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ROBERT POLLARD
Not In My Airforce
Matador
4 stars
On his first solo outing, Bob Pollard, Guided By Voices' head honcho and lo-fi poster boy, eschews the more conventional song structures and production values of *Under The Bushes Under The Stars*, this year's classic GBV opus, in effect retrofitting his own brand of retro. *Airforce* comes closer to matching the giddy rush of *Bee Thousand* or *Propeller* than the powerful art-rock brilliance of *UTBUTS*, meaning he's essentially delivered a pre-*UTBUTS* GBV record. What's missing, of course, is the sweet, sprightly pop of Tobin Sprout, creator of his own sans-GBV record, *Carnival Boy*, released in conjunction with Pollard's. Given Pollard's dominance over the band's material and the rumored upheaval of the ranks, *Not In My Airforce* could be a precursor of what to expect from GBV from now on.
Which isn't a bad thing. Pollard's never been loathe to display his fondness for artish rock, so nothing's changed there, and his melodies are as effortless as always. The song titles are typically nutty ("Psychic Pilot Clocks Out," "I've Owned You For Centuries," etc.), and though driving rockers like "Maggie Turns To Flies" are dazzling, the acoustic beauty of tracks like "The Ash Gray Proclamation" is equally striking. There's a winning, casually tossed-off feel to this material, in spite of Pollard's inherent grandiosity (pomposity?), and if this is the direction he chooses to travel from here on out, more than a few sad freaks will surely follow.