Give Robert Polllard credit – he slurred and swayed between songs but as his lyrics arrived, his voice sharpened back to album form. Give his old bandmates credit for making up, and finally bringing their original lineup back to Ohio.
There might be no better place to see GBV than Columbus, just an hour from Dayton, their hometown. Before the group’s final breakup in 2004, they typically stopped at Alrosa Villa. For their reunion, they landed at Outland, the bondage club I always expected to resemble a Medieval dungeon.
Instead, it was a relatively stylish club with a lounge - albeit, one where someone could easily have had hot candle wax poured onto them without an audience batting an eye. But GBV would trumpet its return from Outland's performance space, a 400-capacity black box that hearkened back to the late, lamented Little Brothers.
The Columbus crowd ran a bit older, unsurprising considering the middle-aged GBV lineup onstage. Once the neon light above the stage signaled the bar was open, any thoughts of age evaporated.
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This version of GBV has split in 1996 – Pollard, guitarists Mitch Mitchell and Tobin Sprout, bassist Greg Demos and drummer Kevin Fennell. Seeing Pollard reunite with his old songwriting foil Sprout demonstrated what propelled the band through its golden period.
Cutout Witch highlighted the Under the Bushes Under the Stars offerings. This lineup stuck to its era’s songs, mainly plowing through much of Bee Thousand, Alien Lanes and Under the Bushes – a little taste from Vampire on Titus worked superbly.
Pollard swung the microphone and broke out a few of his old kicks, jawed between songs and introduced every song. His slurring caught up with him here; until the blistering chords of Motor Away tore through the room, it was hard to tell what song he just announced.
No matter how nonsensical Pollard's lyrics grew, almost every tune became a singalong. I myself shouted out lyrics to Echoes Myron, a Bee Thousand favorite, and quite possibly the best song ever to include the name 'Myron.'
These songs are classics among a certain group of people, those in love with the twists a 90-second nugget of pop-punk perfection can take. Not everyone can handle the inherent sloppiness that GBV wears as a badge of honor.
The band simply blistered, never caving into the drunken chaos which has enveloped past shows. They turned their standard fare with renewed enthusiasm. I Am a Scientist, Tractor Rape Chain, and Smothered in Hugs all received face time. The slinking beat of Hot Freaks broke up the manic pace of GBV's punkier material.
The live GBV experience wiped away the biggest gripe of critics: the sloppiness of their studio records, the ultra low-fi recording techniques, the commitment to putting every minor song idea onto a record. They alternately felt loose and tight, with nary a missed note and Pollard's voice in fine form.
Guided by Voices never changed the world, even though their pop-punk acumen could have filled arenas with a little refinement. But pressing them into that mold would have stripped their off-the-cuff brilliance. Despite dabbling with the mainstream, GBV always thrived when mining 50-second nuggets of rock joy.
If they never come around again, that's fine. This small crowd at Outland tasted the peak, drunken form of a great band taking on its last go-around.
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