Album #147: Pavement - Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain

Pavement

Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain (1994)

There comes a time in every music lover's life when he just wants to be left alone, to live in relative peace and harmony, free from the neverending nagging and badgering of others. A time when he can enjoy serenity. A time when he can finally satisfy the needs of others and in so doing fill a gap in his own life.

That time has come today because I'm finally going to listen to a Pavement album and get EVERY SINGLE PERSON who has ever said or written, "hey you should listen to Pavement", off my case. So this better be good, because if it's not, I'm going to be sorely disappointed, and I am going to personally make it my mission to discredit every single thing Robert Christgau has said because he thinks Pavement are the ultimate band of the 90s.

The Album

The words I would use to describe Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain are sloppy, messy, chaotic and loose.

I would also use the term 'remarkably carefree'.

I think viewed through those lenses, it's understandable why it has received such high praise, because it's almost the manifesto for underground indie rock - unpolished and rough, yet full of immensely creative musical craft. For the most part, creative force Stephen Malkmus has created an album here full of fire, fury and fizz, where the nods to classic rock are easily found even while there's not a single song that sounds like a ripoff, pastiche or even celebration of those sounds.

Despite a slow start (Silence Kid is good but not great; 70s powerpop vibes meet scratchy vocals and riffs played with reckless abandon, although the mid-song tempo change is like a sledgehammer to the balls, and Elevate Me Later is much the same except for a wonderful false ending) the album soon begins to take flight, and confirm all the buzz of the critics. 

Stop Breathin' is brilliantly produced. Even within all the instrumental noise, Malkmus' vocal seems to occupy its own clear space, and when his vocal gives way to the song's intense second movement, the tension is tightened like a drum. Cut Your Hair is top drawer stuff, with a lyrical theme that seems to target those who critique big hair as representing the worst musical excesses of the 1980s, while musically, the drony choir of guitars are never obtrusive and there's a great drumbreak by the impressive Steve West. It's such a visceral, energetic track that when the comparatively mellow Newark Wilder arrives, with its smooth, jazzy drumming and withdrawn guitars, it provides respite.

Which lasts for approximately one song as the powerful, ballsy Unfair blazes its way into your ears, with abrasive guitar riffery and Malkmus' half bellow/half wail. From there, the high quality is maintained with only a minor dropoff. Gold Soundz probably isn't the ULTIMATE SONG OF THE 90s (good work Pitchfork) - hell I don't even think it's the ULTIMATE SONG OF Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain! It is however an upbeat, jangly tune with clever lyrical turns of phrase.  5-4=Unity (so named for its time signature) is a highly intriguing sonic adventure, where Pavement turn into some sort of indie/jazz fusion band with a splash of avant-garde thrown in (just listen to the repetitive piano meanderings and the dissonant guitar melodies). For sheer chutzpah in including such an out-of-place track (and for doing a good job with it) Pavement deserve praise. They also deserve praise for the fantastic yet folky Range Life (Malkmus offers sage yet honest wisdom on the life of a touring musician, and does it in an old-school folk style, with a vocal that's worldweary, while the music continues the 70s rock vibe) and the jarring, grating Hit The Plane Down (written by guitarist Scott Kannberg, and featuring a rather ingenious guitar effect that sounds like a recording of a car creating the Doppler effect).

Yet it's on the final track, Fillmore Jive, where the brilliance of Pavement is laid bare in all its messy, filthy, creative glory. At almost seven minutes, it's by far the longest track on the album, but what a track; Malkmus and co create a jam track in the finest traditions of 70s bands like The Grateful Dead and Pink Floyd's early 70s work, yet in the lyrics seem to be crying out for this style of music to be left alone; it's rock and roll crying out to have a rest, burned out on thirty years of overexposure ("I need to sleep/I need to sleep/Why won't you let me sleep?" and "Goodnight to the rock and roll era" being the two major examples). The chosen 70s jam rock style acts as a final hurrah even while rock and roll is begging for peace. It's the most terrible timekeeping you've ever heard, and I haven't heard so many flubbed drum fills in my entire life, and some of the solos and riffs are really just fiddly noise, and yet it affirms everything I love about music, that it's the passion and the carefree nature that sometimes creates the greatest work.

The Verdict

Don't believe everything the critics said - this isn't a perfect album. Some of the musicianship is decidedly average and Malkmus, while a stunningly good songwriter and lyricist, is not a particularly good singer (though in a kind of Wayne Coyne way, it fits the music rather well.) Additionally, the first two songs are good but not great, and consequently it takes time to hit its straps.

So it's not perfect but it's a terrifically cohesive body of work, where most of the songs are great (if not brilliant) slices of art. In my view this is what indie music, the really experimental fuck conformity indie music, should sound like.

My rating: 8.9/10

Standout Tracks

Fillmore Jive

Range Life

Cut Your Hair