Tag Archives: pavement

#1151: Pavement – Saganaw

Leave a reply

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.

#1093: Pavement – Rattled by the Rush

Leave a reply

This song does have an official music video, but because it uses its radio edit, the guitar solo is cut out entirely. It’s only right that I have the album version up here first. I’ll embed the video after the final paragraph, though. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s get into this properly. ‘Rattled by the Rush’ is the second track on Pavement’s Wowee Zowee, the band’s third album, released just over a year after Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain. Story goes that critics couldn’t wait for Wowee Zowee to arrive because Crooked Rain… was just that good, but when it came around they were somewhat disappointed in its sprawling, eclectic direction, coming to the conclusion that Pavement were trying to sabotage their careers and were afraid of success. Stephen Malkmus replied to these notions, stating that it was mainly the marijuana usage that steered things along. It was also the marijuana that made ‘Rattled…’ sound like a smash hit to him, which resulted in it being released as the album’s first single.

If I tried to explain on here what I think ‘Rattled by the Rush’ is about, it’d probably be a waste of your time and mine. And no matter what Genius might have to say about it, I think this song is one of those occasions where the lyrics are just what they are and don’t have to be interpreted to any length or depth. There’s a clear stream of consciousness technique to them, the second verse in particular is a favourite of mine in terms of the rhyming and the words used in general, with ideas of one line running into a different idea in another (“cross your t’s, shirt smell”), and the words are accompanied by this stop-starting rhythm that makes it all sound very awkward, like it’s struggling to get going, before cascading into these heavy guitar breakdowns after the choruses. It’s a strange, strange song for sure. Especially one to choose for a first single. ‘Grounded’ was right there. But you’ve got to give it to Pavement for sticking to their principles.

The music video for the song caused some controversy back in the day. The band chose the guy who directed their former drummer’s ‘Plant Man’ music video to do the same job with ‘Rattled…’ (If you have questions about that linked song, don’t ask.) Band members mentioned that it wasn’t the greatest experience filming the video, and when it was shown on MTV2, it was banned for making people too dizzy because of the constantly spinning/zooming in and out camera work. An additional music video was made to make it more “pleasant” to watch, where the original video is shown on a bathroom tile next to a grotty bathtub. Fair to say, the track deserved better in terms of visuals.

#1090: Pavement – Range Life

Leave a reply

Along the line, Pavement’s ‘Range Life’ became one of my favourite songs from the group’s 1994 Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain album. But there was once a time where I really didn’t care for it at all. After being convinced that Pavement could be one of the best bands ever after only hearing ‘Cut Your Hair’, ‘Shady Lane’ and ‘Stereo’ – in that order too – I went to seek out some of their other tunes that may have music videos on YouTube. This was a long, long time ago. Probably 2008 time, so much, much younger and a lot more foolish in terms of myself. ‘Range Life’ was there, I listened, and I’m sure I didn’t make it through the entire thing. It was almost five minutes long, which to a 12-year-old me seemed an eternity. But importantly the melody seemed to just meander and not go anywhere in those verses. And those reaches for the high notes in the choruses sounded like the singer wasn’t even trying. What was it all about? I didn’t get it. It took a few years after to come back to it that I eventually understood.

‘Range Life’ is the tale of a narrator, most likely Stephen Malkmus writing about himself, who’s the singer in a good, ol’ rock-n-roll band and tired of the constant touring and cycle of clichés that come along with the rock-n-roll lifestyle. He looks over the horizon and thinks about another way of living, one where he’s free to roam and doesn’t have to think about when his next rent payment is due. The trace of country rock I think adds to the idea of easy living and searching for those bigger horizons. So when Malkmus does reach those high notes with his voice breaking and all on the ‘Raaaange liiiife’ choruses, it’s not because he’s not trying. In fact, he’s trying very hard. Not saying he’s in pain when he’s singing it, but I think it’s meant to symbolize some sort of mental pain, like it’s signifying the strong urge to break away that’s eating away at him. But in the end, it’s not meant to be seen as song that’s sad or emotional. On the contrary, there are some incredibly relatable and witty lines in here, the most notable one being where Malkmus disses The Smashing Pumpkins. This act would begin a rivalry that people comment on to this day.

I think the track really solidified itself in my eyes upon finding a live performance of it by the band on HBO’s music television series Reverb. Bear in mind, the year’s 1999 so Malkmus was already thinking of ending Pavement during this time, so there’s much more of a couldn’t-give-a-fuck-vibe on his part than usual. Some marijuana may be involved in there too. More importantly though, the track is delivered with a lot more punch than in the original recording. Plus, Malkmus goes even deeper in the Stone Temple Pilots and Smashing Pumpkins lyrics in the final verse, referring to the former as the ‘Stone Temple Nothings’ and almost making a slight at D’arcy Wretzky’s plastic surgery for the latter. It’s pretty funny stuff, the crowd have a laugh at it too.

#1068: Pavement – Pueblo

Leave a reply

For a while in 2018/19, I was into buying 33 1/3 books that had been written and dedicated to albums that I greatly appreciated myself. Off the top of my head, I own the ones written for R.E.M.’s Murmur, The Village Green Preservation Society by The Kinks, Talking Heads’ Fear of Music and Television’s Marquee Moon. I’m sure there are a few others too. Being the Pavement fan I am, it only made sense to get the edition dedicated to Wowee Zowee. Now, at this moment in time, I can’t really remember anything much from it. I read it the one time and felt that I didn’t really need to again. But I did learn a few things that I would have never thought about before. Like how Malkmus recorded the guitar solo for ‘Rattled by the Rush’. Or how he played all the instruments on ‘AT&T’.

A large amount of the book is taken from an interview with Stephen Malkmus in which he reveals all this stuff. While mentioning the things noted in the paragraph before, he also stated that when time came to record the vocals, the majority of them were made on the spot with a mix of also having some stuff written down to help guide him along. I have a clear memory of reading this, anyone can correct me. But I do recall him mentioning that ‘Pueblo’ was one of the songs to receive this treatment. You can probably tell by looking at the lyrics anyway. What Malkmus is singing about here is anyone’s guess, but the melody mirrors that of the guitar during the verses so at least that gets into your head during the initial listen.

The track consists of a verse and a chorus and another verse and chorus, separated by a chill instrumental break with a few guitar freak outs. Probably the most notable part of the whole song is when Stephen Malkmus amps up the intensity of his vocal from the second verse into the final chorus, in which he’s more yelling at the listener rather than singing. After all this, the song funnily ends on a bit of a damp squib – like the band had no idea to properly end everything, so they sort of just stop playing. But in the context of Wowee Zowee, its oddities should come as no surprise. If any reader out there is a big, big fan of the song, it’ll be worth to check out the work-in-progress versions of the song that were released on the Crooked Rain deluxe edition from 2004. The ‘Beach Boys’ take makes sense when you hear it, and the ‘Domain’ version is something that sounds like it could have fit on Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain itself.

#1030: Pavement – Perfume-V

2 Replies

Slanted and Enchanted. Regarded by many to be Pavement’s best album. Regarded as one of the best indie-rock albums of the ’90s. I believe a few members of the band look fondly upon the album and the time it was made themselves. But personally, it’s low down on my ranking. Not that I think it’s bad. It has a few of their best songs on there. But then I hear how the songs are performed live compared to how they were released, and they just sound so much better in a live context. To be fair, I did listen to Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain before going back to it, so that may have played a part in my judgement.

When I did go through Slanted for that first time in 2012/2013, ‘Perfume-V’ wasn’t a track that I considered to be much of a highlight. Then again, I didn’t really like the whole lo-fi feeling the album was going for. Again, it just didn’t sound like Crooked Rain. It probably wasn’t until some years later where I watched videos of Pavement performing the track live, particularly this performance from their initial 2010 reunion tour and this from their ’92 Reading show, that I thought, “Hmm. This song’s actually pretty great.” It’s quite intense in its own short way. Gets a bit shoegazy at some points. No solos, no wandering breakdowns like you can get in many a Pavement track. It’s two verses, two choruses a bridge and then it’s outta there.

Not very clear on what it’s about. Contains the cryptic and surreal lyricism that Stephen Malkmus is known for. But to hazard a guess, I think it actually may be about a narrator who’s having severe guilt and a bit of an existential crisis after having a one-night stand with a prostitute. They question whether these one-nighters would actually be able to fulfil them for the long-term. When the sun comes up and the rays come down on the scene that’s happened on the bed, the narrator can’t help but be attracted to what they see, but still doesn’t feel too great about it. The rest of the lyrics is anyone’s guess. Well, all of what I’ve said is my guess too. But all in all, it’s always a good time when this one comes on shuffle.