first full lyric, “Great seekers of violence, go away”. So it seems that the message so far is a massive plea for peace. The rest of the words I think can pretty much be taken at face value, even if they may seem to not be related to one another or connected in any kind of narrative way. Really, what I think the song’s main point comes in its final verse where Malkmus states that he wants to pack up a small bag and go on his merry way to Saganaw, inspired by the country music he listens to. (We’ll assume it’s the Saganaw in Michigan, which is actually spelled ‘Saginaw’).

Trying to think of a way to describe the music that drives this song. Or drags it, depending how you feel. I’m sure I’ve heard a song somewhere that sounds just like this or would have inspired it. There’s a definite country feel behind it. I envision the track playing in the background of a cattle trail scene or something. Malkmus belting out the notes from the top of a high mountain. Helps that his voice reverberates just the right amount to emphasise that effect. After the first chorus comes a guitar solo that is typical Malkmus, very in the moment and relying on feel, before transitioning back to its droning note that buzzes behind the verse again. Each drum strike has a booming tone behind them. The Mellotron strings add a surreal quality to the proceedings. And it closes out with Malkmus howling into the distance as the song fades out. Big, big fan of this one. Very underappreciated, I think.