Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks Real Emotional Trash (Matador)

[February 27th, 2008]

[JANGLE JAM] The first words to come out of Stephen Malkmus’ mouth on Real Emotional Trash are: “Of all my stoned digressions/ Some amputated into the truth.” For one of the better lyricists of our time, they’re kind of a letdown. Musically, however, the couplet couldn’t be more perfect; instead of the jangly indie rock of the ex-Pavement leader’s past, the Jicks play intricate, technically awesome jams. Malkmus lets his guitar do the talking.

Real Emotional Trash sees him continuing the guitar wankery of 2003’s Pig Lib, but while some of the longer tracks used to meander only to showcase Malkmus’ ever-increasing guitar vocabulary (I see your wah-wah pedal and raise you one schizophrenic lick), Trash highlights his interplay with the rest of the band. The title track twists and turns like the evil love child of Television’s Marquee Moon and the Allman Brothers. It’s not just Malkmus the guitar hero; it’s a well of places for each Jick to shine—especially drummer Janet Weiss, who anchors the chaos with badass fills (making sure tracks like bluesy single “Baltimore” don’t get too jammy) and delivers harmonies on the ultra-poppy “Gardenia.”

Malkmus has always had a knack for witty one-liners, which come off as either incredibly snarky or oddly endearing. The majority of Malkmus’ post-Pavement career has seen him move away from anything personal and into narratives about a crazy cast of characters; here we meet “Hopscotch Willie,” a Leroy Brown-like outlaw on the run in some mythical Wild West where anyone can claim innocence and the guitars sound like lasers, and “Wicked Wanda,” a “pretty little spider with Hollywood inside her.”

Understanding each word, however, is beside the point. Malkmus hides even his most sincere songs in a lyrical Rubik’s cube. For every line that breaks your heart (“Faceplant, stumble ahead/ Victim of your bitter pretensions”), you get something laughable (“The world is my oyster/ I feel like a nympho stuck in a cloister”). It’s an inverse of songwriting maturity—as Malkmus grows older, his music becomes more fluid, his lyrics ever more bizarre. Growing up never sounded so young.