First album in 23 years find Pixies in 'progression'

Washington - Joey Santiago has this helpful tip for Pixies fans savouring the alt-rock band's first album in 23 years: Add to your existing playlist of past Pixies favourites. Hit shuffle. Enjoy.

"It belongs in that old catalogue," said the lead guitarist who, with frontman Charles "Black Francis" Thompson and drummer David Lovering, has kept the Pixies at the cutting edge of American indie music since the 1980s.

"The shuffle thing works for me, and hopefully people are cognizant of that," added Santiago over a dodgy telephone line from London on Tuesday, the official North American release date for Indie Cindy.

Bringing together a dozen tracks from three previously released extended-play records, Indie Cindy is the Pixies' fifth studio album - and the first since Trompe le Monde way back in 1991.

Never ones to dominate the charts, the Pixies have nevertheless had an outsized impact since coming together in Boston in 1986, with their raw sound influencing the likes of Nirvana, Weezer and Radiohead.

A cover version of their earliest hit, Gigantic, features prominently in an iPhone commercial now running on US television.

Reviews for Indie Cindy have been mixed: while Rolling Stone shrugged it off as a sampling of "hit-or-miss songs", Britain's NME music weekly hailed the "long overdue" album as "free-sounding, adventurous and explosive".

For Santiago, it is "an honest progression" and something of a "snapshot" of where the Pixies now stand, and where they might be going next, now that its members are well into middle age.

'A lucky band'

"We're such a lucky band, that we have, like, a style of our own," he said. "We can basically pick and choose (musical styles) and explore out of that, without even thinking of it."

Hardcore fans will lament the absence of founding bassist Kim Deal, who abruptly quit the band in 2012 just as it was starting to record new material in Wales with producer Gil Norton.

But Santiago, who kept in touch with all his band mates when the Pixies took 10 years off before reuniting as a touring entity in 2003, said the remaining Pixies have moved on.

"When the news first got to us in that coffee shop in Wales (that Deal was leaving), it was a shock to the system," he said.

"But after the third day... We went through the mourning process, and it's over. We've got to let the past be the past."

While Simon 'Ding' Archer laid down the bass lines for the Indie Cindy tracks, Santiago said the band is delighted with its current touring bassist, Paz Lenchantin, formerly with the rock group A Perfect Circle.

"Fortunately, we found somebody who fits right in," he said. "We're enjoying every moment of it, and we're really enjoying this new line-up."

The Pixies should be enjoying life on the road as well.

Coming off a US tour that began last September, the group is soon heading to Australia for four gigs at the Sydney Opera House, before spending June and July in Europe - including a Glastonbury festival appearance.

"Sometimes I don't know what country I'm in," said Santiago, reflecting on the touring life with a hearty laugh.

"You know what? I relish it, because it's complete freedom, not knowing where you are. Does it really matter, as long as you woke up?"