Talk:Pixies

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	Pixies is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do.
Article milestones Date Process Result August 26, 2006 Peer review Reviewed September 23, 2006 Featured article candidate Not promoted October 22, 2006 Featured article candidate Promoted Current Status: Featured article

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Archives

— April 2007

Contents 1 Definite article 2 Allison 3 Discography 4 The 5 dynamics 6 Misinformed 7 Origen 8 date of establishment 9 Final Split 10 Hüsker Dü

[edit] Definite article

If this group have devised their own variation on English grammar, then it ought to be explained in the article. --Multivitamin 16:26, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I'll write a footnote to clarify usage - good idea. Don't know why I didn't think of that before. CloudNine 17:42, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Allison

Are you sure the song "Allison" is about Mose Allison? I vaguely recall reading an interview back about the time the album was released in which Black Francis said it was somehow inspired by James Allison and the Allison Engine Company. I also heard it suggested somewhere that it has something to do with Jerry "Ivan" Allison, who played with Buddy Holly and co-wrote "That'll Be The Day" and "Peggy Sue". Unfortunately I can't find a reference which has Francis/Black/Thompson giving a definite explanantion. In the absence of something definitive it is possible the Mose Allison thing was a conclusion that someone jumped to at some point in the past and which has just got copied and repeated so many times that people wrongly assume it's definitive. Circusandmagicfan 11:27, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

[1] says it's about Mose Allison (from a Q article). [2] is transcribed from a Rolling Stone interview, and says the song is about Mose Allison. We can say beyond doubt that it's about Mose Allison. CloudNine 11:43, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Discography

The Infobox musical artist could use verifiable dates for all four record labels listed, and the band template needs release dates for albums and singles. Without such data, I find the band career hard to track, as would many visitors to Wikipedia. - B.C.Schmerker 04:34, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Surely the information is already available in the prose? I see no other (featured) band article that does this; perhaps you could point me towards a few examples? CloudNine 06:40, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Release dates, at least in selected discographies in articles for bands with many releases, are somewhat irrelevant. Oh, they'd be nice to have if someone wants to type them out, but I doubt they're mandatory. At most the year of release should be listed. They cetainly don't belong in the template, though. That would look very messy (I'm thinking mainly of the RHCP band template). WesleyDodds 10:08, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The

I'm pretty sure this band should be referred to as just pixies without 'the'. See all their album covers. It's correct in the title but not elsewhere in the article. See the two live images, one captioned 'Pixies in concert in Greece...' and the other 'The Pixies in concert in Kansas City' --Neon white 01:28, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

There's been discussion about this before in the talk page archives. While the band's name is officially "Pixies", the band itself always says "the Pixies" when using the name in a sentence. WesleyDodds 03:33, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

There are examples of both usages. Nevertheless it should really be consistant across the article. --Neon white 15:28, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Could you point out others? I've fixed the image caption. (Note that "the only Pixies album" and similar is fine). CloudNine 16:25, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Well firstly the title of the page is just Pixies. Maybe the naming thing needs a mention. After the name was shortened to simply 'pixies' how soon did people add 'the' to it? Maybe something like 'they are now almost exclusively known as the pixies except on album covers. Interestingly Doves never aquired a 'the' --Neon white 21:50, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

There's a footnote virtually at the start. It's acquired one because band members refer to themselves as part of "the Pixies"; so we reflect such usage. To clarify: it's the Pixies, not The Pixies. CloudNine 22:31, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I dont see any footnote. --Neon white 23:28, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Here. It's after the first instance of the band's name. CloudNine 08:48, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Thee Headcoats and Thee Hypnotics must make you people froth at the mouth —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.125.110.223 (talk) 21:46, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] dynamics

"Pixies songs typically feature hushed, restrained verses, and explosive, wailing choruses"

i realise it might be a little pedantic but some songs have loud verses and quiet choruses, such as 'gouge away' and 'where is my mind' so i find this statment a bit general. It's not that important but one of the reasons i like the pixies so much is that they did the loud quiet dynamics both ways while all the artists that copied(in a sence) this technique only did loud chouses. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.74.193.131 (talk) 20:02, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Hence the word "typically". There of course were exceptions, but in general, Pixies songs were noted for the above dynamic. I'll look further into things though. CloudNine 20:57, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Misinformed

Black Francis is a misnomer; his real name is Charles Thompson. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.26.100.31 (talk) 02:10, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

not really —Preceding unsigned comment added by Petchboo (talk • contribs) 15:13, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Origen

The article itself refers to the meeting of F.B*(B.F.) & J.S at UM Amherst. This is where they started to play. This is where the band """was formed.""" Some Brit deciding s/he knows all about the geography of Massachusetts, with a citation to a couple music magazines, well, this does not fly. It happened at UMass, .cf the article. Umass' flagship is located in Amherst. F.B.(B.F ) met J.S. at UMass. They played there. B.F w/o J.S != Pixies.

And like I said earlier, we have bigger things to worry about than Limeys' appraisal of geography.

No. Black Francis and Joey Santiago state they formed the Pixies in Jan 1985 in Boston. This is from Fool the World, a book written about the Pixies.

I haven't seen you provide a citation to a reliable source that states otherwise. Could you please provide one? (A personal attack involving my current location is not too convincing.) CloudNine 22:41, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

We're arguing the first time the word "Pixies" was uttered, vs. when music started to be made. It's a stupid argument, especially, since we're both right. Fine. Boston it is. "History

Formation The Pixies' history began when" is good enough for me.

Because I'm not <<currently located>> overseas

Ok. The first Pixies songs were composed when Francis was a teenager ("Here Comes Your Man" and "Velvety Instrumental Version"), so the band could be formed in California by that definition. We stick to when the band officially forms. CloudNine 09:26, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] date of establishment

I'm sorry to say that but Pixies established in 1986, not 1985. The pair Santiago-Thompson were not Pixies. Not yet. Charles Thompson got back from Puerto Rico in march 1986, in order to start a rock'n'roll band. You can find this information in every good book about Pixies.

Red-E (talk) 19:33, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

No. The band was formed in January 1985 by Santiago and Francis (who spent 1984 working). Deal joined two weeks later, and Lovering joined later. All sourced to Fool the World: The Oral History of a Band Called Pixies (a good book). What's your source for claiming Francis returned in March 1986? (which I've never read in over a year of research on the band). CloudNine (talk) 19:38, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

In the Spin article, Santiago says: "He wrote me a couple of letters from Puerto Rico. One of them said, 'Screw the academics, let's just start the damn band!' So he came back and we drove to UMass. It was the last day to withdraw to get your full tuition back, and I got my money back and we drove to Boston." It doesn't list a year, though. WesleyDodds (talk) 00:00, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

So, CloudNine, that's all you read about Pixies? Is Fool The World your only source? I read some books with Santiago and Francis statements too. For example, Francis explained he returned to Boston instead of going to New-Zealand to observe Halley's comet... By the beginning of 1986. Oh, where did I read that? Books were in Spanish and French, so no need to give you the titles. But they're good too, believe me. Red-E (talk) 18:12, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

No. I have access to other sources, including Doolittle 33 1/3, and a number of magazine and web archives. I can tell you that Francis and Santiago returned to Boston and worked during 1984. Could you give a citation for your statement? I can read French and Spanish to an acceptable level. CloudNine (talk) 19:55, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Final Split

In an interview with Colin Murray on BBC Radio 1 in 2007 Charles stated that he thought the pixies were finally over and they would not be recording any new material or playing live again. Although this isn't an official confirmation that the band has split up again, it should probably be mentioned in the "new album" section of the article, or better yet, just have that section removed now seeing as it's pretty irrelevent, unless all it says is "There was discussion of them recording a new album in blah blah blah but later nothing happened" etc. 217.44.103.85 (talk) 06:00, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree. I took out the new album section, culled a few of those references to refer to it as an abortive attempt, and clarified that Black is now stating that the reunion is over. Changed years active as well. Does anyone really disagree? Anazgnos (talk) 23:32, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Interesting. Has there been official confirmation? For now, I think we should mark the band as inactive. I think the verb tenses need changing as well. CloudNine (talk) 01:08, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hüsker Dü

I know Hüsker Dü is mentioned as an influence at least twice, but they aren't mentioned at all in the "Influences" section. Shouldn't it be included in there? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jowerkatz (talk • contribs) 01:50, 22 January 2008 (UTC)