The Pixies' Pre-Reunion Landmark: Trompe le Monde Bursts with Crafty Hooks, Prickly Tones, Quirky Lyrics, and Electrically Charged Energy
Mastered from the Original Master Tapes for Audiophile Sound: 1991 Album Springs to Life on Mobile Fidelity's Numbered-Edition Hybrid SACD
The Pixies verged on commercial breakthrough when the now-iconic band released Trompe le Monde in September 1991. A sea change in popular music tastes that the band helped initiate began to sweep the world. And the Boston quartet seemed prepared to lead the way, with this, its eminently tuneful fourth record, jam-packed with crafty hooks, prickly tones, catchy elements, outer-space atmospherics, electrically charged energy, and delightfully quirky lyrics.
Trompe le Monde takes its place as one of the finest pre-reunion swan songs ever recorded. If the Pixies wouldn’t have broken up right after its release, there’s no telling what would’ve happened. All that you need to know is that the 15-track effort is as hard rocking and brilliantly innovative as any of the group’s creations. That’s no small feat.
Mastered from the original tapes, Mobile Fidelity’s numbered-edition hybrid SACD presents the ensemble’s abrasively melodic landmark in a fidelity it’s never enjoyed on any prior digital version. Featuring lush keyboards and moody soundscapes, and reclaiming the nasty guitar edginess and swooning distortion of the group’s earliest efforts, Trompe de la Monde comes across as the Pixies intended: A sonic bridge between college-rock’s influential cruder-textured albums and the polished professionalism that distinguished alt-rock classics.
In other words, Mobile Fidelity’s SACD presents the music with grit, rawness, and character, but mixed in with radio-friendly smoothness and virtuosic professionalism. Awash with incredible timbres and tonalities, myriad new details rise to the surface. Listen to the counterpoint melodies and layered vocals on “Letter to Memphis”; the trash-compactor feedback and thumping bass during the whipsawing “Planet of Sound”; the “Spyhunter”-like pace and limitless depth now present on “Subbacultcha”. Dynamics, contrasts, low-end frequencies, and imaging are all significantly enhanced.
Musically, the Pixies were never better. On par with the groundbreaking Surfer Rosa and Doolittle, Trompe le Monde explodes with hyper riffs, jerks to stop-start progressions, elates with cheerful emotions, and bangs on to giddy surf-fused arrangements. With Kim Deal absent from the songwriting process, vocalist/guitarist Frank Black takes the reigns and doesn’t disappoint.
Tales about sea monkeys (“Palace of the Brine”), aliens (“Planet of Sound”), and love (“The Sad Punk”) bop alongside memorable jabs at hipster pretensions (“Subbacultcha”) and inflated egos (“U-Mass”). A contagious cover of the Jesus and Mary Chain’s “Head On” will have you hitting repeat. Power pop, wanderlust punk, theatrical glam rock, reconfigured reverb-laden country, all here, all encouraging repeat listens.
1. Trompe le Monde
2. Planet of Sound
3. Alec Eiffel
4. The Sad Punk
5. Head On
6. U-Mass
7. Palace of the Brine
8. Letter to Memphis
9. Bird Dream of the Olympus Mons
10. Space (I Believe In)
11. Subbacultcha
12. Distance Equals Rate Times Time
13. Lovely Day
14. Motorway to Roswell
15. The Navajo Know