Playboy.com: Are you doing dishes?

Stephen Malkmus: I was. I'm going to bake some brownies. But I won't work on them while we're talking. You might get some interesting answers because I'll be thinking about the brownies and all this real deep shit will come out.

PB: All the references to fudge in your answers will sound suspicious.

SM: Or highly scatological.

PB: You just got back into the country -- have you been touring?

SM: I just did a promo thing in Europe, interviews and stuff like that. I didn't really go into all the towns for the last album two years ago. I'm getting sick of it but I did it.

PB: Do you get a better reception in Europe than in America?

SM: It's hard to tell. They have different tastes in all those places. Maybe in England, maybe in Scandinavia, in Spain or Italy. But the French have totally different ideas. On the indie level, they like these bands that don't swim in America very well, like Placebo, and Muse. And Interpol's probably pretty big there. It would make sense. [In a French accent] Zey love zeir Joy Division.

PB: It's a tough time to be an American in Europe.

SM: It's been that way for a while. Two years ago, when I went to Sweden, there was a university where we were playing, and it was all Marxists, attacking me all the time. [They were] 18-year-old kids who had never had jobs, and they were just full of a lot of piss and vinegar. And if they could, they'd all probably want to leave and go to America, anyway.

PB: When you first got into the rock biz, what did you expect you'd be doing by your mid-30s?

SM: I didn't really think that far ahead, and I don't know who does. I remember back in '86, on New Year's Eve I was partying with some older people who had kids. It was 14 years until 2000 and I remember thinking, "I'll probably be like them, living in this house with some babies and drinking beers in 2000. That's going to be weird." After that I didn't think of it anymore, but I did have an epiphany when I was drunk that one night.

PB: But you never thought to yourself, "After five years I want to be playing arenas?"

SM: Not really. I think everybody who does this wants to either grow or be in a holding pattern. If it starts going down, some people can't handle it and they start making sullen albums. But a holding pattern's good. If I can just travel in comfort and tour, I'm pretty happy, because I like to play. It's a purpose.

PB: The music industry is one where people can burn themselves pretty quickly. You can have a couple of strong years and then completely fall off the map. Do you have any sense of why you've managed to endure?

SM: [Pauses] It's probably just that quest for new stuff and being sort of unsatisfied with what came before. And don't burn too bright, ever.

PB: Are you dissatisfied with things you've done in the past?

SM: Not particularly. Once it's over, it's over. I just feel like you can do better or move on. For whatever reason, I just decided to move on and try new things, and to try to get excited about the new thing being better.

PB: At this point you've already defied conventional wisdom. Most musicians' lifespans are about four or five years.

SM: We made it! We have a little support group. We have big rabid fans of cultish albums, but the Pavement albums mean a lot to people. And now we have some new fans of The Jicks, hopefully. Our audience just sticks with us.

PB: Do you bristle at your reputation for being one of the smartest people in music?