At the Orpheum on Tuesday, May 3

In 1991, Kurt Cobain wrote the quiet-loud-quiet book on how to write an alternative-rock smash with Nirvana’s Nevermind. On Tuesday night at the Orpheum, college-rock legends the Pixies put the finishing touches on the guide to putting together a hit show: 1) Play your most popular record—in this case, 1989’s grungy surf-rocker Doolittle, which routinely shows up on top 100 albums of all time lists—from beginning to end; 2) Build anticipation first, maybe by playing "Un Chien Andalou", a surreal Salvador Dalí­ short film that inspired said record; 3) Throw in enough B-sides to keep the die-hard fans happy; 4) Near the end of the set throw in a song that just about anyone can hum thanks to its inclusion in a popular movie (“Where is My Mind?” off the Fight Club soundtrack); 5) Enquire about a city’s favourite sports team/latest achievement, understanding that in Vancouver, mentioning the Canucks is the logical choice.

All this isn’t to say that the reunited Pixies sleepwalked through this show—far from it. It’s more that they are a seasoned band that knows what their fans want, and don’t have the pressures of a reunion tour because they got that out of the way in 2004. How many acts play for two hours, when their audience would walk away happy having seen them stand there and read a phone book for 10 minutes?

Singer-guitarist Black Francis, bassist Kim Deal, guitarist Joey Santiago, and drummer David Lovering played not only one, but two encores. Actually, make that two mini-sets of encores, for a total of six songs, including a B-side version of “Wave of Mutilation”. Where the song’s original version is all tsunamis of distortion, what we got here was more of a lullaby.

As one would expect, those in the sold-out audience knew the album backwards and forwards. Fans didn’t react the most to the usual favourites—they gave it up more for oddities like “La La Love You”, where Lovering pulls a Ringo Starr and croons over off-kilter, meandering guitar, making you wonder why he doesn’t sing more. From a band performance standpoint, the Pixies absolutely nailed “Crackity Jones,” the hundred-mile-an-hour track where you could practically see the veins in Black Francis’s neck pulse as he barked out the lyrics.

If you missed a night that delivered everything a rabid Doolittle fan could hope for and much more, don’t be too upset. The Pixies looked like they had so much fun that the tour for Surfer Rosa can’t be far behind.