2 keepers
keeper avg .090
Robert Pollard's first solo album was released following the final "classic lineup" Guided By Voices album "Under the Bushes Under the Stars", and simultaneously with bandmate Tobin Sprout's "Carnival Boy." Opening track "Maggie Turns to Flies"**** is a driving, resonant shoegaze masterpiece, and in the fashion of that final GBV album actually sounds like a professional recording. The slow stomping angry-Weezer "Girl Named Captain" is also conventionally listenable. But let's face it, Pollard most frequently strikes gold when emulating The Who, and he one-ups his familiar inspiration with the dramatic "Psychic Pilot Clocks Out"*****, concluding the rousing call to action exclaiming "I feel life passing on by us."
Predictably, several other tracks, such as "Get Under It", "Release the Sunbird", "Chance to Buy an Island", and "Flat Beauty" would be considered middling tracks on any GBV album from around this time or after, and indeed all have analogues in the GBV discography (such as "My Valuable Hunting Knife" and "Smothered in Hugs" if you must know). The vaguely English folk "The Ash Gray Proclamation" (resembling "The Battle Of Evermore") actually kind of stands out from the rest in tone as well as cohesion.
Most of the rest of the album is populated with the typical half-baked song blurbs we've come to expect from a Robert Pollard record; "I've Owned You for Centuries" actually packs a lot of drama into a minute and some change, but apart from a conspicuous effect (John Strange School) or an annoying onomatopoeia (One Clear Minute) most simply run together, and hardly any after "Psychic Pilot Clocks Out" are noteworthy.
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