Pitchfork

Photos by Nilina Mason-Campbell

Were there indeed a Pavement reunion in the works, we would almost certainly be freaking out a little too hard to gather our puns enough to write a story about it. So you'll note our calmness when we tell you this: the scuttlebutt about the reformation of one of the greatest bands of all time flying around the old internet today, springing from a story on EW.com entitled "Wait... a Pavement reunion!?", is a lotta nice talk, it is. But, for now anyway, that's really all it is. And it's not even new talk.

Speaking with Entertainment Weekly in this week's issue, Stephen Malkmus cheekily mentioned that he wouldn't be averse to "something small in 10 years like the Zeppelin thing," adding "obviously, the arena would be smaller than theirs." In a separate interview, bassist Mark Ibold chimed in and announced that he's game, but that it "needs to be carefully planned" just so he can stave off a recurring nightmare he's had of "a reunion show [where] he couldn't remember the songs."

Scott "Spiral Stairs" Kannberg is quoted as saying, "Matador is having a 20th anniversary party soon, so maybe we'll try to do something for that." EW.com adds, "[When contacted, Matador had no response.]" Matador tells us that no such party is even in the works just yet. But the anniversary isn't until 2009, so that's plenty of time to get a party together, right guys?

Of course, anyone looking at those quotes individually can tell that these dudes aren't ruling anything out, but they aren't suggesting anything concrete, either. Really, the talk doesn't differ much from what Spiral Stairs told us back in September of 2006 when he claimed that "it would probably work well for a 20 year anniversary or something like that... but I don't know."

Certainly we can see why folks would get excited-- it's fucking Pavement, after all!-- but this truly (and sadly) isn't anything to get your hopes up about at the moment.

But hey remember that other band Malkmus is in? The ones with the new record and the big tour? Well, they played a show last night at Satyricon in Portland, Oregon. Above and below, find photos from that show. And way down below, find the band's tour dates, including newly added UK and Europe shows.

Pavement tour dates:

JUST KIDDING

SM/Jicks dates:

03-05 San Francisco, CA - Amoeba Records (in-store)
03-19 Minneapolis, MN - First Avenue *
03-20 Milwaukee, WI - Pabst Theater *
03-21 Chicago, IL - Vic Theatre *
03-22 Indianapolis, IN - Vogue Theater *
03-23 Newport, KY - Southgate House *
03-25 Nashville, TN - Mercy Lounge *
03-26 Atlanta, GA - Variety Playhouse *
03-28 Washington, DC - 9:30 Club *
03-29 Philadelphia, PA - The Fillmore at the TLA *
03-31 New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom *
04-01 New York, NY - Bowery Ballroom *
04-02 Brooklyn, NY - Music Hall of Williamsburg *
04-03 Boston, MA - Paradise Rock Club *
04-04 North Adams, MA - MASS MoCA *
04-11 Portland, OR - Jupiter Hotel (Malkmus with James Mercer) (Buckman Bash)
04-20 Austin, TX - La Zona Rosa #
04-21 Dallas, TX - Granada Theatre #
04-23 Albuquerque, NM - Launchpad #
04-24 Tucson, AZ - Plush #
04-26 Indio, CA - Coachella
04-27 San Francisco, CA - Fillmore #
04-28 Sacramento, CA - Harlow's #
04-30 Eugene, OR - WOW Hall #
05-02 Victoria, British Columbia - Sugar #
05-03 Vancouver, British Columbia - Richard's on Richards #
05-24-26 George, Washington - The Gorge (Sasquatch!)
05-29-31 Barcelona, Spain - Primavera Sound Festival
06-05 London, England - Shepherd's Bush Empire
06-07 Manchester, England - Academy 2
06-08 Glasgow, Scotland - Oran Mor
06-09 Dublin, Ireland - Tripod

* with John Vanderslice
# with the Joggers