Long-term fans will be relieved to hear that the first album of new material from the classic Guided By Voices line-up since 1997’s Mag Earwig! is every bit as sprawling, obtuse and uncompromising as the albums produced by Robert Pollard and company in their mid-90s pomp.
In getting back to their roots (recording sessions took place in bandmates’ homes and garages), GBV have rediscovered the chemistry and shared influences that allows them to make an album with the contrasts of The Big Hat And Toy Show (a thoroughly disconcerting slice of eerie Beefheart) and the strangely melancholy pop of Doughnut For A Snowman – yet still sound like no other band. Elsewhere, straightahead rockers such as The Unsinkable Fats Domino and Chocolate Boy rank among their most immediate, melodic moments, while remaining as lyrically allusive and musically raucous as GBV were in their heyday; and an edgier side is unleashed with the Cramps-evoking Spiderfighter and God Loves Us.
Old Bones is perhaps the album’s most startling moment: a dirge that recalls Brian Wilson’s A Day In The Life Of A Tree, it’s oddly touching, with a fragility that’s also present on Who Invented The Sun. An embarrassment of riches, LGETF may be a mess at times, but gloriously so.
