Torture. Incest. Being terrorised by tiny fish. The subject matter of the Pixies’ songs on 1988’s debut full-length Surfer Rosa, isn’t exactly canon. Yet the butterfly effect created by many of them would ripple through rock music and wider cultural touchstones for decades to come.
When the oddball Boston quartet – frontman Black Francis (the stage name of Charles Thompson IV), guitarist Joey Santiago, bassist Kim Deal (then going by the stage name Mrs John Murphy, a sardonic reference to her “uncool” marital status), and drummer David Lovering – went into Q Division Studios in the winter of 1987, they did so with a green, “laissez-faire attitude”, wholly unaware of the adventures that awaited during their 10-day stay.
