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GUIDED BY VOICES
Do The Collapse (TVT Records)
Reviewed by Jason Thornberry
GBV luckily found a speedy post-Matador Records home at TVT, hosting also the wonderful XTC. This being their twelfth album, with literally dozens of 7" and compact disc EPs, it answers quite a few questions I'm sure a lot of people have about the band. First: Is the well finally, after all this time, running dry for this Dayton, Ohio combo? The lead, uh, Voice belonging to their singer/primary song-writer Robert Pollard, and his growing catalog of down-time solo LPs (he has three, presently) would make one feel that Bob can 'keep up the good work' forever, but is GBV almost done? Almost? Secondly would be the veneer, the gloss placed onto this record by Ric Ocasek (The Cars) and his pristine-yet-analog-sounding-enough-to-still-rock production. Working on Weezer's first, self-titled effort helped immeasurably, and obviously, in bringing the sixteen songs herein into sharp focus.
This is no doubt my favorite album by the Guided By Voices, second only to the sonically un-glossy (recorded on a grimy 4-track machine) 1994 Bee Thousand CD. A very, very strong, hook-laden record. You'll find yourself absent-mindedly singing "she's bleeding now, she's receiving now, she's defeating now-ow-ow-ow, wreckiiiiing" like i did the other day. Only you'll be getting in the bus queue with everyone staring at you like you've gone mad.
Lastly is the near-complete firing of the earlier version of Guided By Voices. Robert Pollard hired Cincinnati's Cobra Verde to back him for 1997's Mag Earwhig! album, but sacked everyone from that band except guitarist Doug Gillard, who, coincidentally, shares the spotlight on Pollard’s newest solo LP. Does the continual personnel upheaval cause GBV's music to have a fractured or fragmented quality? A rudderless din? Have the razor-sharp hooks that came so naturally to Mr. Pollard (as he was addressed in his old job as an elementary school teacher) been somehow dulled in the process? With a CD as strong as this one, the answer to these questions is a resounding NO!
© 2000 - Jason Thornberry