i wanna ask you a question: what is the best song in GBV's Alien Lanes?

Surprised that there hasn't been a TS: Bee Thousand/Alien Lanes yet.

xp OK this is one of many instances where I again feel like I don't understand what makes lyrics good or bad at all, and am completely unable to understand extreme feelings one way or another, making me terrified to try writing any more lyrics myself.

Well, there's that theory that lyrics themselves are meant to be imperfect, a verbal statement that is best accompanied by music. Not a poem. There's really no way to say one is 'good' or 'bad' outside of evaluating the broader context of the song, delivery, etc.

I mean, if I heard "A Salty Salute" being sung loudly by a bunch of drunk college kids-- and I have heard-- and perhaps have sung myself-- I'd probably think the words were pretty crap.

"Go Up/Down" is really about the 4 second bridge "I speak in monotone", great line in a song I have bad memories of.

My friend was not a moron she was herself a songwriter and her disgust with GBV was strictly professional

Absolutely, but nobody ever seems to address those variables in their criticisms, and they don't break their analysis down enough. Then I'm left sympathizing blankly because I can't understand their point. Part of my problem is that I've never really been interested/barely pay attention to lyrics, and instead study the compositions. I do hate when lyrics lazily just go "I don't know why, I don't know why" or something, so I guess everyone gets set off by certain things.

see, i think that the point is that lyrics *aren't* poetry -- they're meant to be sung! (sorry if that's capt. obvious). Someone in the New Yorker writing "The truth is just a lie" = total duh. But in this partic song, the way that line is sung, so happy, so heartfelt -- it's not a teenagey statement of jaded cynicism, it's more like a total abandonment of .... um something. I've had a couple beers.

these songs are too short

Game of Pricks is obviously the winner.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't My Valuable Hunting Knife considered a bigger hit *at the time* than Game of Pricks? It had the video, and was the first track on Tigerbomb, and everything.

true, and?

Motor Away to me always sounded like The Who circa 66. It is my favorite on this record. Being a midwesterner that saw them a few times, I got to say I like the one before and the album after more though and I was totally into GBV when all of this was coming out new. They were a hell of a lot of fun to drink a lot of beer and see in a bar, they really were. Later on that kind of got a sad melancholia as the band kept turning over and over and it just wasn't the same, but it was fucking great the first few times.

I think GBV would have been killer if they would have had a great melodic lead guitar player to eat up those chord changes and turn some of those two minute dittys into 3 minute popgasms.

Just noting the critical re-evaluation xpost.

wanna fight about it, drew? huh? huh?

oh, you don't. ok.

I think GBV would have been killer if they would have had a great melodic lead guitar player to eat up those chord changes and turn some of those two minute dittys into 3 minute popgasms.
don't really agree -- but this is pretty much the doug gillard era of the band, no?

I dig sad melancholy GBV! My first record of theirs was Isolation Drills, and it still has tons of sentimental value.

I think Game of Pricks is the answer too but I haven't voted yet because I have too many favorites to pick from. I might vote for "Alright," actually, which is one of my fave album closers ever.

"but this is pretty much the doug gillard era of the band,"

For some reason, Pollard went on a big time off streak on his songwriting after "mag earwhig" and when they started trying to record like a regular band. Maybe he had shot his wad, I don't know. That band was really good the first time I saw them, but then it started to kind of slide.

Maybe it's me, I can hear J Mascis solos in some of those earlier GBV songs in my mind and think, that would have sounded pretty dope.

I dig sad melancholy GBV!

totally. isolation drills is my #2 GbV record after B1000.

I think Game of Pricks is the answer too but I haven't voted yet because I have too many favorites to pick from. I might vote for "Alright," actually, which is one of my fave album closers ever.

― drew in baltimore, Tuesday, July 20, 2010 12:01 AM (46 minutes ago)

yes incredible song

Earthquake Glue is an awesome latter day GBV album.

"Little Whirl" over "Game Of Pricks" and "Blimps Go 90"

I think GBV would have been killer if they would have had a great melodic lead guitar player to eat up those chord changes and turn some of those two minute dittys into 3 minute popgasms.

this is basically Isolation Drills, which is a great album

Gillard's guitar playing really got on my nerves after a while

I like how "Hit" was on the Best of Guided By Voices.

i should listen to those TVT-era records again ... I didn't really love them at the time, but i think i was still just buzzing from the "classic era" -- there is probably plenty of good stuff.

"Isolation Drills" is a great album. Don't much like any of the albums that came after it.

isolation drills was basically a second attempt after do the collapse to do a "big rock album production" bit and done much better with much better songs.

(tho do the collapse has Teenage FBI)

... and proper lyrics that meant something

yeah i guess they are pretty straightforward for pollard, some real "divorce" type stuff on that album

Tearjerkers *sniff* ... tho, one of the most moving songs, IMO, is "Privately"... and fuck knows what that's about

I think Isolation Drills works best of the studio albums because it provides a coherent context for the glossy production. By the time I get to the end of that record, I always feel exhausted and punchy from the sheer loudness of it, sort of like being drunk, which I think is the correlative of a lot of the album's lyrical themes. Pollard and Sprout were real geniuses during the lo-fi era at creating an aural context in which all these sketches and fragments could hang together simply and elegantly. I don't think he ever quite managed to hit that balance again after Alien Lanes, though I'm still fascinated by his attempts to get it right. For instance, I love the sound of Under the Bushes Under the Stars even though it never quite clicks with the songwriting, IMO.

The album Isolation Drills reminds me of most is Soundgarden's Badmotorfinger, in terms of how enervating it is to listen to.

i like how the title of this thread sounds like some drunk guy accosting you at a bar

Which is apt

do the collapse is kind of a glorious mess in retrospect imo, pollard decided to bring his most oddball set of songs to the table right as he made the maligned hi-fi transition, so there was nothing familiar on there for people to latch onto as sounding definitively like GBV

i hated it at first too, but now i like it and i definitely don't think it's the worst post-classic-era GBV album

isolation drills is still the better of the 2 hi-fi ones though

I think it's definitely the worst post-classic-era GBV album.

i remember thinking universal truths and cycles was really really boring and hookless

i remember really liking universal truths and earthquake glue when they came out, and i haven't listened to them since. "best of jill hives" is really the only one I can conjure up.

universal truths & cycles was another grower, there's some hookless songs on there but also some great ones and songs have more variety in tempo/structure/rhythm than some of the other late-period albums (half-smiles of the decomposed is my least favorite for this reason, it's pretty much entirely mid-tempo songs, though some of them do have pretty hooks)

i'd rank the 'studio' ones something like
isolation drills > earthquake glue > universal truths > do the collapse > half-smiles

mag earwhig would go somewhere in the middle there if it counts i guess, all of them of course rank after the 'classic' propeller thru UTBUTS stretch

^^

the "volunteer fire department" or whatever pollard lp w/doug gillard is my favorite of the post-bushes era, i think.

yeah, that one is very, very good.

isolation drills > earthquake glue > universal truths > do the collapse > half-smiles

i would swap EG & UT&C but otherwise agree. half-smiles is a bit crap, probably the worst GbV album in terms of being straight-up boring

Do the Collapse is by far the worst. The first time they were ever really boring, IMO.

AAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUDITORIUM

The scenario is bright for the King and Carol

Echoing upthread about 'Under the Bushes'...man we all had such high hopes for that album

1;15 in King and Caroline -
Bob: And the wisdom they will sell us, and the wisdom they will sellllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll
Tobin: sell!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

^^^^^^yessss

yeah "love king and caroline" - great performance on the daily show, too

^^^ too much time on i love terius

i <3 under the bushes fwiw. second i heard after alien lanes but first i bought. not a duff track on it, honestly, except the sprout ones and i never really dig sprout's stuff tbh.

aww i lovvvvv "atom eyes"!! one of his best.