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GUIDED BY VOICES

Guided By Voices

Nowhere To Go But Up

    This record is massive and amazing. Nowhere To Go But Up is Guided By Voices’ third album of 2023 (and thirty-ninth overall) and is a sprawling, wild adventure. With virtually no choruses and just two repeated lyrics in forty minutes, GBV is audacious and unafraid.

    One of the most fully realized works that Guided By Voices has created, Nowhere To Go But Up showcases an expert rock band at the top of their game. The band is on a roll and unstoppable.

    Following their monumental 40th Anniversary Celebration in Dayton, Ohio, GBV begins their fifth decade with a bang!

    STAFF COMMENTS

    Barry says: You'd think that by an artists THIRTY NINTH album, they'd have a struggle coming up with the goods, but Pollard & co have once again crafted a beautifully psychedelic blast of epic proportions. It's got tons of heft, and packed to the brim with melody too.

    TRACK LISTING

    1. The Race Is On, The King Is Dead
    2. Puncher's Parade
    3. Local Master Airplane
    4. How Did He Get Up There?
    5. Stabbing At Fractions
    6. Love Set
    7. We're Going The Wrong Way In
    8. Jack Of Legs
    9. For The Home
    10. Cruel For Rats
    11. Song And Dance

    Guided By Voices

    Self-Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia - 2023 Reissue

      Self-Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia was Guided By Voices’ third album, self-released by the band in 1988 in a pressing of 500. While both of the band’s earlier albums exhibit strong songwriting and plenty of vision, it is here that the GBV sound really begins to coalesce. While Devil Between My Toes is rife with contrasts, variety, and dark psychedelia, and its follow up Sandbox is a cohesive ’60s-influenced affair, Self-Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia marries the two approaches to outstanding effect.

      Unsurprisingly, recording began before Sandbox was even done pressing. These sessions would yield an aborted LP titled Learning To Hunt, but after personnel changes and second thoughts, Robert Pollard shelved most of the tracks, dismissing them as too similar to those on Sandbox. Fair enough, as many of Pollard’s more recent songs were simply on another level than previously. Here are the first of the classic Pollard slow-burners, often built on a simple melodic or rhythmic figure that circles itself ever outward, accumulating heft, variation, and inevitability as the song evolves into something unexpected yet inevitable. It’s the aural equivalent to watching a butterfly grow out of its cocoon.

      A few things are unique to this particular LP. Original powerhouse drummer Peyton Eric returns for nearly half the tracks, while engineer and lead guitarist Steve Wilbur shines at his brightest, resulting in some of the most thoroughly rocking GBV songs to ever be cut to lacquer, such as “Earful o’ Wax,” which simply explodes out of the speakers when the solo section begins. On the other end of the spectrum, you get Pollard recording perfect pop gems at home with just voice and guitar, which would become a calling card on later GBV albums. There’s simply a tremendous variety of material, all strung together in such a way that the album is all of one piece, a mosaic.

      TRACK LISTING

      1. The Future Is In Eggs
      2. The Great Blake Street Canoe Race
      3. Slopes Of Big Ugly
      4. Paper Girl
      5. Navigating Flood Regions
      6. An Earful O’ Wax
      7. White Whale
      8. Trampoline
      9. Short On Posters
      10. Chief Barrel Belly
      11. Dying To Try This
      12. The Qualifying Remainder
      13. Liar’s Tale
      14. Radio Show (Trust The Wizard)

      Guided By Voices

      Welshpool Frillies

        Robert Pollard has a very strong work ethic. With most of their touring canceled due to the pandemic and then a fractured kneecap, Guided By Voices ran up an extremely prolific streak in the studio, recording and releasing eight albums in the past three years and garnering piles of rave four star and five star reviews in the process. In case one were snoozing, the last album, La La Land was Uncut magazine’s “Best Of The Month.”

        The pandemic records were particularly notable and unique that the band members recorded most of their instruments individually in separate cities. Welshpool Frillies finds the gang back together, in a Brooklyn basement with producer Travis Harrison. Much of it was recorded live to tape. The catchy ear worms in these new songs are undeniable, as the kinetic energy of the band is captured in its most raw and pure form. The album is brash, no-frills, and punky, inspired by the wiliness of 90s-era GBV, specifically the Scalping The Guru compilation that Pollard put together in 2022. 2023 marks the 40th anniversary of GBV’s start in Dayton, Ohio. Robert Pollard was an elementary school teacher with no formal music training, and his unlikely success has been an odds-defying adventure. It’s never too late to discover this vital rock band and join the GBV cult.

        Guided By Voices

        Sandbox - 2023 Reissue

          Even back in 1987, Guided By Voices was not content to release just one album in a year—Sandbox was released in the summer of that year following Devil Between My Toes’ appearance that February. Likewise, in similar GBV style, the sound and approach of the two albums could not be more different. Where Devil mostly mines a darker, lo-fi psychedia, along with several instrumental explorations, Sandbox is sunny, direct, has a bigger, crunchier sound, and zero instrumentals. Where Devil has a murky and impressionistic black and white photo of a rooster for a cover, Sandbox sports a full color photo of the band relaxing on a lawn on a sunny day. Let’s also recall that unlike today, in 1987 a full-color album jacket wasn’t just a little more expensive than a black and white one, it was way more expensive. Right up front, the band was communicating that this was a more commercially ambitious endeavor, while behind the scenes they rented better gear for a bigger sound, and tackled more sophisticated arrangements and honed in on the hooks and harmonies of the songs. Of all the band’s early self-released albums, Sandbox differs the most from the sound fans would later associate with the group, which is in itself a recommendation. Nowhere else will you hear the perfectly rendered three-part harmonies of “Long Distance Man,” direct Beatles quotes, or Robert Pollard reveling in his southern Ohio drawl. It’s also true that one of the more enjoyable aspects of the record is finding all the places where the band’s future is indeed foreshadowed. Simply put, Guided By Voices just can’t help but be a little weird, even when attempting something like a power pop album. At the close of the opening track, Pollard announces, “Ladies and gentlemen! Back by popular demand for your entertainment and spiritual enlightenment...Electric Jam Soul Aquarium!” a truly “wtf is happening here” moment. Or the stripped down gloom of “Trap Soul Door”—a track that could be right at home on nearly any later GBV album wherein Pollard intones, “Just one spark can start a hell of a fire.” Little did he know how true that statement would become.

          Guided By Voices

          La La Land

            La La Land doubles down on the intricate proggy-pop displayed on Guided By Voices’s last album Tremblers And Goggles By Rank. On a hot streak of critical acclaim, Robert Pollard continues expanding his songwriting towards extremes of prettiness, heaviness and poeticism. As always, unforgettable hooks are everywhere. But with this latest, it seems Pollard is playing with the extremes of his abilities as a songwriter, emboldened by the power of this lineup now on their fourteenth album together since 2017. The prettiest stuff is prettier than ever (“Queen Of Spaces”) and odder, more complex songs like “Slowly On The Wheel” combine minimalism, whimsy, and cinematic inclinations. There are the exquisite power pop bangers that fans come to expect like “Ballroom Etiquette” and “Pockets.” Tracks like “Instinct Dwelling” and “Caution Song” effortlessly display a cranked-up weight and complexity most bands could never muster. Celebrating forty years in 2023 with their thirty-eighth album, GBV has lately been garnering rave reviews from Rolling Stone, Stereogum, Brooklyn Vegan, Uncut, MOJO, Shindig, Paste, Popmatters, The Quietus and many more.

            TRACK LISTING

            1. Released Into Dementia
            2. Ballroom Etiquette
            3. Instinct Dwelling
            4. Queen Of Spaces
            5. Slowly On The Wheel
            6. Cousin Jackie
            7. Wild Kingdom
            8. Caution Song
            9. Face Eraser
            10. Pockets

            Guided By Voices

            Scalping The Guru

              Scalping The Guru is an archival Guided By Voices release, envisioned and sequenced by Robert Pollard as a cohesive album, featuring select tracks from four GBV EPs released in 1993-1994 by Domino, City Slang, Siltbreeze and Engine Records. These hard to find records are essential for fans of Vampire On Titus and Bee Thousand, with classics including “My Impression Now,” “Matter Eater Lad,” and “Big School.” They feature the line-up that includes Robert Pollard with Tobin Sprout, Mitch Mitchell, Kevin Fennell, Jim Pollard, Dan Toohey, Greg Demos, and Larry Keller. Recorded on four-track cassette by Tobin Sprout, with some songs lovingly fucked with by Mike Hummel.

              TRACK LISTING

              1. Matter Eater Lad
              2. Damn Good Mr. Jam
              3. Hunter Complex
              4. My Impression Now
              5. Scalding Creek
              6. Mobile
              7. Melted Pat
              8. Glow Boy Butlers
              9. Hey Aardvark
              10. Spring Tiger
              11. Rubber Man
              12. Big School
              13. Volcano Divers
              14. Indian Fables
              15. Pink Gun
              16. Dusty Bushworms
              17. Gelatin, Ice Cream Plum
              18. Grandfather Westinghouse
              19. Johnny Appleseed
              20. Scalping The Guru

              Guided By Voices

              Tremblers And Goggles By Rank

                Tremblers And Goggles By Rank marks a new phase in Robert Pollard’s songwriting evolution. His songs have always included non-traditional approaches to form and song structure, but with this album, he has pushed it further than ever. While the familiar Guided By Voices pop-craft and melodic virtuosity always occupies center stage, the first-time listener will never be able to predict what’s coming next in a song.

                “Alex Bell” and “Focus On The Flock” are the two anchors, each one expansive and filled with rock grandeur, and both exemplifying the complex wordplay, melodies, and structures that are hallmarks of the album.

                GBV’s latest batch of brilliant songs ride on colorful psychedelic flourishes and brash post-punk textures that make this ten-song album a one-of-a-kind head trip.

                While there are hooks and earworms aplenty within, this album is a complex and kaleidoscopic journey, representing a new echelon in the Guided By Voices universe. It represents another level of songwriting and performance from the group. It plays out like an intricate and powerful collage, in a very multicolored and multi-faceted fashion; a work grand in scale and undertaking.

                There are triumphant and glorious choruses, deep and dark wormholes, sinewy twists and turns, bold and theatrical bravados, massive cliffs, plateaus, peaks, and valleys - these emotional landscapes reach new and unexpected heights along the way.

                TRACK LISTING

                1. Lizard On The Red Brick Wall
                2. Alex Bell
                3. Unproductive Funk
                4. Roosevelt's Marching Band
                5. Goggles By Rank
                6. Cartoon Fashion (Bongo Lake)
                7. Boomerang
                8. Focus On The Flock
                9. Puzzle Two
                10. Who Wants To Go Hunting?

                Robert Pollard

                Our Gaze

                  On Oct 9, 2007, Robert Pollard simultaneously released two albums on Merge Records: Standard Gargoyle Decisions and Coast To Coast Carpet Of Love. Both now out of print, Pollard has reimagined and condensed the two as Our Gaze, a single fifteen song album. Because it’s better.

                  TRACK LISTING

                  1. The Killers
                  2. Pill Gone Girl
                  3. Count Us In
                  4. The Island Lobby
                  5. Rud Fins
                  6. Current Desperation
                  (Angels Speak Of Nothing)
                  7. Hero Blows The Revolution
                  8. Come Here Beautiful
                  9. Shadow Port
                  10. Miles Under The Skin
                  11. Folded Claws
                  12. Feel Not Crushed
                  13. Youth Leagues
                  14. When We Were Slaves
                  15. Our Gaze

                  Guided By Voices

                  Devil Between My Toes - 2022 Reissue

                    Devil Between My Toes was the debut album by Guided By Voices, originally self-released by the group in February 1987 in an edition of 300 copies. Disillusioned by the lukewarm reception to the band’s debut EP the previous year, Robert Pollard resolved that this record would be conceived for an audience of one: “(it) is strictly for me and me only. Because no one’s going to buy it, no one gives a fuck, but I’m still gonna do it. So I might as well put only what I want on it, for me. An album for me.”

                    Even amongst the 30-odd proper GBV albums, Devil Between My Toes remains unique, and not simply because it was the first to be released. Much like its out-of-focus cover photo of the mean rooster next door (Big Daddy), the album’s vibe is dark, minimalist, and mysterious. Most of the album was recorded as a trio, and it contains more instrumentals than any other GBV album, but like the best LPs in their catalog, the sequencing renders these tracks essential to the flow and mood of the LP. While there are the expected Brit Invasion hookfests sprinkled throughout, we’re also treated to career highlights like the monolithic “A Portrait Destroyed by Fire” (Tobin Sprout’s first GBV appearance) and “Cyclops,” a track that would be right at home on Vampire On Titus had it been recorded more crudely.

                    TRACK LISTING

                    1. Old Battery
                    2. Discussing Wallace Chambers
                    3. Cyclops
                    4. Crux
                    5. A Portrait Destroyed By Fire
                    6. 3 Year Old Man
                    7. Dog's Out
                    8. A Proud And Booming Industry
                    9. Hank's Little Fingers
                    10. Artboat
                    11. Hey Hey, Spaceman
                    12. The Tumblers
                    13. Bread Alone
                    14. Captain's Dead

                    Guided By Voices

                    Crystal Nuns Cathedral

                      The mighty Guided By Voices are set to unleash upon the world their 35th and quite possibly…best album, Crystal Nuns Cathedral. How do they do it you might ask? Well we have no idea how they do it, but we certainly do know why they do it. They do it because quite honestly we need them to do it. The world needs The Rock, and we need loud guitars, we need anthemic songs, we need a reason to raise a rock fist in the air and give a “Hell Yeah”! On Crystal Nuns Cathedral, the band delivers all of this and so much more.

                      Just four months since It’s Not Them. It Couldn’t Be Them. It Is Them!, comes this latest, twelve songs determined to challenge for the title of greatest Guided by Voices album of all-time. Hyperbole you say? Not this time. The guitars are bigger, the arrangements are more ambitious, the songs are uplifting, epic, and as incredibly hook-laden as always!

                      Pure power pop perfection like lead single “Excited Ones” mix perfectly with the slow burning “Climbing A Ramp,” which reaches its climax on a stunning guitar lead before dissolving into the fist pumping anthem “Never Mind the List,” which serves as the beating heart of the entire album. Do you still need convincing? Listen to the one-two punch of “Forced to Sea” and “Huddled” and marvel at the epic scope and vision of an incredible band on full display.

                      This record is a statement, a challenge, a monument, a call to arms. Top this one if you can, this is the new benchmark. Who will best it? Who will try? Listen to Crystal Nuns Cathedral, and report back to us. We will be eagerly waiting.

                      STAFF COMMENTS

                      Barry says: THIRTY FIVE albums later, and Pollard & co are sounding at possibly their most incendiary for years. It's a bold and raucous collection, punctuated with moments of levity and wry humour, and absolutely jam-packed with the riffs and psychedelic progressions we all know and love from this musical institution.

                      TRACK LISTING

                      1. Eye City
                      2. Re-Develop
                      3. Climbing A Ramp
                      4. Never Mind The List
                      5. Birds In The Pipe
                      6. Come North Together
                      7. Forced To Sea
                      8. Huddled
                      9. Excited Ones
                      10. Eyes Of Your Doctor
                      11. Mad River Man
                      12. Crystal Nuns Cathedral

                      Guided By Voices

                      It's Not Them, It Could Be Them It Is Them!

                        It’s been just a few months since Guided By Voice’s faux rock opera Earth Man Blues garnered four-star and five-star reviews, with Rolling Stone proclaiming that it “squarely hits all the marks that make Guided By Voices great - again and again and again.”

                        “Again and again and again”, is perhaps GBV’s credo, with Robert Pollard’s never-ending supply of fascinating and supremely catchy rock. Just when one thinks one’s got them pinned down, album number thirty-four opens with bizarre percussion, mariachi trumpets, strings and acoustic guitar. The adventurous spirit pervades yet another killer album from the greatest and most versatile GBV line-up. The golden boys (Doug Gillard, Bobby Bare Jr, Mark Shue, Kevin March) can do no wrong.

                        Hooky singles “My (Limited) Engagement”, “High In The Rain” and “Dance of Gurus” intermingle with occasionally dark lyrics and the oddest of GBV oddballs, the ridiculous “Razor Bug”, “Psycho House”, and the “Maintenance Man Of The Haunted House”. The horns and strings return intermittently, with “The Bells Get Out Of The Way” going full Burt Bacharach. It’s Not Them. It Couldn’t Be Them. It Is Them! is a creative tourde- force full of surprises from the most prolific and captivating band on the planet.

                        TRACK LISTING

                        1. Spanish Coin
                        2. High In The Rain
                        3. Dance Of Gurus
                        4. Flying Without A License
                        5. Psycho House
                        6. Maintenance Man Of The Haunted House
                        7. I Share A Rhythm 8. Razor Bug
                        9. I Wanna Monkey
                        10. Cherub And The Great Child Actor
                        11. Black And White Eyes In A Prism
                        12. People Need Holes
                        13. The Bell Gets Out Of The Way
                        14. Chain Gang Island
                        15. My (Limited) Engagement

                        Guided By Voices

                        Isolation Drills - 2021 Reissue

                          Originally released in 2001, Isolation Drills is the twelfth album by Dayton, Ohio indie rock group Guided by Voices. It was their second and final LP released under TVT Records and their second to feature producer in Rob Schnapf. The album notably features instrumental contributions from Elliott Smith and David Sulzer. This special 20th Anniversary Edition has been remastered and it is included on double gatefold vinyl for the first time. The packaging mirrors the original foldout design from the limited cd digipak.

                          TRACK LISTING

                          Disc: 1
                          1. Sister I Need Wine
                          2. Fair Touching
                          3. Want One?
                          4. Skills Like This
                          5. The Enemy
                          6. Chasing Heather Crazy
                          7. Unspirited
                          8. Frostman
                          9. Twilight Campfighter

                          Disc: 2
                          1. How's My Drinking?
                          2. Glad Girls
                          3. The Brides Have Hit Glass
                          4. Run Wild
                          5. Pivotal Film
                          6. Fine To See You
                          7. Privately

                          Guided By Voices

                          Under The Bushes Under The Stars

                            Guided By Voices’ long out-of-print ninth studio album repressed on vinyl - originally released in 1996 as the follow up to the breakthrough Alien Lanes, Under The Bushes Under The Stars further cemented GBV as one of rock music’s most lauded contributors

                            TRACK LISTING

                            Man Called Aerodynamics
                            Rhine Jive Click
                            Cut-Out Witch
                            Burning Flag Birthday Suit
                            The Official Ironmen Rally Song
                            To Remake The Young Flyer
                            No Sky
                            Bright Paper Werewolves
                            Lord Of Overstock
                            Your Name Is Wild
                            Ghosts Of A Different Dream
                            Acorns & Orioles
                            Look At Them
                            The Perfect Life
                            Underwater Explosions
                            Atom Eyes
                            Don't Stop Now
                            Office Of Hearts
                            Big Boring Wedding
                            It's Like Soul Man
                            Drag Days
                            Sheetkickers
                            Redmen And Their Wives
                            Take To The Sky

                            Guided By Voices

                            Half Smiles Of The Decomposed

                              The final Matador album from Dayton, Ohio’s legendary geniuses Guided By Voices which, at the time, was set to be their last ever. After twenty- odd years, twenty-odd line ups and twenty-odd albums, EPs, singles, triples, stolen bases, misdemeanour convictions and broken hearts, Dayton’s fortunate sons took a leave of absence only to re-emerge in 2010 at a certain label’s 21st birthday celebrations in Las Vegas. Back in print for the first time since 2008!

                              TRACK LISTING

                              Everyone Thinks I’m A
                              Raincloud (When I’m Not
                              Looking)
                              Sleep Over Jack
                              Girls Of Wild
                              Strawberries
                              Gonna Never Have To Die
                              Window Of My World
                              Closets Of Henry
                              Tour Guide At Winston
                              Churchill Memorial
                              Asia Minor
                              Sons Of Apollo
                              Sing For Your Meat
                              Asphyxiated Circle
                              A Second Spurt Of
                              Growth
                              (S)Mothering And
                              Coaching
                              Huffman Prairie Flying


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