Wowee Zowee: Sordid Sentinels Edition
Label: Matador
Length: LP
Media: CD
Format: Album
WorkNameSort: Wowee Zowee: Sordid Sentinels Edition
Here, indie-thesaurus touchstone Pavement hit its daftly freewheeling peak by happy accident ‘ before an elder statesman’like formalism crept in and crossword-puzzle champ/frontman Stephen Malkmus called the whole thing off without bothering to tell anybody else. As grand as it was dilapidated, Wowee Zowee‘s bedheaded delirium encompassed everything from giddy, chittering faux-hardcore punk (‘Serpentine Padâ?�) and country on the click (‘Motion Suggests Itselfâ?�) to deep-fried lounge (‘Grave Architectureâ?�) and gnarled-out Stereolab (‘Half a Canyonâ?�). Eleven years later, this generous reissue supplements the original’s insouciant, sloppily drawn eclecticism with a hodgepodge of period U.K. radio sessions, soundtrack cuts, B-sides and bootleg-only swag. Of these extras, only the excellent Pacific Trim, Rattled by the Rush and Father to a Sister of a Thought EPs as well as the austere ‘Sensitive Euro Manâ?� rival the base material; we’d have been better served by gonzoid live cuts than throwaway versions of ‘Box Elder,â?� ‘Easily Fooledâ?� and ‘Fight This Generation.â?�
This article appears in Nov 8-14, 2006.