POLLSTAL BLOWFISH - ILM Artist Poll #8 - Guided By Voices

Great score! I'd say the American equivalent would be like $2.50 at a garage sale.

High five for striking the motherlode. I love when that happens.

And in the UK! Have we talked about the book yet? Who else has read the book?

Are you talking about A Brief History? Or the 33 1/3 on Bee Thousand? Or another I'm not aware of?

Have never seen the book. The Jim Greer thing?

Brief History -- I haven't read the 33 1/3 because I, well, I dunno. For some reason I continue to resist the focus on that album when there is so much more to appreciate.

Yes, the Jim Greer thing. It's really really good and gives you an idea of the early days that I think is missing from the general narrative about GBV.

Bee Thousand works so well as an album. So well that I rarely listen to it anymore. I mostly just put a ton of songs on random or listen to comps/dj mixes these days. Bee Thousand songs don't sound as good to me out of context.

Always look for it, but doesn't seem to have made it across the Atlantic, at least not in sufficient numbers (xp)

The GBV song that gives me the biggest jumpstart is "Wished I Was A Giant". When that comes on, I can't help but yell along with the hooting at the end. I have no idea what the song "means" but to me it means release.

I'd venture to guess that 90% of all GBV songs don't mean anything at all.

Like, the best GBV songs have particular phrases you can shout along to while listening and those phrases sound great when shouted (or sung)...but they're absolutely nonsensical.

That is part of what I love so much about them.

i HATE that jim greer book, ugh. such a smarmy tone and boring, "insider" bullshit

It's never quite as poignant as when everyone's shouting along together at a show -- and tbh I don't get drunk (like DRUNK) very much and I don't think I've ever been drunk at a GBV show. I have been drunk at home and singing to GBV and made my neighbor come upstairs on account of the noise though :-/

xp wow, ok we all have our opinions.

I will be plowing through all the suggestions on this thread this weekend before voting, but wanted to rep for what to me is one of their very best:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8Q_XHYV_AY

I could listen to this song non-stop for days and two weeks.

Also unsuspected GBV addition on Propeller: guitar solos.

Just sent mine in. It was really hard to get down to 20.

xpost the live album in the Hardcore UFOs box was in my ballot for top 5 GBV albums ...

I've begun listening to all the GBV albums. There is no way I'll have time for the solo/side project stuff.

I've discovered that the 'small speakers' preset on my ipod gives a warm fuzzy sound on my neutral sounding headphones. I'm relistening to Alien Lanes with this discovery.

I'd venture to guess that 90% of all GBV songs don't mean anything at all.

― Johnny Fever

I'm not super familiar with the lyrics at this point but I'd venture to say that there is a lot more meaning than 10%. A lot of that meaning is disguised in metaphor (some metaphors may only be decipherable by people who can find a way inside the writer's mind). There is also a lot of seperate ideas that get collaged together in one song.

"The closer you are, the quicker it hits you"

^I'd wager to say that that is an absolutely brilliant lyric

oh, there are so many, explicitly laid out like a fruitcake

God free the pilgrims
Laid out in sunday clothes

drunk really is the best way to enjoy this band, even though i didn't drink at the height of my fandom

Just sent mine in. It was really hard to get down to 20.

― righteousmaelstrom, Thursday, September 22, 2011 12:55 PM

Hey, would it be a pain to send that again in plain text? I don't seem to be able to open the file for some reason.

On its way, Johnny.

If this is the topic we're on, the first GBV song I ever heard was "My Valuable Hunting Knife". Actually, not sure I remember how.

Been trying to figure this out. I think it was probably "Wished I Was a Giant" since Vampire On Titus was the first album of theirs I got. Then I saw em in St. Louis on the tour for Bee Thousand (Scat Records "Insects of Rock" tour with Cobra Verde and Prisonshake) and bought Bee Thousand at the show.

Mine's gone too Johnny.

Similar to dmr above. Had to choose "Wished I was a Giant". First GBV i heard. Indebted to Tim from the legendary Ajax Records for that. Cheers Tim

first i heard of them was the "bulldog skin" video on 120 minutes

Tractor and salty were horrible omissions. Eeek

Speaking of lyrics: I read somewhere that 'Always Crush Me' is written from the point of view of an insect.

Soz to be a bore but the live version of "a good flying bird" by Sprout is just so. Lovely

Name any band who get's near GBV these days. Forget the fact that they are about to dominate the world again.
Who else is there?

For all the Tobin haters, a late lobby for this one I almost forgot about:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hM3tZIagviE

Like, the best GBV songs have particular phrases you can shout along to while listening and those phrases sound great when shouted (or sung)...but they're absolutely nonsensical.
― Johnny Fever, Thursday, September 22, 2011 10:50 AM (10 hours ago)

I always think of GBV as a very knowing take on Outsider Art, from the home taper/DIY aesthetic to the kinds of cracked imagery in the lyrics (cf. "Demons Are Real" and "Queen of Cans and Jars" to name only two). When I was a kid, someone briefly was leaving on our doorstep these sort of creepy, insane homemade cassette recordings with elaborate drawings on the paper inserts and the lyrics were like GBV but not as good!

How "aware" were Pollard/GbV?

I know they reference The Who, Wire, REM, Beatles all over the place... but then Pollard namedrops psyche-garagers Cat Butt in the lyrics of "Pendulum" (SPTFGS, 1990) who was way more niche at the time. I think their late 90s career verged way more into the crafted classic rock and away from fringe experimentation, but did they have a period of hipster awareness in the late 80s?

dodging invisible rays is my fav tobin for sure

i listened to the Human Amusements comp this week trying to see if i liked enough songs to throw together a ballot, just couldn't do it. like "I Am A Tree" more than any Pollard song, somebody vote for that for me.

Dodging Invisible Rays might well be the best Tobin, I still can't get behind it. I'm sure it's just his pissy weak voice, even the instrumentation seems to be dialled back so as not to overwhelm it. Would like to hear it with some beefier guitars and Pollard singing. Or Teenage Fanclub.

Shit! I missed Gleemer(Fertile Jim)! Was that A Sprout?

just sent my list. any love for don't stop now? love that song.

Don't Stop Now is a great song, definitely will be loved I think.

33 ballots now! (though I still haven't added in the latest five, so no stat clues at the moment)

Johnny, I will be submitting one! Just trying to listen to as much as possible to see if I have been sleeping on anything. I am afraid my ballot is shaping up to be what it would have been without all the homework, but still fun to trawl through the excess. Really looking forward to the results.

I think "Cryptic Shapes" is an excellent Tobin track. The whole song chugs along like gentle driving music. The chorus tugs at the heartstrings by hitting that magic chord right around the top peak of the range of natural notes that I embody

man, i didn't even realize that such a thing as a "Tobin hater" existed. what a world.

1712 - 14 cover versions - according to this - http://www.gbvdb.com/tracks.asp Damn this is hard - it doesn't help that I've listened to bee thousand, like 6 times this week.

Just sent my ballot in. For the record, it has 5 songs from outside the '92-'96 period

Submitted. I'm 100% correct.

I'm assuming the due date means end of the weekend, Sunday midnight. I'm making a last push to get through as much as I can...