Making Waves

Originally forming in 1990 as a vehicle for then Pixies' bassist Kim Deal to get her stockpile of songs out into the world at large, The Breeders eventually became one of the most influential bands of the massive '90s alternative rock boom. They've continued on to this day in various incarnations – coalescing around dual guitarists Kim and her identical twin sister Kelley – but it's their 1993 second album Last Splash for which they're most remembered, and to celebrate its birthday the Deals have brought the “classic” rhythm section (bassist Josephine Wiggs and drummer Jim Macpherson) back into the fray to tour the album as it was intended.

“It's been going fantastic – it's been super fun,” Kelley enthuses about the US leg of the reunion tour. “Everybody knows what you're going to play and they want to hear that record, so they've given us permission – it's like this wonderful clean contract with the audience: 'This is what we're doing and you obviously want to see this, otherwise you wouldn't be here, so now we're all going to have a good time and enjoy ourselves!' That's what it feels like, a big celebration.

“It's been a blast working with [Jim and Josephine] again. It doesn't feel like any time has gone by – I feel like that's probably not a good thing somehow. Somehow one of us should have morphed into something really, really special somewhere along the line, but everybody seems to be exactly the same as they were twenty years ago, myself included.”

Fittingly, the milestone celebration began in rather ad hoc fashion, with the Deal sisters perched on the couch reflecting on the passage of time.

“That's exactly what happened, exactly,” Kelley laughs. “It was one of those things, like, 'I don't know, it's been twenty years – should we do something about that?' and the answer straight away was, 'Yeah, we should probably play a show'. 'Where would we play?' 'I don't know.' 'Want to just play one show?' 'I dunno.' Should we ask the others?' 'Yeah, awesome!' So [Kim] touched base with Josephine and I touched with Jim, and we got answers back straight away going, 'Yeah, that sounds great!' Then we just went from there, and of course [The Breeders' UK label] 4AD heard about it and re-issued Last Splash [as LSXX] – it's a beautiful package.

“It was really fun [finding the bonus material]. Some of the live stuff – not all of them – sounded really good, but some of them were really hard for me to listen to; 'My god, why am I singing so out of tune? No, we're not using it!' But then a lot of it was really good, because we'd practiced and practiced and played and practiced – a lot – so we were good live.”

The story of how Kelley couldn't actually play guitar before joining The Breeders has become rock'n'roll lore, but it seems that it was this unfamiliarity with her instrument – combined with some traits of laziness – which ended up forging The Breeders' live talents.

“That is indeed true,” she smiles of her initial ineptitude. “I did own a bass guitar and a bass amp, although I couldn't really play it – I played like somebody who couldn't play bass guitar. Kim would play acoustic guitar for an early duo that we played in occasionally – we both sang and Kim played guitar – and I tried to join her on bass for a couple of tunes, to step it up a bit. And it's weird, because Kim took that bass – the Aria Pro II – and that's the bass that she played in the Pixies. And that guitar – her Les Paul – ended up being the guitar that Joe [Santiago] played in the Pixies.

“But we practiced a lot. I'm really bad at practicing by myself. Josephine said recently that when we'd play festivals – which are notorious for not having good monitors and you not being able to hear anything – that it was such a good thing that we'd practiced as much as we did, because it was so easy to play live. But the reason that we practiced so much was that I needed the practice, but I wouldn't practice by myself – I needed the whole band to gather round and practice with me. It's one thing to sit there and play your part on guitar by yourself, but it's another to stand up and hear the racket that everybody else is making and then play your part and sing at the same time. So yeah, I needed a lot of practice.”

Little could Kelley have known at the time that the album they were crafting – anchored by its brilliantly off-kilter single Cannonball – would go on to be so revered, and that The Breeders would play such a pivotal role in that '90s guitar explosion.

“It's one of those things where you don't realise at the time – I knew, 'Ooh, this grunge thing certainly seems to be taking off', of course you're aware of it – but it's not until years later that you realise, 'Wow, that was a movement', like the Sixties was a movement,” she reflects. “You don't know while you're in the middle of it how big it was. If you're caught in a tidal wave you don't know how big the wave is, you're in the middle of it with no clue, so it's interesting now that the dust has settled and some years have gone by to look back and see what impact it had. We'll see if it becomes just yet another footnote, like hair metal for instance, or if it's something that keeps resonating with people.”