Shady Lane Guitar Tab

		
		Ver 1 Ver 2 Ver 3 
	

Brighten The Corners Tabs:

Shady Lane

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Pavement, Shady Lane.
 Tabbed by Adam Carrel, adam.carrel@btinternet.com.
  
Ok I've seen a few different versions of this song, but I don't
think any of them have tabbed the intro correctly.
I haven't put down the chords for the rest of the song, they can
be found elsewhere.


e-----------------------------------------------------
B-----------------------------------------------------
G-----------------------------------------------------
D------------------------------------------0---0-0---0
A-----5---5-5---5-------2---2-2---2----2-2---2-----2--
E-3-3---3-----3-----0-0---0-----0---------------------


e------------------
B------------------
G------------------
D-----2---2-2---2--
A-3-3---3-----3----
E------------------

 
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Tab Discussion, Comments, and Critiques


No Picture Mike Average	#1 by Mike Dawgg at Aug 13, 1970 at 7:18 PM EST
	The story is right on, no doubt about that. But everyone's opinion of a shady lane is going to be different, because it's your place. It's the mental happy spot everyone dissapears to when things are at their worst, and you just want to crawl up into your bed and hide. Nothing matters there, (i.e. religion, politics, social status.. etc) and even though everything is going to hell, there's always your shady lane.

No Picture Jimmy Rhythm Player	#2 by Jimmy at Jul 8, 1973 at 5:08 PM EST
	Excellent explanation. There's just one thing that bothers me - why is the restaurant serving a cheap-ass wine like Lancers? Could it be a Portuguese restaurant?

No Picture Shredmaster Average	#3 by Shredmaster Will at Feb 10, 1978 at 2:02 PM EST
	wowwwww! great explanation summerbabe! it all makes sense now, you rock :D

No Picture cinn Professional Badass	#4 by cinn mcrickson at Jun 14, 1978 at 4:46 AM EST
	you are awesome

No Picture stephen Average	#5 by stephen warunki at Sep 22, 1982 at 3:04 PM EST
	An extra in the sequel to your life (ie, a person crying at her funeral) thats brilliant, I hadn't thought of it that way, really good job.

No Picture Mike Average	#6 by Mike Dawgg at Dec 27, 1982 at 6:22 PM EST
	you know, looking back, i think it's just kinda safe to say it's about a bad date. nothing else. too crazy.

No Picture randy Professional	#7 by randy taylor at Dec 8, 1983 at 7:40 PM EST
	This song, in my opinion is one of the finest examples of Stephen Malkmus's narrative brilliance. In fact, it is one of the few examples of the use of straight narrative, in a Pavement song. SM doesn't normally tell stories; his songs are usually oblique meanderings on various moods. However, in keeping with the general "maturity" of SM's songwriting style on "Brighten the Corners," it makes sense. Here's a brief exegesis of the story of "Shady Lane," as I see it unfolding: 1) A sort of unwashed slacker hick decides to go on a blind date with some high-class fancy new girl in town, at a fancy resturant in the town's five-star hotel. 2) They go on the date, and when the check shows up, the mostly broke and ambitionless slacker decides it would seem most egalitarian if he proposes they go dutch (i.e. both members of the party pay). 3) During this potentially terse moment, the slacker reminisces back to earlier in time before the date, as he regarded his shabby visage in the mirror ("A redder shade of neck on a whiter shade of trash"), and prepared his grubby fingernailsfor the big endeavor ("this emory board is giving me a rash"). 4) Finally, after sitting around in uncomfortable silence, the slacker admits to the girl that he's totally broke ("I'm flat out")! 5) The girl starts bawling her eyes out. He tells her she looks beautiful when she cries, in a shallow attempt at making amends for the growing embarrassment of the scene. He sticks his foot further into his mouth by joking about her being captured there, in the moment, "as an extra in the movie adaptation of the sequel" to her life. 6) The chorus has the slacker singing about how much he wishes the world were easier, and less high-maintenance. 7) The scene grows more terrible. The waiter waits, the girl sobs, and the slacker gropes empty pockets. "Glance, don't stare," he thinks in the direction of the perplexed and embarrassed onlookers. The girl begins to scream, "Fuck you!" to the slacker, and then to the onlookers, pissed that she's in the situation. Therefore, as the slacker predicted they soon would, he and the onlookers are both being told to "recognize [their] heirs"! 8) In his mind, the slacker thinks, "Fuck me?" and mentally rebuts in a bored and matter-of-fact way, "No, not me...I'm an island of such great complexity." Basically, in the face of humiliation and defeat, he'd rather put on an air of blase nonchalance. 9) "Stress surrounds / in the muddy, peaceful center of this town" is pretty self-explanatory at this point. I imagine the girl throwing down all of her cash, and storming out of the restaurant, into the hotel lobby, where (predictably)... 10) ...she tells the slacker off in the hotel lobby, "right in front of all the bellboys and the over-friendly consierge". A brilliant tune from a brilliant album, and my favorite songwriter in the world.

No Picture Jon Wanna Be	#8 by Jon Leff at Aug 30, 1989 at 11:59 AM EST
	oh how I love pavement!! i had this song stuck in my head today, and i think that a shady lane is kinda like an inbetween place for them, or anybody, where money or class or whatever differences dont matter

No Picture Andrew Wanna Be	#9 by Andrew Long at Apr 7, 1997 at 6:34 PM EST
	umm...whoah

No Picture Matt Lead Player	#10 by Matt Miller at Jul 15, 1998 at 4:28 AM EST
	Distress surrounds In the muddy, peaceful center of this town on my cd its stress and moldy and right on summer babe enjoyed this song since my second year in high school... makes me smile

No Picture Ben Rhythm Player	#11 by Ben Formica at Nov 12, 2001 at 6:34 AM EST
	so summerbabe covered the story but what about 'shady lane'.....i think that each persons shady lane is different, a place for people to find solace and seek comfort from the pressures of the world. i think it also corresponds to the part about god - 'Oh my God, oh your God, oh his God, oh her God', acknowledging that religion and faith can offer refuge to people....i know thats sappy b/c i myself am extremely without religion but i think that this whole song is not about a bum dating a lady (why would she date him if she was a bum, she could deduce that he had no $$$) but a statement about society. one of pavements best.

No Picture Average	#12 by Riqu - at Jun 5, 2002 at 9:26 PM EST
	good job summerbabe. i think there is a little bit more, though. the scene in the restaurant is right on - but i don't think that the chorus is about wishing the world was more simple. at first i did - i thought that the "shady lane" was like the "range life" that he wishes for in another song (guess which song) - you know: home, home on the range . . . where seldom is heard a discouraging word, etc. but now i think that the shady lane is a peaceful cemetery. in the middle of the debacle at the restaurant the narrator begins to think of the futility of all this, how it will all end in death. and aging. the narrator is transported momentarily to his death bed where he is old and dying and demented trying to recognize his heirs. and the lines about god are confused because the narrator is confused about god as well. then he's back to the present at the embarrassing restaurant situation. but maybe the shady lane is heaven - not a cemetery. the narrator is hoping that there is a heaven – like everybody else. the world's collide but all that i want is a shady lane.