Artist · chart history · #211 in indie & aaa artist polls
Pavement
Band Stockton United States Active 1989–2000 US indie rock band
Pavement formed in 1989 in Stockton, United States and was active until 2000. Pavement has 104 chart appearances on 63 radio countdowns from 22 stations on RockLists, spanning 1991–2026. The most successful song on radio countdowns is “Cut Your Hair”, which appears on 47 lists with a best position of #34. The station that charted Pavement most often is CD101 (Columbus, OH), with 21 appearances. The artist’s biggest year on year-end countdowns was 1994.
Pavement came out of Stockton, California, in 1989 with no press, no gigs and, for a while, no apparent interest in either. It started as a recording project, and the early records slipped into the underground like rumors, scratchy and tossed-off and impossible to shake. Only gradually did it harden into a working band: Stephen Malkmus singing and playing guitar, Scott Kannberg on guitar and vocals, Mark Ibold on bass, Steve West on drums and Bob Nastanovich shouting, banging and playing whatever needed playing, with Gary Young part of the early going.
Slanted and Enchanted in 1992 sounded like a band that couldn't be bothered to tune up and still wrote better melodies than everyone who could, with "Summer Babe" and "Here" as proof. Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain in 1994 tidied up just enough to let "Cut Your Hair" sneak into the mainstream for a moment, their only real brush with it, while "Gold Soundz" and "Range Life" showed the slacker shrug was covering real heart.
Wowee Zowee, Brighten the Corners and Terror Twilight followed, five albums and ten EPs in all, and they never went to a major, staying with independents such as Flying Nun and Matador. The band came apart with some bad feeling at the end of the decade, but the cult only grew: Robert Christgau and Stephen Thomas Erlewine were among the critics who ranked them above every other band of the '90s, and the reunion tour of 2010 and another run from 2022 to 2024 were greeted like homecomings.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs by Pavement on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Peak year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cut Your Hair | 47 | #34 | – | 1994 | |
| 2 | Gold Soundz | 10 | #22 | – | 1994 | |
| 3 | Spit On A Stranger | 9 | #357 | – | – | |
| 4 | Shady Lane | 7 | #239 | – | – | |
| 5 | Summer Babe | 6 | #34 | – | 1991 | |
| 6 | Summer Babe (Winter Version) | 3 | #91 | – | – | |
| 7 | Stereo | 5 | #271 | – | – | |
| 8 | Range Life | 4 | #14 | – | 1994 | |
| 9 | Trigger Cut | 1 | #8 | – | 1992 | |
| 10 | Here | 2 | #10 | – | 1992 | |
| 11 | Silence Kid | 1 | #419 | – | – | |
| 12 | Box Elder | 1 | #471 | – | – | |
| 13 | Major Leagues | 1 | #31 | – | 1999 | |
| 14 | In The Mouth A Desert | 1 | #35 | – | 1992 | |
| 15 | Father To A Sister Of Thought | 1 | #40 | – | 1995 | |
| 16 | Circa 1762 | 1 | #42 | – | 1992 | |
| 17 | Carrot Rope | 1 | #45 | – | 1999 | |
| 18 | Conduit For Sale | 1 | #47 | – | 1992 | |
| 19 | Harness Your Hopes | 1 | #983 | – | – |
Albums with charting songs
Where each song was first released, from MusicBrainz.
Year-end chart timeline
Combined year-end countdown points per year. Taller bars mean more songs placing higher across more stations.
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