Pains
So today, the Pains of Being Pure At Heart, Alex’s band, a band he told me excitedly about in 2007 (“I’m going to be playing bass in a band! And they’re called … wait for it… THE PAINS OF BEING PURE AT HEART!” How awesome is that?”) was given the “Best New Music” tag by Pitchfork in a headliner review. Before March 2007, the Pains did not exist. At their first show, at a warehouse in Bushwick, Brooklyn,their drummer was an iPod. Obviously, we’re all beyond thrilled for him, and obviously Alex is grinning, bashful and self-effacing (Me: How you doing this morning, rock star?” Him: “Great. Pretty cool! [Ten second pause] So hey, is it weird that I’m excited about a Prefuse 73 album?”)
So today, all of Alex’s friends (myself included) are foolishly indulging in some expansive, “I was there, man” strutting, Entourage-style. It makes us all look very silly, but fuck it, it’s fun, and anyway, being this close, even by accident, to a cresting wave of “buzz” is crazy and fascinating. Watching the Google hits build slowly, then proliferate with alarming speed, was like observing some mysterious natural process at work –salmon swimming upstream, baby turtles crawling toward the sea, Matthew Perpetua linking enthusiastically to an “Everything With You” mp3 — all is part of the same grand cycle.
Anyway. We’re excited. It’s a good thing. Congratulations, Alex, Kip, Peggy (Wang-East!), and Kurt. Say hello to Vampire Weekend and the Arcade Fire for us.
Check out the album here.
Jayyyyyyyyyyyyyyson. There are no words. THANKS THANKS THANKS!
I came to this record through the Pitchfork review and was just thinking wow, this is the coolest new thing I can remember hearing in AGES. No kidding. My best new artist and best of 2009 lists have their first entry.
The “today’s buzz” page references (among others) Teenage Fanclub, which reminds me of when Spin picked Teenage Fanclub over Nirvana as artist of the Year for 1991, something that they spent a lot of time trying to overcome/appologize for over the years to come.
The thing is I think they may have been right. Nirvana (who I loved, don’t get me wrong) spawned a lot of nu metal and mook rock. Teenage Fanclub influenced everyone from Belle & Sebastian to the current crop of fuzzy rock (Pains included). Bandwagonesque sounds a lot better to me now then Nevermind does.
I remember that vividly — Teenage Fanclub’s Bandwagonesque was their #1 album of 91. History may have proven that an error in judgment, but there’s something kind of retroactively punk about that pick that I still like.
Joe, I’m not so sure Spin got it wrong in 1991. Maybe there should have been a tie for No. 1. But Bandwagonesque is awesome, and influencial (Nirvana is too, obv.).
Basically, I’m with Adamm on this.
My wife digs this band, too. We just listened to POBPAH’s debut and Clinic’s “Internal Wrangler” pretty much nonstop for a few hours during a long road trip.
I finally got a chance to listen to the Pains album over the weekend and loved it. It has a very nostalgic sound without being overly derivative. Very nice. Congratulations Alex and crew.
Just got in from seeing Pains at Black Cat in DC and I’ve got to say….holy crap, they’re the real deal. And it doesn’t hurt that they’ve got a bass player that makes the girls swoon.