C or D : Guided By Voices.

yes -- i learned about how troubled their european tour was in this book

and it was like dude couldn't even handle being around people who didn't speak English -- he was uncomfortable traveling in general per that book. he shows no curiosity of the world beyond the one he inhabits, in my mind a classic xenophobe. he doesn't even seem to enjoy the company of women or men who are slightly different from him. if i am wrong and he has grown out of this that is great. but my impression of reading the book was that he has a very narrow and limited worldview.

...and still i manage to enjoy his music that also has remained more or less the same for his entire career (narcissism of small differences aside)

That's not surprising to me at all. I was worried there was something more overtly political/racist I hadn't heard - something more like Morrisey. I think Tobin Sprout is a Trumper or something.

I guess the less I know the better. Ugh.

Nope -- just his essential personality. I think sadly Sprout was outed as a gun nut at some point and has since stfu about his beliefs, allowing people like me to continue to enjoy his music.

the less you know, the less it hits ya lol!

i should rephrase -- he was not outed, he revealed himself to be a gun nut on facebook iirc

yeah, I think there may be something on covid/vaccines as well but don't remember exactly.

The shine came off bob for me when he was assholish about Georgia YLT years back

I read some book or other on GBV, it might have been the Jim Greer one, and I must admit I found that boorish macho milieu he seems to need to surround himself with slightly nauseating. I mean, the guy writes poetry and makes artworks (Tobin Sprout is actually a full time fine artist!) and it's like he needs a lot of beer chuggin' bozos around so he doesn't appear to be some cissy intellectual.

four years past graduation but still hanging out drinking at all of the high school football games and cruising Main Street every weekend night, always harassing the current high school kids

Maybe it's because I'm currently being crushed by copyediting deadlines so I can stave off the debt for a college I graduated from with a useless degree a quarter century ago but this doesn't sound like such a bad life to me at the moment

he was uncomfortable traveling in general per that book. he shows no curiosity of the world beyond the one he inhabits, in my mind a classic xenophobe

Reminds me of accounts of the Ramones on their European tour with Talking Heads.

I have heard ample tell of Pollard's boorishness, but to be fair, not every great artist is a world traveler or even cares about such things-- the idea that artists need to be enlightened renaissance types who speak three languages is bizarre to me

He kind of is a renaissance artist though! He writes songs, writes poetry, designs his own covers, has had his artworks published and displayed in galleries. He's hardly the Midwest jock he likes to present himself as.

New one from last week is a lot more lo-fi than other recent albums. As usual there are some good tunes buried amidst the sketches

By "new", do you mean Scalping the Guru? It's a comp of old EP tracks from 1993-94. I think it's great, though I had most of these on other releases.

Ah, no wonder it sounded like a throwback

lol

has Pollard cited the Grateful Dead as an inspiration ever? Was listening to "Dusted" and felt some Hunter/Garcia vibes with the lyrics.

Usually when I hear a new GBV album my initial sensation is that it might better than any other of the late-period stuff. (Then i stop listening to it and it just blends into my memory of “all the late period stuff”).

Didn’t have that feeling this time. Just feels like another gbv album.

earth man blues is the only one from the past 5 yrs i've gotten that feeling with

For me Crystal Nuns Cathedral is the best one. But they’ve all been at least pretty good.

They have all been surprisingly strong, imho, though some better than others. I like the recent turn towards longer songs as well, never thought I'd see the days of 40-minute, 10-track GBV records. Last year's Tumblers and Gogglers By Rank (such a GBV title!) was particularly strong. Haven't played the new one yet, it just arrived yesterday.

good pal works for KJHK out of Lawrence and the kids were going to toss a bunch of great vinyl, he saved a bunch (he’s a grad student closer to my age) and sent me two EPs the other day: Plantations of Pale Pink which is nice raw trash and the Surgical Focus 7”, which I love…. “Surgical Focus” might be the GBV song I feel silliest about loving, but the vocal melody just gets trapped in my skull, it’s so good.

Surgical Focus has that lovely descending guitar line on the chrous, right? Great song. I think I have that 7 somewhere too.

Who tosses modern vinyl these days? It’s so easily worth $$$ in the current market...

next on the list, thanks Alfred

Surgical Focus has that lovely descending guitar line on the chrous, right? Great song. I think I have that 7 somewhere too.

Who tosses modern vinyl these days? It’s so easily worth $$$ in the current market...

Is plantations the one with The Who vs Porky the Pig? I used to have that one too

Yes calstars, that's the one— piss yellow vinyl

soft clay orifice
quivering
like new structures
and formations
a perversion not known to the perfect ones
a stinging
disruption, alas
it is quick like the ultimate
brush-off
is it time yet?
we've coupons and stamps
and valuable cramps from
~~ LIQUID INDIAN ~~

Couldn’t tell if that was real or not

Is it?

wah-wah-ooh

Oh it’s real
I love that one!!!

Welshpool Frillies is the first GBV in a while that's doing it for me

The apparent resistance to being categorised as a 6 Music Dad station also feels extra muddled when you factor in things such as the recent eight-part 30th anniversary Britpop series – a subject so worn and threadbare surely even Lamacq has run out of things to say on it – or the Strokes’ Albert Hammond Jr playing 13 Guided By Voices tracks back-to-back in one Artist in Residence show.

(from https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/aug/08/bbc-6-music-radio-station)

ugh i am so SICK of this!!

It’s the “OK boomer” of the indie music world; a flippant and generalising piss-take that doesn’t possess much weight or sting but carries an undercurrent of ageism, and characterises its target as culturally shallow.

It's worse than that -- it's also sexist and is oozing with ageism. For me, it stings pretty bad because it erases my existence. Does not feel good!

deCIDE now!

Three (3) albums released in 2023...

which makes a total of...

24 (!!!) full-length records released since 2012 (the reunion).

That number does not include the seven (7!) full-length records released under Robert Pollard's name in the same time frame...

nor any singles, side-projects, collabs, etc.

...insanity!

What’s most surprising to me is how great much of that material is! Dude is on a great run lately. And another new side project coming next month, Rip Van Winkle, with a debut EP.

Whenever I see this thread bumped I wish Hadrian was popping in for a surprise visit.

Swimming river flow
Rifle, bullet, arrow & bow
Plaster, paint & tile
Lepus, canine, cat & reptile

― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli), Monday, August 1, 2016 7:00 PM (seven years ago)

take a little time to stumble
show a little faith in something larger than your life

(guitar solo)

UTBUTS at breakfast this morning, all killer no filler

B1000 / AL / UTBUTS = best all-time three-album run consideration?

(and throw in not in my airforce and waved out if going for an all-time fiver)

carnival boy too, yeah?

I'd throw in Propeller an Vampire on Titus.

same, plus the siltbreeze etc eps