Jeff Miller When the iconic indie-rock forebear Pavement last reunited, for a massive tour in 2010, it was a tale of two bands, depending on when you saw them.
At the beginning of the run, the lineup was tighter and mightier than ever, playing Coachella with the grit of a band determined to solidify its legacy while collecting paychecks and playing venues exponentially bigger than those it hit during its initial run.
If you saw Pavement at the end of the tour, though, you saw a band going through the same issues that led it to break up in the first place.
At the Hollywood Bowl on the second-to-last-night of that run, the tension onstage between Stephen Malkmus and the rest of the band was palpable; it was a miracle they got through that show, not to mention the four that followed it, before calling it quits again, seemingly forever.
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