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Album Details

• Artist: Stephen Malkmus
• Album: Face The Truth
• Label: Matador
• Year of Release: 2005
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: dscanland on 2005-06-13

Stephen Malkmus is back with the third installment of his solo career and this time we are asked to Face The Truth. I really enjoyed Pig Lib, his last solo album but it seems I was almost alone in that sentiment. Malkmus kicks into full swing with the album opener "Pencil Rot". It is one of the more rowdier tracks of his solo outings. A jerky immature track "I've Hardly Been" fails miserably. He does have some high points with "Freeze The Saints" and "Loud Cloud Crowd", some tracks that shows Malkmus leaning in the right direction. I think it is his Pavement history that enables him to do the music he does but it seems that he just can't quite get away from that jerky sound that he defined many years ago. In the end Face the Truth doesn't sound like it was fully baked. On more than one occasion there are songs that just seem to wane, ("It Kills"). Then we get some more college rock on "Baby C'mon", a track that really goes nowhere and makes it seem like Malkmus has really gone nowhere. I felt that Stephen was going somewhere on Pig Lib but with Face The Truth he has taken a few steps back. I don't know why he doesn't just resurrect Pavement. It sounds like that's what he wants and I'm sure people that buy his albums really wouldn't give a shit if it was a Malkmus solo album or a Pavement album.

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