The Pixies are an American alternative rock band formed in Boston, Massachusetts in 1985. The band disbanded in 1993 in acrimonious circumstances but reunited in 2004. Black Francis, Joey Santiago, Kim Deal, and David Lovering have been the band's continual members. The Pixies found only modest success in their home country, but were significantly more successful in the United Kingdom and elsewhere in Europe, although never achieving mainstream success with their studio albums.
The Pixies' music was heavily influenced by punk and surf rock, and while highly melodic, was capable of being tremendously abrasive at the same time. Francis was the band's primary songwriter and singer and had a distinctly desperate, yowling delivery. He typically wrote cryptic songs about offbeat subjects, such as UFOs and surrealism. Francis, Black. Lyrics. "blank">The Happening." _Bossanova. LP. 4AD 1990. References to mental instability, violent Biblical imagery, physical injury, and incest feature in many of the band's songs.
The group is frequently posited as the immediate forebearer of the alternative rock boom of the early 1990s, though they disbanded before reaping any of the benefits this might have brought them. Avowed fan Kurt Cobain's acknowledgement of the debt Nirvana owed to the Pixies, along with similar tributes by other alternative bands, ensured that the Pixies' legacy and influence grew substantially in the years following their demise.
