It’s EDUCATIONAAAALLLL!!

Time now for an Unironic Recommend: loudQUIETloud, a film about the Pixies. Netflixed this the other day, and have watched the movie, all the special features, and the movie a second time with the commentary.

The movie follows them from their reunion through their 2004 tour, and it’s not a “Behind the Music” sort of thing at all — just sort of an observant camera — and they don’t really go into much history, because that’s not really the point.

The sound editing is AMAZING — the crazy-ass energy of their shows comes through spectacularly well. Them old fat bald motherfuckers can ROCK!

There are things it’s really uncomfortable to watch (a scene in a van with a downward-spiraling David Lovering comes to mind), and things that are really beautiful (Charles/Black Francis and Kim in a tiny church in Iceland), and things that are raw and strange (an interlude with a girl and her friend waiting outside a show venue 12 hours before the show because she’s such a huge fan), and things that are touching (Joey “visiting” his kids via iSight), and things that are totally fucking hysterical (a deleted scene with Kim buying some stuff in a music store and the 19-ish clerk recognizes her name on the credit card, but doesn’t seem to recognize the woman standing there as the Kim Deal) — and plenty of scenes that clearly illuminate why, no matter how much ass they kick or how hard they kick it, they were more or less bound to break up via fax.

The members of this band are four mondo bizarro people — I suspect that’s why their music is so fucking good. Pixies sound like no other band — their legions of imitators can’t come anywhere close. I have this vague fear that I’ve seen all their shows I’m ever gonna see,* because these fuckers can’t relate to each other at all, and they’re bound to implode again someday. But loudQUIETloud fucking rawks, and I guess that’ll have to do for now.

*9/30/2004, Greek Theatre, Berkeley CA
5/30/2006, Warfield, San Francisco, CA (early show, got Kim’s setlist & Frank’s pick)
5/30/2006, Warfield, San Francisco, CA (late show, got my mind blown out)