Robert Pollard may not need anybody, but he does need Tobin Sprout. Desperately:
It has become an annual ritual, listening to a new Guided by Voices album. By this time, I can almost predict my reaction, and the reaction is perfunctory. Come to think of it, I have not been consistently impressed with Guided by Voices music since Bears for Lunch. And that was, what, 2012. An eternity by the standards of Robert Pollard.
For sure, the band has never released an all-out masterpiece, but then all-out masterpieces are not Pollard's concern. Pollard has always been about the scattered flashes of brilliance that have over the years provided such timeless pop 'hits' as "Hey Hey Spaceman", "Drag Days", "Feathering Clueless" and about a million others. The sound, the attitude, the hooks.
These days, it seems, I can't dig deep enough. On surface, each song on 2019's Zeppelin Over China sounds like a potential Guided by Voices classic. The sound, the attitude, the hooks - it's all there, in spades. What is missing is that timeless melody that was last heard, albeit briefly, on "What Begins on New Year's Day" from August by Cake. 2017, no less. Otherwise, my ears are drowning in the sea of perfectly serviceable power pop and feedback-drenched balladry which, crucially, lacks that extra dimension.
Quite simply, it lacks timelessness that Tobin Sprout can still produce on occasion. Highly unlikely, granted, but I assume a melody like the one on "When I Was a Boy" (from Sprout's overlooked The Universe and Me, 2017) could well remind Robert Pollard that he can still pen a melody which could fly:
Not that I will ignore those two other LPs to be released by Guided by Voices in 2019, of course. Like I say, it's a ritual. A hope. And maybe a curse, too.
