Inspiration strikes Robert Pollard nearly 40 years into his songwriting career.
As their 3rd album this year (and their 39th overall), it’s anybody’s guess as to what made the process of creating Nowhere To Go But Up any different from any of the other recent Guided By Voices albums. Despite appearances, the band has certainly never embraced quantity over quality. However, with such a prolific output, some are bound to be less memorable than others. Their latest stands apart as their best record of the year (a moniker few bands even necessitate the use of), and moreover, of the last couple of years as well. Every few records, Robert Pollard seems to produce a pack of songs that are a consistent cut above the rest. On his latest, he crafts a memorable collection of glossily produced, hard-rocking anthems that, when coupled with especially inventive instrumentation, stand out amongst the band’s post-2016 lineup’s output.
Nowhere To Go But Up seems to harken back to the power pop sound of their majestically unsuccessful early-2000s major label era. The marriage of the radio ready sound of Isolation Drills with Pollard’s more esoteric modern lyricism makes for a surprisingly satisfying listen. The atypical high-fidelity production feels slicker, and the instrumentation richer, than the satisfying, yet simplistic hard rock sound they’ve recently grown into. Although no songs stretch over 4 minutes (which was, at one time, about double the length of a typical Guided by Voices song), there are multiple multi-sectional anthems which feel clearly indebted to Pollard’s obsession with The Who. Above all, what really stands out here is a renewed sense of urgency. Pollard and Co. feel more determined than before to prove they’ve still got it, even if they’ve never really come close to resting on their laurels.
Single “The Race is on, The King is Dead” is a propulsive, thumping opener, and certainly one of their best songs in years. The lyrics here, and across the record, are typically abstract and fantastical, such as “The race is on, the king is dead / The shit is on appointed heads” and “Greetings noble Caesar/We have come to congratulate/You on your successful crossing/Of the Rubicon”. However, Pollard’s writing does feel a bit more specific, a bit less determined to confuse than it often does, as on 2022’s “Lizard On the Red Brick Wall,” where he repeats “I saw the lizard on the red brick wall/I saw the lizard on the red brick wall.” Here, he lets a few highly satisfying all-timers like “Every single highway/Is the wrong way home” slip out. His lyrics often feel like some kind of poetic mad libs, but this time around, there is a little more emotional resonance behind many of them.
“Jack of Legs” shows Pollard at his most arena-rock ready; An attitude it seemed the band left behind long ago. Cascading guitar riffs and extremely dramatic slow-builds back him as he snarls “I’ve seen your Mona Lisa”. “For the Home” has a fantastic, dissonant Brian Jones-esque acoustic intro that comes as a welcome surprise. The big takeaway here is that these songs feel imbued with little touches that help make them each feel like their own distinct track. Pollard can tend to fall into writing a dozen (albeit all enjoyable) same-y songs, but it seems like some amount of added attention was paid to the compositions on this record.
Overall, Nowhere To Go But Up packs a tighter, more memorable punch than its recent predecessors. Some of his most beautiful melodies in years are on display across these songs, and the rest of the band more than meets his high bar, with fantastic guitar parts and a much more inventive approach across the board. If this year’s Rolling Stones’ record is an example of how not to age gracefully as a long running rock band, Nowhere To Go But Up is quite the opposite. Pollard proves that he can still pull off a surprising stylistic left turn nearly 40 records in. Thankfully, it shouldn’t be more than a few months before his next offering arrives.