Review Summary: The distilled sound of bored suburban genius, and the beginning of an indie rock legend.
You probably know the story. Smart-ass UVA History major Stephen Malkmus returns from college and hooks up with his best friend and fellow
The Fall devotee Scott Kannberg - AKA Spiral Stairs (with whom he had played in 'Bag O Bones' in the mid-eighties) to record a bunch of songs he'd written, at the cheap recording 'studio' of ageing local freak Gary Young in Stockton, the band's hometown...
1. You're Killing Me: The EP starts with a bunch of noise and then static, which dips in and out of the mix. Two guitars - one crunchy, the other completely fuzzed out, play a simple D minor - G progression, and Malkmus' vocals come in, low in the mix, with the lines "Killing me! You're killing me again". The song has a very minimalist feel - Malkmus' lyrics are pretty impenetrable and repetitive, and the instrumental passages are one chord drones with simple tremolo picked guitar lines over the top. These factors combine to create an air of mystery - you can imagine listening to this song in 1989 with no knowledge of the people behind it, and becoming very intrigued by this band (which is, of course, what happened!) However I can imagine some people finding this song too repetitive, or a bit of a downer, so it gets a 3.5/5
2. Box Elder: The band pretty much subverts the sinister feel of the first song with this catchy three chord pop tune. Lyrically, it's perhaps the least cryptic of Malkmus' compositions - a simple tale about a guy who wants to escape his boring suburban town and clingy girlfriend. To me at least, it is reminiscent of the great New Zealand Flying Nun bands, and in fact Malkmus admits to appropriating a very small part of the melody of The Verlaine's track 'Death and the Maiden' for part of Box Elder. Nevertheless, it became a Pavement staple, performed on every tour from 1990-1999, and deserves to be up there in the upper echelons of the Pavement legend - just a great indie pop tune. 4.5/5
3. Maybe Maybe: Here comes the noise. After some long bent notes and strumming, a sloppy, noisy riff full of bent notes attacks the speakers, and following two bracing down-strummed chords, Malkmus' shouting vocals burst out like a caged animal. "What I was, was a pisiiiiingg Jooooohhhnssssonn!" he screams, as an brilliant, semi-atonal guitar battle rages on in the background. This is the sort of song that makes your friends look at you funny if you play it to them (I know this from experience). The instrumental passages in this song are full of energy, and the percussion - alternating between some strange tapping sound and tribal tom toms - just about keep up. A great punky lo-fi romp. 4/5
4. She Believes: This is also a simple pop tune, really, but the Pavement guys mask this with the use of a chugging, extremely fuzzy detuned guitar line and by burying the vocals low in the mix. There are some great lines in this one - "I told her I... was free of disease/ And she believed... she believed in me" ranks among my favourite Malkmus couplets, and the pulsating drum rhythm keeps it all together until the 2:20 mark, when the instruments cease, and Malkmus screams "She believed in ME!!" before all the instruments come tumbling back in and the band goes crazy. You have to listen to it for yourself, really. 4/5
5. Price Yeah: This is the other punk one on the album, and perhaps my favourite. Spiral Stairs (I think) plays a power chord progression, with the sound of a boiling kettle fit to explode in the background. The intro riff is simple but very effective, and is exemplary of these guys' ability to come up with great guitar music even early in their career. Malkmus' vocals in this one are particularly snarky - "You can't say it, you can't say it, you can't say I'm wrong", the chorus goes. The guitar work in this track is superb the solos are perfect, perhaps primarily because Pavement know not to overcomplicate their music and let the songwriting speak for itself. 4.5/5
It is a rare thing for a band to burst onto the independent music scene with such an accomplished and confident slice of noisy guitar beauty, and this is really what made Pavement such a revelation in 1989, when this EP came out. Sure, Malkmus hadn't fully honed his songwriting ability yet, and sure, the cynical amongst you may say it's just Swell Maps with snarky northern English vocals swapped for snarky northern Californian vocals, but great songs are great songs, and Pavement have a unique charm that makes them one of the American indie rock greats.
