Pixies concluded their UK tour in support of their most recent album When The Zombies Came with a sold-out show at Manchester's Apollo Theatre. Featuring tracks from the album alongside many of the classics with which they made their name in the late 1980s and early 1990s they delighted a fan base of young and old over the course of an hour and three quarters.
Following on from last year’s triumphant three-night stand across town playing Bossanova and Trompe Le Monde in full, Pixies returned with a more traditional gig set-up to the Apollo that’s packed to the rafters and eagerly anticipating a career spanning set from a band that seems to have been permanently on the road since they reformed in 2004 but whose appeal never feels to have dwindled in that time. It’s telling looking around that there’s plenty who weren’t even born when they started to break here with incendiary shows at the long-lost Internationals let alone be there to witness them.
They start with a bang. Monkey Gone To Heaven and Wave Of Mutilation has the crowd bouncing up the sloped floor of the Apollo past the sounddesk. The Apollo’s sometimes muddy sound has taken leave tonight and you can hear that thrilling coursing energy that lies at the core of all the songs from that first phase of the band’s existence.
Their cover of The Jesus And Mary Chain’s Head On and a ferocious U-Mass keep that pace up until the first respite where Emma Richardson takes lead vocals on a delightful In Heaven (Lady In The Radiator Song) that shows Pixies weren’t, and aren’t, just about anger fuelled by adrenaline.
Nimrod’s Son sees Joey Santiago use his guitar lead to great effect to create that crackling effect on touch whilst Motorway To Roswell soars like a stadium filling rock anthem that points where Pixies were heading before their implosion.
Frank Black says very little during Pixies shows but tonight he makes an exception to commemorate Chas Banks who was one of their early tour managers who first met with them in Manchester as they began to break over here. He passionately dedicates Here Comes Your Man to him and the Apollo bounces as one.
The biggest problem any artist of Pixies standing has is audience acceptance of new material. Frank admits as much when he almost sheepishly tells us there’s two more in a seven-song stretch of Death Horizon from Between The Eyrie and six from their most recent The Night The Zombies Came. The crowd listen attentively, understanding the band’s desire to showcase their new material, but they, like the songs, understandably don’t have the same energy of youthful immortality and anger. To appreciate them properly would be take them out of these surroundings and immerse yourself in them.
Velouria kicks in and the crowd lose it like their on switch has been flicked back alive. The first of three tracks in a row and the only songs from Bossanova, the Apollo is once more a heaving sweaty mass.
The last half hour of the show focuses heavily on Doolittle and Surfer Rosa and is a relentless assault on the senses. A false start on Debaser creates a moment of levity as the crowd simply carry on singing the hook line whilst the band figure out what went wrong. Caribou’s gorgeous melody is preserved beautifully whilst Bone Machine, Mr Grieves and Hey hit sledgehammer hard. Into The White sees Emma take the lead again.
They finish on Where Is My Mind, a song with over a billion plays on Spotify, dwarfing everything else at least four fold. The Apollo becomes a sea of raised phones taking a shot of the moment to say they were there. In a strange way it’s fitting - a band from a different era still relevant, connecting and important, a constant that feels like they always have been, and always will be there.
Pixies played Monkey Gone To Heaven, Wave of Mutilation, Head On, U-Mass, In Heaven (Lady In The Radiator Song), Vamos, Nimrod's Son, Motorway To Roswell, Here Comes Your Man, Death Horizon, Jane (The Night The Zombies Came), Primrose, Kings Of The Prairie, Chicken, Mercy Me, The Vegas Suite, Velouria, Blown Away, The Happening, Gouge Away, Debaser, Cactus, Tame, Caribou, Bone Machine, Mr. Grieves, Hey, Into The White and Where Is My Mind?
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