Indie rock is alive and well and getting the push it deserves. Showing a little thought behind a marketing directive, Warner Bros. Has decided to inaugurate its relationship with the newly signed Built To Spill with the release of a live album. True to its no bullshit aesthetic, the record is called Live. The nine cuts consist of material released on earlier albums, as well as crowd favorites. The result is documented proof that there exists an audience for intelligent, guitar based rock in the “Marquee Moon” mold. And since Sonic Youth are too busy dilly-dallying at art galleries, Pavement appear to have broken up and Dinosaur Jr. seems to have dropped off the map, it looks as though it is up to Built To Spill to hold the torch.

“Live” is a swell introduction not only to the band’s songs, but their purpose. First and foremost, the group wants to rock. And while so-called alternative rock stations may be playing the music of Limp Bizkit and UK emigrants like Travis, it is just alarming how little these bands rock. Did Jeff Buckley drown singing “Whole Lotta Love” in vain? Is Cheap Trick doing all those albums-in-toto tours for their health? No! It is because, in a very real way, America needs to preserve its rock.

Built To Spill bring a whole lot to the table. Driving pop rhythms, guitars that shimmer, sprinkle and wail, sometimes at the same time. To compare Built To Spill’s use of guitar to Television’s Verlaine and Lloyd, or Renaldo and Moore during their heyday, is not heresy. Admittedly, there are few who even attempt to “even go there” as the current phrase turns, but we must applaud Built to Spill just for trying, and for succeeding so much of the time.

Of course, there are three guitars on “Live.” Doug Martsch, also the lead singer, solos on “the left,” Jim Roth on “the right.” Brett Netson crunches away on well disciplined rhythm. Netson is schooled in good the Velvets cum Feelies jangle method, and while this is certainly nothing new for indie rock, it does sound remarkably fresh under the swirling, kaleidoscopic wails. J Mascis never tried this.

Further impressive is Built To Spill’s willingness to break from the AABA structure, given their strong ties to pop euphoria. Songs, therefore, are crafted and intricate, leaving room for exploration on future listenings. “Virginia Reel Around The Fountain” has many a secondary hook buried beneath its initial groove.

This is taken to its logical extreme on “Broken Chairs” a rock opus as brash as any from the glory days of arena rock, but wonderfully in step with a scruffy lo-fi worldview. Clocking in at close to twenty minutes, “Broken Chairs” does not loosen its grip, allowing each of its three guitars to explore their own permutations of pop-based experimentation. But know this: this is not jamming. This is the wonderful lesson one learns from Television’s “Marquee Moon.” One can be proficient at guitar, and want to show off, and want to wail, but he need not jam. Richard Thompson himself says he has no idea how to play blues, and there’s not a man woman or child alive who wouldn’t like to do just one thing on earth half as well as he plays guitar. And why Built to Spill, like Pavement and Dinosaur Jr. before them, are technically proficient musicians, it is this devil-may-care experimentation, flying in the face of convention, that gives them the lo-fi aesthetic without being lo-fi. It took a lot of planning to get the footage of Buffalo 66 to look that washed-out, if you know what I mean.

Martsch is an admirable singer, if only because he knows when to take a back seat. His higher register, at times, can remind one of Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips, but he does not retain that sense of goofy wonder. His lyrics (I’m assuming he writes them) are equally vague and unassuming. Refreshing.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the eighteen minute version of Neil Young’s “Cortez The Killer.” I have mixed feelings on this one Were it played in a bar, I bet nine out of ten Neil fans would just think it was some new Crazy Horse live cut. It sounds less of an homage, more of a facsimile. Curious, from a band that in every other capacity really “gets it.”