For more than three decades, Pavement have been synonymous with indie rock. Five years into their improbable second reunion, can they be more than what they have already been?

Pavement should be on in 37 minutes. On a steamy Saturday night in Atlanta, they should headline the Piedmont stage, one of three enormous platforms at the Shaky Knees festival, tucked into the corner of a 200-acre park two miles north of downtown. And the band should play at the same time as the Prodigy, English electronic miscreants that two members confess might have frightened them a tad in the ’90s, or at least made them feel like the nice young indie-rock boys.

Getting here for this one-off gig—the last show of their improbable second reunion, which began in 2022—has been a production: Guitarist Spiral Stairs came in from Australia, where he’s lived for four years, while singer Stephen Malkmus came from Chicago, days after dropping off his youngest daughter, Sunday, at a Philadelphia college.…