Review: 9 out of 10
The Come On Pilgrim EP, the Pixies first album, began as a demo tape cut in March '87 for less than $1000.  Dubbed "The Purple Tape", it consisted of 18 songs recorded over three days.   Copies were passed around locally and Ken Goes, a Boston-area promoter heard it and signed up as the Pixies' manager.  Record label 4AD signed the band after hearing the demo, and released eight of the songs as Come On Pilgrim. The title came from a Christian folk song (Black Francis' Pentecostal parents sent him to Christian summer camps as a teenager) and his parents' religion pops up throughout the record, especially on "Levitate Me". Come On Pilgrim features two songs that would make it on the next record, "Caribou" and "Vamos."  The latter, along with "Isla de Encanta" show the Spanish influence that would be so prominent in much of Black Francis' lyrics on future albums (he spent six months as a foreign-exchange student in Puerto Rico).  The promise of the Pixies manages to break through the limited production of Come On Pilgrim.  The songs are solid, and their are plenty of bright spots.