The Pixies song Black Francis has “absolutely no memory” of writing
Black Francis, the iconic figurehead of Boston alt-rock band Pixies, knows his stuff when it comes to writing catchy, creatively enlightened rock songs. After co-founding Pixies alongside Joey Santiago, Kim Deal and David Lovering in 1986, Francis garnered an early cult following with a run of intimate local gigs and the band’s promising debut EP, Come On Pilgrim.
Released in September 1987, Come On Pilgrim showcased Pixies’ trademark “loud-quiet-loud” formula across a delectable scattering of short, punchy tracks. The EP’s eight songs only took up 20 minutes, but with enduring classics like ‘Caribou’ and ‘The Holiday Song’ in its ranks, it remains one of the band’s most praised releases.
While writing material for Come On Pilgrim, Francis was inspired by several contemporary alt-rock bands, but none more so than Atlanta’s R.E.M. “I was listening to Murmur by R.E.M. a lot just before Come on Pilgrim, and that was hugely influential on me as a songwriter,” he told The Guardian in 2022. “I’m going to be cocky and say: we were even better than Murmur.”
Despite its short stature, the EP holds plenty of thematic and even lingual variety. ‘Vamos’ and ‘Isla de Encanta’ are partly sung in Spanish, inspired by Francis’ time spent in Puerto Rico. Meanwhile, the group ventured into religious territory with ‘Caribou’, ‘Nimrod’s Son’, ‘The Holiday Song’ and ‘Levitate Me’.
The EP’s opening track, ‘Caribou’, references the widespread religious belief in reincarnation. Speaking to the NME in a past interview, Francis explained the song’s meaning, stating, “Maybe even the singer of the song is reincarnated as a caribou.”
In the same interview, the frontman admitted that he has “absolutely no memory of writing that song.” This isn’t to say that Francis isn’t a fan of the track, however. He and Lovering are particularly fond of the early classic and often swap out songs from pre-planned setlists to fit ‘Caribou’ in. “It kind of runs the whole gamut of things that we do with music,” Frances added of the song.
Come On Pilgrim was precursory to the monumental success of Surfer Rosa, Pixies’ debut album of 1988. Along with its seminal 1989 follow-up, Doolittle, Surfer Rosa is regarded as one of the most important proto-grunge releases. When listing his 50 all-time favourite albums in the early 1990s, Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain put Surfer Rosa in second place, just behind The Stooges’ Raw Power.
During a 2013 interview, nearly two decades after Cobain’s tragic death, Francis discussed the Pixies’ legacy. Asked what his contribution to rock was, he replied ironically: “Being original, influencing Nirvana so they could rip a song. I’ll admit it — if Kurt Cobain’ fessed up to it, fuck it, I’ll agree with it, you ripped us off.”
Listen to Pixies’ ‘Caribou’ below.
