Keith Pille's Weekly Shuffle

Every week, I will fire up the Shuffle Songs option on my iPod; the first song to come up, no matter what it is, will get an instant, unvarnished review. We're at the mercy of random chance and the limits of my digital music collection. Let's see where this takes us.

Ed Is Dead [live]
The Pixies, Live at the Fine Line

I've talked before about my ambivalence towards all of the live albums clogging my iPod, and everything I said before still goes. "Ed Is Dead" has never been one of my favorite Pixies songs, and I think the album version is better than this one. But this show, the very first one of the Pixies' reunion tour, was one motherfucker of a great rock and roll concert, and I'd feel like I was violating some moral law if I deleted it.

So I'm stuck with a bunch of songs—some pretty good, but most just your average not-quite-as-good-as-the-album live versions that I feel sort of stuck with. I guess it's not the worst problem to have. There are some songs from this show ("Bone Machine," "Gigantic," "La La Love You," and both versions of "Wave of Mutilation") that absolutely shred—I get excited just thinking about them. The lesser songs aren't bad, either, and I guess that if I'm having a blah workday and this copy of "Ed Is Dead" floats up, it'll at least briefly take me back to that transcendent show. It's a so-so version of a weak song (come on—ed is dead? That's all you've got to say? The best Pixies songs rock on a trifecta of witty Black Francis lyrics, weirdly ssssmokin' Joey Santiago guitar lines, and raw energy; the best I can say about “Ed” is that it's sort of energetic), but it evokes some nice memories.

So it's got that going for it.

Weekly Shuffle Scoreboard (Best to Worst):
1. "Rock N Roll Radio V2," Derailleur
2. "Back from Somewhere (live)," Husker Du
3. "The Ride of the Valkyries," Richard Wagner
4. "Powderfinger," Neil Young
5. "Sliver (live)," Nirvana
6. "Whiskey Bottle," Uncle Tupelo
7. "Don't Be Afraid of the Robot," Electric Six
8. "Allison's Starting to Happen," The Lemonheads
9. "Gassed & Stoked," Lou Reed
10. "Shooting Star," Golden Smog
11. "Wherever I Go," Steve Earle
12. "You Are the Everything," R.E.M.
13. "Nicotine & Gravy," Beck
14. "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart (live)," Wilco
15. "Ed Is Dead [live]," The Pixies
16. "The Calming Sea," Beachwood Sparks
17. "John, I'm Only Dancing," David Bowie
18. "Take It or Leave it," The Strokes
19. "Is It Too Late?", World Party
20. "P'twgs," The Honeydogs
21. "Monkey Dot," Money Mark
22. "I Wanted to Tell You," Matthew Sweet
23. "Dazed and Confused," Led Zeppelin
24. "Soldier's Joy," Mark O'Connor
25. "Blue-Eyed Soul," Wilco
26. "Masoko Tanga," The Police
27. "Scenery," Neil Young and Pearl Jam
28. "We Got The," The Beastie Boys
29. "The Big Foist," The Minutemen
30. "Climbing up the Walls," Radiohead
31. "That's When I Reach for My Revolver," Mission of Burma
32. "You Win Again," Keith Richards