To record their debut album, 1990's Pod, Deal and Donelly recruited bassist Josephine Wiggs of the Perfect Disaster and drummer Britt Walford of Slint.

Kim recruited local Dayton musician Jim Macpherson (previously a member of indie rock band the Raging Mantras) to replace the recently departed Walford on drums, cementing the Breeders' best-known line-up.

In the late 1990s, Kim and Kelley reformed The Breeders with a new line-up (including members of the band Fear) and released two more albums, Title TK in 2002 and Mountain Battles in 2008.

In 2013, Kim and Kelley had announced that the "classic" line-up (including Josephine Wiggs and Jim Macpherson) had reunited for the first time since the 1990s for a new series of tours celebrating the 20th anniversary of the band's hit album Last Splash.

As neither band had plans in the immediate future, Deal discussed possible side projects with Throwing Muses guitarist Tanya Donelly.

[4] They recruited Carrie Bradley, violinist and vocalist in Boston band Ed's Redeeming Qualities, and recorded a short demo tape.

[5] With the help of three different drummers—David Narcizo, Mickey Bones, and Carl Haarer—and bassist Ray Halliday, Deal and Donelly completed their demo tape and subsequently played one show at The Rathskeller in Boston.

[10] A week of rehearsal took place at Wiggs's house in Bedfordshire, England, and Pod was recorded in ten days in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Released on 28 May 1990,[10] Pod, although not commercially successful, received positive reviews from alternative and mainstream critics alike; The New York Times' Karen Schoemer wrote: "The angular melodies, shattered tempos, and screeching dynamics recall elements of each of the women's full-time bands, but Pod has a smart, innovative edge all its own.

"[12] Pod was cited by Kurt Cobain as one of his favorite records ever: "The main reason I like [the Breeders] is for their songs, for the way they structure them, which is totally unique, very atmospheric.

Deal, with time off from the Pixies, visited Wiggs in Brighton, and they went into a London studio with Spacemen 3/Spiritualized drummer Jon Mattock to record a new song called "Safari."

[16] The Pixies became inactive in mid-1992, at which time drummer Jim Macpherson was recruited and The Breeders became a full-time band,[10] opening for Nirvana on their 1992 European tour.

[18] The band contributed a live recording of the song "Iris" to the 1993 AIDS-Benefit Album No Alternative produced by the Red Hot Organization.

Kim formed a side project, The Amps, with Macpherson, Dayton locals bassist Luis Lerma (member of The Tasties) and guitarist Nate Farley, who later joined Guided by Voices.

In 1996, Kim reclaimed The Breeders moniker, but with essentially The Amps' lineup plus violinist Carrie Bradley, and played a few California dates.

They were approached by the production staff after they had been playing the show's theme, written by Nerf Herder, as a regular part of their concert set.

Rolling Stone described the song as "a classic Breeders bruiser, clocking it at two minutes, and packed with punchy drums, sugar-rush power chords, and lead riffs".

[24] During a BBC interview with Lauren Laverne on October 13, 2017, Kim revealed that the band expected to release a new album in 2018, possibly on the 4AD label.

[29] They went on to undertake a US tour to mark the 30th anniversary of Last Splash with Belly in support on some dates, during which Tanya Donelly joined the Breeders onstage for the encore.

[33] Their MSG set on April 8 was praised by Billboard's Andrew Unterberger, who wrote that seeing the band "get the chance to become arena-rockers that should have long been theirs by right of their inspired '90s work – which has also since extended to excellent albums in the '00s and '10s – was a very powerful thing",[34] and said that Rodrigo including them "goes beyond a new artist paying her respects to those who came before her, I think, and serves to help connect and re-strengthen a timeline that was at serious risk of being totally severed.