LISTEN: Pinback’s Rob Crow on Rush, Mortality, and “Information: Retrieved”

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Just days before the release of Pinback’s fifth album, Information: Retrieved, on the Temporary Residence Ltd label, the website Pinback.com was still fully dedicated to the duo’s last release, Autumn of the Seraphs, which came out way back in 2007. “I heard there was plans for a new website. I don’t know what happened to them,” vocalist/guitarist Rob Crow, tells me nonchalantly during a Skype chat.

With an indie act as revered as San Diego’s Pinback—consisting of former roomates Crow and bassist Zach Smith (of Three-Mile Pilot fame), who began recording together in 1998—one might expect to encounter a full-on publicity blitz for the group’s first album in five years. But Pinback is a humble pair that has built its devoted following with a self-produced library of infectious and pleasantly mysterious music unaccompanied by a lot of hype and gimmicks. (That is, if you ignore the Pinback video game. Don’t get hooked.)

Information: Retrieved begins, as Pinback albums are apt to do, with a sonic call to arms: Here’s “Proceed to Memory.” Note how it builds from a single bass tone, then lifts and lifts and lifts, a reminder that Pinback has not abandoned its signature sound:

“Proceed to Memory,” Crow says, is “another in a long line of songs about mortality.” When I press him to tell me more, he says he “wasn’t prepared to get all…depressed.” He’s more willing, however, to talk about the inspiration for the single, “His Phase.” (Hint: It involves Zach and the band Rush.)

There’s an air of mystery infusing the new album, both in the music and in the accompanying artwork. Inside, you find artist Daniel Danger’s eerie line drawings of vintage radios, telephones, and zoetropes, as well as strips of 8mm film and newspaper clippings with headlines like “Local Pong Champion Complains of Visions.” It would appear that we’re being challenged to solve a puzzle. And indeed we are…

Pinback released two 7-inch vinyl records last year containing the tracks “Sherman” and “True North”—both of which appear on the new full-length—and also Danger’s artwork. Here’s Crow’s response when I ask how those singles relate to the new release: 

When Crow isn’t busy recording, touring, and discussing album conspiracy theories with fans, you might find him sharing his taste for rare and unheard music via his podcasts. But they only come out occasionally. Crow may have no qualms about performing in front of a crowd, but the podcasts, he reveals, make him anxious. Listen:

He’s sticking with the music, anyway. After 14 years of recording and touring with Pinback, Crow says he aims to keep performing up “until his hands fall off,” although he should probably “be an EMT or marine biologist.” Listen:

If you’ve never listened to Pinback, Information: Retrieved is just as good a place to start as any. It’s a solid example of Pinback’s sound. And like the band’s other albums, it quickly grows on you. Maybe soon, you’ll even find it on their website. For the moment, though, shooting scary fish will simply have to suffice.

Click here for more music coverage from Mother Jones.

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate