Pavement Rocks 26 Song Set at The Ryman

July 29, 2026 Jason Shrum

It was nearly 35 years in the making, but I finally got to see Pavement play live. I first heard their sound in 1992 off a bootleg cassette placed into my car’s deck on the way to school. By the way, Istill have a cassette player in my ride. That year was a wonderful time of music discovery for me. Bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains and Soundgarden were my gracing my ears during those days, but then Pavement was introduced to me and I thought, “I have to see these guys play!” Sure, it was 2026, when I finally made it, but the promise was kept to 17-year-old me. Pavement were at The Ryman Auditorium for two nights and thanks to the diligent efforts of my friend Matt Perkins, I was able to procure those precious digital tickets, along with his wife Sarah.

They were supported by a band out of Halifax, Nova Scotia (that’s in Canada) except for one guitar player who, as they made sure to point out, was hailing from Winnipeg. The band is called Nap Eyes and while their music may strike you as light and airy the depth of the songwriting was really quite brilliant. Guitarist (not the Winnipeg guy) and singer, Nigel Chapman, draws inspiration from poets like Yeats and Pushkin, to impose a heightened symbolism into his paradigm. They had a very down-to-earth vibe and set up the evening quite well.

After a fairly quick instrumentational turnover Pavement emerged from behind the curtain and I felt as if I had been launched into my Own Private Idaho. It was really happening. The anticipation for this tour had certainly grown inside me with the recent release of the meta-documentary Pavements. Pavements came out in 2024 and is a film about the American indie band Pavement, which blends actor driven scripts with real life images of the band and a musical mise-en-scene composed of songs. If you are a fan of the band, you will love it, but if you’re not, well, you will be pleasantly confused. It does feature Joe Keery (Stranger Things) who is taking on the role of lead singer Stephen Malkmus. That’s the thing about the Stockton, California group… they have always kept it weird.

The band has played on their own terms since forming in 1992 and this often described “lo-fi, DIY, slack-lustered formation” has not bowed down to the corporate formula playing their brand of music and stayed away from major record labels. I suppose that’s one of the things that has always drawn me to Pavement is their unwillingness to compromise. I have always done things my way and not followed the path that society suggested. A B-side called “Harness Your Hopes” gained some notoriety as it appeared as a trend on Tik-Tok a few years ago, but most people probably recognize the song ‘Cut Your Hair’ and I have begrudgingly heard them called a “One Hit Wonder” from that radio success. I could really care less about other people’s opinions and if that is all they know about this groundbreaking band, then that’s fine by me.

The show was beyond phenomenal with Pavement playing for nearly two hours on Monday, July 27^th. School night Schmool night. They orchestrated 26 songs (including the encore) and sounded incredible. The Ryman is a fantastic venue known to locals as “The Mother Church” (it is in fact an old church) with a glorious sound built into its walls. You couldn’t recreate the sonic tonality or the ambience of its foundation today if you tried. Everyone was up out of their pew row seating and on their feet the entire time, singing the words and shouting the hooks where they were needed. Fifty-two-year-old me kept thinking back to my teenage self and wondering if he would have appreciated this as much as I do now.

The band went on hiatus in 1999 but came back in 2010, and this tour marks their longest that they had been on since that reformation. Nashville was their last stop before they head to Georgia for the Shaky Knees Festival in September. For most of their career, the group has consisted of the folks on the road now. That is vocalist and guitarist Stephen Malkmus, guitarist and vocalist Scott Kannberg, bassist Mark Ibold, drummer Steve West and vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Bob Nastanovich. They only have five studio albums throughout their time together, but the material is so great, and they seem to be more proficient players than they originally started out as. Time will do that.

Malkmus sounded just like those copied tapes that I heard back in the 1900’s. They looked like they were having an amazing time on stage together and the onlookers all grinned from ear to ear as they voiced their appreciation between songs. There was also a pretty wide age range to be found at the Nashville venue that night too which was shocking to me. I figured the crowd was going to be a whole lotta me’s (and it was for the most part) but there was definitely a spattering of young folk who clearly knew the assignment. I ran into some twenty-somethings named Pete and Anna before the show in the merch line and I was delighted to hear how into the band they were. I suppose maybe Tik-Tok could have played a role or maybe it was a parental influence (I just realized how old I am).

I was afraid that maybe I had hyped myself and this show up too much and a letdown was inevitable but that was not the case. For a bunch of dudes that started in a garage, who are now all somewhere around 60 years old they are still part of my Pantheon of indie-rock Gods. In the last year alone, I have seen bands like Mudhoney, The Pixies, Pearl Jam, Nine Inch Nails and many others who could have called it quits years ago, but they are still going and I am so glad they are. Nobody is phoning it in either, they are truly playing for the love of the game. I would love it if Pavement gave us one more album, but that is usually the thought of the fan and not necessarily the artist. If they do not that is okay too, I got to check a big box and fulfill a dream.