Pixies – Indie Cindy

Pixies’ latest album has finally arrived, 23 years since the 1991 release of Trompe Le Monde. Since then the Boston band have been through a hiatus, sporadic tours and shows, as well as the departure of bassist Kim Deal. It was with great anticipation that fans awaited Indie Cindy, with the teasing single Bagboy released a year ago. The album is produced by Gil Norton who also sat behind the wheels on Doolittle and Bossanova.

The album opens with the song What Goes Boom: a good title and a strong opening track, it runs head first with heavy guitar riffs and alluring melodies that sound very punk. It almost brings to mind something Billy Talent could have done. Greens & Blues, the following track, is stripped of the punky guitars and boasts instead an arena-friendly pop tune with classic indie vibes. This song will be perfect for the summer headline slots at Glastonbury and T in the Park with choruses made for singing along to and guitar loops already echoing future arena acoustics.

The title track Indie Cindy is one of the highlights of the album, mixing the wild elements of What Goes Boom with the soft melodies of Greens & Blues into one unique sound, ranging from velvet melodies to raging riffs and back again. It’s a song packed and ready for the masses, and though Pixies have kept their signature sound even after such a long time, it seems as if modern music has had some influence on Francis’ songwriting: maybe they are looking for some more mainstream hit songs in their discography.

The beguiling tune of Silver Snail is the peak of these 45 minutes and 49 seconds, with special kind of darkness to it – yet somehow some light slips through in the chorus. The last part of the album is blurred into a haze of variations on the songs in the first half. This album could have been considerably shorter: it feels quite long even though it only holds 12 songs. Pixies have some good tracks on Indie Cindy, but unfortunately a lot of them merely pass by as yawn-worthy fillers.

Johanna Eliasson

Indie Cindy was released on 19^th April 2014. For further information or to order the album visit Pixies’ website here.

Watch the video for Indie Cindy here: