Phoning It In: "Telephone Town" by Guided By Voices

Illustration titled "Travel by Covered Wagon" from Covered Wagon Co., c. 1928

I wouldn't really be phoning it in if I didn't include a post about my favorite band, Guided By Voices. I could write posts about this band in my sleep, and they have a catalog of ~1000 songs, meaning that there's a track for any occasion or subject. Take 1987's "Telephone Town", a home recording that sat in a suitcase in Robert Pollard's basement for almost twenty years, before being released on Suitcase 2, the second box set of Guided By Voices rarities pulled from the titular piece of luggage. The rinky-dink woodblock percussion gives this one a demo sound from the start, and the Midwestern accent Pollard sings in pegs this as predating the band's British-accented peak years, but there's something nice going on here. The lyric is doggerel("everyone I know pretends to be a person/everyone should try not to be a person"), but Pollard sings with a lot of energy, especially on the beautiful ascending melody line of the bridge.

I'll never understand the allegations that Robert Pollard needs an editor - he left a song this good in his basement for two decades before he decided it was worth sharing. Pollard's new project, Boston Spaceships, is re-recording some of these old rarities, and I think "Telephone Town" is a good candidate for this treatment.

"Telephone Town" by Guided By Voices