Out of the many band reformations currently going on, The Pixies’ might well be one of the strangest. During their original run in the late 80s and early 90s the alt-rock legends quickly descended into acrimony and in-fighting splitting up before they could reap the rewards of their innovative sound. Now their reunion continues into it’s sixth year (only one year short of the band’s original lifespan) and they have as yet only released one new song, which was back in 2004 – not that the fans seem to mind too much, considering it means that the band can put on sets stuffed with old favourites (as this run of two shows definitely are, being low-key warm up gigs supposedly based around set-list suggestions from the fans) without having to suffer through lackluster new material to get to it.
The band’s habit for unusual decisions extends to tonight’s support act – with the Pixies’ legendary status they could have pretty much any band they wanted and yet they’ve selected unsigned duo Bromheads to appear at these shows, a British duo who look like the early, uglier era of Kings of Leon and play uninspired sub-White Stripes songs, which they aim to compensate for by simply playing as painfully loud as possible. Fortunately the Pixies odd choice of venue works better as although not ideally suited to gigs the former cinema and bingo hall the Troxy has a rather more luxurious feel than most.
After Bromheads thankfully short set, the Pixies promptly come onto the stage, obviously looking more mature than in their old press shots. Or at least drummer David Lovering and black-clad guitarist Joey Santiago do, looking respectively like a hip middle-aged uncle and roadie who has wandered onto the stage, central duo Frank Black and Kim Deal look possibly better now than they ever did in the past, with Black having lost some of his trademark girth, and Deal looking so delighted to be on stage for the whole of the gig that it’s impossible not to be swept up in her enthusiasm.
Bossanova’s surf-rock instrumental Cecilia Ann makes a perfect choice for the set’s opening, as does an amusingly abortive take on second number Rock Music. This rare slip up during the set does highlight the fact that the members of the band barely communicate with each other throughout the show. Apart from towards the end of the show where Lovering and Santiago toss a drum stick back and forth, and during the encore when Deal and Black not entirely successfully try to recreate spoken word sections from the band’s debut album Surfer Rosa (leading into Where Is My Mind, probably their most well-known song thanks to Fight Club) each member of the band stays in their own spot on the stage concentrating on the audience or their instruments. Even at the end of their set the band choose to warmly acknowledge the audience, rather than each other. Which does raise suspicions as to how well the famously volatile band are getting on.
But perhaps this is for the best, this lack of inter-band interaction means that they can concentrate on delivering a set that’s both exilihariting and efficient (during an hour and a half on stage, they manage to play twenty-nine, or rather twenty-eight and a half songs) and Deal, who in particular felt dominated by Black during the early days of the band is here given her own chance to shine, acting as the band’s spokesperson, a role that she embraces so joyfully that it doesn’t matter that she repeats herself more than once - at several points she thanks the crowd for making the effort to get tickets and come out. Her claim that the band have made an effort to learn the weirder songs that fans requested (well, at least the ones they remember) seems to be only a half truth as despite a few of dips into later albums Trompe Le Monde and Bossanova, most of the material comes from the band’s most well regarded records Surfer Rosa, Come on Pilgrim and Doolittle, not that there’s anything wrong with this as frankly every song from that trio of records blows anything from the other two out of the water. With each song being given the same level of committment by the band it’s difficult to select particular highlights, but Debaser, Monkey Gone to Heaven and Gigantic are all very warmly received, Cactus is a low-key perverted delight and Vamos is enlivened by some impressively acrobatic waves of feedback from Santiago.
With the set being so long, and so packed with fan favourites, it must be said that it does have a negative effect on some portions of the crowd – there aren’t the usual peaks or troughs of interest you’d find at a gig and some members of the audience work themselves into a state of over-excitement, leading to ugly scenes with more sensitive spectators. But despite this, the show still feels like a genuine privilege to witness, and even if there is going to be an absence of new material, long may The Pixies reunion continue.
