The Pixies first full length album is brittle, tinny and raw sounding. The incredible production is due result of the work of Steve Albini, the notoriously obstinate 'sound-engineer' but musical genius. Albini hates the term 'producer' although that's what he does. From his perspective he's not their to produce anything, he's there to capture and record a band. He is uncompromising in his determination to capture their 'real' sound and will go to extreme lengths to get it.
There's a great description of the recording of SURFER ROSA in the book Our Band Could Be Your Life by Nirvana and Grunge biographer Michael Azzerad: "the recordings were both very basic and very exacting: Albini used few special effects; got an aggressive, often violent guitar sound; and made sure the rhythm section slammed as one." For the tracks 'Gigantic' and 'Where Is My Mind?' Albini moved all the equipment and recorded the vocals in a studio bathroom to achieve a real echo rather than apply one in post-production. Elsewhere he experimented with making the vocals as raw as possible. For the track frenetic feedback-laced track 'Something Against You' he filtered Frank Black's voice through a guitar amp to create a guttural terrifying vocal line.
The production is one of the best things about the album and created a demand for Albini who subsequently worked with PJ Harvey on the equally ragged 'Rid of Me', Nirvana on 'In Utero' as well as bands like The Wedding Present, Jesus Lizard and The John Spencer Blues Explosion.
Beyond the production, the songs on SURFER ROSA are brilliant. Violent, ragged, alternate rock with some simple, almost childish, pop hooks. The Pixies make excellent use of the dramatic quite builds and punctuations of loud terrifying blasts of noise. The melodies are so deceptively simple you can whistle along to the majority of them. The lyrical subject matter on the other hand is much more disturbing and featuring lashings of torture, mutilation and sex.
'Cactus' is sung from the perspective of a prison inmate who want's his girlfriend to bloody her dress and send it to him. 'Gigantic' is about a black mans large penis which now having read the lyrics seems totally obvious, but it has not occurred to me once over the past twenty years. 'Break My Bones' and 'Broken Face' both contain explicit reference to incest with mothers or sisters and daughters. Conversely one of the assumed 'darkest' tracks on the album is 'Where is My Mind?' which as it's been used as a staple for film and TV moments of insanity, most notably at the end of the film Fight Club. It was however inspired by a diving holiday Frank Black took in the Caribbean.
SURFER ROSA has inspired the best of the alternate '90s rock scene. Most vocally Cobain is quoted as saying the songs on the album gave him the confidence to progress the mix of heavy rock and pop he was trying to achieve with Nirvana: that he "heard songs on SURFER ROSA that I'd written and thrown out because I was too afraid to play them to anybody". If you listen to this album and then go back an hear the likes of 'Lithium', 'Rape Me' or 'Aneurysm' you can hear a Pixies template. Personally I just think it rocks. It is without a doubt the best of the four (and a half) Pixies albums. Saucy cover art too!
'GIGANTIC'
'CACTUS'
'BREAK MY BODY'
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