The Breeders have a new album. Who cares? Not me!

From Rolling Stone July 5th: "Kelley says she thinks the sound of the record will not be as big a shock as the fact that the band has returned."

From a Chicago(?) website around the same time:
'... produced by Steve Albini in his Electric Audio Recording Studio in Chicago. "The record as a collection covers a lot of territory," said Albini. "There's some sort of classically sweet melodic songs. And there are some really strange mood pieces."

Deal set out to record the third Breeders full-length with a new band in New York City three years ago. At the time, Kim's twin sister, Kelley Deal, was in rehab, so the second incarnation of the Breeders, which featured Kelley on guitar, was on permanent hiatus. "The band disintegrated under her while she was in New York, and she didn't get anything of merit recorded," Albini explained. "She got burned by that experience, so she decided, 'Screw it. I'll take a year or two and I'll learn to play drums and I'll play everything myself.'"

Kim entered Albini's studio in 1999 and recorded a handful of songs mostly on her own, though Kelley added guitar parts to a few tracks. "Then Kim met the guys in her current band and thought she might be able to realize her dream of having a permanent band that would record and tour and be committed," Albini said.

That line-up — guitarist Richard Presley and bassist Mondo Lopez of the Los Angeles punk band Fear, drummer Jose Medeles of 22 Jacks along with sister Kelley — spent nearly a year of rehearsing and played an unannounced club show in L.A. before recording the album with Albini this year. Although Albini said the basic idea was to structure it around a band and not a lead performer, three songs from Kim's solo sessions made the cut. "Those sound a bit more piecemeal," he said. "They're a bunch of interesting sounds layered together in almost a collage manner. But they fit together well, it's not like one of those records where people record a million things and sort it out later."

The rest of the material is more straightforward rock band stuff, but with oblique, sometimes spooky lyrics, Albini added. "Kim's got an atypical taste on music and the things that excite her about her songs are the strange little moments of interest rather than say, a great chord progression or cool riff."'

Bang, the Earth is Round sets off a lot of Dear God No warning bells from the get-go, insofar as it (a) was a mid-90s Geffen "alt- rock" signing, and sounds it, and (b) is conspicuously "quirky," down to smug nonsensical lyrics and pitch- shifted lambish vocals at certain points. This is why it's impossible to convince anyone of how great this record is, and rightfully so -- keep in mind here that I am not necessarily "recommending" this release to any of you. But I do firmly believe that it is great -- a fact which is only enhanced by the seeming impossibility of that fact -- and while I could easily spew forth a lengthy article on why, I'll try to capture it as succintly as possible.

The first point is: it is prog. (Insofar as an obvious XTC influence can wind up "prog" -- i.e., they are prog like Stump were prog.) Ben Eshbach, the songwriter, is a clearly skilled guitar player, and what's even more notable is that he writes like it, something that's pretty hard to come across among the mid-90s rock label-jumpers. And he writes well, and even more amazingly he writes as if he doesn't even care how well he writes -- one is tempted to almost hate him at first, simply for devoting a decent ear to penning what seem upon first listen to be dorky jokes. But part of the fun is discovering that whatever the form and the production lead you to believe during the first ten seconds of several tracks, these are not four-chord Superdrag-style alt-rockers; they are chirpy and they wind around beautifully, to the point where memorizing their structures is sort of satisfying in and of itself. This is why the chirpiness and the easier "quirks" seem less smug than justified -- there's almost a sense that these were guys who were too smart, and having too much fun, to take the 90s alt- rock boom very seriously.

Which ties into the next thing: this is a record that reveals itself. Most notably, it's stridently weird, but in a way that takes some engagement to really work out. This is very possibly a personal preference, but I love records that do this -- that seem full of messy, contradictory signifiers that somehow come together during the 10th listen as both completely coherent and completely original. Bang... does this for me, in spades -- what seemed like calculated, if catchy, quirkiness eventually became transparent to me as entirely lovely, potentially quite serious, and for the most part brilliantly assembled in pure musical terms. I think it's the digging and the revelation that makes this appeal to me so much, more so than the initial signifiers.

This is not to say that large portions of the album are not quite bad. It is, after all, a mid-90s Geffen release -- but I like to imagine that the more boring of the tracks (the crunchy/quirky stuff that's so immediately offputting) was really the label's fault. And then there's the digging again: portions of this seem like potential brilliance that are just submerged under attempts to make them something they're not. Every one of those crap tracks reveals, at some point, either a mindbendingly interesting hook or a wonderfully complex song structure tucked somewhere into the bridge. It's quite possible, in fact, that I've listened to this record more than any other record I've bought during the past two years, for precisely this reason -- it's like candy that turns out to have meat in the center. In a good way.

I'll stop there. Again, this is maybe, well, personal -- my guess is that the majority of ILM would likely spit on this sucker, and I do think it takes a certain receptiveness to be able to sit down and do the digging I'm talking about above. But, like I said, it costs like a dollar, so why not grab a copy if you see it, if only to laugh at me? I already own three.

Upon rereading, I think I overplayed the alt-rock references. This is not an alt-rock record -- it just comes from such a time-frame and production ideal that you're tempted to think it is. It's quite clearly just power-pop, though. Just sort of weird, fascinating power- pop.

Even after all those words, I don't think I've explained this well.

Back to our regularly scheduled Breeders discussion ...

but can i just say

Title TK

ROCKS (that's right marcello, it rocks ; ) )

the she? off you? the song that goes "swinger!.... oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh ooooh..." little fury?

will somebody please back me up on this?

As for Sugarplastic (see above) they have a great single called "Motorola Rocketship" that've very worth tracking down. Came out as a bonus track on a Japanese version of one of their albums, and on some compilation or other. Best to download it. Not that that's the only other song of theirs worth looking for, but it's a great great weirdo power pop thing that's of a piece with the Bang! stuff.

and yes i still remember this VERY clearly

gave it like a 7.4, which i now realize isn't that bad, which i also now realise doesn't mean that much

but then i read a bunch of reviews, after its release. and i think people kind of got it. not enough, but kind of.

off you just came on. shoot me!

the breeders are one of the few artists i'm a fan of that haven't released a bad song.

ever.

maybe a half bad one, but not based on taste, based on - mmm, will power.

whole album seemed rather thoughtful to me

that was like the point of the record. more stripped than Pod.

it better not be.

Pacer is amazing.

AYE SIR!

New album soonish, I hear.

Hoorah. I was just listening to Title TK again the other day and marveling at how it simultaneously sounds completely tossed off *and* completely planned out. And, the drum part to "Too Alive" is genius: always in the wrong place at the right time. In fact, I'm surprised that song isn't mentioned above as it's just amazing. I'm very ready for a new one.

cool new breeders song

i like it a lot, very comfortable in its simplicity, nice sound

lol search function

i love the breeders! and the amps!

the new song is great!

hi!

i also love the kelley deal 6000! at least their first album! it kicks!

I love heroin and Nude Spock and jogging in extreme heat!

whats so fuckin funny about the fuckin search function

I miss the Josephine Wiggs Experience.

“Iris” is heavy as fsck, the drums make it

No Alternative version is even more haggard