In a move set to confound as is their wont, Guided By Voices are offering up one of their best recent releases. But it's under a different name. Clang Clang Ho, out this Friday via Rockathon Records, is by Cub Scout Bowling Pins. And while that's only a funny name for GBV, there's enough here to suggest a genuinely different approach has been undertaken by Robert Pollard and crew.
Blending bubblegum pop, weird throwback AM Gold vibes, and classic AOR hooks, Cub Scout Bowling Pins crank through a catalog of catchy gems. From the straightforward "Magic Taxi" -- The Who's "Magic Bus" now taking fares, one suposes -- and forward into the odd with "Flip Flop World", a cousin to Hurricane Smith or something, the record races through a collection of inspired pop confections. "Schoolmaster Bones" is fairly conventional, and could pass as a GBV classic, while "© 1-2-3" not only sounds like one of those oldies, but one of their best ever compositions. And if that's not surprise enough, the absolutely stunning "She Cannot Know" faintly echoes both 1910 Fruitgum Company and Nilsson.
At a certain point, Guided By Voices-as-Cub Scout Bowling Pins seems like a winning proposition. The new name has given them a kind of cover to goof off, weird out, and deliver stuff that feels more fun than some of their recent standard records. If Boston Spaceships was Pollard's AOR venture, this is his Seventies gold one. That he's chosen to go in some decidedly crazy directions here is to be admired though. There's nothing dull here, and every experiment, however brief, yields pleasure for a listener, and reaffirms for a long-time GBV fan just how resilient the band's skills remain, and how sharp their focus on finding the perect hook and making it rock.
Clang Clang Ho is out on Friday via Rockathon Records.
More details on Guided By Voices (or Cub Scout Bowling Pins) via GuidedByVoices.com.
[Photo: me, 2019]