Slanted & Enchanted (CD - 1992)

Engineers include: Cy Jameson.

Recorded at Louder Than You Think, Stockton, California from January 13-20, 1991 and South Makepeace Studios, Brooklyn, New York on December 24, 1990.

This is a remastered and augmented edition of SLANTED AND ENCHANTED featuring the original album, the WATERY DOMESTIC EP, studio outtakes, two John Peel radio sessions from 1992, and a live recording from Brixton Academy.

Pavement: Stephen Malkmus, Spiral Stairs (guitar); Gary Young (drums).

Producers: Mike Robinson, James Birtwhistle.

Principally recorded at Louder Than You Think, Stockton, California; South Makepeace, Brooklyn, New York and Brixton Academy, London, England between December 1990 and December 1992. Includes liner notes by Stephen Malkmus.

All tracks have been digitally remastered.

Even back in 1991/1992, fans, geeks, and critics found it irresistible to compare Pavement to Nirvana, the underground band that made the concessions to the mainstreams and reaped the rewards, expecting the group that remained doggedly underground to make a rush for the charts, even if it really never made sense, especially when you became acquainted with their debut. Ten years later, give or take a month, each group has a reissue in the store -- one with one track to bait collectors to buy 13 songs they already have, the other with B-sides, EPs, Peel sessions, unreleased sessions, and a full live concert, plus a 50-page booklet, all presented as enhancements to a seminal 14-track album. Generous really isn't the word for this lavish reissue of Pavement's first album, dubbed as Slanted & Enchanted: Luxe & Reduxe -- it offers an embarrassment of riches, with each new song proving that the band really was not just the best of its kind, but the best of its time. A heady statement, to be sure, but few classic albums would have their status bolstered the way that Slanted & Enchanted does here, with 34 (!) bonus tracks, enhancing an already legendary album in ways that are giddily revelatory. Those that trawl file-sharing services or trade CD-Rs might find that they have already heard most of the material here, but even so, nobody can argue with the scope of this reissue, especially since the music is of astoundingly high quality. There are wonders to behold everywhere: the surging "Baptist Blacktick," discovering that the previous unreleased "Nothing Ever Happens" is quoted after "Trigger Cut" as "Wounded-Kite at :17," two John Peel sessions consisting of songs that never made the LPs (and it all could, most notably "Kentucky Cocktail"), Watery, Domestic is revealed as a key transition from Slanted to Crooked Rain with its final song, "Shoot the Singer," standing as one of the band's unheralded classics, and the entirety of the December 14, 1992, concert at the Brixton Academy in London is phenomenal, capturing a notoriously erratic live band at the peak of their powers. There's so much material here, the album itself feels like the bonus! But this isn't rarities for rarities sake: it all has something to offer. No other reissue of a single album of any genre has covered its ground so completely and appealingly; there's simply nothing left in the vaults, or on singles, and everything that's been added is worthwhile. It's essential listening, not just for indie rockers, but any serious rock fan. And here's hoping that the rest of the Pavement catalog is subjected to a similar treatment -- there are great B-sides from Crooked Rain through Terror Twilight that should be preserved in this fashion. (And maybe Matador will be able to reissue Exile in Guyville in a similar fashion for its tenth anniversary in 2003, adding all the Girlysound tapes -- this reissue is so good, it makes you greedy for more.) ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Slanted & Enchanted is a left-field classic, a record that came out of nowhere to help establish a new subgenre of rock & roll. Pavement had already sketched out their sound, as well as their amateurish lo-fi aesthetic, on a series of indie singles before recording their debut, but Slanted & Enchanted is where they pulled all of their disparate sounds together into a distinctive style. At first, the primitive sound of the record is the most gripping thing about Slanted, but soon the true innovations of the record appear through the songs themselves. Stephen Malkmus and Spiral Stairs subvert conventional pop structures, turning melodies inside out, reinterpreting and reworking older songs, and bending genres together. It's a complex, enthralling record, filled with fractured riffs, strong melodies, and cryptic melodies, and with all the hiss and static, Slanted & Enchanted sounds like listening to a distant college radio station -- melodies and hooks keep floating in and out of the mix, with individual lines instead of full lyrics surfacing through the murk. This unique song structure as much as the sound of the album itself makes Slanted & Enchanted an individual, signature work and one of the most influential records of the '90s. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

By the time SLANTED & ENCHANTED was released in 1992, Pavement had reached mythical status among indie-rock lovers. The hype had been generated by three masterful vinyl-only releases: SLAY TRACKS (7" EP), DEMOLITION PLOT J7 (7" EP) and PERFECT SOUND FOREVER (10" EP). The dissonant, often beautiful mix of noise and melody on these recordings reaches its apotheosis on SLANTED & ENCHANTED--an album that simultaneously recalls the haunted darkness of The Velvet Underground and the sheer garage pop of the Modern Lovers. SLANTED & ENCHANTED exists from moment to moment, establishing ideas even as it breaks them down, deifying its influences even as it escapes them, becoming more exciting the more you hear it. It is, in short, a rock and roll masterpiece.

In their own way, Pavement changed the face of '90s rock just as much as Nirvana, at least for those with an ear closer to the ground of the indie scene. In fact, they virtually defined the indie scene for that decade, and their first full-length album SLANTED AND ENCHANTED was the non-anthem of slacker rock. For years after its release, every hip indie band seemed to imitate Pavement's Fall-influenced, off-kilter sound and post-functional, obscurantist lyrical approach.

The 10th anniversary of the record's release occasioned this special deluxe two-disc edition. Besides the original album, we get a healthy dose of rarities from this phase of the band's career, including radio sessions, outtakes, unreleased tracks, and a generous helping of live cuts. Though there are few revelations here, as the rare cuts sound pretty much of a piece with the classic album, the quality level is consistently high, both in terms of sound and songs. Any of the countless geeks who were instantly transformed into hipsters upon hearing "Summer Babe" or "Conduit For Sale" should be overjoyed at the abundance of prime Pavement on offer here. minimize