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Overall, it's another great GBV album that continues to spotlight the Pollard's staggering work of genius.
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Earthquake Glue meets any GBV album that isn't named Bee Thousand or Alien Lanes.
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Their best album since 1996's brilliant Under the Bushes, Under the Stars.
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If Earthquake Glue isn't a masterpiece, it's as close as this band can be expected to get, and is the rare Guided By Voices effort that's imaginative enough for longtime loyalists and tight enough for dabblers at the same time.
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'Earthquake Glue' once again posits Pollard as purveyor of stupidly breezy tunes.
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Earthquake Glue nonetheless contains the band's best work since the energized Isolation Drills and edges out last year's Universal Truths And Cycles in the memorable hooks department.
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This is what makes Earthquake Glue such a startling arrival. You dont simply listen to it out of obligation, but instead because you are compelled to return to it, again and again.
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While it delivers the triumphant rock 'n' roll thrills and oddball incantations promised by the GBV "brand", the most surprising thing about Earthquake Glue is that, at a point in his career when his inventiveness really should be waning (along with his libido and his prostate), Robert Pollard's creative spark seems brighter than ever.
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Steeped in big rock history, steadfastly tenacious, perversely, refreshingly uncool, Bob Pollard has written a fine collection of songs, for the most part, and his band, in their execution, have matched him every step of the way.
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The band functions as a unit, informing the songs with a structure and a fully realized design that has sometimes been lacking in past albums.
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Guided By Voices albums have become predictable, a shocking end for a group defined by its surprise delights.
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Under The RadarPollard has evolved into college-rock comfort food of little consequence. [#5, p.106]
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MojoEarthquake Glue sees a return to the satisfyingly stylistic cohesion of 2001's Isolation Drills, ... while retaining the impressionistic aural fug that's so key to the band's appeal. [Sep 2003, p.98]
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Alternative PressThe songs are getting samey. [Sep 2003, p.102]
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UncutStrange, though, that we yearned for Pollard to treat his songs properly when he tossed them off as lo-fi sketches, but now they arrive as crafted, completed stadium anthems, that faint whiff of underachievement remains. [Sep 2003, p.102]
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BlenderThe offhand charm isn't enough. [Sep 2003, p.123]
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Q MagazineA familiar bag of tricks. [Sep 2003, p.101]
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FilterThe best song is track 13, "Apology in Advance." It is still not that good. [#6, p.86]
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SpinHazy, almost-there stadium anthems that don't quite fill the stadium. [Sep 2003, p.115]
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MagnetAside from a few fleeting moments of watery prog and lumpen rock, the album's 15 songs have a slow-growing charm and understated grace, something that gradually becomes powerful in its own right. [#60, p.102]
User score distribution:
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Positive: 20 out of 22
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Mixed: 1 out of 22
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Negative: 1 out of 22
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Apr 6, 2018
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Nov 18, 2012
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belletMar 13, 2004great