Random Rules Playlist 039: Pavement Family Tree
The Ultimate Pavement Cinematic Universe Playlist, plus a review of the 'PAVEMENTS' film
Welcome to a brand new edition of RANDOM RULES! The point of this newsletter is to tell stories via playlists (Spotify and Apple Music, primarily). So far we’ve featured DEEP dives into genres like shoegaze, slowcore and freak folk, playlists for holidays like Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, 4th of July, Memorial Day and Easter, plus fun themes like songs about The Devil, songs about UFOs, songs about Insects, Beef tracks outside of the hip-hop genre, songs about Florida, plus our ongoing Family Tree series which has covered Talking Heads, Slint, Matmos, Vivian Girls, Pedro The Lion and now, Pavement. You can access the archive, mostly for free, or you can upgrade to paid to have full access to our archive.
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We can get this out of the way right from the jump, I have always been a HUGE Pavement fan since around the release of Slanted & Enchanted in 1992, so I am not going to be a very objective source when it comes to critiquing any of their music or the new film about them. My senior yearbook quote in high school was the entire second verse of “Fame Throwa.” This very Substack is named after a Silver Jews song. Slanted is one of the few albums I have purchased and re-purchased at least 5 times (cassette, CD, vinyl, deluxe edition CD reissue, and then on vinyl again).
The Pavement revival is in full swing, thanks in large part to the release of the film Pavements, along with the recently released documentary about the band’s original drummer, Gary Young, Louder Than You Think. The reunion tours keep happening, “Harness Your Hopes” remains an algorithm-driven success story and 90s era Pavement collectibles are fetching higher prices than ever. The jam band crowd has even finally begun to fully embrace SM & Co (fingers crossed for a performance at The Sphere on the next tour). It seemed like the best time to put together the Ultimate Pavement Playlist, an overview of 36 years of musical output.
In these Family Tree playlists, I try to spotlight the best tracks from the titular band’s catalog, as well as every related side project, solo project, guest appearance and supergroup - all of which are represented here. Four different band members from Pavement have released solo albums (Malkmus, Spiral Stars, original drummer Gary Young and second drummer Steve West - under the name Marble Valley). Side projects include Silver Jews (SM and Bob appear on quite a few SJ albums, but not all), The Crust Brothers (Malkmus with Silkworm), and Mark Ibold’s other bass playing gigs, including Dustdevils, Free Kitten and brief stints playing in Sonic Youth and Spectre Folk. Malkmus is currently playing in the indie rock supergroup The Hard Quartet.
When I was making the playlist, I had the realization that Malkmus may have the best work ethic of anyone to ever operate in the indie rock world. Ironic, since Pavement were known as the slack rock poster boys. I’d like to make a case that Malkmus is the antithesis of a slacker, he’s been releasing music and touring without a significant hiatus since 1989! Put some respect on the man’s name!
RANDOM RULES PLAYLIST 039: PAVEMENT FAMILY TREE
Every song on this loosely chronological playlist features at least one member of the two classic Pavement lineups (SM, Spiral Stairs, Gary Young, Mark Ibold, Bob Nastanovich, Steve West), Plus some of my favorite covers of Pavement at the end, as a bonus:
Pavement - You're Killing Me
Pavement - Box Elder
Pavement - Perfect Depth
Pavement - From Now On
Pavement - Angel Carver Blues/Mellow Jazz Docent
Pavement - Debris Slide
Pavement - Home
Pavement - Baptist Blacktick
Silver Jews - Canada (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Secret Knowledge of Back Roads (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - I Love the Rights (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - The War in Apartment 1812 (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - You Can't Trust It To Remain (feat. SM & Bob)
Dustdevils - The Revenge of Cruiser Gurner (feat. Mark Ibold)
Dustdevils - Feet Head High (feat. Mark Ibold)
Dustdevils - Throw the Bottlefull (feat. Mark Ibold)
Pavement - Sue Me Jack
Pavement - So Stark (You're a Skyscraper)
Pavement - Summer Babe - Winter Version
Pavement - Trigger Cut/Wounded-Kite At :17
Pavement - In The Mouth A Desert
Pavement - Conduit For Sale!
Pavement - Zürich Is Stained
Pavement - Loretta's Scars
Pavement - Here
Pavement - Two States
Pavement - Perfume-V
Pavement - Fame Throwa
Pavement - Jackals, False Grails: The Lonesome Era
Pavement - Our Singer
Pavement - Circa 1762 - John Peel Session #1
Pavement - Kentucky Cocktail - John Peel Session #1
Pavement - Secret Knowledge Of Backroads - John Peel Session #1
Pavement - Here - John Peel Session #1
Pavement - Greenlander
Pavement - Texas Never Whispers
Pavement - Frontwards
Pavement - Lions (Linden)
Pavement - Shoot The Singer (1 Sick Verse)
Pavement - Unseen Power of the Picket Fence
Gary Young - Plant Man
Gary Young - Birds in Traffic
Pavement - Silence Kid
Pavement - Elevate Me Later
Pavement - Stop Breathin
Pavement - Cut Your Hair
Pavement - Unfair
Pavement - Gold Soundz
Pavement - Range Life
Pavement - Heaven Is a Truck
Pavement - Fillmore Jive
Pavement - Raft
Pavement - Nail Clinic
Pavement - All My Friends
Pavement - Flux = Rad
Pavement - Hands Off The Bayou
Pavement - The Sutcliffe Catering Song
Pavement - Camera
Silver Jews - Trains Across The Sea (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Advice To The Graduate (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - New Orleans (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Living Waters (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Rebel Jew (feat. SM & Bob)
Free Kitten - Harvest Spoon (feat. Mark Ibold)
Free Kitten - Call Back (Episode XXI) (feat. Mark Ibold)
Pavement - Kris Kraft
Pavement - Give It a Day
Pavement - Gangsters & Pranksters
Pavement - We Dance
Pavement - Rattled by the Rush
Pavement - Black Out
Pavement - Grounded
Pavement - Father to a Sister of Thought
Pavement - Grave Architecture
Pavement - AT&T
Pavement - Fight This Generation
Pavement - Kennel District
Pavement - Pueblo
Pavement - Easily Fooled
Pavement - I Love Perth
Pavement - Painted Soldiers
Pavement - No More Kings
Free Kitten - Teenie Weenie Boppie (feat. Mark Ibold)
Free Kitten - Never Gonna Sleep (feat. Mark Ibold)
Free Kitten - Bouwerie Boy (feat. Mark Ibold)
Pavement - Stereo
Pavement - Shady Lane
Pavement - Date w/ IKEA
Pavement - Embassy Row
Pavement - Starlings of the Slipstream
Pavement - Cataracts
Pavement - Westie Can Drum
Pavement - Winner Of The
Pavement - Birds in the Majic Industry
Pavement - Harness Your Hopes
Pavement - Roll with the Wind
Pavement - No Tan Lines
Pavement - The Killing Moon - BBC Evening Session
Pavement - Oddity
Pavement - Neil Hagerty Meets Jon Spencer In A Non-Alcoholic Bar
Pavement - Destroy Mater Dei
Pavement - It's A Rainy Day, Sunshine Girl
Pavement - The Classical
The Crust Brothers - Going to Acapulco (feat. SM)
The Crust Brothers - Million Dollar Bash (feat. SM)
The Crust Brothers - Bessie Smith (feat. SM)
The Crust Brothers - You Ain't Goin' Nowhere (feat. SM)
The Crust Brothers - Never Met a Man I Didn't Like (feat. SM)
The Crust Brothers - Feel a Whole Lot Better (feat. SM)
Silver Jews - Random Rules (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Smith & Jones Forever (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Federal Dust (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Blue Arrangements (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Send in the Clouds (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Buckingham Rabbit (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Honk If You're Lonely (feat. SM & Bob)
Pavement - You Are a Light
Pavement - Cream of Gold
Pavement - Ann Don't Cry
Pavement - Billie
Pavement - Major Leagues
Pavement - Carrot Rope
Pavement - Speak, See, Remember
Pavement - The Porpoise and the Hand Grenade
Pavement - Be the Hook
Stephen Malkmus - Phantasies
Stephen Malkmus - Jo Jo's Jacket
Stephen Malkmus - Church On White
Stephen Malkmus - Jenny & The Ess-Dog
Marble Valley - Pina Colada (feat. Steve West)
Marble Valley - Triple-E (feat. Steve West)
Preston School Of Industry - Whalebones (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Preston School Of Industry - Falling Away (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Preston School Of Industry - Doping for Gold (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Preston School Of Industry - Monkey Heart and the Horses Leg (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Preston School Of Industry - The Idea of Fires (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Preston School Of Industry - I Have Done Nothing Wrong (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Ramp of Death
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - (Do Not Feed The) Oyster
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Vanessa from Queens
Preston School Of Industry - The Furnace Son (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Preston School Of Industry - Walk of a Gurl (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Preston School Of Industry - Caught in the Rain (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Preston School Of Industry - If the Straits of Magellan Should Ever Run Dry (feat. Spiral Stairs)
Silver Jews - Animal Shapes (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - I'm Getting Back Into Getting Back Into You (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - Sleeping Is The Only Love (feat. SM & Bob)
Silver Jews - The Farmer's Hotel (feat. SM & Bob)
Stephen Malkmus - It Kills
Stephen Malkmus - Freeze the Saints
Stephen Malkmus - No More Shoes
Stephen Malkmus - Post-Paint Boy
Stephen Malkmus & The Million Dollar Bashers - Ballad of a Thin Man
Stephen Malkmus & Lee Ranaldo - Can't Leave Her Behind
Stephen Malkmus & The Million Dollar Bashers - Maggie's Farm
Stephen Malkmus & Lee Ranaldo - What Kind Of Friend Is This
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Dragonfly Pie
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Hopscotch Willie
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Gardenia
Sonic Youth - Sacred Trickster (feat. Mark Ibold)
Sonic Youth - No Way (feat. Mark Ibold)
Spiral Stairs - Cold Change
Spiral Stairs - Maltese T
Spiral Stairs - Stolen Pills
Spiral Stairs - The Moodist
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Tigers
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Senator
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Asking Price
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Stick Figures In Love
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Long Hard Book
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Tune Grief
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Forever 28
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Fall Away
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Gorgeous Georgie
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Planetary Motion
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - The Janitor Revealed
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Lariat
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Chartjunk
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Cinnamon and Lesbians
Soldiers of Fortune & Stephen Malkmus - Campus Swagger
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - China Cat Sunflower -> I Know You Rider
Spectre Folk - Action Ray (feat. Mark Ibold)
Spectre Folk - Golden Gooj (feat. Mark Ibold)
Spiral Stairs - Emoshuns
Spiral Stairs - Dundee Man
Spiral Stairs - AWM
Spiral Stairs - No Comparison
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Solid Silk
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Bike Lane
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Middle America
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Shiggy
Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks - Refute
Spiral Stairs - The Fool
Spiral Stairs - Diario
Spiral Stairs - Them Cold Eyes
Spiral Stairs - Fingerprintz
Stephen Malkmus - Viktor Borgia
Stephen Malkmus - Come Get Me
Stephen Malkmus - Boss Viscerate
Stephen Malkmus - Xian Man
Stephen Malkmus - The Greatest Own In Legal History
Stephen Malkmus - Juliefuckingette
Stephen Malkmus & Von Spar - I'm So Green
Stephen Malkmus & Von Spar - Spoon
Stephen Malkmus & Von Spar - One More Night
Stephen Malkmus & Von Spar - Vitamin C
Spiral Stairs - Too Late
Spiral Stairs - Petrified
Spiral Stairs - Pressure Drop (End of the Hurricane)
Spiral Stairs - Hey '70
Spiral Stairs - Time = Cuz
Spiral Stairs - Slipped Away
The Hard Quartet - Chrome Mess (feat. SM)
The Hard Quartet - Earth Hater (feat. SM)
The Hard Quartet - Renegade (feat. SM)
The Hard Quartet - Heel Highway (feat. SM)
The Hard Quartet - Thug Dynasty (feat. SM)
The Hard Quartet - Gripping the Riptide (feat. SM)
The Hard Quartet - Lies (Something You Can Do) (feat. SM)
Say Sue Me - Elevate Me Later (Pavement Cover)
Cat Power - We Dance (Pavement Cover)
The Wedding Present - Box Elder (Pavement Cover)
Tindersticks - Here (Pavement Cover)
REVIEW: PAVEMENTS, A FILM BY ALEX ROSS PERRY
Alex Ross Perry could have taken the easy road and made a standard talking head-style rock doc about Pavement, their story is interesting enough, but it probably would not have been nearly as fun to watch as Pavements turned out to be. To be honest, I still wonder what Dave Grohl, Thurston Moore, Questlove and David Fricke would have had to say about Pavement on-camera.
If he had gone down that road, the film would also not have been the type of doc that has the potential to win the band a whole new generation of fans, with the doc serving as the primary entry point, which Pavements also clearly has the potential to achieve over the coming months & years. I took my 18 year-old twins to see the film as a test audience (to be fair, they knew about Pavement already) but the film won them over.
Perry created a whole ton of extra work for himself here, essentially creating what will henceforth be known as the PCU (Pavement Cinematic Universe). This includes a fake biopic called Range Life where the band is played by actors like Joe Keery (of Stranger Things fame) who plays Malkmus, along with Jason Schwartzman as Chris Lombardio and Tim Heidecker as Gerard Cosloy (the guys who co-founded Matador Records). I found out via the Q&A at my screening that they only shot with these actors for about 3 days, which means Schwartzman may have now put more time into doing Q&A’s at screenings of the film than he did even shooting it. Keery in particular is the standout here with his loving, hilarious portrayal of a young Malkmus. The bit about trying to nail Malkmus’ “vocal fry” was particularly great.
Another world within the PCU is the Pavement retrospective NYC art show & opening, featuring only female fronted bands like Snail Mail, Bully and Soccer Mommy performing Pavement covers. It does look like it was a meticulously curated event that took itself at least somewhat seriously, staying on-brand with an element of the band’s trademark snark.
The most unexpected part of the PCU is Slanted! Enchanted!, an actual Broadway style jukebox musical based on Pavement songs with people like Zoe Lister-Jones, and the guy from the Green Day musical and the woman from the Alanis Morisette musical. This is the part that really seems like an inordinate amount of extra work, I just kept asking myself “What was the budget here? How many weeks or months of work went into this?” as I was watching, calculating all of the production costs and actor’s fees in my head. I still don’t know how they got actors like Lister-Jones, Michael Esper and Kathryn Gallagher to agree to put in the work for a musical that would only be performed three times, and then be used as a small part of a documentary film, but kudos to Perry for pulling this off (and to Matador, who I am assuming bankrolled all of this!)
The most interesting part of the film for me was the footage of the actual real life band, the archive footage was golden (somehow I never heard about the mud-bombed Lollapalooza performance before) and the footage Perry got from the 2022 reunion tour and rehearsals was also illuminating. There weren’t too many long form interview clips of the band and its inscrutable leader, but there were some moments from the archives where Malkmus let his guard down a bit. The most revealing to me was a quote about the trajectory of Pavement’s career, admitting that he thought Crooked Rain would lead to Nirvana level success and that he was pretty bummed out when it didn’t.
This revealing moment from Malkmus is one of the few earnest, serious, emotionally raw scenes in the film, most of the rest come from snippets of the musical and song lyrics like “I was dressed for success, but success it never comes” (from the song “Here”) repeated in a mantra-like manner throughout.
Ultimately, the film succeeds by never taking itself too seriously, just like the band that inspired it. Most of the film is comedic (and I do mean it’s actually funny), almost like a Spinal Tap for the indie rock purist set, in the same way the Half Japanese doc, The Band That Would Be King, to the uninitiated felt like “a complete put-on” (I think that quote was on the poster). The Range Life fake biopic scenes are brilliant satire. Now I just need to see Slanted! Enchanted! the musical in full!
Wow! This is the most comprehensive list any Pavement fan could ever wish for, I’m impressed, fr.