By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Mirrored Aztec, Suitcase – Failed Experiments and Trashed Aircraft I used to write songs. After a while, it started to feel pointless. Robert Pollard was writing songs like “Bunco Men” and then not even releasing them on albums; we didn’t get to hear most of them until the first […]
Tag: Guided By Voices
Hudson Rake
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Space Gun “Hudson Rake” is a spooky-sounding song, and its lyrics’ origins have an eeriness to them as well. Apparently, Bob Pollard had had a dream where he was being carried over someone’s shoulder. Another person passed and remarked, “There was a terrible accident last night,” at which point […]
Jon The Croc
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Class Clown Spots A UFO As much as I’m a fan of the non-traditional chords that populate so much of Robert Pollard’s music, I also love when he keeps it simple. “Jon The Croc” is an example of Pollard using conventional chords and a standard rock song structure to […]
Table At Fool’s Tooth
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Cool Planet You know Robert Pollard has a knack for cramming an obscene amount of rock into a minute and a half’s worth of music. In “Table At Fool’s Tooth” from Cool Planet, he’s at it again; this tune clocks in at just one minute and twenty-one seconds, all […]
Know Me As Heavy
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: English Little League There’s nothing I don’t love about “Know Me As Heavy” from English Little League. There’s a great combined vocal performance by Robert Pollard and Tobin Sprout, some of Pollard’s trademark cryptic lyrics, and also a sampling of some of his various guitar songwriting techniques at play. This […]
Apology In Advance
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Earthquake Glue Earthquake Glue is a Guided By Voices album that I’ve always loved, and yet some of its songs took longer for me to realize their greatness. When it was first released, the obvious hits to me were “I’ll Replace You With Machines,” “The Best Of Jill Hives,” […]
I Think A Telescope
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Please Be Honest “I Think A Telescope” finds Robert Pollard deftly plucking a series of single notes on his acoustic guitar’s strings during one of the gentler moments on Please Be Honest. He alternates between a fretted note on one string and an open note on the string above, culminating in […]
Burning Flag Birthday Suit
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Under The Bushes Under The Stars “Burning Flag Birthday Suit” uses a bit of the Floating Chord Shapes technique, with Pollard moving an open D chord shape up and down the guitar neck for some parts, and doing the same with an open G5 chord later in the song. […]
Your Cricket Is Rather Unique
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Sweating The Plague It’s hardly unusual for a member of Guided By Voices other than Robert Pollard to handle vocal duties for a song or two. Tobin Sprout performed vocals for the many songs he contributed to the band during his time, and Nick Mitchell sang his own tunes on […]
You Own The Night
By: Guided By Voices Appears on: Zeppelin Over China The first single from the upcoming Guided By Voices double LP, Zeppelin Over China, is titled “You Own The Night,” and it’s a full-on Pollardian suite of a tune, complete with various pieces of music stitched together as a sonic collage and an undeniable hook of a chorus. […]
