Tracks 22, 23, 24 and 25 from Mountain Battles (2008)

Tracks 26, 27 and 28 from All Nerve (2018)

The Breeders began, sort of accidentally, as a supposed indie supergroup featuring Kim Deal of the Piexies and Tanya Donnelly of Throwing Muses, who eventually left to form Belly, with Kim's twin sister Kelley Deal joining the next incarnation of the band. The Safari EP is an interesting curio as the only transitional project with both Tanya Donnelly and Kelley Deal on it.  

Steve Albini produced (or engineered, per his preferred term) a lot of great indie albums in the late '80s and early '90s, but Pod is famously the one that Kurt Cobain loved and led him to seek out Albini to work on In Utero (which, of course, was supported with a tour with The Breeders opening). "Iris" was the first non-"Cannonball" Breeders song I heard because of the live version on the No Alternative compilation (with the performance filmed by Hal Hartley for the No Alternative TV special!). "Happiness Is A Warm Gun" is one of those Beatles album tracks that feels suitably weird to become a favorite cover for alternative bands -- World Party and The Breeders both released covers in 1990, followed by U2, Tori Amos, Marc Ribot, and more. 

Even with the Nirvana co-sign and Pixies connection, I don't think anybody could've guessed exactly how huge "Cannonball" and Last Splash were going to be. '93-'94 was an interesting moment when grunge had opened the door for some quirkier indie rock-sounding bands to get played on mainstream radio, but arguably no song crossed over bigger than "Cannonball," and Last Splash deservingly went platinum. 

At this point, Kim Deal is the only consistent member of The Breeders across every album. But after Kelley Deal got arrested for heroin possession in 1994 and went to court-ordered rehab, Kim Deal decided to release the album she and Breeders drummer Jim Macpherson were working on as a follow-up to Last Splash under a different band name, The Amps. I'm not necessarily convinced Pacer would've sold a lot better if it had been released as a Breeders album, but it's a cool record and I feel like it makes sense to treat it as part of the Breeders catalog now in retrospect. By the time another proper Breeders album arrived in 1999, the commercial momentum had really dissipated, but I'm glad that Kim Deal has kept the band going in different forms over the years, it's probably more rewarding than if she'd just stuck it out on an infinite sequence of post-reunion Pixies tours.