exystence club

The day Robert Pollard stops making music is the day Hell freezes over. The Guided By Voices singer and songwriter has been at it for over four decades now, and his pace hasn’t slowed — if anything, it’s picked up. More impressive than even that, though, is just how consistent the beloved rock band has been throughout the years. They have a formula and, goddamn, have they perfected it. But that doesn’t mean they’re not willing to explore. Take Crawlspace of the Pantheon, the Dayton group’s 44th album (give or take; the exact count seems to depend on who you ask): compared to other recent entries into Pollard’s vast discography, Crawlspace is considerably more lyrical, more intent on content — there’s a strange thread of semi-autobiography running through it, pulled both…

Given every guitar band since crica 1965 owes a debt – stated or otherwise – to the usual scouse suspects beginning with “B”, you might think that the format has scraped right through the bottom of the barrel by now. But creativity is a weird old thing. Stick a load of the obvious Guided By Voices influences into AI and yeah, you’ll likely get some hackneyed pale imitation of rock music from the past 60-odd years. Which is what most modern guitar bands are doing, to be fair. But something uncanny seems to happen when those same influences are filtered through Bob Pollard’s brain. There’s suddenly something fresh melodically, even now after 42 albums and over 500 songs. It’s like you’ve been eating the same dad rock sandwich for years and suddenly someone’s…