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Surrender Your Poppy Field
Surrender Your Poppy Field in Bloomington, MN
Current price: $18.99
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Size: CD
Anyone who was shedding a tear at the
Electrifying Conclusion
of
Guided by Voices
in late 2004 would probably be taken aback if you had told them that the group would not only be back in action in the year 2020 but also in the midst of one of the most consistent hot streaks in their recording career. However, after
Robert Pollard
assembled a new and improved edition of
GBV
in 2016, the band released six albums that range from quite good (2019's
Warp and Woof
) to genuinely great (2017's
How Do You Spell Heaven
and 2019's
Zeppelin Over China
). 2020's
Surrender Your Poppy Field
puts the count up to seven, and it stands out stylistically from its immediate predecessors. Since
Pollard
debuted this
lineup --
on vocals,
Doug Gillard
and
Bobby Bare, Jr.
on guitars,
Mark Shue
on bass, and
Kevin March
on drums -- their songwriting and production has favored their leader's latter-day embrace of the twists and turns of prog rock rather than the lo-fi dense-pack pop hooks of their '90s breakthrough works.
plays like an effort to find room for both sides of
's personality; while most of this was clearly not cut on a four-track cassette machine like
Bee Thousand
or
Vampire on Titus
, the group and producer
Travis Harrison
mixed up home recordings and rehearsal tapes with studio sessions, so numbers like "Year of the Hard Hitter" and "Queen Parking Lot" are layered in functional murk, and more clearly engineered tracks such as "Physician" and "Woah Nelly" make use of their own sorts of sonic clutter (the filtered vocals on the former, the ambience of an old 78 on the latter).
leans to the grand scale in its melodies and arrangements, but
was clearly in a playful mood when the band cut this material, and after appearing on well over a hundred albums, he still sounds engaged and looking for new angles, even finding some here and there. While
is less immediately approachable than the other albums from this period in the
saga, it's experimental, not meandering, and for fans with a taste for their more esoteric side, this will hit the spot and then some. ~ Mark Deming
Electrifying Conclusion
of
Guided by Voices
in late 2004 would probably be taken aback if you had told them that the group would not only be back in action in the year 2020 but also in the midst of one of the most consistent hot streaks in their recording career. However, after
Robert Pollard
assembled a new and improved edition of
GBV
in 2016, the band released six albums that range from quite good (2019's
Warp and Woof
) to genuinely great (2017's
How Do You Spell Heaven
and 2019's
Zeppelin Over China
). 2020's
Surrender Your Poppy Field
puts the count up to seven, and it stands out stylistically from its immediate predecessors. Since
Pollard
debuted this
lineup --
on vocals,
Doug Gillard
and
Bobby Bare, Jr.
on guitars,
Mark Shue
on bass, and
Kevin March
on drums -- their songwriting and production has favored their leader's latter-day embrace of the twists and turns of prog rock rather than the lo-fi dense-pack pop hooks of their '90s breakthrough works.
plays like an effort to find room for both sides of
's personality; while most of this was clearly not cut on a four-track cassette machine like
Bee Thousand
or
Vampire on Titus
, the group and producer
Travis Harrison
mixed up home recordings and rehearsal tapes with studio sessions, so numbers like "Year of the Hard Hitter" and "Queen Parking Lot" are layered in functional murk, and more clearly engineered tracks such as "Physician" and "Woah Nelly" make use of their own sorts of sonic clutter (the filtered vocals on the former, the ambience of an old 78 on the latter).
leans to the grand scale in its melodies and arrangements, but
was clearly in a playful mood when the band cut this material, and after appearing on well over a hundred albums, he still sounds engaged and looking for new angles, even finding some here and there. While
is less immediately approachable than the other albums from this period in the
saga, it's experimental, not meandering, and for fans with a taste for their more esoteric side, this will hit the spot and then some. ~ Mark Deming
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