Aerial M (David Pajo) - The Peel Sessions (1998) 

Slint alum David Pajo's mythical '98 Peel Session - featuring rare full band versions of three classic Aerial M cuts - finally makes it to wax! Post-rock history, really.

Pajo only recorded one Aerial M Peel Session, dragging his tour-torn bandmates into the BBC Radio One studios in Spring of '98 to dub lush alternative versions of 'Skrag Theme', 'Vivea' and 'Safeless'. The tracks all featured on his early run - 'Skrag Theme was from his '97-released self-titled Aerial M debut, 'Safeless' from '98's 'Vivea' EP and, confusingly, 'Vivea' was snipped from 'October', also released in '98 - with each part tracked in Louisville, Kentucky by Pajo himself. So the Peel Session versions buzz with a different energy, powered by additional instrumentation from Tim Furnish on guitar, Cassie Berman on bass and Tony Bailey on drums.

'Skrag Theme' is particularly unique, stretched out from a four minute march into 13 minutes of abrupt shifts and dissonant free rock dilations. The original theme bookends the track, but the middle section is where the gold's at - a good few minutes of freeform dissonance and distortion shepherded by Bailey's propulsive rhythms. In contrast, 'Vivea' has been contracted slightly, but the spirit is still remarkably different - a video of the session issued by Drag City to coincide with the release can attest to that. And on 'Safeless', Pajo and his bandmates extend the distorted final section, infusing the original with the kind of momentum Mogwai would make their calling card almost in parallel.