Did anyone go to the Chicago shows? Tooms just sent me this review. While it sounds great, I was satiated by the three shows I saw in 2004...
--------------------
A final, fitting note
--------------------
Guided By Voices caps 21-year run by flexing its mix of carefree, creative
By Bob Gendron
Special to the Tribune
January 3, 2005
Before the festivities commenced, revelers could tell that they were
going to be in for a long, special night just by taking one look at the
Metro's stage. Two 5-gallon buckets sat on the drum riser, crudely
labeled as receptacles for band members to relieve themselves. Three
plastic tubs crammed with beer bottles and ice rested on the floor.
Reserve cases of suds stood nearby. If those libations weren't
enough--and they weren't--a bar stocked with hard liquor and manned by
an overzealous server named Trader Vic was off to the right, its vacant
barstool doubling as a welcome mat for the thirsty. Shortly after 11:30
p.m., a large neon sign hanging above lit up to proclaim "The Club Is
Open." Guided By Voices' final show was officially under way.
After 21 years, dozens of releases and a back catalog that makes Bob
Dylan's songbook seem small, the Ohio band founded by a grade-school
teacher and beloved by legions of cult fans said its farewell New Year's
Eve in front of a sold-out house. The party included a traditional
balloon drop and countdown, but ringing in 2005 paled in comparison to
celebrating a group whose unassuming background and lo-fi recordings
established indie-rock standards throughout the '90s. The band is
calling it quits not because it lacks success or critical acclaim, but
because the group's creative minds fear complacency and want to move on
to fresh challenges.
Irreverent, sloppy and carefree, the 220-minute performance touched on
all of Guided By Voices' lovable strengths and irritating excesses. Over
the course of a mind-boggling 63 songs, soaring mountaintop melodies,
paper-crunching crescendos and cactus-sharp notes tucked away in lush
harmonic blankets shared space with frazzled diction, haphazard
arrangements and confounding 30-second fragments that were dead upon
arrival. The quintet wouldn't have wanted it any other way.
Early on, Guided By Voices captain of industry Bob Pollard declared his
intention to get inebriated. Although the vocalist's speech deteriorated
with each drink, he avoided garbling words until well past the set's
midway point, after which he briefly began reducing smash-and-grab
power-pop such as "Huffman Prairie Flying Field" and "Unleashed! The
Large-Hearted Boy" into slurry.
But as has long been Guided By Voices' credo, when one member falls the
others rally and pick him up. Nate Farley was so soused that his eyes
were tiny slits, yet he and Doug Gillard's guitars carved hang-fire
grooves, fire-crackling tones and sticky-sweet hooks into the
trampoline-bounce rhythms and serrated tempos supplied by bassist Chris
Slusarenko and drummer Kevin March. A rotating cast of guest musicians
comprising former band members, family and friends spelled temporary
relief for everyone but Pollard, who took a few quick time-outs by
handing his microphone to willing participants in the crowd.
Pollard also received a pick-me-up in the form of a break before the
first encore. When he returned, his faux English accent, sailor
salutations, Roger Daltrey microphone-cord twirl and one-legged bunny
hop were backfiring on all cylinders. The quintet proceeded to rattle
off a stream of should-have-been hits, sonically commandeering a moped's
sputtering engine for "Motor Away," contemplating physics through the
roller-coasting dips of "Echos Myron" and transforming the crowd into a
giddy choir that basked in the paranoid vibes of "Teenage FBI."
Halfway into "Secret Star," Pollard launched into the reasons he started
Guided By Voices. He recalled telling his first mates, "I just want to
have fun. I don't have anything to offer because it's all been done."
And although the band's tuneful chug drew from a gene pool that included
the Who, the Cars and Cheap Trick, Pollard's intuitive ability to
transport listeners to exotic worlds was anything but ordinary. Pasted
together, his mystical lyrics and impassioned delivery were a mammoth
storybook that never ran out of pages or ideas. "Wished I Was a Giant,"
"I Am a Scientist" and "I Am a Tree" reflected childlike fantasies; "I
Drove a Tank" and "My Valuable Hunting Knife" served as escapist
mechanisms; "Hot Freaks" and "Demons Are Real" adopted folklore's sense
of mystery.
When the swan song arrived, Pollard jokingly introduced it as a new
number titled "The Ballad of Guided By Voices." It was actually "Don't
Stop Now," a message that as he sang the closing chorus, Pollard
struggled against defying. Standing motionless with his eyes closed and
right hand frozen in the air, the 47-year-old was a stoic portrait of
bittersweet relief and sad joy, realizing that what began as a basement
hobby was in the home stretch of its fairytale run, a dream that if it
had been anything but real no one would ever have believed could come true.
Copyright (c) 2004, Chicago Tribune
