FEATURED INTERVIEWS

Sonic Youth, 2009

Grizzly Bear, 2009

Yo La Tengo, 2009

Michael Stipe, 2008

Stephen Malkmus, 2008

Conor Oberst, 2007

The Long Blondes, 2006



FEATURED REVIEWS

Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks, 2008

Beach House, 2008

The Clientele, 2007

Frida Hyvönen, 2006

Ladybug Transistor, 2006

Hidden Cameras, 2006

Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks
Real Emotional Trash
+ Venus magazine, March 2008 +

Real Emotional Trash, in its title alone, gets to the heart of the frustrating dichotomy that too often is Stephen Malkmus. It’s in the way gloriously poignant moments that teeter on universal appeal are suddenly skewered with obfuscations, revealing a disdain for the cheapness of emotion in a pop song. The Pavement discography was nonetheless unimpeachable, a legacy defining canon for Malkmus, but his solo records both with and without the Jicks have been wildly uneven affairs, until this one. Real Emotional Trash is as close to a cohesive band album he’s created since Crooked Rain, due in no small part to the addition of Janet Weiss as drummer, and it’s a fine one indeed.

A Fairport Convention homespun influence guides much of Trash, especially the serpentine chamber folk of “Wicked Wanda,” and the fuzzed-out psychedelic wash of “Elmo Delmo.” The schizoid “Baltimore” is superb, beginning as a warm Dylan Basement Tapes send up, a waltz time piano guided torch song undergirded by Tom Verlaine-like quicksilver guitar lines, before metamorphosing into a caustic, elongated jam breakdown that evokes 70s prog heroes The Groundhogs.

On the scintillating centerpiece track “Out of Reaches,” a scarred, R.E.M. informed ballad, Malkmus finally comes clean with his ache. It’s as emotionally direct as anything he’s written, devastating as he abjectly wheezes, “There’s no more running gags to attract,” leading up to a treble charged chorus that drives a stake through your heart, and he’s right. This is no goof. It’s the visceral payoff on a challenging, truly great record.