Pixies: Come On Pilgrim

PIXIES: COME ON PILGRIM (1987)

1) Caribou; 2) Vamos; 3) Isla De Encanta; 4) Ed Is Dead; 5) The Holiday Song; 6) Nimrodʼs Son; 7) Iʼve Been Tired; 8) Levitate Me.

General verdict: Short as heck, but already contains every single seed of the greatness to come.

If Come On Pilgrim fails to immediately establish the Pixies as one of the most major acts of their generation, then we have no one to blame but Ivo Watts-Russell, the president of 4AD, who was given the entire «Purple Tape» — the results of the bandʼs first major recording session, with 17 tracks in all — but cautiously decided to cherry-pick only a sample of it and release it in mini-LP format, with a UK-only release that was, allegedly, fairly strange for a US-based band, but apparently little had changed in the way of things over those twenty years since Jimi Hendrix had to prove his worth by jumping across the Atlantic.

Even so, the ridiculously short length is just about the only major complaint I could raise against the Pixiesʼ debut — because even these eight short songs suffice to let you know that here was another band all set to change the world. The first thing that comes to mind is that it is all but impossible to put a label on the kind of music they are playing. It seems to be equal parts «pop» and «rock», but it is certainly not «power pop» in a Cheap Trick sense — the guitars have none of that thick arena crunch which can sound so uplifting in skilled hands and so plebeian in not so skilled ones. More apt is the often heard assessment of the music as a hybrid of «surf rock» and «punk rock», but that, too, might give one unwarranted visions of the Ramones playing ʽSurfinʼ Birdʼ when in reality the Pixies sounded nothing like that.

Why donʼt we go straight to the source material? ʽCaribouʼ opens with a thrice repeated flashy little guitar flourish that would not have sounded out of place on some late Sixtiesʼ Californian folk rock album — except this one is lo-fi and distorted in prime underground Eighties fashion. From there, the guitar goes into epic folk-blues mode (think ʽHouse Of The Rising Sunʼ), except it keeps staggering and stuttering around in pseudo-drunk DIY mode. When the vocals kick in, they come in short, simple, minimalistic bursts, evoking the old beatnik spirit both in form and essence ("I live cement / I hate this street / Give dirt to me / I bite lament" is almost Allen Ginsberg, though it probably rhymes a bit too much for him) — and the wobbly man-woman unison between Black Francis and Kim Deal gives the song an oddly universalist atmosphere despite only featuring two people. Itʼs a mournful dirge that can easily turn into rebellious anthem, a creepy mystical incantation that can mutate into prime anger — and it never takes itself too seriously, like the Birthday Party or something like that.

That last part is actually essential, as is the bandʼs infatuation with elements of surf music. The Pixies introduced a level of «meta» into rock and pop music that few, if any, other Eighties acts had dared to, or even thought to introduce. When you think back to all the non-mainstream music from those days, what comes to mind is probably the hardcore punk scene, the industrial and experimental noise bands, the starry-eyed or bitter-cynical college rockers, all or most of them bent on stressing the sincerity and immediacy of their sound as opposed to the artificial gloss of synth-pop, hair metal, and power balladry. But what makes Come On Pilgrim so awesome is that it has a little bit of it all —hardcore, noise, idealism, cynicism — yet always leaves you a way out so you do not end up pledging all your life and all your values to any single one of those elements. Serious and playful, sincere and ironic at the same time, all the while pursuing crazier and crazier ideas of musical synthesis that are valuable inside and outside their social context.

Thus, ʽVamosʼ is at the same time a bitter satire on stereotypes of Hispanic immigrants in New England ("estaba pensando sobreviviendo con mi sister en New Jersey" — no way this song wouldnʼt get these guys «canceled» in modern times if they had a million dollars and a million Instagram subscribers), and an innovative and exciting experiment in guitar playing. Amusingly, its structure reminds me of that old Amboy Dukesʼ reinterpretation of ʽBaby Please Donʼt Goʼ: like Ted Nugent in his psychedelic period, Joey Santiago here is all bent on making his guitar go as wild as possible over a very basic, very fast, very headbanging rhythm track, and even though this early version is shorter and less efficient than either the extended variant on Surfer Rosa or their even more extended and crazy legendary live performances, itʼs still a lot of fun — and, of course, that «bumblebee siren» bended riff coming in at key points in the song is easily the most unforgettable single moment of the entire mini-LP.

Perhaps most of the things attempted on these songs would be done better later, on the Pixiesʼ first two full-length LPs, but this should not detract from the fact that there is not a single bad song here — and by «bad» I actually mean «not containing at least one or two fresh musical ideas, let alone the lyrical content». ʽIsla De Encantaʼ mixes a hardcore punk riff with crazy Angus Young-style guitar solos, stop-and-start techniques, and more of Francisʼ hilarious Spanglish (all those Puerto Rican experiences paying off). ʽEd Is Deadʼ would later be reshaped into the much more memorable ʽWaves Of Mutilationʼ, but Joeyʼs use of sustain still makes it into a gaping psychedelic monster in its own rights. ʽThe Holiday Songʼ has one of the bandʼs happiest punk-pop riffs shadowing lyrics full of references to such happy themes as masturbation and incest. ʽNimrodʼs Sonʼ, I believe, actually steals the melody of Motörheadʼs  ʽAce Of Spadesʼ, but plays it in a more retro, almost Fifties-like fashion, with another story of an «incestuous union» tacked on top of the crazy beat (does Black Francis know something about his family history, I wonder, that he has not explicitly shared with the public?). And while ʽIʼve Been Tiredʼ is more of a spasmodic indictment of brainless radicals ("sheʼs a real left-winger ʼcause she been down south and held peasants in her arms") than a musical breakthrough, it still ends the record on a ska-punk note with lots of fun interplay between bass, rhythm, and lead.

In my humble opinion, the historical significance of Come On Pilgrim is easy to define: simply put, it was the last time in the known history of pop / rock that a small band with a classic, traditional Beatlesque lineup (rhythm guitar, lead guitar, bass, drums) was able to come up with a sound completely its own and completely overturning existing models and stereotypes. Itʼs all simple as heck, really, but for some reason nobody else had that kind of genius simplicity in 1987, and nobody — to the best of my knowledge — has been able to come up with another kind of genius simplicity with the same bunch of instruments ever since. In this way, you could argue that this music set the stage for the last important pop/rock revolution in known history — and even if I may be pushing it, I donʼt care, because the more people try to hear this record from this angle of view, the better.