The Tale Of the Pixies …Just Gigantic

John Robb retraces the twists and turns of the legendary Boston band, The Pixies.

Few bands have become as loved as The Pixies. John Robb examines the band whose brief flight in the late Eighties was the touchstone for a whole generation of alternative rock; they became far bigger after their split and have rightfully reunited to bask in the glory. Credited with inventing the quiet verse/loud chorus dynamic of rock song writing, The Pixies managed to meld an unlikely raft of influences and change the course of alt. rock forever.

Credited with being one of the first bands to break the post punk alternative into the mainstream, the band paved the way for Nirvana and were a big influence on much of the Britpop scene in the mid Nineties, being one of the few American bands it was deemed OK like by the alternative establishment.
The Pixies were formed in Boston in 1986 by Charles Thompson who, inspired by Iggy Pop, decided on a name change and became Black Francis, and with his then roommate Joey Santiago. Francis was born in California and had moved to the East Coast during high school before becoming anthropology major at the University of Massachusetts.

Halfway through his course he went to Puerto Rico to study Spanish but, six months into the course, the lure of rock ‘n’ roll proved to strong and he returned to the States to put a band together. Dropping out of university he moved to Boston and persuaded Santiago to join him in his new venture.
The pair of them advertised in a music paper for a bass player who liked Husker Du and Peter Paul and Mary. They were on the lookout for something different and the advert is a dead giveaway to a warped vision. Husker Du had blitzkrieg the underground with their fine ear for melody and explosive intense fast as fuck take on punk rock, they had come up with ‘Beatles Through A Fuzzbox’ mantra that would, along with The Pixies, be such a keenly felt influence in the next few years. The Peter, Paul and Mary influence on the Pixies would be on their use of pop melody to counterpoint their explosive quirkiness. An advert as loaded as this could only attract someone with a keen sense of pop absurd into the breach stepped Kim Deal (name checked as Mrs John Murphy and the first two records).
Deal had been messing around Dayton Ohio in the mid Eighties with her twin sister Kelly in a band called The Breeders and was looking for a change, after all Dayton is hardly one of the great rock ‘n’ roll towns – being a rusty Midwest small town.

On Deal’s advice the band picked up drummer David Lovering and they called themselves The Pixies after, in that time honoured and desperate way, they flicked through a dictionary and grabbed the first name that caught their eye.

The band chugged around the local Boston circuit during 1986, a time when rock was changing. The Eighties mainstream was a terrible time, all faux modern and new romantic blustering but the underground was vibrant. Post punk had thrown up some amazing new shapes in music and bands like Sonic Youth and Big Black were beginning to make inroads on the underground; a starker more shredded sound was the flavour as bands stretched the possibilities of rock to their very limit. The Pixies melodic charged shrapnel rock was well placed to make an impact.

The Pixies were by now supporting fellow Boston band The Throwing Muses and the pair of groups fitted each other very well. It was at a Throwing Muses gig that Gary Smith, a producer and manager heard The Pixies and offered to demo the band. In March 1987 The Pixies went to the legendary Boston studio Fort Apache studio, a session paid for by Black Francis’ dad, recorded 18 songs in 3 days to make the ‘purple tape’ – a demo that was handed out to members of the Boston rock congesti and eventually by word of mouth, the international underground. Ivo Watts, head honcho of 4AD records was one of the people who got the tape and signed the band up immediately in a brilliant stroke of foresight.

Eight of the demo songs made it onto the bands first EP ‘Come On Pilgrim’ in 1987. Right from the off, the band’s genius from the screeched ‘Repent’ opener ‘Caribou’ to the final scrunch of guitar this was a gifted and highly original debut.

hallmarks are all in place from Black Francis’ intense, unearthly, shrieking vocal, Santiago’s distinctive shrapnel guitar and the shit tight rhythm section keeping it simple and twisted plus Kim Deal’s backing vocals that keep the whole thing melodic and yet make it even kookier.

There are echoes of the surf rock signature that was a keynote to so many Pixies songs on ‘Ed Is Dead’ and you can hear hints of classic influences like the Stooges and Lou Reed but, somehow, The Pixies on their very first release had stumbled into a sound of their own with a theatrical spook, that was very much their own signature twisting the simple garage rock into completely new shapes. Francis’ lyrical interest in sex, death and religion and twisted sense of humour gave the record a feel of its own. It was obvious right from the start, that the Pixies were dealing out something very very special

The PIXIES – ‘Caribou’ (live)

The PIXIES – ‘Ed Is Dead’ (audio only)

Triumphant, the band set to work on their debut album with Big Blacks’ Steve Albini who was just starting out on his production career. Working back to back on Slint’s awesome debut and my own band, The Membranes, current album, Albini was already a workaholic and somehow managed to shoe horn The Pixies sessions as well. Whereas the other records he was making in the cellar of his suburban Chicago house, The Pixies was his first in a proper studio. Albini gave the ‘Surfer Rosa’ album a harder much more linear edge and the marriage between both parties was perfect. The Pixies noisenik tendencies were drawn out but their tough melodies remained intact.

The album showcased all sides of The Pixies from their offbeat humour, to their ability to make hardcore noise; from surf twangs and neo pop moments switching to harsh dissonance moments. It also showcased Kim Deal’s ‘Gigantic;’ a song that swiftly became the group’s anthem and was perhaps the first crack in Deals’ relationship with Black Francis in the band’s internal power struggle.

The PIXIES – ‘Gigantic’ (live)

Released in the spring of 1988, the album came out just at the time when the new American underground scene was exploding along with the Throwing Muses, Sonic Youth and Britain’s My Bloody Valentine. The Pixies were seen as a brave new world of rock and the album was an instant smash in media circles and propelled the group into the fringes of the mainstream. The buzz on the band was now so intense that they were signed to major label Elektra records.

The PIXIES – ‘This Monkey Gone to Heaven’

At the end of 1988, The Pixies went in to record their major label debut with Liverpool born producer Gil Norton at the helm. The resulting album ‘Doolittle’ was the band’s big break through. Songs like ’This Monkey Gone To Heaven’ and ‘Here Comes Your Man’ were the group’s signature breakthrough songs.
Its cleaner sound was primed for the charts and crept into the American top 100 as well as s the British top ten. Very much flavour of the month, The Pixies were far more loved in Britain and Europe than the more conservative American scene.

The Pixies now set out on their biggest tour to date. The aptly named ‘Sex and Earth’ tour saw them pushed to the very brink. But it was not without moments of humour, playing the whole set list in alphabetical order and other whimsical jokes on the staid notion of rock ‘n’ roll. By the end of the tour and the end of 1989, the high workload saw the band decide to take some time out for the beginning of 1990.
Well time out from being The Pixies that is.

The PIXIES – ‘Here Comes Your Man’

Frank Black went out on a quick solo tour, and Kim Deal put a project together with Throwing Muses’ Tanya Donnelly and British bass player Josephine Wiggs digging out The Breeders monicker again recording ‘Pod’ with Steve Albini back at the controls. ‘Pod’ was a brilliant album, a harsh, angular yet melodic slice of alt rock that underlined Deal’s song writing talent.

The PIXIES – ‘Velouria’

In the summer of 1990 The Pixies regrouped to record their third album ‘Bossanova’, which came out that autumn. The album was a series of songs written by Frank Black and as such flavoured but his surf rock predilection, less intense than previous outings, it was still a college rock and underground hit but bagged much more of mixed reaction. Despite this it was a top five album and saw the band headlining at Reading festival.

The PIXIES – ‘Into The Light’ Live Reading Festival 1990

The creative gulf between Kim Deal and Frank Black was exasperated by the band’s endless touring and Black taking over full creative control of the band and at a gig at Brixton Academy Deal announced onstage that it was the band’s last ever show.
Not true!

They may have cancelled their American tour because of ‘exhaustion’ but in 1991 they were back in the studio to record their fourth album with auxiliary member ex-Beefheart keyboardist Eric Drew Feldman padding out the sound. ‘Trompe le Monde’ was bigger and louder than its predecessor but lacked the quirky intensity of the first two albums.
They toured the album for a year supporting U2 at stadium shows and inching closer towards the big time, but the band was becoming a hollow shell with the ‘Trompe le Monde’ album again contained no songs from Kim Deal.

At the end of the U2 tour Frank Black started recording a solo album and Kim Deal returned to The Breeders.

During the recording of his solo album Frank Black announced on the radio that the band had split up and then faxed the other members to tell them what had happened.

And that was the end of The Pixies.

Kim Deal went on to score big success with The Breeders especially after the fantastic ‘Cannonball’ crossed over whilst Black’s solo career seemed to dwindle with each album.

In the interim, Nirvana’s astonishing success and name-dropping of The Pixies saw them sell more records than when they were together, and the mainstream respect, they so openly deserved, was for once accorded to the band.

As the Nineties rolled by virtually every alt. rock band used that well worn quiet verse/ loud chorus path that The Pixies had virtually invented so it was with wide open arms that the reformed group were welcomed back into the fray in 2003. The genuine excitement generated by their reformation only going to underline just how crucial and loved the band had been.

Whether they can turn this heat into anything more than a series of well received gigs and histrionic festival appearances remains to be seen. A new album would cap a remarkable comeback from the group. After reuniting in 2004, the Pixies issued a download-only single, Bam Thwok’ and Warren Zevon cover, Ain’t That Pretty At All, as well as collaborating with Disc Live to release a number of reunion tour live albums in the same year. But the band’s first impressions still echoes the loudest, so far.

The PIXIES – ‘Bam Thwok’