Better Than Archers of Loaf: Pavement for Dummies

Also I should say, you really oughtn't vote unless you're somewhat familiar with both acts. Otherwise the results would be skewed by all the people who have only heard Pavement. PS- I voted for Archers so take that.

the fuck is this shit

it's a poll

because you're butthurt that people like one overrated 90s indie band more than another overrated 90s indie band and think this is thread will be the necessary course correction? i don't know/care if you're a 'newbie' but fyi literally anything else is more worth a thread than this.

some dude!

epistandoophus

yikes, sorry for being a little glib, really just wanted to know what the result would be. totally not butthurt fyi. until now. :(

and thx 4 great nickname i love it

this is like polling led zeppelin vs uriah heep or some shit

i like polvo best

i prefer staind

I like polvo too. However, I will go ahead and answer your weird poll. It's easy for me since I strongly dislike Pavement and The Archers are one of my all-time favorite bands so, them.

archers of loaf are like third eye blind but without the hit

get the fuck out

you're just doing that to annoy me

For the record, this wasn't a random matchup- the poll title is taken from the liner notes of the Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain reissue. So really let's all blame Pavement for this awful poll.

I had a six year love affair with Archers when the best I ever did was flirt a little with Pavement. Also, Crooked Fingers >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> solo Malk.

someone fire up the sonic youth vs. polvo poll

"beggars bowl" is better than any late period sonic youth track iirc

say what you will about indie rock but it brings heavy game to the challops field

ciderpress otm

"the results after the loaf's revenge" is better than the collected works of picasso, gaugin, van gogh & michaelangelo

"beggars bowl" is better than any late period sonic youth track iirc

just wanted to play along

I never saw Archers Of Loaf live so they win by default.

The less-heard band with the better rhythm section always ages better. That's the answer to almost every poll like this. See also Sonic Youth vs. Dustdevils.

the Dustdevils. they were our generation's Beatles really, only vastly superior

i'm still buzzing from the inspiring, well played, gracious, and passionate reunuion shows in chicago, i'm going archers

pavement's suckiness as a live band even at their "peak" was kind of annoying, though i love them too

i saw both of these bands in high school, mid-90s and i enjoyed the pavement shows a lot more -- they were sort of the important band for me for a couple years there. i'm only now really coming around to archers of loaf, really been enjoying icky mettle lately.

That's because it's awesome.

yes it is!
i should say that when i saw the archers way back when they were the openers and i was distracted by some intense teenage draaaaama. it's probably one of my top 5 i wish i could go back and relive that concert" concerts.

there's different ways you could argue who's recorded output is better, and i might even slightly give pavement the advantage for just having more range and a lot more recorded output

but live there is zero question in my mind, archers were simply one of the truly great 90s bands live, up there w.superchunk and fugazi, pavement was not

i don't know anything by archers of loaf so i won't vote in this, but i do like pavement

"the results after the loaf's revenge" vs. the greatest of all time is better than the collected works of picasso, gaugin, van gogh & michaelangelo

next in trendwatch: afghan whigs, another awesome 90s live band ime

but i guess my more considered answer is

The less-heard band with the better rhythm section always ages better.
totally, which is why i can still stomach archers (enjoyed the reunion show, but not as much as i had expected to) and not pavement (took a pass on that since seeing them on crooked rain tour and wowee zowee were really pretty great/sufficient and i am lolsob never going to be 19 again, etc)

that said, archers lyrics were often just godawful whereas pavement is...i dunno, distractedly inscrutable (?) at worst, that is to say that i can ignore what's annoying.

STILL going archers for the strength of crooked fingers, barry black, showing surprisingly diverse later output promise (continued not strictly under the ARCHERS OF LOAF name, thank goodness really)

Sebadoh

Butterglory

haha

TS: Pavement / Smashing Pumpkins

still bummed that this wasn't a tie

I had a six year love affair with Archers when the best I ever did was flirt a little with Pavement. Also, Crooked Fingers >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> solo Malk.

I had a six year love affair with Pavement when the best I ever did was flirt a little with Archers. But, Crooked Fingers >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> solo Malk.

(sorry guys, I will go and flirt a little more with my Archers records just for you)

Icky Mettle and Vs. the GOAT are classic but lately my go-to has been Speed of Cattle. Just a great compilation of pure ROCK OUTness.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Smashing Pumpkins

I like Pavement and all, but it seems like there are too many songs where it's like, these guys are just screwing around. Archers are just balls to the wall, pretty much the whole time. There are WAY more Archers songs that are important to me than Pavement songs.

the Westing collection
Slanted and Enchanted
Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain
Wowee Zowee

one of the greatest runs in pop/rock. certainly not overrated.

I like epistantophus and all, but it seems like there are too many posts where it's like, this guy is just screwing around.

i like how i read through "better than" and get excited and "archers of loaf" and am still pretty excited and then read "pavement" and thread seems boring again

one of the greatest runs in pop/rock. certainly not overrated.

Plus brighten the corners, their biggest 'rock' record and some of malkmus' best songwriting. Most consistent record, even more so than crooked rain.

Also, before the poll closes: Pavement was really better than Archers of Loaf. Come on. Icky Mettle is awesome, but it hasnt had nearly the same effect as any single Pavement album, let alone 4-5 of them. Malkmus' output is up there with (though different than) Tom Verlaine, Neil Young, Westerberg, Lou Reed. He'll go down as one of the best, as he should.

I play Icky more than Slanted, and Speed of Cattle and Westing both are two of the few indie arcana comps you can actually listen to, but I take Crooked and Wowee over Vee Vee and All The Nations. And I'll take the "Stephen Malkmus bursting free" period over the "Eric Bachmann bursting free" period (not to mention Malkmus solo over Crooked Fingers). So Pavement, I guess.

I prefer the Archers without a doubt. If they swapped their band names, even more so

these two have always been twinned in my brain, as I basically heard them at the same time, and it always perplexed me that Pavement was more beloved. I guess I like more Pavement songs, but I also dislike more. And while "Frontwards" is awesome, it's doesn't hit me near as hard as "Web In Front." But yeah, lousy name.

xxxp The Archers' catalog doesn't boil down just to Icky Mettle. I think they had just as strong a run of albums as Pavement did. I'm not even sure Icky Mettle is their best.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

At the time, I saw the Archers as kind of like a delayed response to Pavement, but through a heavy Merge/North Carolina filter (mid-era Superchunk by way of early Polvo?).

Sonic Youth or My Bloody Valentine would have never had AoL open up for them like they asked Pavement to. For comparison's sake, AoL's first national tour was opening up for Weezer circa Blue Album.

Not to say I didn't enjoy the Archers... if you take Icky Mettle and follow it up with an album made of Greatest of All Time and the better songs off of VeeVee that would be a fantastic statement. I tuned out after VeeVee, the vocal affectations/Waits-isms lost me and the music felt less inspired. Pretty good live band though!

Welp, there you have it. It's hard to be disappointed, as I like Pavement too. But I do prefer the Archers. I'm glad they at least made a decent showing in this poll!

Pavement dissent STILL hasn't ripened into a backlash yet, I see...

not really worth waxing over enough for a backlash

The less-heard band with the better rhythm section always ages better. That's the answer to almost every poll like this. See also Sonic Youth vs. Dustdevils.

― dlp9001

I hadn’t thought of comparing Archers vs Pavement but yeah, the former have aged really well for me in comparison and yeah their rhythm section is great. Archers are a better band, Pavement has the better overall songs. I think I prefer Archers nowadays though.

i like pavement a lot, but i fucking love the archers

Every once in a while I remember that AoL released an extremely dodgy comeback album a couple years ago, but most of the time it's blissfully forgotten and all I remember is the perfect band they were when they broke up in 1998.

i don't think that record was embarrassing, but yeah it was nothing like one might have hoped for

dude, what was up Al's butt at the beginning of this thread

I saw AoL on the tour for Vee Vee and Pavement on the Crooked Rain tour, and I have to admit AoL were the way better live band.

Yeah just watching clips on yt from both bands seeing them live looks like wildly different experiences. AoL are very energetic, very tight sounding... they "rock hard". I love Pavement too but they give more of a goofy vibe and sound like they're not trying at all... I mean, they are THE slacker rock band after all.

the best live patter i ever witnessed was at the merge fifth anniversary show when, during the 1994 world cup, matt gentling intoned 'this next one goes out to stoichkov, because he has no friends on or off the pitch'

he was otm