Pitchfork

Last year, Frank Black returned to his Pixies-era stage name, Black Francis, for the first time in his solo career. It seemed to be a way of marking a change in direction, steering away from the rootsy rock of the Catholics and his sedate recordings with legendary session musicians and back toward surging, punk-inspired weird-rock. His first album after the change, Bluefinger, didn't quite get it all right, but it was a good first step, and SVN FNGRS, a mini-LP that grew out of the sessions for a Bluefinger B-side, takes one more step in the right direction. It was recorded in less than a week with just a bassist and a drummer, and it sounds like Black for the most part just let things come to him and made the most natural record he could.

In seven songs and about 20 minutes, he briefly touches on nearly every territory he's explored in his career. The record is led off by the oddest thing Black has done since the mid-1990s, the funked-up freak out "The Seus", which finds him kind of rapping in places and generally stumbling through a noble experiment with pretty unsatisfying results. "Seus" is never defined for us-- I was sort of hoping it would turn out to be a tribute to Doug Seus, trainer and owner of Hollywood animal actor Bart the Bear-- but Black's heartily yelped "I am the great Seus!" refrain doesn't seem to worry over it.

After tripping out of the gate, though, the record picks itself up nicely with "Garbage Heap"-- the best song he's done in ages. I don't think it's a coincidence that it's also the most Pixies-ish thing he's done in ages, apart from reuniting with the Pixies. The chorus is astounding, with a brilliant, doubled vocal melody featuring Black at the bottom of his range, in sharp contrast to the chorused falsetto he employs in the verse. It's a sharp reminder of what was so damn great about the Pixies in the first place. Their sense of songwriting dynamics was amazing, and it's been missing from a lot of his solo work-- it's great to hear it again.

The rest falls into that uneasy space between his Pixies and Catholics days. The vowel-infused title track is great, and with a fuzz guitar it could be some lost 60s garage artifact. Black's sung-spoken verses and catchy, all-out chorus reminds me a bit of the La De Das' "How Is the Air Up There?" "The Tale of Lonesome Fetter" leans toward the Pixies side of things, riding a weird little groove in the opening verse, but never goes for the jugular, preferring to drop the rhythm entirely for its oddball chorus. "When They Come to Murder Me" and "Half Man" both retreat to roots rock, and "Murder Me" does it well, with a few big hooks-- it would have been the best song on a couple Catholics albums. Black isn't all the way back to his Black Francis form, but he's close. If he has a few more songs like "Garbage Heap" rattling around in his head, I hope we get to hear them on his next album, and as much as "The Seus" fails in its own right I hope he keeps going out on those limbs, because in the distant past that's where he found some of his best ideas.