Photo credit: Summerfest
By the seventh or eighth year or so, The Pixies’ reunion had stopped doing the band’s legacy any favors. Hundreds of tour dates had sapped the reunion of its novelty, and on stage the group simply seemed exhausted, if not outright miserable. They’d run out of new ways to present their old songs, and had given up any pretense that their existence was anything other than a massive cash grab. It was getting hard to watch, and that was even before bassist Kim Deal jumped ship and the band released an embarrassing 2014 album, Indie Cindy, that verified for the record that The Pixies had lost their touch.
Compared to the band’s nadir a few years ago, the bounce back on display Wednesday night at Summerfest’s BMO Harris Pavilion was nothing short of miraculous. Low expectations certainly helped—only the most naïve fan would expect the road-wearing 2018 incarnation of The Pixies to deliver the same charge the band did during their enigmatic ’80s, when they still carried an air of subversion and mystery—but this version of The Pixies had a nervy, stubborn energy that was all their own. Without directing so much as a word to the crowd, Frank Black and company muscled through nearly 30 songs, delivering the expected hits (“Here Comes Your Man” and “Where is My Mind,” natch) but also a slew of deep-cuts, rarities and—gasp—new songs, from both Indie Cindy and its similarly unloved yet much-improved 2016 sequel Head Carrier.
Although nobody comes to a Pixies show hoping to hear new songs, they gave the band a sense of purpose, and the unfamiliar material made the old standbys sound that much sweeter. Past Pixies tours sometimes suffered from too much fan service, and the resulting impression that the band was performing out of joyless obligation, but Thursday night’s set drew heavily from the weirder, screamier corners of the band’s songbook that they seem to enjoy the most: “Ed Is Dead,” “Tame,” “Caribou,” “Holiday Song,” vocally demanding numbers that Black delivered convincingly. They even snuck a few numerological in jokes into the show, entering the stage to The Beatles’ “You Know My Name (Look Up The Number)” and slotting “No. 13 Baby” as the 13th song in their set.
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The night’s unsung MVP was bassist Paz Lenchantin, who inherited the difficult task of replacing the band’s most popular member. She follows Deal’s footsteps closely, careful not to upset the group’s existing dynamic, but she brings some new energy into the fold since, unlike Deal, she’s visibly happy to be on stage. While her older bandmates performed with their usual poker faces, her big smile became a proxy for the audience’s enthusiasm. What a difference having even just one band member openly excited about hearing these songs again makes.
Read more of our Summerfest coverage, including picks, previews and reviews, here.
