Audiopile Review: Long awaited first-time reissue of this cult classic GBV mega rarity, which was initially issued on Pollard’s own Rockathon imprint in a mail-order only edition of 1000, with used copies averaging $500 when they surface. This incarnation of GBV consisted solely of the duo of Pollard (of course) and Tobin Sprout, who was soon to leave the group. It has the ramshackle, whipped-off-in-a-weekend feel hinted at by the faux-bootleg jacket which repurposed their Sunfish Holy Breakfast EP cover, though it’s seemingly dashed off aesthetic belies the quality found in the two-dozen tracks here, slowly becoming a fan favourite over the decades. While Under The Bushes (also issued in 1996) and the following year’s Mag Earwhig! would see an evolutionary step up in fidelity for one of the more adamantly lo-fi bands of mid’-90s indie rock boom, Tonics reverted back to the good ol’ fashion plug in and play, off-the-cuff songwriting that falls somewhere between the hook-laden Alien Lanes and the rickety Vampire On Titus. With Tobin Sprout writing and playing most of the music here—ranging from hissy jangle, busted garage-fuzz, home-fi acoustic odes, and drum machine-addled basement scuzz—Pollard effortlessly rattles off his freshly inked lyrics, eschewing his usual hook-laden choruses while still maintaining his beer-soaked and anthemic delivery. An absolute must for any GBV/Pollard die-hard. We managed to score a good handful of the coloured vinyl pressing, though it does appear as if that edition is now sold out at the source.

Originally released in 1996 as a limited fan-club pressing for Rockathon, Guided By Voices’ Tonics And Twisted Chasers has always existed as an anomaly in Robert Pollard’s vast discography. In many ways, the album serves as the tail of a creative comet that in just two years included the “classic line-up” trilogy of Bee Thousand, Alien Lanes, Under the Bushes, Under the Stars and countless singles that crammed endless hooks in their grooves. In the intervening space, Tonics And Twisted Chasers has taken on a mythic status. It’s arguably Pollard’s strangest, gnarliest, most enlightened record and also the fans first chance to see the stitches that bind his galaxy of songs. It’s like peering at the caliber inside a watch, responsible for making the whole enterprise tick.

This nineteen-song collaboration with guitarist Tobin Sprout could be interpreted as spontaneous sketches, late-night improvisations, ideas that blossomed later in the timeline (“Knock ‘Em Flying” and “Key Losers”), but as with anything in Pollard’s orbit, its intention is clear when heard as a cohesive whole. The Pollard tenet that “less is more” is on full display here. The songs rarely creep past ninety seconds and coalesce much like Pollard’s collage-styled visual art. Arena anthems in miniature (“158 Years of Beautiful Sex”) bash up against eerie piano laments (“Universal Nurse Finger”) without any time to breathe, acoustic lullabies that sound like a Midwestern summer’s twilight (“Look It’s Baseball”) segue into monochromatic post-rock (“Maxwell Jump”). The euphoric joy and obtuse melancholy in Pollard’s voice is so palpable on the album’s standout, “Dayton, Ohio – 19 Something & 5” (which has since become a live staple), that it’s impossible to find a more autobiographical yarn in his catalog.

The album’s closest analog is 1993’s Vampire On Titus, as it contains that album’s prickly, dark and shimmering obfuscation that only reveals its beauty after repeated listens. Tonics And Twisted Chasers maintains the lore because the melodies are so strong. Using a primitive drum machine, Radio Shack effects, minimal instrumentation and the DIY spirit that guided them in the first place, Pollard and Sprout construct a masterpiece of pop that could only come from a basement in north Dayton, Ohio. Anyone in that hallowed era who happened upon it, kept it as a secret.