If you ask 10 fans what their favourite Pixies song is, you're likely to get 10 different answers, since the band has a legendary catalogue full of classic tracks. Whatever songs people choose, however, there is sure to be one uniting factor: they all came out more than 20 years ago.
This is the disappointing reality of the Pixies: having broken up in 1993 and made a comeback in 2004, the band has now spent a decade on the nostalgia circuit without producing anything of particular value. It's a rather sad fate for a group once renowned for being ahead of the alt-rock curve.
Case in point: the last time the Pixies came to Vancouver was in 2011, when they were performing their beloved 1989 LP Doolittle. At that gig at the Orpheum, they recreated every song almost note for note; I suppose that's the point of playing an album in full, but it was so rote and predictable that I scarcely remember the show at all. I seem to recall having a fairly good time.
After 10 years of playing it safe, however, the Pixies' narrative has gotten messy in the past eight months. First, longtime bassist Kim Deal quit, marking the dissolution of the core four-piece lineup. She was quickly replaced by Kim Shattuck, who was in turn canned in favour of new recruit Paz Lenchantin.
Meanwhile, remaining members Frank Black, Joey Santiago and David Lovering finally delivered some long-awaited new material with EP1 and EP2, which mark their first new releases -- other than the one-off 2004 single "Bam Thwok" -- since the early '90s. Response to the new songs has been mixed, and that's putting it generously; the best thing I can say about "Magdalena" and "What Goes Boom" is that they sound a bit like sub-par Pixies tracks. Others, like "Bagboy," are scarcely recognizable as the same group. If a fan named any of these as their favourite Pixies song, I'd be flabbergasted.
The band will presumably pull out a few of the new cuts when it comes to the Orpheum on Feb. 17, which will give everyone a chance to take a bathroom break and grab another beer before making it back in time to hear favourites like "Monkey Gone to Heaven," "Caribou" and "Where Is My Mind?"
By the way, my favourite Pixies song is "Debaser." Even without Deal on backup vocals, it probably still kills live.
Read more: Music
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