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There isn't any Malkmus records not worth owning, unless maybe you want to count his sideman work with the Silver Jews. Even still, one of his best songs ("Blue Arrangements") appears on the otherwise dire Silver Jews 'American Water' LP, so that's essential in spite of itself.
The thing I'm wondering about is this - how did you come to get Slow Century before the actual Pavement albums? In a way, Slow Century is the best primer to get into Pavement, but I can't imagine anyone actually buying it first.
If you've watched Slow Century, you certainly don't need to be told about Pavement's history, or even what the albums sound like. There's only five Pavement albums, and they're all essential. All of the early singles and eps are collected on Westing (By Musket And Sextant), and that's slightly less essential. If you're going to buy Slanted & Enchanted, I urge you to get the new reissue version, because it packs in a lot of amazing extra songs from that era.
There's a LOT of non-album Pavement songs floating around. I'd be happy to hook you up with it. It'll be a while before all of the Pavement albums will be reissued the way S+E has been, so patience may not be a virtue if you're hungry for it all now.
As for post-Pavement records, Malkmus hasn't stopped being brilliant. He's playing with a new band called The Jicks, who are considerably tighter and more professional players than Pavement. This is pretty much a logical progression, especially on the newest album Pig Lib, which features a lot of songs which are a lot more complicated musically than anything Malkmus ever played with Pavement. This doesn't mean he's gone prog, or that he's sacrificed his playful aesthetic - the post-Pavement stuff isn't all that much different from Pavement besides the new band having better chops and Malkmus indulging in a few narrative story-songs. The Malkmus albums keep up the logical progression of Malkmus' songwriting - if you listen to each album in order from S+E through Pig Lib, it makes perfect sense.
Spiral Stairs has put out some records with his new band, The Preston School Of Industry, and though they aren't on the same level of quality as the Malkmus solo albums, they're still solid indie rock records. There's only one full length LP right now, All This Sounds Gas, and I'd recommend that album over the singles and EPs the band has put out. Though some of the songs are a bit generic indie pop, there's a few songs that are really quite good and Spiral does a fairly good job of clinging to the S+E vibe that Malkmus has long since abandoned. There's a reason why some of the more conservative "I wish things were the way they were back then" Pavement fans prefer Preston School to the Jicks. |
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