In July, a celebration for the late Steve Albini took place in Chicago in honor of the legendary engineer and musician’s birthday. It was revealed a street in the city would be renamed after him, and that became official today when Steve Albini Way was unveiled at the corner of W Belmont Ave and N Rockwell St, near Albini’s famous Electrical Audio. The ceremony featured a speech from Kim Deal as well as performances from the Mekons and Jeff Tweedy, as per Brooklyn Vegan.

Kim Deal doesn’t care much for the beach. “I don’t like hot weather,” she tells me over Zoom. “I’m from Ohio. I don’t go into the ocean. I don’t do water sports. But then again, I do like the view.”

After playing in iconic bands for decades, Kim Deal is going solo. Deal, formerly of the Pixies and currently of the Breeders, will release Nobody Loves You More, her first-ever solo album, later this week. She’s also getting ready to hit the road as a solo act for the first time ever. Today, she’s sharing her Nobody Loves You More title track, as well as the dates for her upcoming tour.

In August, Kim Deal announced her debut solo album Nobody Loves You More. The indie rock stalwart has shared the singles “Coast” and “Crystal Breath” so far, and today she’s back with the gauzy LP closer “A Good Time Pushed.”

Kim Deal has had quite the legendary career run. Between playing bass for Pixies across their first five studio albums, she somehow still had the bandwidth to form the Breeders, whose stone-cold classic sophomore album Last Splash arrived in 1993. Not long after that, she started a short-lived Breeders spinoff project called the Amps, who were not as good as the Breeders, but still quite good. Deal put out some solo singles in the 2010s — and returned earlier this year with “Coast” — and the Breeders have been busy opening for Olivia Rodrigo on the Guts tour. She’s never released a full solo album, though, and nobody can blame her with a schedule that stacked. But today, Deal announced Nobody Loves You More, arriving Nov. 22.

Kim Deal is best known for her roles in legendary bands the Pixies and the Breeders, the latter of whom has been opening for Olivia Rodrigo on select dates of the Guts tour. Today, the musician is releasing “Coast,” her first new solo material since 2014.

We’ve Got A File On You features interviews in which artists share the stories behind the extracurricular activities that dot their careers: acting gigs, guest appearances, random internet ephemera, etc.

We’ve Got A File On You features interviews in which artists share the stories behind the extracurricular activities that dot their careers: acting gigs, guest appearances, random internet ephemera, etc.

Last week, Dinosaur Jr. kicked off a seven-night residency at the Music Hall Of Williamsburg in Brooklyn to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Where You Been. They’ve been bringing out special guests for every show, an esteemed list that has included Hamilton Leithauser, Isaac Brock, Kurt Vile, Warren Haynes, Lee Ranaldo, and Kevin Corrigan. On Tuesday night, Kim Deal was brought to the stage to do Pixies’ “Gigantic” and the Breeders’ “Divine Hammer.” She also helped out with “Tarpit.” Also present at the show were the Hold Steady’s Craig Finn and Tad Kubler, who played on “The Wagon.” Here’s some video:

Last year, the British trio Big Joanie released their second album, Back Home, and they’re about to head out on some live dates in support of it. Today, they’re sharing a new version of the album track “Today” featuring the Breeders’ Kim Deal. “We are immensely proud to announce our new version of ‘Today’ featuring Kim Deal,” the band’s Stephanie Phillips said in a statement. “Whether through Pixies, Breeders, or her solo work, Kim has been a vital influence on us as a band and we’re so happy that she’s become part of the Big Joanie world.”

The Breeders are announcing a 30th anniversary reissue of Last Splash coming in September. Last Splash (The 30th Anniversary Original Analog Edition) has been remastered based off of the original analog tapes, which were previously thought to be lost. This process actually unearthed two unreleased tracks from the Last Splash days, and one of them — “Go Man Go” — is available to hear now. It’s a co-write between Kim Deal and Black Francis from 1993.

Joe Walsh convened an all-star lineup of Ohio rockers at Nationwide Arena in Columbus night to benefit VetsAid, the veterans’ charity he founded in 2017. Walsh’s James Gang got back together for their first proper set in 16 years, though they did quickie performances at both Taylor Hawkins tribute shows earlier this fall. Nine Inch Nails, the Black Keys, and the Breeders (who covered the James Gang’s “Collage” on the 1999 The Mod Squad soundtrack) were also on the bill, with Dave Grohl, a native of Warren, Ohio, on hand to sit in with some of the performers.

Courtney Barnett and the Breeders have some history together. Obviously, the heavier guitar-rock side of Barnett's sound shares more than a little DNA with what the alt-rock legends were doing in the '90s, and she covered the Breeders' iconic hit "Cannonball" in 2014 and appeared on the Talkhouse's podcast with Kim Deal the following year. Barnett went on to provide backing vocals on "Howl At The Summit," one of the songs from the Breeders' new album All Nerve, their first in 10 years, and Kim and Kelley Deal returned the favor by lending their vocals to a few songs on Barnett's new album Tell Me How You Really Feel.

Next month, '90s alt-rock greats the Breeders are coming back with All Nerve, their first album in 10 years and their first with their classic lineup since 1993's Last Splash. Late last year, the band more or less announced their creative resuscitation with the new single "Wait In The Car." At their live shows, they sold a few different 7" versions of that single, and one of those singles featured a cover of "Joanne," a lush 1970 folk-rock single from Michael Nesmith. (Nesmith was a former member of the Monkees, and "Joanne" was his only solo single that reached the top 40.) The Breeders have now shared a live-in-studio video of frontwoman Kim Deal playing a live-in-studio version of "Joanne" at Steve Albini's Electrical Audio, the Chicago studio where the Breeders recorded some of All Nerve. It's cool to see Deal singing one of the songs that she must've grown up with, and it's almost certainly the only time anyone has ever sung this particular song in this particular studio. Watch the video below.

Pixies will release Head Carrier, their second post-reunion LP, this fall. We've already heard lead single "Um Chagga Lagga," and now, as NME points out, Black Francis has offered some more details in an interview with BBC Radio 6 Music. He says the new album is less slick than 2014's Indie Cindy and 1991's Trompe Le Monde, with a simple sound closer to the 1989 classic Doolittle. More intriguingly, Head Carrier includes the first lead vocal by new bassist Paz Lenchantin, singing a song about founding Pixies bassist Kim Deal. It's possibly titled "All I Think About Now," and it's described as a "thank-you letter" to Deal. Listen to the interview below.

The Breeders are in the middle of recording a new album -- their first since 2008's Mountain Battles -- and apparently they got Courtney Barnett to stop by their Ohio studio while she was in town to perform at the Nelsonville Music Festival. According to a Facebook post, Barnett recorded some backup vocals for a new song that's going to appear on the group's upcoming album. Barnett and the band have some history: Barnett covered "Cannonball" back in 2014 for A.V. Club's Undercover series, and Barnett and Kim Deal appeared together on a Talkhouse podcast last year. Check out some photos from the studio and a CD charmingly dubbed the "Barnett Quintet" below.

The Talkhouse has been on a roll recently -- last week they enlisted Ghostpoet and Phil Selway to have a lengthy two-part discussion about Radiohead history -- and this week they've paired up emerging Australian indie rocker Courtney Barnett and iconic alt-rocker Kim Deal. Barnett covered the Breeders' "Cannonball" for the A.V. Club's Undercover series last year, and that's part of what prompted the Talkhouse to connect them. Check out the hour-plus conversation below; they cover everything from live TV gaffes to whether or not Barnett is a sociopath, and how to stay sane in an insane world (Spoiler alert: Deal doesn't think she did).

Northern Ireland's Arborist is Mark McCambridge's country project. McCambridge is proud of his Irish roots but adores American countryside culture. In the Stephen Agnew-directed clip for the band's debut single, "Twisted Arrow," the two cultures mesh so organically that it is difficult to picture the images being captured anywhere but the US. The lead vocals delivered with an American Southern drawl, accented by twangy guitars and Kim Deal's backing vocals are quite deceptive as well. McCambridge had this to say about the clip:

Kim Deal, of inimitable Pixies and Breeders fame, has been releasing a solo 7" series all year. Her latest is "Biker Gone" b/w "Beautiful Moon," which she's just put out today along with a video for the A-side. The video was directed by Lance Bangs (who also directed the Slint documentary Breadcrumb Trail) and was shot in Dayton, Ohio. Deal plays with her sister Kelley and drummer Britt Walford (who recorded drums on the Breeders' 1990 album Pod) at a biker funeral. You can watch the video below.

During Record Store Day Kim and Kelley Deal stopped by Reckless Records in Chicago to play a stripped-down set. Kim played an acoustic version of "Gigantic," her first performance of the song since leaving the Pixies, then Kelley joined on electric guitar for the Breeders classic "Cannonball." Kim is overwhelmingly charismatic and clearly has a blast playing the old songs. Watch below.

It is not possible to overstate the importance of Kim Deal. As a member of the Pixies and a founding member of the Breeders, she has made some of the most deeply compelling -- not to mention some of the most compellingly influential -- music of the past three decades. Though she is not currently playing in the Pixies (a subject that she is very happy not to talk about), she is no less busy than she has ever been. The Breeders recently wrapped up a lengthy tour in celebration of the 20th anniversary their seminal 1993 album, Last Splash. The tour proved to be such a success (and apparently such a good time) that the band -- featuring the Last Splash-era lineup of Kim and Kelley Deal, Josephine Wiggs, and Jim Macpherson -- are currently working on music together for an all-new Breeders record. In addition, Kim continues to release music in her ongoing 7" solo series. The fourth installment in that series -- two songs recorded with LA musician Morgan Nagler ("The Root" and "Range On Castle") -- was released on April 1. Much like the other singles in the series, Deal's latest release is a decidedly lo-fi and somewhat scrappy affair -- a kind of playful, somewhat insouciant version of what Deal does so well on her full-length endeavors. Still, it would be wrong to think of her singles as somehow less serious or mindfully conceived. Taken as a whole, the eight songs Deal has released so far via the singles represent some of her most sublime and most Kim Deal-iest music to date, not to mention some of the loveliest. After speaking to Deal about her work, it's easy to see why so many legions of music fans remain obsessed with her. She has an almost workmanlike devotion to music-making and clearly doesn't give too much of a fuck about the rest of the music business. While so many of her contemporaries have burned out, retired, or simply given in to the easy lure of becoming a nostalgia act, Kim Deal -- one of rock music's most fantastically individual talents -- just becomes more and more herself.

Over the last year or so, Kim Deal has been working on a singles series, dropping two songs every couple months. In the past we've heard tracks like "Hot Shot," "Walking With A Killer," and most recently "Are You Mine?" Today she has a new one out with Morgan Nagler (whose band, Whispertown, has toured with the Breeders) called "The Root." Watch the quick and dirty music video, shot with a cameraphone a car's backup camera (like Death Grips), below .

Kim Deal's been having a big year. She quit the Pixies, and she's spent the summer leading the Last Splash lineup of her reunited Breeders on tour. She's also been releasing a series of solo 7" singles on her website, and it's included tracks like "Hot Shot" and "Walking With A Killer." The latest entry in the series, "Are You Mine?" b/w "Wish I Was," is out now. The A-side is a gorgeously spindly desperate-love song. It's also got a video, in which director Kurt Ralske somehow makes a bunch of porcelain figurines look like they have feelings. Check it out below.

How times change. 20 years ago, Frank Black broke up the Pixies, informing the rest of his band that they were done via fax. Of course, the Pixies reassembled as a hard-touring on-and-off unit in 2004. But now Kim Deal, who recently reunited the Last Splash lineup of her post-Pixies band the Breeders, has quit the Pixies. The Pixies bade Deal a fond farewell in a statement, which you can read below.

A few days late but stacked with excellence, here is your collection of May's absolute jams. For optimal ease of consumption, you'll find it here in three forms: a 12-track downloadable zip of the month's best free MP3s, a 15-song Spotify playlist of May's finest Spotify-enabled tracks, and to close it out, a 46-track Soundcloud set of the essential songs you ought to have in your ears and under your belt before moving your mind onto June. For your weekend:

The first 7" from Kim Deal's single series, “Walking With A Killer”/“Dirty Hessians,” was released in January and sold out of its limited run (1,000 copies) almost instantly. Now, she's released sides 3 and 4 of that series, "Hot Shot" b/w "Likkle More," whose A-side is available for spinning below. "Hot Shot" has a stripped-down Breeders-y feel, with Deal's voice bending over rigid instrumentation. I'm pretty sure she's singing about killing someone with a poisoned spike of heroin. It's pretty fucked-up stuff. But Deal makes it sound as sweet as a cold beer on an August afternoon. Listen below and nab one of the presumably few remaining copies of the 7" here.

Between the Pixies and the Breeders, Kim Deal has been blowing minds for as long as anyone can remember, but she's somehow never gotten around to releasing any solo music until now. Deal is starting up her own single series, selling extremely limited 7" platters on her website, and the first entry is already sold out. Fortunately, YouTube exists, which means we can now hear both "Walking With A Killer" and "Dirty Hessians." The former is a weirdly romantic, scratchy ballad with a few extremely satisfying guitar-eruptions, and the latter is a slow-building postpunk instrumental. Listen to both below.

Kim and Kelley Deal turn 50 today. The twins have quite a cake helping them celebrate the occasion:

When Kim Deal's not singing through a distorted mic with sister Kelley in an elaborate Mayan World Series in Brooklyn, she's back in the fold with the reunited Pixies. The group hit the Palladium in Los Angeles (for the first of three nights) to launch their nine-city 20th Anniversary Doolittle tour. Speaking of distortion, No Age got things started. Our trusty photographer Andrew Youssef tells us there were microphone problems for the first couple of songs, but that Dean and Randy, who should be getting used to performing with punk legends, hit their stride toward the end of the set with "Eraser" and "Miner," etc. Throwing a bit of a curve ball, the Pixies opened with B-Sides before jumping into "Debaser" and the promised complete run through of Doolittle, which was followed by two encores. (Besides saying "Gracias" between a few songs, Deal jokingly asked if anyone was coming the following night because they were playing the same thing.) The set was up and down as might be expected on a first night, but the group received a huge ovation that brought them out to center stage for a deserved -- if not for last night, for all time, or whatever -- group bow. We have the setlist and tons of great photos from Andrew.

A few weeks ago we posted an early take of "When You Were Born" (aka "When Yer Born") from The Long Count. At the time, Aaron Dessner told us the track would eventually include Kim Deal singing on it. Now that we know the piece focuses on twins via the Dessners and the Deals, the Cincinnati Reds' second back-to-back World Series victories in 1976 (the year the Dessners' were born), Popul Vuh's Mesoamerican "ball game" (aka "a reenactment of the creation of the universe," according to The Long Count artist Matthew Ritchie), and that the project combines a recording of the 1976 World Series with the first two books of Popol Vuh, etc., the context of that track makes sense. (The Long Count's title comes from Mayan cosmology's "vast, millennial calender," which ends/starts again/resets on 12/12/12.) Last night the brothers Dessners' collaboration with Ritchie opened at BAM and folks got to see how all of this worked off the page. If you weren't there, take a look at the photos taken by Julieta Cervantes that find the Dessners, guest vocalists Matt Berninger, Shara Worden, and Kim and Kelley Deal and various other players performing on a stage and in front of projections designed/created by Ritchie. There are two remaining performances at 8PM on 10/30 and 10/31. Before the performance on Saturday -- full-disclosure, etc. -- I'm moderating a discussion at 6PM with the Dessners and Ritchie at BAM's Hillman Attic Studio. You can get info about all of this at BAM. Here's a preview in the form of "Bull Run," (featuring Kelley Deal on vocals) recorded at the University of Illinois' Krannert Cente last month.

TONY: Did the success of that song [“Cannonball’] cause any jealousy among your indie-rock peers?

 

Via TONY:

KIM DEAL: You know, [Pavement’s Stephen] Malkmus is being a bit of a bitch in interviews recently. One thing he said last summer referred to me as “trashy mouth.” And he just did this article in Spin where he alluded to me unpleasantly, saying [something like], “You know, I always thought that Pavement could have had one of those big hits in the early ’90s with ‘Cut Your Hair,’ but I guess people preferred ‘Cannonball.’?”

TONY: Are you a fan of his music?

KIM DEAL: Yeah, I liked Pavement. But if he keeps fucking smacking his mouth off about me, I’m going to end up not being able to listen to any of their fucking records again. Anyway, I thought, God, man, “Cut Your Hair” isn’t as good of a song as “Cannonball,” so fuck you. How’s that? Your song was just a’ight, dawg.

She’s right, “Cannonball”‘s better than “Cut Your Hair.” But “Cannonball”‘s not better than “Summer Babe” or half a dozen prime Pavement tracks. Still, good to know Kim has her slang down. The SPIN article she’s talking about can be read here. This is the quote that bugged her:

SPIN: Back in 1994, you had a brush with fame with “Cut Your Hair,” a song that seemed to be about careerism.

Stephen Malkmus: Yeah, and it’s too bad it wasn’t quite the song that could’ve really pushed the band. For all the mistakes that were made marketing Pavement, it comes down to the song; and the song was pretty good, but it just wasn’t the song of the time. The Offspring song [“Come Out and Play”], “Cannonball” by the Breeders — those were bigger songs people could get behind.

Wonder where he called her “trashy mouth”? Sounds like something a grandma would say. The Time Out interview has plenty of other fun stuff including this quip: “At the Buffalo show recently, after we sang ‘Bang On,’ one guy yelled out, ‘I’d do you, Kim!’ That was cute. I’d do you….” Dude, to complete the pun, you should have yelled, “I’d bang you, Kim!” See?

The post Kim Deal: “You Know, Malkmus Is Being A Bit Of A Bitch…” first appeared on Stereogum.

'90s alt-rock fight! As prematurely mentioned, we dig the new Breeders album, Mountain Battles. We also like aspects of Real Emotional Trash, though we still say it runs on (and on). Which is sorta what Kim Deal's saying about the mouth of our favorite late-night Fox News Channel guest in the new issue of Time Out. It starts with this question from the interviewer:

TONY: Did the success of that song ["Cannonball'] cause any jealousy among your indie-rock peers?

The new Breeders record is scheduled to be released in April 2008. There are 13 songs. Mando Lopez is still on bass, Jose Medeles on drums, Kelley Deal, my evil twin, on guitar and vocals, and I’m playing guitar and vocals.

The songs are just songs. But for instance, one song Kelley and I did live. She played stand-up bass and I played acoustic guitar while we sang. Steve Albini taped it live like that. Yet another song has Kelley playing bass and Mando playing rhythm guitar. I’m playing the lead and Kelley and I are singing throughout. On song has Mando playing a lead guitar which Albini then backward masked. One song has three, count ‘em, three basses on it….

Triple bass! Well that shouldn’t be that surprising, “Only In 3’s” and all that. The album’s entitled Mountain Battles, and it’s out 4/28/08 on 4AD (UPDATE: Nope, it’s out 4/08/08, three weeks earlier. Hizzah!)

Meanwhile, the interview’s worth checking for Kim’s take on what supergroup she’d like to be in, declaring “she’s too bossy for a supergroup,” instead offering a revealing list of classic song parts she’d like to have played, a sort of super-amalgamation of instrumentation and production…

I would have liked to be onstage at the Book T and the MG’s playing the keyboard or the lead guitar at 1960s London gigs. I would have liked to have played the guitar on the Johnny and Santos, ?Sleepwalk?; Duane Allman’s guitar part on ?Layla?; done the handclaps on ?Tighten Up? by Archie Bell; played the tambourine on any Stones song or the dog barks on Pink Floyd’s Animal. I would like to have written ?I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry? by Hank Williams. I would have liked to have played the snare on the ?Fame? recording by David Bowie; the drums on Cannonball Adderley’s ?Stand Tall.? I would have liked to have done the recording of ?Madcap Laughs? by Syd Barrett. Some of the off-the-mic singing on the Clash’s London Calling. Every track on there sounds like a mic was left on and it’s picking up some guy talking or shouting or singing. I would have liked to have been that guy. Of course, I?d like to have played Clyde Stubblefield’s drums on pretty much any James Brown song and/or the bass and organ on the early Faces stuff. That’s a start. There is an all-girl surf band from L.A. called the Neptunas. I would like to be the announcer guy who says, “Door slammer stay home!”

Anyway we’re psyched about hearing the fourth LP, but from what we hear, probably not as psyched as this guy.

The post The Deal On The New Breeders Album first appeared on Stereogum.

Lady Pixie and lead Breeder Kim Deal answered some reader mail for Venus Magazine, offering advice on the songwriting process ("It's hard. Sit down and write the fucking song.") and multiple queries on being a girl in the "male-dominated" music world ("I don't talk much about the subject of male domination in the music industry because it?s not my problem ... Honestly, just pretending I'm stupid has gotten me out of a few excruciatingly painful situations."). But through the asides and awesomely dead-ending tangents, Kim gives some solid details on the Breeders follow-up to Title TK:The new Breeders record is scheduled to be released in April 2008. There are 13 songs. Mando Lopez is still on bass, Jose Medeles on drums, Kelley Deal, my evil twin, on guitar and vocals, and I'm playing guitar and vocals.

The songs are just songs. But for instance, one song Kelley and I did live. She played stand-up bass and I played acoustic guitar while we sang. Steve Albini taped it live like that. Yet another song has Kelley playing bass and Mando playing rhythm guitar. I'm playing the lead and Kelley and I are singing throughout. On song has Mando playing a lead guitar which Albini then backward masked. One song has three, count 'em, three basses on it....Triple bass! Well that shouldn't be that surprising, "Only In 3's" and all that. The album's entitled Mountain Battles, and it's out 4/28/08 on 4AD (UPDATE: Nope, it's out 4/08/08, three weeks earlier. Hizzah!)

Meanwhile, the interview's worth checking for Kim's take on what supergroup she'd like to be in, declaring "she's too bossy for a supergroup," instead offering a revealing list of classic song parts she'd like to have played, a sort of super-amalgamation of instrumentation and production...