Pavement: Slanted And Enchanted (30th Anniversary/splatter) LP

The first installment of Matador's 2022 "Revisionist History" catalog series is a 30th anniversary colored vinyl LP reissue of Pavement's landmark debut Slanted & Enchanted. First released in 1992, it remains a truly monumental album three decades later  – one that defined/ruined a generation and a genre, depending on who you ask. Beneath its coils of raw distortion and screaming-for-the-hell-of-it, Pavement's first full-length disc gets over on the strength of stellar songwriting and ingenious melodicism. Steve Malkmus's sly, evocative word-games reveal genuine emotion ("Here"), and sometimes they just pay tribute to his favorite bands ("Conduit For Sale!" is a nod to the Fall), but these songs are unconventional in a way that set the convention for bands that came after them. NME hailed it as, "a marvellous piece of lazy rock'n'roll that does for the current American new wave what Teenage Fanclub's 'A Catholic Education' did for British guitar music...Almost unintentionally they've forged one of the most refreshing American noises for ages" while Spin named it one of their favorite albums of 1992 proclaiming it was, "so rich in melliflluous melodies, elliptical lyrics and thrilling, avant guitar-pop seductions that it renders any and all competition meaningless."