Guided By Voices to perform at The Bluebird Nightclub

The 90s classic lineup of Guided By Voices had made Bloomington one of its stops in the reunion tour.

Indie rock band Guided By Voices is set to play at 9 p.m. on Friday at Bluebird Nightclub.

Robert Pollard’s former collaborator and musical foil, Tobin Sprout will join Pollard on guitar along with a third guitarist, Charles “Mitch” Mitchell. The rhythm section features Greg Demos and Kevin Fennel on bass. Musically the band strikes a balance between art school punk pretension and jangly power pop.

Guided By Voices rose to prominence with release of its 1994 album, Bee Thousand. That album is easily the most popular of the band’s catalog and was a critical smash.
Pitchfork ranked Bee Thousand at number 10 on its list of the 100 best albums of the ’90s.     

The band’s set will focus on material from 1992 to 1996, arguably the most popular period of the group’s career. Fans can expect to hear songs from albums such as “Propeller,” “Bee Thousand,” “Alien Lanes” and “Under The Bushes Under The Stars.”

“People are really excited. Guided By Voices shows are the stuff of legend. In fact, the city went so far as to declare Oct. 25, 2004, Guided by Voices Day. It’s a chance to cut loose and enjoy pure rock and roll,” said Dan Coleman, owner of Spirit of ‘68 Promotions.

Coleman said people were already asking him about booking a show about 15 minutes after the tour dates were posted on Pitchfork. He said pre-sales have been healthy and walk up sales are expected to be strong, following the pattern of other big shows this year.

Sarah Baldwin, an IU alumna, is very excited about seeing Guided By Voices for the first time. Baldwin said she didn’t care for the group at first, but said it became one of her favorite bands when she revisited the material.

“They really reminded me of Pavement, a band I had loved since high school. They represent a culmination of a lot of my taste.

Their songs are short and to-the-point in the true style of punk music. They have very obvious garage, psychedelic and post-punk influence and pedal-filled, shoe-gazey lo-fi sound,” Baldwin said.

Baldwin said she appreciated the band had released so much material through the years and the large number of tracks on most of the albums made purchasing the band on vinyl exciting.

Sophomore Greg Simpson has never seen the group live. He said he got into the group a few years after it had broken up.

Simpson said he had been a fan for years and thought this might be his only opportunity to see the band live. Simpson said the having the classic lineup is the icing on the cake.

He said he was particularly happy about the involvement of Tobin Sprout, who wrote some of Simpson’s favorite Guided By Voices songs.

“I’m looking forward to a hell of a drunken sing-a-long, and I really hope they’ll play something older from their more obscure albums that I won’t expect. I’ve been listening to bootlegs of other shows on the tour, and it seems as though they’re doing just that,” Simpson said.