Pavement to release first new song in 25 years in biopic
Indie rock cult heroes Pavement have announced that they will be releasing their first new song in 25 years, which is to be released as part of the soundtrack to Pavements, the upcoming film about the band.
Billed as a mixture of documentary and fictionalised biopic, the Alex Ross Perry-directed film made its premiere in September at the Venice Film Festival and will be released to the public via streaming platform MUBI.
The song, which will be released as part of the official soundtrack to the film, will be the first new material that Pavement have released since 1999, when they released their fifth and final studio album, Terror Twilight, and the accompanying EP, Major Leagues.
Speaking on the Kreative Kontrol podcast, guitarist Spiral Stairs, aka Scott Kannberg, film producer Robert Greene, and Perry revealed a few small pieces of information about what to expect from the as-yet-unnamed song but refused to give away too much information about the track.
“There will be a new Pavement song on the soundtrack, that’s all I’m gonna give you,” Kannberg declared to podcast host Vish Khanna, before expanding and saying that it isn’t exactly anything to get too excited by. “It’s not a big deal,” he continued, explaining that it stemmed from jam sessions during live rehearsals. “It’s just cool because it’s something different and is a song we all really loved playing.”
Perry was unaware of the song’s origins, stating, “even I didn’t know that”, although this may have been said as more of a shocked response to Kannberg letting it slip that there would be new Pavement material featured in the soundtrack.
Having first announced Pavements in 2022, this marks the second time the director has used the band as source material for his work, having previously directed the musical Slanted! Enchanted!, from which footage was used for the film. Perry also directed a music video for the song ‘Harness Your Hopes’, an outtake from the Brighten the Corners album sessions that saw an unexpected sharp spike in popularity online in 2017.
The film will star each member of the band as themselves in a performing capacity but will also see Stranger Things star Joe Keery fill the role of frontman Stephen Malkmus, with Jason Schwartzman and Tim Heidecker in supporting roles as Matador Records executives Chris Lombardi and Gerard Cosloy.
Malkmus previously said in 2022 amidst their reunion tour that there would not be any new music from Pavement on the horizon, stating that “it would be total cringe,” before adding: “I understand the impetus to put out a new record — it makes it sound like the band’s more legit or something, and not just like a cash-in deal. But it doesn’t have to be that way if you just own your songs.”
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