Pavement-- Brighten the Corners (Matador 55226)

Unlike, oh, Oasis, Pavement know how to nick from rock's past to make music for the present.

Brighten the Corners, the band's sprawling new opus, finds frontman Stephen Malkmus casting a delightfully crooked stare down the barrel of classic rock, drawing inspiration from names like Queen, the Beatles and the Byrds. But, for better or worse, Malkmus has always been more content to come across like Ferris Bueller than John Lennon, so the music always bursts with whimsical energy and sarcastic smugness.

Tauter than 1995's "Wowee Zowee" and tamer than the band's seminal debut, "Slanted and Enchanted," the new disc pulses with a stumbled-upon group dynamic, shifting effortlessly through faux-punk outbursts, mock anthems and winding guitar solos. Echoing the band's sophomore crossover platter, 1994's "Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain," the lyrics run humorously amok through a game of pop culture Trivial Pursuit, where everything from furniture stores to Geddy Lee gets name checked. Malkmus stammers through terse witticisms ("A redder shade of neck / On a whiter shade of trash"), ambivalently responding to Pavement's played-out slacker image ("Let's drink a toast to all those who are idle"), and refuses to deliver the lines of the gushingly maudlin "Type Slowly" with sincerity.

And like the band's self-referential retro-country "Range Life," the songs bask in a healthy dose of jaded irony, taking self-conscious jabs at the mechanizations of the music biz. But the boys in Pavement have grown up a bit, and most of the tracks on "Corners" are tepid exercises all pointing to a not-quite-thirtysomething fear of commitment. As might be expected, Malkmus has upped the male-rock-star ante, casting starlet after starlet into the slipstream. "I know you're my lady but / Phone calls could corrupt the morning," he croons, reveling in the irresponsibilities of an idle idol's life.

Not that he's suddenly morphed into Axl Rose, or even Bono; I suspect that Pavement's main man hides behind his vocal sophistries to keep from falling into the trappings of a lifestyle where "Transport is Arranged." And the ladies should take heart-- classic rock never sounded so good.

--- Stephen Head

(Pavement will appear at the 9:30 Club in D.C. w/ Shudder to Think and Silkworm on May 13th)