Remember when they played Moe's in 1997? That was a good time!

The last time I saw, Pavement, well it was really Stven Malkmus and the Jicks, was Bumbershoot 2003. It was a great set, but was unfortunately marred by some smooth talking DJ that ruined the beginning and end of the show. Alas.

@3 you could have walked away from the stage and kept your opinion to yourself...but alas it's the internet and some anonymous asshole has to pipe up....

Clumsy, pointless, intellectually lazy, there-is-no-world-beyond-my-inarticulate-mumblings-and-trip-to-the-thrift-store hipster garbage.

Always has been. Always will be.

If you haven't achieved one iota of emotional or intellectual growth since you were a college freshman in the mid-'90s, then Pavement's your band!

@6: A 44-year-old who still sits around namedropping "cool new bands" is exhibiting intellectual growth? How, exactly?

Not a thrift store for so-called "cool records." A thrift store for stupid vintage shirts.

Clumsy... that would be the chord changes and melodic structures.

Pointless... pick any Malkmus lyric. Hermetically sealed, contextually ambivalent signposts of a homogeneous hipster culture.

Intellectually lazy... see your own post.

is or was pavement on matador records?

matador?!?

@5: Its just music! It may be sloppy nonsense, and yeah, it takes me back to days past when I would be the first person to tell you I myself was intellectually lazy. Its not like they are on this tour saying "look how much we have grown to satisfy your need to validate your taste 15 years ago" If thats how you define yourself, stay home. You're probably no fun anyway. I myself will be checking out for the evening and return to work Tuesday in all my intellectual glory.

I can't wait.

I just got called "no fun" by some guy on the internet! This really is my lucky day!

Totally fun show.

d.p. : Who, in terms of musical acts, do you consider to be worthy? I'm genuinely curious.
Yeah, I'm one of those people that fell in love with Pavement in the 90's and still highly regard (most) of their work. I can assure you I have emotionally and mentally grown significantly in the last 15+ years. It's hard to say if I would like them today if hearing them for the first time, but seeing that my favorite contemporary band is the Black Lips, I think maybe yes.
No, it's not intellectual and I don't pretend it is. What I get out of rock and roll is much different that what I get out of, say, reading Zizek. I like my music to have the right balance of smart and stupid. If I want intellectualism I read a fucking book, but I stand behind the sincerity of my opening question.

I tried to like Pavement. I tried really hard. But after my 30th time through Slanted and Enchanted I came to the realization that it just wasn't going to happen. If only Malkmus could sing. And write intelligible lyrics. And they could actually play their instruments.

In twenty years I'd expect the same reaction to Pavement that today's kids have to Bob Dylan, except I doubt that Pavement will be remembered two decades down the road.

@19: I always thought of Pavement as more comparable to the Velvet Underground; people still listen to them 40+ years later.

Bhowie,

Žižek would have plenty to say about Pavement if he ever heard them, just as he has plenty to say about every artifact of high or low culture that crosses his path. Why wouldn't you want to be aware of how your enjoyment of one filters through your enjoyment of the other?

I'm unable to play the "list" game. I don't know a single person over 30 whose music tastes could be easily encapsulated by a genre label or a representative list of band names. Do you?

I listen to music that is fun and that is serious, that is wry and that is stirring, that is intense and that is subtle, that is adventurous and that is comforting. I listen to plenty of so-called "indie rock" and to plenty of bands you might abhor. I listen to more than a few bands that have toured with Pavement or with Stephen Malkmus.

In fact, my lasting enmity towards Malkmus stems from holding him responsible for making me think I didn't like "indie rock." All of the indie-rock people with whom I went to college were so sycophantic about Pavement -- and I was so incapable of finding anything witty in Malkmus's ramblings or interesting in the band's dying-cat guitar strummings -- that for years I shut myself off to anything the indie-rockers deigned to hype. It wasn't until much later that I discovered the indie-rock canon is full of bands that aren't so annoying!

If you went to school in the mid-1990s, there were essentially two groups of music obsessives: those who listened to Pavement and those whose palates were whet by Massive Attack. So it was fascinating, thirteen years later at the Gorge, to see Massive Attack achieve a spellbinding set of politically savvy, sexually raw, musically crackling, total sensory overload... just minutes after seeing Pavement limp through their hour of dated, drunken, aimless meanderings and finally confirm my incredulity of yesteryear!