Guided By Voices
http://www.guidedbyvoices.com

styles: indie rock, lo-fi
others: Pavement, Sebadoh, Bob Mould

Universal Truths and Cycles
Matador Records, 2002
rating: 7.9
reviewer: clement coleman

If you haven't heard a Guided by Voices album in some time, then I highly recommend Isolation Drills (2001), the second GBV outing with major label TVT Records. Prepare yourself for something startling, however, for the band on that release is a strong, forceful power pop outfit with burnished flags flying high. There is very little fuzz, and not a single registered cough caught on tape. Also, the songs on that album are fairly grim, as divorce or something like it finally caught up with Bob Pollard and brought his brilliant imagination down to hard earth. Isolation Drills exposed not just a great rock band, but a band exploring crisper forms and painful melancholy. Isolation Drills qualifies with 1997s Mag Earwig (Matador) and the twin polestars of indie rock magnificence, Bee Thousand (1994, Scat Records) and Alien Lanes (1995, Matador). If you've been exposed to Isolation Drills, then come along and sample Universal Truths and Cycles. The band has come home to roost with Matador Records, and advance press describes this new LP as the marriage of Alien Lanes and Isolation Drills. This sounds like a desirable union, but the new LP lacks the one thing those albums shared: absolute confidence. That being said, Universal Truths and Cycles is rammed full of imagination, harmony, and energy. It just lacks the impeccable artistic voice and concision of its predecessor.

With the arrival of this new and eclectic album, Guided by Voices has delivered a fine collection of songs for summer bonfires, rope swings and other great beer sports. Universal Truths and Cycles holds 4-star singles like "Everywhere with Helicopter" and "Back to the Lake," and these are backed up with the giddy ephemera of "The Ids Are Alright" and "Wire Greyhounds." Pollard is an artist with prolific abilities, and in the past it seemed that whatever product the man delivered, he invariably hit the mark with awesome songs of roughly- hewn brit-pop and folk-metal. A pattern seems to have set in, however, and the quality of his records depends more than ever on his ability to harness his editorial skills and deliver first-rate music. If Pollard doesn't have anyone in his stable whom he can depend on for sharp criticism, then hell suffer the fate of the genius surrounded by yes-men. Evidence of this first appeared on Do the Collapse (2000), the first TVT-issued LP, infamously produced in a beer-free environment by Ric Ocasek. A smart combination of talents was sunk from the start by a song-stable of poor GBV-imitations. Pablo Picasso said it: one should always imitate but never imitate oneself, and the maxim is proved true when artists of such voluminous productivity as Bob Pollard enter the realm of self-parody.

And yet, I wonder how you could pen thousands of songs as Pollard has in the space of 10 years, and not begin to sound like mere regurgitation of oneself? Pollard answers such questions with dexterity and invention on "Cheyenne," which proves the first highlight on Universal Truths. As beautiful a GBV cut as you've ever heard, "Cheyenne" is a sermon on the form and craft of elocution in song. Pollard wraps his vocal chords around the title and song-chorus: "Chey- ey- enne!!!" flipping the word open and tossing the melody up and away. This is discovery, not invention, and you can hear the man as he witnesses it. Unpretentious power inhabits the best of the cuts on this new LP. For the most part, the new platter succeeds in avoiding the pitfalls that beset the group throughout Do the Collapse.

Pollard hasn't fallen into that pit of self-imitation very often, and Universal Truths and Cycles clearly basks in the notion that great art is a cyclical and living thing. Echoes of of the past can just as often be rewarding rather than dull. Even so, it is not with the familiar GBV experimentation of yore that this record really pleases. No, it is when Guided by Voices pumps out red-blooded rock songs that Universal Truths makes the case for some sort of rock and roll reincarnation. Nostalgia has always been central to the Guided by Voices mission, but if they sink into a morass of wistful self- elegy, their spark will quickly fade.

The burnished production of Isolation Drills lingers on Universal Truths, but it feels like the cloak without the britches. Pollard and company deliver the hot licks and respectable percussion that are required, but the "experimental" moments seem to be carted out without purpose. There's a touch of string arrangements, but nothing like the expertly woven stuff on the last outing. If its not meant to be there, then leave it behind, or put it out on a Rockathon spin-off.

Bob Pollard is, if not the insane incarnation of Paul McCartney, then the sane ghost of Captain Beefheart. He couldn't have been invented in the dreams of a thousand restless teenagers. Bee Thousand and Alien Lanes were shocking testaments to anarchic discovery and poetry. Subsequent albums and side-projects explored what remained of this territory. After two decades of search and destroy, on the hunt for an audience with the very essence of the creative spark, Bob Pollard seemed to have arrived at the mighty rock of Isolation Drills. This was not a record about music, about pop, or about the fleeting flame of idea. Isolation Drills is a pop rock LP virtually free of questions. This Album marked the groups arrival. As a follow up, Universal Truths and Cycles is eminently
pleasurable and rewarding. It is perhaps the first new effort on an expedition that finally reached the Pacific Ocean. The men woke up the next morning and found a little canoe. Oh well, here goes...

1. Wire Greyhounds
2. Skin Parade
3. Zap
4. Christian Animation Torch Carriers
5. Cheyenne
6. The Weeping Bogeyman
7. Back to the Lake
8. Love 1
9. Storm Vibrations
10. Factory of Raw Essentials
11. Everywhere With Helicopter
12. Pretty Bombs
13. Eureka Signs
14. Wings of Thorn
15. Car Language
16. From a Voice Plantation
17. The Ids are Alright
18. Universal Truths and Cycles
19. Father Sgt. Christmas Card

Isolation Drills
TVT, 2001
rating: 9.0
reviewer: rather ripped

From the super-cool fighter jet collage cover with lyric foldout to the no-BS production wizardry of Rob Schnapf (who knew a "real" producer could actually bottle up the magic that is Bob Pollard and sell it??!) this is a deeply satisfying 100% pure rock and roll record made by and for true believers as is impossible to find nowadays.

Surprisingly, I have seen people aged 21 to 61 at GBV shows, so I guess some of the kids these days still know what rock is. I have a memory of roaring across the Richmond Bridge at 3 AM with an old friend blasting Who's Next and thinking "THIS is the ultimate soundtrack to my life!"

Well, now this is. This record makes me feel 15 again! I want to finish every sentence with an "!" when I write about this record!

Fair Touching
A demonstration of how you can take GBV out of the basement studio but you'll never take the basement studio out of GBV. This is the iron gauntlet slap in the face to all those nay sayers who claimed that a professional production would "ruin" GBV...well, this song was recorded inside a freaking coffee can under Bob's side project Lexo and the Leapers, and here it is pumped up on the multitrack board, and by golly, it rocks like a satchel of gravel. Best line describing the "Farewell Ladies" that seem to occupy many of his songs: "Does it snap or just happen?"

Skills Like This
Not one to lose momentum by the second song, Bob tosses this thunderer out for the neophytes and old friends alike, just as he does the Bud longnecks he chucks like circus knives to the unsuspecting front row. Evoking equal parts AC/DC, Bad Company, the Who, the whole Punk Rock catalogue, and every previous horse-frightening GBV anthem, herein Uncle Bob both invites and warns. Accessible though its guitar-thrustings may be, the Captain nevertheless makes no bones about the addictive and intoxicating experience that awaits. "....do you want me in your head?...who will be the human boot?" Best line is the punchline: "I'll reunite you"

Chasing Heather Crazy
Heavy Rotation! Pure pop, pure GBV, fun for the whole family! Best line: "Staring out from otherworldy windows painted red"...

Frostman
A little lo-fi for the oldtimers! Bob plunking and spelunking for rhyme crimes on his couch! Reminding us all the much-repeated quote, "I can write 25 songs on the crapper, and twenty of them will be good ones." Surprisingly a moment of poignance amidst all the revelry. It's a sad song, like a tear from Falstaff's weary eye. And it's over in a heartbeat. A stolen moment.

Twilight Campfighter
With more delicious wordplay--notice the multilayered resonance between "campfire" and "firefighter" (remember the cowboy of "Hold On Hope" whose campfire flickers on the landscape? Here he is again, the weatherbeaten American rock hero bruised but unbeaten by circumstance), the striking image of a "fire [built] into an open wound", the ironic counterpoise of the rhyme "congratulate" and "late"...Bob sets himself up again as the doubtful rock and roll superhero everyman we all relate to so well. Best line: "On these darker trails/With light revealing holy grails..."

Sister I Need Wine
Both gorgeous and sad, herein is stated Bob's bacchanalian philosophy in a nutshell, in which he invites his Muse to help him "Drink the truth/Shed not one tear"...yet its minor-chord, muted threnody implies perhaps a mild desperation, as if we can feel the supressed pain lurking beneath where the "backed-up river spreads"...a song for the first sip where "How's My Drinking?" dregs somewhere at the bottom of the magnum...

Want One?
Perhaps in this song above all others is Bob's nod to past British Invasions most clearly noted in a swaggering Humble Pie-esque guitar-sneer and invitations to partake in "A nursery whip/for men who skip...", calling to mind footage of Keith Moon in "The Kids Are Allright" being whipped by a dominatrix during an interview...psychedelic, groovy, and sick, worthy of Zep's "Physical Graffitti", here they show us how GBV manages to be both "Alternative" AND "Classic Rock".

The Enemy
A heart-stirring sample of "Broadcaster House" from GBV's seminal release "Clown Prince of the Menthol Trailer", featuring some of Bob's least lucid beery howling, followed by an ominous 4/4 guitar fanfare reminiscent of Wire's "154"...GBV's greatest nod, as always, is to themselves. Best line: "A childproof survival kit/Just for a glimpse/Of the everlasting big kick"

Unspirited
In which Bob disses the competition, the critics, the nay-sayers, and perhaps a few discarded fairweather friends with a wry flair that would make your average hip hop DJ doff his Kangol. Best line: "When you lose it all, you'll think of me/When you take the fall, you'll drink to me/I'm the one who did it painlessly/I'm the one who does it..."

Glad Girls
LAUNCH FRISBEES! AVAST YE LANDLUBBERS! BOB'S AWAY!!!!!
What we used to call "A real corker". In some ways reminiscent of "You Shook Me All Night Long", although the lyrics are far more transportive. Best line: "There will be no coronation/There will be no flowers flowing/In the light that passes through me..." Bless us, Uncle Bob!

Run Wild
Even after the previous salvo the band's guns are not yet spent. In a brooding  heavy-rock stomp exploding into an anthemic major-chord chorus, somewhat reminiscent of very early Utopia, Bob paints a brief, disquieting
portrait--eerily prophetic--of our wartime landscape: "Think of a no parking zone/where armored cars keep the street/and every heart seeks inspiration", which is followed by his  audibly inebriated rallying cry, "Leave your things in the streets/And run wild".  He could be ranting against globalist consumerism--"your things" being our cell  phones, SUVs, snowboards, etc.--but with Bob it's always hard to say. There's even a note of desperation in the guitar solo, a climbing wail almost like an air raid siren. The "Run wild" part, though, speaks for its Bacchanalian self. In the studio as well as live, this one always seems to be timed to coincide with Bob's
lowest level of coherence. But the passion is still there.

Pivotal Film
This one really gets me. It's GBV's "If 6 Was 9", only instead of "White collar conservatives" Bob torpedoes "scenesters" who, "grotesque and arrogant/perfect for the experts", "showing cloaks of rubber" like ridiculous superheroes (or cinematic Batmen), who from their "critical rooms" end up "exit[ing] into thin air". The comparison to the J. Hendrix Experience here is not a loose one--witness the swaggering, almost military, yet still laid-back-intoxicated roll of the drums  against a guitar snarl that sneers. He appears to be repeating the old
refrain: It's only rock and roll, puncturing the self-importance of the elite-purist indie-pundits and poseurs who have frequently stood on the sidelines vainly stroking their goatees wondering about Bob's deep significance, or lack thereof. Again, a lugubrious dismissal any gangsta rapper would be proud of--that is if, in his elocution, English Teacher Bob isn't talking straight over their heads.

How's My Drinking?
As short and sweet as any classic GBV tidbit, though lush with piano and chiming guitars, Bob's proud alcoholism enshrined in a golden nutshell. Probably the most defiant, yet poignant, song next to "Frostman". I remember at the GBV concert at the Showbox earlier this year my wife, who was seeing GBV for the first time,
turning to me and saying, "Enjoy him while you can. I don't think he's going to be  around much longer." But that's good advice for us all, if you think about it.

The Brides Have Hit Glass
Most artists would have stopped there...but here comes another one of what endless writers have dubbed "pop gems", in which Bob gets so self-referential he name checks the song he's singing! Yet, at the same time, this swinging tune, somewhat reminiscent of Merseybeat or other early Brit Invasion, manages to be one of
his most thoughtful. "To be on top of your own world/With no guardrails to cling to/You fall so very fast" isn't just self-referential, it's reflective. It's hard  to write Bob off as a monument to dysfunctional-ism with statements like that.

Fine To See You
Amazingly, this could also be a fine last song on the album for 99% of the album-makers out there--you can easily visualize row upon row of teary-eyed fans waving lighters at this old-fashioned, almost corny farewell to an imaginary concert audience. And yet, they still keep going!--much like they do live and in person.

Privately
Bob always has to have the last word. The guitars surge one last time like the turning wing of their departing rock star jet plane, and the violins wave goodbye. The lyrics seem to imply an admonition to long time fans who, as long time fans always do, might have tried to press Bob in their yearbooks and not want him to
rise from obscurity and become famous the way it always seems to happen...the Clash, REM, your favorite band here...he says, "In the midst of this effort/Courageous tongues are bitter/Don't blast them/Bring posters and
broadcast/Not a public display/But a new secret". In other words, the obscure and intimate quality of a great band like GBV need not be lost, but can actually be shared by everyone. For someone as cynical as Bob this is a strangely idealistic, almost naive sentiment, but his obvious belief in it is what may help GBV succeed in remaining, even in the face of being loved by all mankind and on sale at K-Mart, the coolest obscure indie rock band in the world.

There are my humble opinions--of course, your own experience of this album will be  its own inner universe, untouchable and unreadable as the closing words, which  might even be addressed to you: "Cigarette lifter/The frozen violins/Solid movement//Privately". A fitting last word for an album by anyone's favorite band.

1. Fair Touching
2. Skills Like This
3. Chasing Heather Crazy
4. Frostman
5. Twilight Campfighter
6. Sister I Need Wine
7. Want One?
8. The Enemy
9. Unspirited
10. Glad Girls
11. Run Wild
12. Pivotal Film
13. How's My Drinking?
14. The Brides Have Hit Glass
15. Fine to See You
16. Privately