The All-TIME 100 Albums: Slanted and Enchanted by Pavement

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The All-TIME 100 Albums

20 of 101

By Josh Tyrangiel Published: November 13, 2006

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ALBUM: Slanted and Enchanted

YEAR RELEASED: 1992 LABEL: Matador ARTIST: Pavement

TIME 100 ALBUMS PODCASTS

PODCAST: Welcome to the All-TIME 100 Albums - the musical compilations of the last half-century that need no introduction. That said, listen in below as music critics Josh Tyrangiel and Alan Light introduce the list and talk about the top albums of the 1950s and '60s.

PODCAST: We know. Twenty-nine of the 100 greatest albums of all time come in the 1970s, and Pink Floyd isn't there. Play this podcast to learn why we picked the titles we did, and if you have something to say, tell us about it using the talkback link below.

PODCAST: Maybe it's a Sign O' The Times that you're listening to critics' audio recordings about great music, but this podcast about how we chose the best albums of the 1980s really is a Thriller. Give it a listen below.

PODCAST: Here's music even the younger set will know by heart. Listen to selected clips from the 1990s through present day as music critic Josh Tyrangiel discusses his picks.

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Sales of Pavement's fuzzed-out masterpiece don't stack up to the rounding errors on Nevermind, but its influence on Beck, Blur, Radiohead and countless other musicians of the 90s is incalculable. Lead singer and former Whitney Museum of Art security guard Stephen Malkmus expressed alienation with the same lo-fi guitar grit of Kurt Cobain, but his lyrics and vocals are models of cryptic passion. "Summer Babe" could pass for a rougher than normal bit of classic rock if Malkmus weren't singing, "She waits there in the levee wash, mixing cocktails with a plastic-tipped cigar" before finally getting to the money line—"You're my summer babe!" Somehow his word salads communicated both the ennui of a suburban smart ass as well as an awareness that ennui isn't tragic. As Malkmus yelped on "Conduit for Sale": "Between here and there is better than either here or there."