terror twilight

Pavement fed their thrill and brought on the major leagues in the dusty craft of this crepuscular conclusion.   The band had made dramatic changes in their sound with every album, from the lo-fi distortion of 'Slanted and Enchanted' to the twisted classic rock of 'Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain' to the expansive experiments of 'Wowee Zowee' to the pop playfulness of 'Brighten the Corners'.    For their next album, they decided to work with acclaimed producer Nigel Godrich.   Sessions for 'Terror Twilight' began at RPM recording studio on East 12th Street in New York City and continued at RAK Studios in St. John's Wood, London.  The album features Stephen Malkmus on vocals and guitar;  Bob Nastanovich on percussion and keyboards;  Scott Kannberg on vocals and guitar; Steve West on drums and percussion;  and  Mark Ibold on bass and vocals;   with Dominic Mercott playing drums on "Major Leagues" and "Carrot Rope" and Jonny Greenwood offering harmonica on "Platform Blues" and "Billie". 

Nastanovich explains:   "We decided to take six months off after the touring for the last record.  We wanted to get reacquainted with our families. We have two married gentlemen in the band now. I don't know about their plans for families but I guess, it will be even longer intervals in the future for us...For the first time we set out to make a coherent record.  We started recording last July, but then that studio turned out to be sort of a rehearsal space. Then we moved to another, and then on to London. This procedure did seem to make sense at the time and we are pleased with the results... the way it works is, that Steve comes to us with his ideas in the shape of demos and then we start to work on the songs. Some come out pretty much the same he'd imagined them, and others change completely. We did lose some songs in the process...Twilight Terror is the short span between Sunset and Dusk.  This is considered the most dangerous time in traffic, because half of the people switch on the headlights, and the other half doesn't. It's when most accidents happen."

Kannberg adds:   "Also it stands for times, when strange things happen, like Equinox, during an eclipse or on a full moon and we thought that this would be the best times to listen to this album...What's important is, that we tried to make those songs as good as possible, whereas in the past we recorded as much as possible and then threw away what we didn't like ... This record will be better-sounding, because the studio was a lot better, the instruments were a lot better, the takes were a lot better...I think the album is more Pink Floyd than Radiohead. That's what I call this record: a Pink Floyd record. Just because of Nigel. And every time I say that, he gets really happy."

Ibold imports:  "It's 'Slanted and Enchanted', but after somebody played Black Sabbath. The thing is, Slanted always sounded weird next to anything else on the radio, whereas the songs on this record... well, they'll still sound different to songs on the radio, but they're not going to have the problem of sounding like they're coming out of a different stereo system...We definitely had the the idea of going in and doing this and coming up with extra parts or overdubs...There are some tunes where the tunefulness comes in hidden pockets, and then there's like a couple where the tunefulness is... sort of a messenger bag or something!"

Malkmus muses:    "It's got some really weird moments that are like heavy rock. I had some pop tunes - like, our version of pop tunes, that probably are too weird to be really pop...The idea was to sort of do four hard rock tunes: y'know, bring back hard rock, or things like The Groundhogs and Captain Beefheart, show that that's a valid thing that people should listen to. And then, like, four standard mellow tunes that we can do in our sleep that sound pretty. And then four pop tunes, which are not my best forte, or something that I have trouble with...It's a different sonic imprint, though it's the same people writing the songs. I don't know, no matter how hard we try to be different, it comes out sounding like Pavement. It's just less grungey-sounding, somehow. There's a modern psychedelic sound to some of the things. One of the things we wanted to do was riff, or at least do our riff-style thing. But riffs are tough: they're all there or they're not. You can get judgmental about it - like, are we boogieing or are we too wimpy to boogie? There's this song 'Folk Jam' that sounds sorta like an electrified version of Pentangle's 'Sweet Child'. Then there's 'Billie', which originally was going to be just a straightahead pop tune but has become acoustic and weird. And 'Ground Beef Heart', which we consider a hybrid of, like, Split-era Groundhogs and Lick My Decals-era Beefheart. And that's pretty rocking...We're pretty pleased with the record.  Because I had this little digital four-track mixing thing at my house, I had things a lot more planned out, and if you combine that with Nigel and his meticulous ways, that was a good thing to go together because we're pretty slack musically. But he couldn't get us too uptightly tight."

'Terror Twilight' went to number ninety-five in the US, sixty-three in France, twenty-four in New Zealand, twenty in Norway, and nineteen in the UK.  It would be their final album.  





http://crookedrain.com/









"Spit on a Stranger" – 3:04
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFjJP8O5vqQ




"Folk Jam" – 3:34
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWLeNZQOOQ0



"You Are a Light" – 3:54
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDtZousQsME




"Major Leagues" – 3:24
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13DfvdeH-io



"Platform Blues" – 4:42
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsY7c2ImuWc




"Ann Don't Cry" – 4:09
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQEaSTBg3g0




"Billie" – 3:44
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euECGzqdBIU




"Speak, See, Remember" – 4:19




"The Hexx" – 5:39
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZA7uFDZaEM




"Carrot Rope" – 3:52
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G53DW71BlNk

'Terror Twilight' 
full album:



"Spit on a Stranger" – 3:04
"Folk Jam" – 3:34
"You Are a Light" – 3:54
"Cream of Gold" – 3:47
"Major Leagues" – 3:24
"Platform Blues" – 4:42
"Ann Don't Cry" – 4:09
"Billie" – 3:44
"Speak, See, Remember" – 4:19
"The Hexx" – 5:39
"Carrot Rope" – 3:52

bonus tracks:
"Roll With the Wind"
"Harness Your Hopes"
"The Porpoise and the Hand Grenade"