Wowee Zowee

how do I start to talk about the Godlike genius of Pavement's Wowee Zowee (1995)? It often gets lost in my estimation as I constantly play Slanted and Enchanted, Crooked Rain, or Brighten the Corners but Wowee has so many virtues. Familiar Pavement preoccupations like architecture, despair, music, career, hotels, and money are evident, with complex, layered, and nuanced music. On a day when we pay tribute to James Brown and his, seemingly out of nowhere, coming up with an entire new style of music that reverberates in all popular musics, it's fitting to celebrate Pavement's complexity.

Pavement are often cited as being influenced by The Fall, and that's definitely here (complete with a "witch trials" reference), but with a good dollop of California sweetness.

I do look for new music to listen to, ever hopeful, but I don't find much.
The Over Friendly Concierge is a very nice Pavement site, very helpful for lyrics though it has a couple of mistakes -- it's "is the sedan he bought" in "Grounded", not "is this the den he bought" (and that reminds me, there used to be a wonderful site called "The Replacements Misheard Lyrics Page" - ou sont les web sites d'antan?)