Pavement vs. Royal Trux

My dirty secret as a Pavement fan is that I often found Bob N.’s onstage “contributions” to be irritating/extraneous, and wished he wasn’t there... :/

(Although he was great at Lollapalooza, running around the stage and taunting mud-throwers in the crowd.)

there was a drag city announcement; however, the royal trux stuff is coming from fat possum where they're signed now

My dirty secret as a Pavement fan is that I often found Bob N.’s onstage “contributions” to be irritating/extraneous, and wished he wasn’t there... :/

kinda feel this... but he's such a great dude I can't help but like him in any context

He seemed to be the "heart & soul" of the band, for sure!

he was like the bosstones dude or the happy mondays acid gremlin, right? yeah, these people are always annoying.

i never cared about seeing them live though. the records were all i needed.

i thought they were pretty terrible at pitchfork

Were Royal Trux a great live experience? Never saw em. I looked all the Pavement gigs I saw but they weren't really an essential live act

liked

Trux could be "variable," I guess -- but when they were "on," there was no one better!

no one better??? really doe?

Well, NMH is my favorite musician -- it doesn't get any better than his gtr playing for me -- and RTX were one of my favorite bands! So those shows were as good as it gets for me (equaled/topped only by certain NMH shows). Obviously, YMMV!

Trux were great when I finally got to see them last year. Pavement were highly variable as a live band - from great to absolutely abysmal/sloppy/lazy

i wonder if i had seen royal trux back in the day if i would have been a convert. could be. i never got to see pussy galore much to my regret.

i'm going to see matt valentine and j. mascis's neil young cover band tomorrow night! i hope its as wasted as it should be.

Maybe, I really liked RT and was always a bit befuddled by them live probably the best time was circa 1992 which I believe would have been the 2nd self-titled record opening for Sonic Youth, an ur-90s show!

That time they were most like an actual rock band and I was like kind of "hmmm" though I really loved the records and never thought they were bad, it was clear they were doing something else

my favorite musician is sonny sharrock

Steve Forbert

Look, we all have our favorites!

i'm just being silly i have nothing to contribute here

both bands are good

i love music

:)

Four times I saw RTX:

1. Third album out, but something close to Cats and Dogs lineup (I think) already in place. Great show, I seem to recall. This was when they did “I’ Waiting for the Day” from Pet Sounds. Band pretty loose.

2. Hagerty/Herrema with drum machine/tapes, I guess, when Cats and Dogs was out. Didn’t like it as much as the previous show, but I think I liked it overall. Hagerty played some violin.

3. The next night, I think. We drove up to see them in Orange County or L.A. and I think this was a showcase for them. Possibly for. Virgin. Whole band with the two drummers. Seem to recall they were great. Way tighter than the band from the first show.

4. After Thank You. Same band, but I think minus one drummer. Thought they were playing the songs too fast.

now, let's get into the most important stuff- NMH vs Malk on Twitter. gotta go with malk, he's a bit more breezy and fun. NMH is responsible for wil wheaton appearing in my feed

malkmus had a better twitter impersonator account too. but i don't know overall. i saw wesley willis open for royal trux at gabe's in iowa city. wesley was sitting at an empty table before the show, drawing. he was happy to show his chicago skyline sketch to early birds. his show was amazing. jennifer and neil watching like normal starstruck fans. then they tore the place apart. i can't remember a single song, just the personification of rock n roll strutting on stage. pavement / malkmus = favorites too live and on record just way more self-conscious

NMH follows me, so he obv. wins ;)

"Gotta build your rock on the Ray-O-Vac" still one of the most hilarious things ever.

Thank You was like the summit of the most unusual, triumphant rise in rock history.

"Were Royal Trux a great live experience?"

Eh...they were pretty poor the time I saw them open for Sonic Youth, just basement skronk on a big stage. Might have been a more musical event in a small place, but to me it was more something to endure at this gig.

Thank You was like the summit of the most unusual, triumphant rise in rock history.

― timellison, Saturday, May 26, 2018 1:06 PM (fifty-four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

finally someone besides me views Thank You as some sort of peak

IMO it was the beginning of the peak! — Thank You thru 3-Song EP. (Sweet 16 being the highest elevation of the peak)

this is such a thrilling performance, I never saw Pavement live so can't attest to their consistency but this is a very high peak:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_i4C8axWBs

Flawless performance, funny and emotive showmanship, Malkmus clearly conflicted, at once bored and completely in the moment. The context - the first song of their second to last show ever - is almost beside the point.

youtube commenter otm:

Ben Jones
Malkmus's energy is so cool in this vid. It's like a mix of feeling it and pissed off frustration that culminates in jigging around with the guitar behind his head

They're riding the razor's edge in this video. It's just amazing.

For parity, here is the best RTX video on the Internet: https://youtu.be/TpzmoBniw_I

My dirty secret as a Pavement fan is that I often found Bob N.’s onstage “contributions” to be irritating/extraneous, and wished he wasn’t there... :/

but when you find out that bob was literally the only thing holding it all together, you have to understand his performances as a sort of demented yet earnest cheerleading (allez! allez! allez!).

listened to way more pavement but trux still feels like the right answer.

Bob is cool

Chances of Pavement covering Money for Nothing seem v low, another point in RTX's favour

Just listening to Accelerator and realising a) Reggie was pretty much quoting and b) RTX have some weirdass lyrics

The context - the first song of their second to last show ever - is almost beside the point.

i feel just the opposite - to me the context is everything in that video. it's a good performance, but SM looks so over it and ready to be done. he looks like a very tired driver doing anything he/she can think of to stay awake so as not to crash.

All that is evident in the performance itself though imo.

qualmsley I didn't know you were a quad cities person

Playing guitar swinging around and behind his head at first as a bored joke, turning both times into a graceful trance; the way he sings, quavering and moving from eye rolling ("i know the medical world could knock you out") and belting it (the last "boys are dying on these streets"). Sounds like they're all walking a high wire.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

voted trux one of my alltime faves, both great tho (dont really vibe to later pavement tbh)

Chances of Pavement covering Money for Nothing seem v low, another point in RTX's favour

― albvivertine, Monday, May 28, 2018 2:41 AM (three days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I could totally see malk covering DS tbh

they wld do walk of life tho, with implied sports bloopers