At some point, I must have pissed Ryan off something fierce because I got shafted when the music industry conference assignments got passed out this year. DiCrescenzo got to cover CMJ. Chanko got South by Southwest. What did I get? Something called "LoFiCon '99" in Dayton, Ohio. Whoopity fucking doo. All the decent bands were too busy with the other conferences to make an appearance at this one. They couldn't even get Lou Barlow to sit in for a panel discussion. I could only surmise that the hyped "special secret guest appearance" was either Jandek (fat chance) or an impromptu Harry Pussy reunion (shudder). I wasn't even looking forward to the free booze.

When I arrived, suspicions worse than my worst suspicions were confirmed; instead of booking clubs for the bands to play at, the conference's organizers decided to hold the thing in an old Air Force hangar on the outskirts of town. Since they could only afford to rent the hangar for one day, all the bands were told to set up in adjoining booths and play simultaneously. I arrived just as the first wave of bands began playing. I imagine you've heard the racket that one self-described lo-fi band makes; can you imagine the sound of twenty lo-fi bands all playing at the same time? It was actually kind of interesting for about thirty seconds, before I started feeling the onset of tinnitus. I tried to find a quieter place in the hangar to collect myself and take some notes (which mostly consisted of variations on "memo to self: kick Ryan's ass"), but the sound followed me everywhere I went, bouncing off the cement floors, corrugated-metal roofing and my sore, sore eardrums.

Finally, I found a place that was reasonably sheltered from the cacophonic onslaught, next to a sparsely decorated booth that only held two people: a middle-aged man in a cheap, shiny business suit, and a much younger man sitting on a stool, absent-mindedly strumming an acoustic guitar and singing. I could just barely hear him over the rest of the noise. I picked up some of the poorly photocopied promotional literature from the table and read the first sentence: "Here at Globoprodevolutech, we make the people that make things better better at making things better by making the things which help the people that make things better make things better better." I put the pamphlet back down.

"No, please, take it-- it's free," the suit prodded hopefully.

"Um, that's okay."

"No, really!" The man leaned over the table and pushed a pamphlet into my hand, whispering conspiratorially, "We're doing some great things here. Great things! And you look like the type of person who would be interested in these kinds of things."

"What kind of things? Better things?" I said sarcastically, looking around for a buffet table. There was none in sight.

"Better than better! You see, we've noticed that most bands in the industry today suffer from a distinct lack of efficiency. Too many members, for instance. All those ska and swing bands with ten-piece horn sections and such. Many hands make light work, you know."

"Huh? Why does a record label care about a band's 'efficiency'?"

"Oh, we're not a record label. We're more of a generalized consulting firm that works with the music industry in various respects. What we've done here is consolidated talent, basically." He motioned to the young man on the stool, who kept strumming and paid no attention to us. "We took Guided by Voices-- pre-Do the Collapse, naturally-- stripped out all the unnecessary members, took away Robert Pollard's beer, shaved about twenty years off him, and replaced his four-track with a computer and some mixing software. And this," he said, picking up a CD off the stack on the table, "...this is the result, my friend. Kleenexgirlwonder."

I took the CD and examined it more closely. "Ponyoak?"

"Yessir, Ponyoak! Twenty-five tracks, seventy-four minutes, and not a clunker in sight! I'd like to see Pollard himself beat that!"

"So, let me get this straight. This Kleenexgirlwonder is, like, a pocket version of Guided by Voices?"

The man laughed. "Pocket version?! KGW is fully functional in every respect. Sleeker, sharper, more efficient. Graham Smith-- that's the boy's actual name-- I personally think he's better than Guided by Voices." He leans closer again. "He actually writes lyrics, you know."

"Lyrics you can understand?"

"Sure enough."

"Hmmm." GBV, but with comprehensible lyrics. An intriguing concept. "What about this computer thing? Why are you at a lo-fi music convention if Kleenexgirlwonder records his stuff on a computer?"

"That's the hook-- it's lo-fi recorded on a computer! Isn't that something? Sure, the tone's a little more tinny and static-y, but it's definitely good ol' rickety lo-fi. The best part is that you sometimes notice the computer's role in creating the music, and it's a good thing. Like the accidental hiccup in 'Don't Wait Up,' or the last half of 'I Cut Myself in Half,' where the sampled sounds get completely rearranged within the buzzing, galumphing groove."

I looked at the list of song titles on the back-- "The Mohican Antler-Yard Alphabet," "Mayflower Looks at Asia," "Power Bird..." At the very least, the propensity for bizarro song titles was still there. "So, the sound is still pretty much Guided by Voices?"

"On some tracks, sure, there's a resemblance. But KGW's not entirely about duplicating the GBV experience. On 'What Does She Know?,' for instance, there's a touch of the Apples in Stereo, and 'Anne Marie' is actually a bit of an Irish jig. Don't that beat all! And the acoustic numbers have a bit of a folk-country bent to them, of course. Kinda makes sense, since all the songs are about heartbreak, both real and imagined."

"Do you-- do you mind if I have a closer listen to this?"

"Why, sure!" The suit produces a discman and a pair of headphones from under the table.

I didn't stay around for the rest of the conference. There was no story there anyway, save for Kleenexgirlwonder. Which is why I returned to Pitchfork Central Headquarters with a box full of Ponyoak CDs for the staff. Ponyoak is Kleenexgirlwonder's Bee Thousand, every track a scruffy pop nugget waiting to be discovered by intrepid listeners. All this, and I hear he's huge in Japan.

-Nick Mirov, August, 1999