indy cd & vinyl

STEPHEN MALKMUS & THE JICKS—Real Emotional Trash

Stephen Malkmus headed up Pavement, one of the most seminal indie-rock bands of all time. Pavement was most often characterized by Malkmus’ off-handed lyricism and winning way with a melody. Occasionally, however, Malkmus would indulge his guitar jones. This seemed to happen most often when the band was lacking a full bag of catchy tunes for their next album. On Real Emotional Trash, on the other hand, what we have is an album chock-full of good tunes AND Malkmus putting down the best guitar playing of his career. The album is full of solos both short and long, taut and stretched out, all the while surrounded by great melodies and tight ensemble playing. The addition on drums of Janet Weiss, late of the much-missed Sleater-Kinney, may be key in this development, as Malkmus may well have found a musical foil with skills equal to his own. Whatever the reason, Real Emotional Trash ranks right up there with the finest work of Malkmus’ career. Opener “Dragonfly Pie” starts things off with a heavy metal-like riff, which gives way to a nursery rhyme chorus (with marimba!), which then circle back to the riff. And in the middle and end, a few loud and beautiful guitar solos find their place. Second song “Hopscotch Willie” seemingly tells the story of so-named small-time crook who says, “Can’t blame me for my guilty face/It was a gift from my mother and my father in place/Of all the love they should have given/They just left me with this dirty DNA”. It starts with a strummed acoustic and great tom-tom work by Weiss, and the adds some very sweet slide work, before concluding with another amplified wig-out. Tune after tune follow in this vein, contrasting sticky sweet hooks and melodies with indie-rock guitar-god excursions.  One gets the feeling that these songs will be powerhouses when played live.