I had a yen to hear Sonic Youth’s "Total Trash", which quickly spiraled into a YouTube-assembled playlist of late ’80s/early ’90s indie rock—Pixies, Blur, PJ Harvey, Galaxie 500, and more. What can you say, the algorithm knows what it’s doing. It starts with my search (Sonic Youth), pulls in the obvious contemporaries (Pixies), and then folds in the British acts it knows I like. It’s a formula that’s pretty much guaranteed to keep me listening.
It’s 2026, and I still haven’t heard a Pixies album, back to front, in my life. ’80s and ’90s American indie rock is a real blind spot in my listening—I grew up hearing about it, reading about it, but never really listened to it beyond the tracks that made it onto alternative radio. There are plenty of gaps in anyone’s musical life, of course, but this one stands out given my other listening habits.
So the algorithms keep assuming this was my thing, even though it never was. As a result, I’ve probably heard more Pixies songs in their post-reunion lifespan than I did during their original run. Still, I’ve heard enough to say what everyone already knows: this band was at least five years ahead of their time. Good thing they eventually put their differences aside and cash in, finally getting the chance to make the money their imitators enjoyed."
The mythology of the ’90s is now every bit as strong as the mythology of the ’60s once was. Bands get defined by that era, and it sticks with them no matter what they do afterward. Jefferson Airplane and The Kinks, for example, are forever labeled as ’60s bands, even though both were actually more commercially successful in the ’80s.
As for Kim Deal, the Pixies will always be her ultimate legacy, even though she had more commercial success outside of the Pixies, and was a bigger individual star when she led her own band. This remains true even though she has spent much of her adult life trying to move beyond the Pixies. After falling out with Black Francis over creative and personal differences, she formed the Breeders and released Last Splash, which sold over a million copies and far outperformed anything the Pixies did commercially. She released music only sporadically after that, eventually rejoining the Pixies for their to tour the world many times over, before stepping away again when new recordings began. Good for her for cashing in when the opportunity was there—she earned it. But the Pixies will always define her legacy, even if the "Cannonball" single remains her true commercial (MTV, sales) and creative peak.
Similarly, Gorillaz have somehow recorded as many albums as Blur (nine) and have sold at least ten times as many copies. But Damon Albarn will always be the frontman of Blur first and foremost.
Sonic Youth’s trajectory is wild, and becomes more fascinating and debatable with the passing years. "Daydream Nation": every track is a revelation, each one is an anthem for a generation. It’s even in the National Recording Registry at the Library of Congress. Then "Goo": much in the spirit of "Daydream Nation", but filtered through major-label oversight. The "Kool Thing" single threw in everything but the kitchen sink in a bid for something resembling a commercial breakthrough. That track has everything -- wild noise freakouts, the Chuck D cameo, a singable chorus, an eye-catching video with Kim Gordon in leather, cats galore, and metric tons of sparkle and tinfoil. In some alternate, freakier universe, this is the album that breaks bigger than "Nevermind".
And then, just two years later, they’re putting out "100%" and "Sugar Kane", and they're sounding like an ordinary grunge-esque band—albeit one with stranger guitar tunings.
