Pavement’s seemingly never-ending 2022 reunion tour, which is still going strong, made a stop in Richmond last Saturday, marking the band’s first performance in drummer and VCU grad Steve West and hype man supreme Bob Nastanovich’s hometown since the halcyon days of 1995. The band were clearly excited to be playing so close to home (The National’s VIP section was full of Nastanovich’s) and turned in a special show that won’t soon be replicated.
Late in the show, lead singer Stephen Malkmus said “You have to like us because we are from here,” which is probably the most un-Malkmus thing I’ve ever heard come from his mouth. He also called West “the four wheeler of the band,” and no, I don’t know what that means either.
The set itself was a hard left turn from their DC show in 2022, which leaned heavily on Wowee Zowee and Brighten the Corners. This gig went the other direction — deep into Slanted & Enchanted, the early EPs, and Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain. By my count, 18 of the 27 songs played dated from before 1995, including all four songs off the Watery, Domestic EP — “Texas Never Whispers,” “Frontwards,” “Feed ’em to the (Linden) Lions,” and “Shoot the Singer,” for the first time maybe ever but certainly in this century. We also got “Greenlander,” “Home,” and “Box Elder.”
Watch Stephen Malkmus perform “Shoot the Singer” live for Paste Magazine on YouTube:
Before “Cut Your Hair,” Bob wished Plan 9 Records a happy 45th anniversary, which is the kind of local-institution shoutout that only lands in a room that actually cares. “Stop Breathin” closed out on an instrumental stretch that ran longer than I remembered and was better for it. “Father to a Sister of Thought” was the highlight of the night for me — Malkmus jokingly called it “mid-Atlantic country music.” “Frontwards” had the best guitar riff of the night, full stop.
Harness Your Hopes” (their closest thing to a hit) rolled straight into a half-joking cover of “Stairway to Heaven” that wasn’t on the printed setlist and didn’t need to be. “Grounded” made me realize it’s got the same slow-unspooling riff as Deerhunter’s “Desire Lines,” and once I heard it I couldn’t un-hear it. During “Range Life,” instead of the usual STP and Smashing-Pumpkins dig, Malkmus swapped in a couple of old RVA band names I won’t pretend I caught in full, but the room clearly did.
By the time the house lights came up, it was clear this wasn’t just another stop on an endless reunion tour, The deep cuts, the local shoutouts and loose asides added up to a show that felt genuinely unrepeatable. Richmond doesn’t get many chances to claim Pavement as its own, and on Saturday night, for a couple hours anyway, the band let it.
Setlist:
In the Mouth a Desert
Feed ’em to the (Linden) Lions
Trigger Cut
Greenlander
Fight This Generation
Painted Soldiers
Shoot the Singer (1 Sick Verse)
Cut Your Hair
Perfume-V
Texas Never Whispers
Frontwards
Silence Kid
Home
Gold Soundz
Summer Babe
Stop Breathin
Father to a Sister of Thought
Harness Your Hopes
Stairway to Heaven (Led Zeppelin cover, not on setlist)
Stereo
Kennel District
Box Elder
Unfair
Encore:
Grounded
Elevate Me Later
Range Life
Here are more photos of Pavement performing at The National in Richmond, Virginia, on July 25, 2026. All photos copyright and courtesy of Kyle Gustafson.
The two bands SM shouted out in “Range Life” were The Dads (from Richmond) and Spiedel, Goodrich, and Goggin (from Charlottesville). And another local-ish shoutout was to UVA’s WTJU FM after “Greenlander” — it was where SM and Bob met at school. It was also a home for David Berman of Silver Jews, James McNew of Yo La Tengo, and the members of Happy Flowers. Thanks for the review, Information Leafblower!
The two bands SM shouted out on “Range Life” were The Dads (from Richmond) and Spiedel, Goodrich, and Goggin, (from Charlottesville). And another local-ish shoutout was to WTJU FM after “Greenlander” — it was where SM and Bob met at school. It was also a home for David Berman of Silver Joos, James McNew of Yo La Tengo, and the members of Happy Flowers.