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CMJ - June 2000
Douglas Wolk

Guided By Voices
Hold On Hope EP - TVT

The songs on albums are usually expected to belong together; the songs on singles generally aren't. Guided By Voices works that phenomenon for all it's worth on the new Hold On Hope EP (TVT). This "single" from last year's Do The Collapse (the lighter-waver "Hold On Hope" itself is tacked on after the disc's eight new songs, not before them), is a trove of goodies. Most of the new material was recorded by Ric Ocasek at the same time as Collapse, but it belongs to GBV's tradition of great throwaways. In the old days, it seemed these abbreviated tracks were being slapped onto tape and then abandoned - now, they demonstrate how Robert Pollard came up with a great idea for another song before he finished the one he was working on. "Tropical Robots" for instance, gets in two promising verses, then abruptly ends before it gets to a chorus. Also, guitarist Doug Gillard is doing great things to Pollard's songwriting (as on the recent collaborative album on Rockathon-Recordhead, Speak Kindly Of Your Local Volunteer Fireman). A showboating lead guitarist is something this band has always needed (see the future guitar-store classic "Avalanche Aminos" for proof), and you can sense Gillard's hand in the strapped-in-harmonies and dramatic tension of "Interest Position", too.