It's like the early 1990s all over again

I'm driving around listening to a new GBV album the day it came out and drinking iced coffee. Only I'm not a starving graduate student, the car is more dependable, and it's on my iTunes touch, not in the CD player.

Any initial takes on it so far? I'm still in absorption mode, but I'm a sucker for the "classic" lineup. I'm leaning favorably but withholding judgment until a few days pass. . .

Nose? Breno? Rhett? Anyone? Bueller?

I am waiting till it gets official released January 24, 2012. Just tell me it doesnt suck, please, Erik!

Hey, who cares if it sucks? There's another on its heels!

"Guided by Voices have not split up and continue to work on new material together. In addition to the album release of Let’s Go Eat the Factory for January, the band are at work on another album, Class Clown Spots A UFO, which will be released in May. Robert Pollard will also be releasing a solo album, Mouseman Cloud in March. So there you have it. While the guys apparently can’t get along on stage, they’re doing just fine in the studio."

God bless the prolific!

On first listen, the full songs range from very good to Oh Hell Yeah! while the fragments make me want to pound my head against the wall and scream "WHY WHY WHY do you insist on wasting a hook like that on a 12 second burst that's shorter than the average yawn???????"

So in other words, it's definitely classic GBV.

Bought it last week, and its kind of bummed me out. I really have very little desire to hear it again, sadly. While it has a nice noisy feel that I theoretically approve of, there is not much meat in this sandwich. That noisy Tobin track (#12) had some nice chord changes. Too bad they made Mr Sprout's vocals intelligible. Other than that tune, the second half has almost nothing pleasurable to listen to. Oh, and the few Bob ones on the first side that are melodic have stupid lyrics about snowmen, Fats Domino, and Crispy Creme donuts. Come on, guys. You could do better. I'm starting to realize that Mr Pollards hit ratio the last 10 years is about 5%. Maybe the dream is dead.



Post Edited (02-04-12 22:31)

It definitely doesn't suck, Nosepail. . . Brad's synopsis matches my initial impression. They also have returned to that trebly, underprocessed production. I'm already finding some standout tracks that I like a lot.

Like nosey, I'm gonna wait on the real deal next month. Still can't really get into the streaming/downloading thing. Glad to hear it doesn't suck.