Courier-Journal

At a show last year, Pollard and the boys were in rare form. ''The Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory'' was unfolding and easing up to one of those moments legendary among GBV fans, where Pollard drops a key change of unimaginable beauty into the middle of an already perfect song. And just as that moment arrives, Pollard, very nearly talking to himself, says, ''This is my favorite part'' and steals my heart forever.

After 11 albums, nearly 20 other releases of various sizes and glowing reviews in every major entertainment magazine, Guided By Voices is still all about the music - and its capacity for making one swoon. Pollard's ''favorite part'' was shared by about 800 other people at the show, but it was somehow essential that he think so, too, and it neatly summed up why Guided By Voices is so appealing. They are the people's band, a bunch of fellow pop music obsessives looking for that next big buzz, the song you play four, five and six times a day.

The difference between us and them, of course, is that Guided By Voices writes the songs it loves. Pollard writes most of them, around 2,000 he figures, and GBV has recorded a relatively small percentage of those (about 300 and counting). That seems a lot until you consider that Pollard is trying to condense 30 years of pop music into two minutes of bliss. His twin peaks are British pop (especially the Beatles) and 1960s art rock; he takes the best of both worlds and makes ear candy that he and the band shape with tape hiss, odd edits and garage acoustics.

Guided By Voices is coming to town April 25 at the Phoenix Hill Tavern, 644 Baxter Ave. (9 p.m., $ 8 advance, $ 10 day of show, available at the club, ear X-tacy or by phone, 502-361-3100; V3 opens). You're getting advance notice because the shows tend to sell out, and no rock music fan should miss out. The only thing better than GBV's music is its story.

Pollard and his brother Jim, Tobin Sprout, Mitch Mitchell, Kevin Fennell and Greg Demos started Guided By Voices in Dayton, Ohio, in the mid-1980s as nothing more - or less - than an outlet for their music and rock-star fantasies. They had enormous fun with it, recording in basements and garages, releasing albums on their own label, taking publicity photos and conducting interviews with each other for nonexistent magazines.

GBV recorded an EP and five LPs before anyone in the business noticed. Not that the band was trying very hard to get noticed; Pollard, for example, was an elementary school teacher, a 14-year job he quit only last year. ''My dad thought I was being irresponsible,'' Pollard told the Chicago Tribune last year. ''That I had a wife and kids and a home to take care of and, 'Do you realize how many bands are out there trying to make it?' And we'd say, 'Man, we're not doing it for that reason. We're doing it because we like to have fun.' He thought that was a waste of time.''

But after the band released 1992's ''Propeller,'' still one of its best albums, Scat Records came calling. Scat is quite small, but it got GBV records distributed nationally, which caught the eye of indie giant Matador. The New York label has put out the band's past three albums. Despite a 10-year ''career,'' Guided By Voices didn't even tour until the 1993 Lollapalooza show. Shortly after, the band enjoyed its shining hour. Well, actually, it's closer to a half-hour. ''Bee Thousand,'' which came out in early 1994, is a diamond mine of a record, full of cracked beauty.

Sounding as if it were recorded on a boombox, the music glows through the tape hiss; the effect is like stumbling across a Bizarro World radio station that you can't quite tune in. Some critics claim that the band's lo-fi aesthetic is artifice, but I think that the fellas just wish there was a Bizarro World where freaks like them would be kings, out-selling Mariah by billions.

But those who can't get past the recorded sound should know that one of the grand things about GBV is the jarring shift from album to stage, where the purposeful 4-track sabotage gives way to Guided By Budweiser, a full-on, dynamic, drunken, rock band. The songs take on a bigness, a sense of celebration similar to catching the Replacements on a good night.

Onstage, Pollard and Guided By Voices are living the fantasy, one they freely share. Pollard tosses beers to the thirsty and shares the microphone with anyone who knows the words. That's true generosity, especially coming from a guy who's already given so much.