“Does anybody need a free cough drop?” Bob Nastanovich was having a very good time on Thursday night at the last of Pavement‘s four-show run at Brooklyn Steel. Ever the band’s hype man, he was constantly running around the stage, shouting along at the appropriate points, playing cowbell and occasionally behind the second drum kit next to Steve West. “We’re not gonna add a fifth night but it’s sure as shit been fun,” he said later in the show, which guitarist Spiral Stairs must’ve missed as he said later when thanking the crowd, “We’ll see you tomorrow.” Bob had to remind him that this was the last show in Brooklyn, Friday was a day off, and then they’d play The National’s Homecoming festival in Cincinnati on Saturday. Everyone laughed, it was clearly a celebratory night. Complete with cake!
The Brooklyn Steel run has felt like a victory lap on Pavement’s current reunion tour, which went a year longer than most people expected, with continued festival appearances, a visit to Iceland, more festivals and these Brooklyn shows. They were definitely looser Thursday night than they were at last year’s triumphant Kings Theatre run, and the more off-the-cuff vibe included playful new visuals, which mixed very psychedelic projections and a few jokes with jumbotron-style footage of band’s performance that occasionally, like on “Starlings of the Slipstream,” slipped into the sublime.
Thursday’s setlist was a nice mix of crowd-pleasers (but no “Harness Your Hopes”), noodly jams, and rarely played deep cuts, like Slay Tracks‘ “Maybe Maybe” which hadn’t been played since 1997 till this week’s run. Highlights: “Shoot the Singer,” a personal favorite, which Stephen Malkmus stopped and restarted almost immediately after the opening “Someone took…” leaving the crowd finishing the line (“…in these pants”) as he regrouped for a terrific version; “Embassy Row,” which didn’t get played at all on Pavement’s 2010 reunion tour but has become a real crowd/band favorite; “Trigger Cut,” where keyboardist Rebecca Cole joined Nastanovich on the mic; the wonderfully dreamy “Father to a Sister of Thought”; and “Here” which fittingly closed the main set, with Malkmus noting, “Last time is the best time.” This was their last headline show of the tour.
The three song encore opened with “Range Life,” continued with Spiral Stairs’ Wowee Zowee gem “Kennel District,” and another on-the-nose closer, “Fin.” If these are their last shows, it was a good way to go out.
Check out Pavement’s Brooklyn Steel Night 4 setlist, along with lots of fan-shot video, below.
Opening this final show was Prison, the Pavement-adjacent band that includes Endless Boogie’s Paul Major and Silver Jews’ Mike Fellows, who pummeled the crowd with heavy drone jams. Made for heads by heads, the band may have felt like prison to some in attendance.
Check out pics, video, setlists and recaps of all Pavement’s whole Brooklyn Steel run here.
SETLIST: Pavement @ Brooklyn Steel 9/14/2023
Silence Kid
Black Out
Perfume-V
Summer Babe
Father to a Sister of Thought
Unfair
Painted Soldiers
Half a Canyon
Trigger Cut
Embassy Row
Feed ’em to the (Linden) Lions
Fight This Generation
No Life Singed Her
Shoot the Singer (1 Sick Verse)
Two States
Stereo
Folk Jam
Starlings of the Slipstream
Maybe Maybe
Transport Is Arranged
AT&T
Here
Encore:
Range Life
Kennel District
Fin
See pictures from night one of Pavement’s Brooklyn Steel run below.
