Nullary Sources

Guided by Voices, man. This is exactly what makes rock music so wonderful.

“Doughnut for a Snowman”
Guided by Voices
Let’s Go Eat the Factory (2012)

Last fall I got the chance to see GbV’s so-called “classic lineup”¹ play a show here in San Francisco. It was fantastic, but I assumed that it would be a one-time deal — frontman Pollard has been a busy bee since the band broke up in 2004, moving from project to project.

Not so, apparently. I admit not being familiar with the band’s full oeuvre but to my ear Let’s Go Eat the Factory fits in perfectly with their other early ’90s–era albums — Bee Thousand (1994), Alien Lanes (1995), Vampire on Titus (1993), Propeller (1992). The above “Doughnut for a Snowman” captures that perfectly — a crystalline pop song that doesn’t overstay its welcome a single second.

Look, anyone else would have added a few more verses to this to “flesh it out”, but not Pollard and crew. And to my ear what’s here is perfect — “Snowman” says what it wants to say and then it’s gone, all in 106 seconds.

For the time being, NPR is streaming the whole record.