Ladies and gentleman, I’m on cloud nine. I woke up in a bad mood and now I want to hug everyone I see. Pavement has confirmed that they will reunite and tour next year. All that’s been announced at this juncture is that they will play at the Central Park SummerStage in New York City. Even better, the first show of the event is scheduled for September 21st, which is my birthday. It’s very difficult to write journalistically right now as the music gods are doing everything they can to make my head explode. A ticket pre-sale begins tomorrow and I’m already daydreaming about flying to New York with my buddy Derrick, each of us taking our guitars, staying in some seedy hotel, and then waking up in the morning ready experience a day of magnificent yet unlikely music. Pavement is often regarded as the most important band from the 90s, but I can never find the right words to describe them. Simply put, they’re my favorite band. Funny enough, I didn’t discover Pavement until a few years ago. While the Beatles, Bob Dylan, and the Beach Boys will forever remain in my top five, I was getting fed up with the fact that I only listened to older music. I understand Pavement isn’t considered “new” music as they did break up in 1999. Still, their sound combined the influences of grunge and pop – the two genres that defined the 90s. As we’ve witnessed in the last decade, the advent of electronic music and crunk rap is tolerable at best. Trends, by definition, don’t have staying power, but when judged against the barometer of quality, 90s music destroys their competitors from the last nine years. True, Nirvana may have held the torch, but Pavement didn’t want to. I have no qualms in saying that Pavement is the closest thing we’ve gotten to the Beatles in the last 40 years. While not nearly as popular, Pavement spearheaded an era in music, produced amazing album after amazing album, and are now regarded as “timeless.” They weren’t experimental (Radiohead), avant-garde (Sonic Youth), or flashy (Smashing Pumpkins). Like the Beatles, they were just a band comprised of a few normal dudes who just happened to be more talented than everyone else.

Per Matador Records…

After years of speculation, the most important American band of the 1990’s is returning to the stage, with the lineup of Mark Ibold, Scott “Spiral Stairs� Kannberg, Stephen Malkmus, Bob Nastanovich and Steve West reuniting for dates around the world in 2010. Please be advised this tour is not a prelude to additional jaunts and/or a permanent reunion.

Described in their own Wikipedia entry as having experienced “moderate commercial success�, Pavement’s catalog for the Matador, Domino, Drag City and Treble Kicker imprints has come to define in the eyes of many the blueprint for independent rock over the past generation. In spite of this, the records are still pretty fantastic, and we’re fully prepared to remind you of such with a details-to-be-determined compilation album planned for release sometime in 2010.

The first show announced is a New York performance on September 21, 2010 at Rumsey Playfield in Central Park. Things worked out really well when Diana Ross played Central Park in 1983, and we have no reason to suspect Pavement’s return to the live arena won’t generate similar headlines.

I’m so excited.