One of the Pixies' most famous songs, this track from their debut album Surfer Rosa describes a woman’s sexual adventures with a black man named Paul. The guitars and drums start out very simple, steadily growing to a powerful climax which calms down almost instantly once the chorus ends – a classic example of the Pixies' legendary loud-quiet-loud dynamic.

“Gigantic” is often thought to refer to the man in question’s privates – although Black Francis claims it instead describes the song’s “big” chord progression. Kim Deal’s ex-husband John Murphy sheds some light on this song’s origin in the 2004 oral history Fool the World:

Charles [“Black Francis”] came up with the riff, but he wasn’t really sure what the lyrics were going to be, so he goes, “Eh, well, Kim, why don’t you take a shot at it? The only thing I know is that I want to call it ‘Gigantic’,” and she says, “Fine.” So she comes home with it and she’s playing it on the guitar and I said, “Gigantic, okay, maybe it’s about a big mall.” She goes, “Okay, let’s try that for a while,” and I’m like, “The mall, the mall, let’s have a ball.” So I wrote that. It changed to “Hey, Paul”, because it had to rhyme. And then, a couple of days later she had fixated on this Sissy Spacek movie Crimes of the Heart about this farmworker, I think he’s a black guy, and Sissy Spacek and this farmworker get together – so that’s what it’s about. An illicit love affair.

“Gigantic” was the first single released from Surfer Rosa, backed with an alternate version of “River Euphrates”, a live version of “Vamos” and a cover of “In Heaven (The Lady in the Radiator Song)” from Eraserhead.

The single’s cover, shot by Simon Larbalestier, shows a baby, nude on a wooden floor who looks to be in the throes of some unimaginably guttural wail – sort of like the ones Black Francis pulls all the time. Larbalestier, however, claims that the baby – the son of an unnamed 4AD employee – was actually gnawing on a piece of bread and laughing.