The Breeders

Bowery Ballroom; Tue 18, Wed 19

Photograph: Chris Glass

Last month the Pixies announced that they plan to tour the United States later this year, playing Doolittle, the 1989 album that made the Boston band one of alternative rock’s most beloved. (The tour hits New York November 23–25 at Hammerstein Ballroom.) If you can’t wait that long for a Pixies fix, we advise you to be at one of these two shows by bassist Kim Deal’s other group, the Breeders, which over the past 20 years has grown into a well-respected alt-rock institution all its own.

Compared with the Pixies’ tidy discography, the Breeders’ catalog is a little chaotic: four studio discs featuring three distinct lineups; several transitional EPs; a handful of singles with proudly loosey-goosey B-sides (such as a cover of Aerosmith’s “Lord of the Thighs”). On last year’s underrated Mountain Battles, Deal and her twin sister, Kelley (the band’s other mainstay since the early ’90s), flexed their enduring knack for cracked dream-pop ditties; the two-minute “Bang On” is as close as they’ve come to reproducing the charms of their left-field radio hit, “Cannonball.”

Backed by their current bandmates—bassist Mando Lopez, drummer Jose Medeles and guitarist Cheryl Lindsey—the Deals are on the road in support of Fate to Fatal, a four-song 12-inch they self-released a few months ago. Among other low-key delights, it’s got a gorgeous rendition of Bob Marley’s “Chances Are.” Don’t let ’em get away without playing it tonight.—Mikael Wood

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