Taking Sides: Trompe Le Monde vs. any Pixies album of your choice.

it's hard for me to explain its appeal beyond "well, it just sounds really good," but i'll try anyway. the pixies, i think it goes without saying, had a sound: pixies albums sounded like pixies albums and even though the tracks progressively distinguished themselves more and more from the others on the album, you can still tell that they're, yes, pixies songs.

with tlm, though, the range of influences is much broader and the sound is their most pop, i'd dare say. so while every track had its own individual personality, when grouped together on the album, it still sounded like the pixies. only in TECHNICOLOR, compared to the relative black & white of their older albums.

had the ending to "motorway to roswell," another one of the greatest things ever, closed the album, it would've been perfect. too perfect, in fact, and thus "the navajo knows," the band not taking its self too seriously to the very end.

More specifically, I still think Bossanova is my favourite. I like the surf guitar element, the dynamism, the explosive energy and the control; I really like 'Cecilia Ann' and 'Velouria'. TLM comes in a narrow second for me. I like it loads, would broadly back what you others have said. I love the opening track above all, in fact; plus 'Alec Eiffel', and I have a soft spot for 'U-Mass'.

Doolittle has great moments, but I was scared off it by Reynolds' review (or was it Stubbs, or True? I *think* it was Reynolds) back in 89, and never quite recovered. No, I never quite recovered from 1989.

"Doolittle" is best.

I have been listening to a cassette of TLM constantly for the last little while. Picked up Bossa Nova around the same time and that hasn't been getting nearly the same rotation. There's filler on both to be sure - despite my incessant listening, I can look at the tracklist of TLM and go "What the hell are those songs?" And "Subbacultcha" in particular does absolutely nothing for me. But somehow the album doesn't outstay its welcome for me - just as it winds down, I'm dying to hear "Alec Eiffel" again and so the cassette gets flipped around.

Really, in the ultimate dream world, they would have waited twelve months and let Bossa Nova and TLM be one fabulous album. If I could swap "The Sad Punk," "Subbacultcha," "Trompe Le Monde," and "Letter To Memphis" for "Velouria," "Allison," "Dig For Fire" and "Havalina" - what an album that would be! I guess you'd want to get the Pod material in there too....but enough what-ifs - any album with "Bird Dreams of the Olympus Mons" can't fail to suck me in, and it's a really solid record. I certainly haven't felt half the interest in hearing Doolittle lately, even if it's probably got a better lineup on paper. Can't say why.

"Intooooooooo the mountaaaaaaaaaain" - great shit! Just great.

LOL the songs you swap off it are my favourite songs on the album! Well, apart from Planet Of Sound. I've always liked TLM better than Bossanova. Apart from the first time I heard it - I admit I didn't like it as much at first, but I was only 15 so I didn't know any better.

I love Subbacultcha.

TLM be fabulous, but I've been listening to the Live In Newport accoustic one a lot recently, and to hear it all stripped down is interesting. The bit at the end of Gigantic where they usually take it down, Kim goes "uh, how do we take it down? It's already down" so they just dwindle off with chatter.

TLM contains some of my favourite Pixies moments, but as an overall album, ranks fairly low with me. "Alec Eiffel", "Planet of Sound" and the cover of "Head On" are as good as, or better than, almost anything else they ever wrote. Still, if I were putting albums in order, for me it goes:

Bossanova
Doolittle
Surfer Rosa
Tromple Le Monde
Come on Pilgrim

Can't imagine rating TLM over the stuff that came before. On TLM, for the first time, the music feels forced to me. As though they were writing "Pixies songs" rather than just making music. I know that's a projective, indefensible argument, but it's true to my experience of the record. There's something freeze-dried about it, and that even applies to its best songs ("Planet of Sound", "Palace of the Brine", "Letter to Memphis"). Plus, for the first time, the filler begins to outweigh the memorable tunes.

with tlm, though, the range of influences is much broader and the sound is their most pop, i'd dare say. so while every track had its own individual personality, when grouped together on the album, it still sounded like the pixies. only in TECHNICOLOR, compared to the relative black & white of their older albums.

this sums it up perfectly for me. i haven't listened to doolittle or surfer rosa in a few years, but trompe le monde usually finds its way into my stereo at least 2-3 times a year and then gets multiple spins

"Head On" is their greatest moment, aside from the guitar solo on Vamos. And "Head On" is a full band press, as opposed to just Joey. Sequencing is better than Surfer Rosa, which sez bundles. Certainly TLM stands as the best album.
-- Sterling Clover, Wednesday, 2 May 2001 00:00 (7 years ago) Link

I love posts like that where the only conclusion can be either 'that guy is a genius' OR 'that guy is an idiot'. It was a good cover but really didn't add much to, or reinterpret in any interesting way, the original versh.

Highlight of TLM is the first minute or so.

I loved Trompe Le Monde when I first got it. I was obsessed with them at the time and it was like birthday cake, 16 big bright Pixies pop songs!

But it's the kind of album that's great because it's immediate. Then you realise that what grabbed you first is really all there is - whereas I can find something new to like about Surfer Rosa every time I hear it.

That's funny, 'cuz I'd have thought it'd be the other way around: TLM seems fresh now 'cuz it's the only one you didn't play to death in the late 80s/early 90s.

i think it is the other way around. surfer rosa seems completely exhausted to me at this point, while trompe le monde's recording is rich and layered to the point where little things that i didn't notice before are constantly popping up, usually depending on the source i'm listening from. i also had the opposite experience as far as it being an immediate album, i wasn't even sure if i liked trompe le monde at all for the first few months i had it

I think of both Bossanova and TLM as technicolor albums, but I think that's due to Vaughn Oliver or whoever totally changed the color scheme for those last two albums.

Anyway I was all set to combine Bossanova and TLM into one mega-album, crafting one all-killer-no-filler album, but then I realized you can put both on a single CD (coming it at about 79 minutes) so why bother.

people who i don't get, part 3674 in a 4bn series: people who prefer Trompe le Monde (or Bossanova) to Doolittle and Surfer Rosa.

here's the thing, this is just plain mental. i like pretty much everything the Pixies recorded but the first two albums proper are so much better than the last two it seem silly comparing them. however, what i have found is that it's not a rare opinion to prefer one of the latter, particularly here in the US.

the big TS in the Pixies catalogue should be Surfer Rosa vs Doolittle. it's a painfully close decision between the two but my gut says Doolittle. if i was taken hostage for a few years and then when i got back home i decided i wanted to listen to some Pixies, i would reach for Doolittle, and surely that is the ultimate litmus test. isn't it?