Class Clown Spots A UFO

GBV spins raw silk from the very same thread, yet again, on its probably-17th studio album. But didn’t these bedroom/garage-recording cult favorites/geniuses already exhibit a deft return to form with early 2012\'s *Let\'s Go Eat the Factory*? How is it possible that there’s already another new album with more than 20 obscurely titled songs from the Dayton, Ohio–based indie rock act, just six months later? How many times can Bob Pollard mine the same collage of Swell Maps and The Who, throwing obscure, early R.E.M.-ish lyrics atop stunted anthems that instantly make listeners want to hear the same song over and over? Granted, GBV and Pollard himself have made a few missteps here and there, but there’s hardly one on this album, which just might be the aesthetic equal of 1995\'s *Alien Lanes*. The album—recorded with the classic mid-‘90s lineup—is named for a song first released on 2009’s *Suitcase 3* collection. Originally one of the group’s biggest downers, it returns here as a jaunty, McCartney/ELO-style hand-clapper.

The new Guided By Voices album is the best thing the band has recorded since the last album by the legendary Dayton, Ohio rockers. That's not meant facetiously: the last thing Guided By Voices recorded was the rapturously received Let's Go Eat The Factory, and Class Clown Spots A UFO ups the ante raised by that stellar effort, both in terms of recording fidelity (boring!) and songcraft (not boring!) One could argue there's more depth and variety here than on Alien Lanes, that there are better songs here than on Bee Thousand, but that's an argument no one's ever going to win, at least definitively. And this album is a win, by any (definitive) definition. Class Clown is classic GBV, starting with the head-body-head combination of "He Rises (Our Union Bellboy)," "Blue Babbleship Bay," and "Forever Until It Breaks" before finishing you off with the title track, a ridiculously catchy, melodically-complex, shot-through-with-melancholia song that serves as a kind of sadder and wiser riposte to XTC's "Making Plans For Nigel" as performed by the Hollies. If that makes any sense at all (it will when you hear it, hopefully). And that's just the first four songs of a 21-track album clocking in at just under 40 minutes. We've yet to get to "Keep It In Motion," a propulsive, drum-machine driven pop song which features, unusually, acoustic guitars, strings, and Bob/Toby singing together in a way not heard since "14 Cheerleader Coldfront" on 1992's Propeller. Possibly. (The song was one of a few that Bob recorded and sent to Toby at his home studio in Michigan for over-dubbing.) Nor have we discussed galvanic rocker "Jon the Croc," a clear single candidate, or "Chain To The Moon," one of the saddest and (why not?) prettiest songs Pollard has ever written.

In between you get wah-wah guitar solos, a wide range of unusual recording techniques of varying fidelity (but, as referenced above, much less of the murk lurking on Let's Go Eat The Factory), and a generous helping of Alien Lanes-style snippets. In fact, the sequencing of Class Clown seems to hearken back to that landmark LP - as on AL, songs bleed into each other, fadeouts segue into fadeins, short bursts of melodic rock ("Billy Wire," "Roll of the Dice, Kick in the Head") jut against somber chamber pop ("They and Them," "Starfire"). The last song, the anthemic "No Transmission," if played at the proper volume, will in fact blow your mind (and your windows). 'Class Clown Spots A UFO' is available now. A side benefit of Pollard's for-now decision to call it quits on touring is that you get more Guided By Voices albums. It's really hard to see how that's not a great thing for everyone. Because it is a great thing for everyone. Obviously.

Following January's Let's Go Eat the Factory, GBV's second reunion LP is shorter, punchier, and livelier than its predecessor. Last time, Tobin Sprout's input felt especially triumphant. Here, it's Robert Pollard's show.

The reunited “classic” line-up of famously prolific ’90s indie-rock institution Guided By Voices already issued one album in 2012, the very good Let’s Go Eat The Factory. But it wasn’t going to be a true GBV comeback until Robert Pollard corralled the old gang into putting out two reunion records in the same year. By…

The classic GBV lineup is back with their second release of 2012, and it's the same old story: brilliance mixed with pointlessness.

Following a 2004 breakup, Ohio lo-fi gods Guided by Voices re-formed to release January 2012's Let's Go Eat the Factory.

It's difficult to put a new Guided By Voices album into context these days. Robert Pollard has established a particular context of his own, individualistic and idiosyncratic as it may be.

After a six-year break, GBV reformed in 2010 and are looking to catch up rapidly, releasing two albums in five months.