Ivg1p.gimme.indie.rock.500.Essential.american.underground.rock.Albums.19811996

500 ESSENTIAL AMERICAN UNDERGROUND ROCK ALBUMS 1981–1996

ANDREW EARLES

Dedicated to my life-partner in crime, Elizabeth Murphy, who’s truly responsible for this book . . .

First published in 2014 by Voyageur Press, an imprint of Quarto Publishing Group USA Inc., 400 First Avenue North, Suite 400, Minneapolis, MN 55401 USA © 2014 Quarto Publishing Group USA Inc. Text © 2014 Andrew Earles All photographs are from the Voyageur Press collection. All rights reserved. With the exception of quoting brief passages for the purposes of review, no part of this publication may be reproduced without prior written permission from the Publisher. The information in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. All recommendations are made without any guarantee on the part of the author or Publisher, who also disclaims any liability incurred in connection with the use of this data or specific details. We recognize, further, that some words, model names, and designations mentioned herein are the property of the trademark holder. We use them for identification purposes only. This is not an official publication. Voyageur Press titles are also available at discounts in bulk quantity for industrial or salespromotional use. For details write to Special Sales Manager at Quarto Publishing Group USA Inc., 400 First Avenue North, Suite 400, Minneapolis, MN 55401 USA. To find out more about our books, visit us online at www.voyageurpress.com. ISBN: 978-0-7603-4648-8 Digital edition: 978-1-62788-379-5 Softcover edition: 978-0-76034-648-8 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Earles, Andrew, 1973– author.   Gimme indie rock : 500 essential American underground rock albums 1981–1996 / by Andrew Earles.        pages cm   Summary: “Music journalist Andrew Earles provides a rundown of 500 landmark albums recorded and released by bands of the indie rock genre”—Provided by publisher.   ISBN 978-0-7603-4648-8 (paperback) 1.  Alternative rock music—United States—1981–1990—Discography. 2.  Alternative rock music--United States—1991-2000—Discography.  I. Title.   ML156.4.R6E27 2014   781.660973—dc23                                                             2014015967 Acquisitions Editor: Dennis Pernu Project Manager: Madeleine Vasaly Art Director: Cindy Samargia Laun Cover Designer: John Barnett Layout Designer: John Sticha Cover photo: © Jim Saah/www.jimsaah.com Printed in China 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

CONTENTS INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 100 FLOWERS – AUTOCLAVE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 BABES IN TOYLAND – BITCH MAGNET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 BLACK FLAG – BUTTHOLE SURFERS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 CAMPER VAN BEETHOVEN – CRAYON . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 DAG NASTY – DWARVES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 EARTH – FURTHER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 GALAXIE 500 – THE GUN CLUB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122 HALF JAPANESE – HÜSKER DÜ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 JANDEK – LYRES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156 MALIGNUS YOUTH – MINOR THREAT. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182 MINUTEMEN – MY DAD IS DEAD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198 NAKED RAYGUN – OPAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212 PAIN TEENS – PUSSY GALORE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228 RAPEMAN – RUN WESTY RUN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250 SACCHARINE TRUST – SILVER JEWS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 266 SLEATER-KINNEY – SQUIRREL BAIT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286 ST. JOHNNY – SWIRLIES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304 TAD – TSOL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 324 ULTRA VIVID SCENE – YOUNG FRESH FELLOWS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340 APPENDICES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 364 INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 384

INTRODUCTION THE INTENTIONS BEHIND THIS BOOK, HOW TO GET THE MOST OUT OF IT, AND OTHER (HOPEFULLY) HELPFUL POINTS

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s I was writing these 500 entries, I regularly found myself removing fully formed statements and dumping them into another file that was saved as

“Bookintroductionandnotes.doc.” Before long, keeping this book’s introduction

under control loomed as an unwelcome challenge. Only so much context can be fleshed out across an entry-based survey of 500 albums, there’s only so much space with which

to provide that context, and there are better sources online and in book form (see below and in the appropriate section of the appendix) that will currently build, if combined, somewhat of a contextual narrative of America’s DIY/individualism/outsider/underground rock-based/experimental and so on . . . community (late ’70s to present day) The term “indie” has been used since at least the mid-’80s (mostly in the U.K. music press, at first) as a truncation of “independent” to describe the small labels that catered to the growing underground rock of the day. Eventually, that term begat “indie rock,” the more specific designator that rose up partly in reaction to the vagary of the term “alternative rock.” As if to confuse things, “indie rock” would eventually be attached to a set of bands with overlapping stylistic values, including Dinosaur Jr, Superchunk, Pavement, and Sebadoh. In other words, it came to be used to describe a subgenre as well as the larger genre that contained it, and during its heyday (see below), there were actual musical requirements that had to be met for a band to be considered indie rock. In the most simplistic terms, successful indie rock was often based on the application of grade-A pop hooks and melody to noisy, distorted guitar, aggressive, heavy or hardcore-tempo rhythms, and other sonic elements that might conflict with sonic beauty. But something else happened, too. Under the larger “indie rock” genre signifier, one could find a number of other subgenres—post hardcore, college rock, noise rock, lo-fi, emo, love rock, riot grrrl, proto-grunge/grunge, noise pop, shoegaze, left-field, outsider rock . . . the list goes on. It was in this loose framework that indie rock (the genre) and all its various subgenres (including, as somewhat confusingly revealed above, indie rock) experienced its heyday from roughly 1986 to 1996, give or take a year on either end. The pre-1986 albums discussed in the following pages would in some way or another influence the ’86–’96 titles. Also, as with the pre-1986 albums, there are quite a few ’86–’96 titles featured that no one in their right mind would call indie rock from a musical or aesthetic subgenre standpoint.

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These would be the albums by bands that operated on the periphery of the American indie rock genre (think opposite end of the spectrum from, say, Buffalo Tom) but appealed to its fans that nurtured more adventurous, demanding or wide-ranging tastes. Then there’s the handful of entries covering more mainstream alternative albums that have aged nicely and are worth reexamining. The lyrics to the song from which this book takes its title, the 1991 7-inch single by the aforementioned Sebadoh, provides a more economical telling of how this all went down in a sort of half-novelty, half-genuine, but one hundred percent rocking fashion. Reading about that 7-inch single prior to purchasing it marked my first real exposure to the term “indie rock,” and it was a godsend at the time, as I didn’t have a name for this music that had been blowing my mind and changing my life over the previous year or so. “What do you have that sounds like Dinosaur Jr?” was getting snickers during my twice-monthly, paycheck-eating forays to the only record store in town that had a clue at the time. Of course, this was the same year that Nirvana’s Nevermind struck chords at all points from the underground to the mainstream. At a distance of over two decades, that album is now appropriately regarded among the great lines of historical demarcation in music and culture. (Though it should be mentioned that, pre-Nevermind, a number of acts from the indie rock world had already made forays into the realm of major labels, including but not limited to, the Replacements, Hüsker Dü, Soul Asylum, Sonic Youth, Pixies, Dinosaur Jr, and Eleventh Dream Day.) Indie rock and some of its satellite subgenres (including, yes, indie rock) ascended—some voluntarily, others not so much—to greater levels of exposure, acceptance, and sales. Subsequently, a substantial number of the bands in this book, those that built grassroots DIY followings or maybe just had one or two albums on an independent label, entered into relationships with major labels and released at least one brilliant album through said channels. Underground rock’s written history as it stands today paints the major-label feeding frenzy of the early to mid-’90s as a black-and-white, good-versus-evil full-scale corruption and co-opting of the once-pure independent, DIY landscape (or an injurious attempt at doing so). While there is some validity in that line of thinking, the thorough and accurate narrative is much more complicated. And it is a narrative for

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another book. This one is concerned only with the strength of an album as a singular creative and cultural document, regardless of the label or imprint logo on its sleeve. Throughout this book, the reader will be beaten over the head with the term “indie rock,” but it’s impractical and impossible to use it to mean “underground rock that is exclusively the domain of independent labels.” While writing this book, I had very little contact with other humans aside from my fiancée. But of the few people to whom I did mention the project, some had an immediate head-scratching reaction to the years that frame it. Though 1979 and 1980 did see the releases of some rather seminal albums that influenced what was to become indie rock, it wasn’t until 1981 that the gates opened. Albums by Agent Orange, the Replacements, X, Black Flag, Gun Club, Wipers, the dB’s, Big Boys, Glenn Branca, Flesh Eaters, Mission of Burma, Half Japanese, Adolescents, TSOL, Sleepers, and the Minutemen, among others, just helped to make 1981 a more sensible starting point (though it pained me to exclude the Feelies’ Crazy Rhythms). Capping everything off with 1996 was a more difficult call. That was a year of transformation in the underground, as indie rock was by then three or four years into a growing backlash. 1996 also marked the first full year of serious encroachment of underground hip-hop, electronica, post rock, widescreen avantpop, and other styles that would soon drive guitars deeper into the metal- and hardcorebased undergrounds. These changes and the previously mentioned backlash enjoyed a relationship of cultural reciprocity. By default, an alphabetized list of 500 albums spanning fifteen years comprises something of a historical outlay of what happened in the American underground during that period, though it is a limited view with inherent chronological challenges and limitations when it comes to addressing all of the characteristics that compose the accurate big-picture history, including ’zines, regional scenes, live shows, 7-inch releases, and label histories. It is with this in mind that I strongly suggest the books listed in the back of this one, namely Steven Blush’s American Hardcore: A Tribal History, Second Edition; Michael Azzerad’s Our Band Could Be Your Life: Scenes from the American Indie Underground 1981–1991; and especially Joe Carducci’s three music-related books to date: Rock and the Pop Narcotic, Enter Naomi, and Life against Dementia. The book you are holding is intended to complement those titles, not be a comprehensive history of the period and its music. (Oral histories of regional scenes are increasing in number and are also recommended.) Readers of a certain vintage remember when record guides were common in the music section of a bookstore. Today, underground heavy music/metal is the only subgenre that still seems to be serviced by books of a similar nature, a fact that can be attributed to that community’s stronger sense of fan loyalty. As for the music covered in this book, straightup record guides were made obsolete once the sounds of yesterday and today could be

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readily sampled on the Internet. This transition made perfect sense for at least a decade, until myriad variables caused a saturation of information and made separating the signal from the noise more challenging than it was even in the pre-Internet days. Unlike some of my similarly aged colleagues in music writing, I find no reason to romanticize a time when one had to scribble lists based on reviews read in ’zines and magazines, videos seen on MTV’s 120 Minutes, overheard comments (if you were lucky enough to have friends who were into this stuff), and flimsy clues like album covers, label reputation, and band member crossover. Dropping $50 on seven to ten albums (new vinyl cost an average of $6 to $9 in the late ’80s and for much of the ’90s) and getting one or two sterling keepers out of the stack was considered a successful venture. However, I’d be a liar if I said I don’t have a tinge of nostalgia for the record guides that were so crucial to the development of my personal frame of reference and tastes as a lifer, namely Robert Christgau’s Record Guides for the ’80s and ’90s and Ira Robbins’ Trouser Press Record Guides (all editions). So, with all of this in mind, the 500 profiles that follow are meant to assist in online and brick-and-mortar explorations and hopefully be of some value as a historical survey of the period. Please note that the subtitle reads “500 Essential. . .” rather than “The 500 Essential. . .” This book in no way claims to be the definitive canon of the movement and period covered within. However, I do feel it is a pretty solid indoctrination, and it’s my hope that it can be of use to readers of all ages, from novices to grizzled and cantankerous know-it-alls. The use of “Essential” rather than “Influential” or “Important” is of even greater, uh, importance. Not all of these albums are “influential”; in fact, many remain buried in an abyss of obscurity. But the least-heard albums are just as “essential” as the general-consensus classics. As for the latter, naturally their status played into their inclusion. At the end of the day, though, the reader should just think of each as a great album within its respective style. First and foremost, these titles were chosen based on their individual strength, which took priority over criteria like band legacy or band discography. For instance, there are bands here of which I am not a fan (to say the least), yet I recognize their significance. As of this writing, some of these albums have been reissued several times and are easy to find. Many have never gone out of print. Others are simply amazing records that were released to a deafening silence. Then there are the albums that are out of print, highly sought-after, and generally exalted, thus commanding anywhere from $50 to the price of a decent used car for an original vinyl copy. And although stating the current status of each album’s availability would threaten to date the profiles, one admittedly idealistic hope for this book is that it will remove some of the above-mentioned titles from the margins of historical neglect or dismissal, and put them in the crosshairs of those with reissue powers. If this book somehow directly or indirectly leads to the reissue of more than one out-of-print title, it will be a personal triumph. —Andrew Earles, June 2014

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100 FLOWERS — AUTOCLAVE

100 FLOWERS S/T (1983, Happy Squid) The Urinals were a late-’70s/early-’80s trio of wiseasses who could play their instruments just fine but performed as ineptly as possible to aggravate audiences and offer a satirical (decidedly art-school) statement regarding the band’s feelings about punk rock. The Urinals never released a full-length LP. (Some demo material and two 7-inches made it onto the Amphetamine Reptile–released retrospective collection Negative Capability . . . Check It Out! in 1997.) When the band morphed into a more serious venture, the name changed to 100 Flowers and the trio released this first-rate Americanization of U.K. pop-oriented post punk. The sound was similar to the shambling Wire heard on the transitional 154 album, early Mekons, Alternative TV, and any number of the rocking but more approachable Rough Trade bands. This album, along with the EP that followed it and other tracks, was reissued in 1990 by Rhino as 100 Years of Pulchritude. A MINOR FOREST Flemish Altruism (Constituent Parts 1993–1996) (1996, Thrill Jockey) Active from 1992 until 1998, this enigmatic trio released two full-lengths: Flemish Altruism and a follow-up, Inindependence (also on Thrill Jockey, in 1998, and highly recommended), and enough material on 7-inches and compilations to justify the excellent two-CD odds-and-such So, Were They in Some Sort of Fight? (My Pal God Records, 1999). Flemish Altruism worked the margins of noise-rock, math-rock, and ’90s heavier post-hardcore subgenres—exactly the categories A Minor Forest was lumped into (when noticed at all)—by employing smarts, authentic heartfelt hooks, and a serious jones for complicated prog-rock time signatures, stretched-out quietness, and city-leveling noise. Fans of Slint and Co. take note.

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ADICKDID S/T (1993, Imp/1994, G Records) This all-female punk/noise-rock/heavy-indie trio was founded by Kaia Wilson, who went on to co-found the better-known Team Dresch and the Butchies. As of this writing, the amazing Adickdid remains barely a footnote in the history of the Pacific Northwest all-girl/riot grrrl/queercore movements (Kaia was active in the latter). Within the bigger picture of early ’90s underground indie/ punk/post hardcore, the band is totally unknown. Adickdid released one full-length and a 7-inch during its existence, plus it appeared on the second Kill Rock Stars compilation, Stars Kill Rock. Wilson has a true gift for marrying the pretty (her singing and vocal hooks) with the heavy and noisy, and it’s clear by listening to this record that she was an integral part of what made Team Dresch the baddest and best in the land (regardless of gender). Adickdid is much different, however, going into and out of sludgy, slower Melvins-ish territory throughout this album, but Wilson’s songwriting gift is on full display from front to back. It’s a lost gem. ADOLESCENTS S/T (1981, Frontier) The first incarnation of this band—they have regrouped many times over the years—was a sort of early-’80s L.A. hardcore/punk super group with Rikk and Frank Agnew (late of Social Distortion, but soon to be in countless bands) on guitars, drummer Casey Royer (who was also in Social Distortion), and former Agent Orange bassist Steve Soto. Singer Tony Cadena was only sixteen when Adolescents formed in 1979; he would go on to be in White Flag and other bands. Like Agent Orange’s Living in Darkness, Bad Religion’s How Could Hell Be Any Worse?, and Descendents’ Milo Goes to College (all released in ’81–’82 by these other L.A.-area bands), the Adolescents’ self-titled debut presents a type of melodic first-wave hardcore that puts the hooks up front and is more or less the blueprint for what would become the SoCal poppunk sound as the years went on. Adolescents is also one of the first hardcore albums to feature two guitarists, and both traded off on leads. When it came to their musicianship, the

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Adolescents did not subscribe to the learn-in-public approach that was not uncommon within that scene. The Agnew brothers were accomplished and could whip out continuous leads that were almost song-length. And when it comes to these thirteen songs, there isn’t a dud in the bunch, Behind the Dead Kennedys’ Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables, this is the best-selling California first-wave hardcore album.

AFGHAN WHIGS Congregation (1992, Sub Pop) The Afghan Whigs’ first two albums, 1989’s Big Top Halloween and 1990’s Up in It, delivered competent indie-grunge of the somewhat aggressive nature, while the latter even dabbled in what was to come (some emphasis must be placed on the D-word here). Released the same year that began with Nirvana escorting Michael Jackson to the exit door, Congregation was one of the special antidotes to the already-in-progress multilevel homogenization of the indie/alt-rock landscape. All of the revisionist talk of an R&B/soul-plus-indie rock hybrid when it comes to the Afghan Whigs’ post–Up in It material is a bit misleading, especially when it comes to this album. Not to say that Congregation wasn’t a severe left turn into new territory, but it was more of a maturation and naked, metaphor-free response to the buried vocals and ironic posturing that marked much of the indie rock landscape in 1992. Nowhere was this more evident than in the clear and intense lyrics and vocals for major-chord rockers “I’m Her Slave” and “Turn on the Water” (both of which received decent rotation on MTV’s 120 Minutes), not to mention the duo of disturbingly honest “ballads” toward the end of the album, “Let Me Lie to You” and “Tonight.” Congregation was a different and refreshing take on the alt/indie influx of the early ’90s—albeit a decidedly anti-grunge communication of real relationship/romantic sentiment and conflict in a manner that was an adult alternative to the coming flurry of ’90s emo. It was also the warning shot for the band’s attempted world takeover that would be the 1993 major-label debut, Gentlemen.

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AFGHAN WHIGS Gentlemen (1993, Sub Pop/Elektra) As the Afghan Whigs toured to support the critically acclaimed Congregation, the band grew a nice following and found itself at the center of a notoriously excessive major-label bidding war. Dulli’s personality as a conflicted, uncomfortably honest alpha-male antihero with an insatiable appetite for romantic misunderstandings came to the forefront on the band’s majorlabel debut, Gentlemen. The album brings to fruition what Congregation hinted at: fusing R&B and soul with thinking man’s guitar rock (in an indie/alternative context) and setting the band apart from the grunge-saturated pack. Gentlemen was recorded in Memphis at Ardent Studios, which spun off from Stax Records decades earlier. Stylish, fist-in-the-air modern rockers like the title track and “Debonair” got some MTV 120 Minutes rotation, and the album did go on to move more than 160,000 units. AGENT ORANGE Living in Darkness (1981, Posh Boy) The conservative suburban nightmare just south of urban L.A. known the world over as Orange County is widely considered the birthplace of American hardcore, thanks to the short-lived outfit Middle Class, who released a four-song 7-inch EP titled Out of Vogue in 1978. The O.C. would export its first wave of hardcore bands a couple of years later, starting with the Adolescents, Social Distortion, D.I. (Drug Ideology), and TSOL, along with Agent Orange, the band behind this charming and peerless little LP. On Living in Darkness, guitarist, vocalist, and founder Mike Palm realized a vision that, on paper, comes off as a recipe for failure. It shouldn’t have worked when Palm pushed surf-rock guitar, melodically moody punk rock, condensed pre-thrash metal riffs, and arena rock hooks through the filter of contemporary hardcore, but what came out was a disarmingly catchy, mature, approachable, and charming document. Living in Darkness mostly avoids the shortcomings associated with the first full-lengths by most hardcore bands of the day. Highlights are certainly “No Such Thing,” “Everything Turns Grey,” and the iconic “Bloodstains” (an earlier recording of which served as the A-side to the band’s debut three-song 7-inch in 1980 and as the opening track on the Rodney on the ROQ compilation LP).

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Though the albums and their makers have little in common musically and thematically, Living in Darkness and Descendents’ Milo Goes to College (New Alliance, 1981) just might share the historically significant distinction of being the first two albums to deliver nearly flawless melodic hardcore. ALICE DONUT Revenge Fantasies of the Impotent (1991, Alternative Tentacles) After half a decade and three albums, this depraved combo of New York City weirdoes added a third guitarist and left behind some of their smirking Zappa-meets-Butthole Surfers irreverence for this release—the first of two Alice Donut albums (the other being 1992’s The Untidy Suicides of Your Degenerate Children) that reached heavier, abstract-metal heights, overshadowing the band’s former reliance on bad acid-trip nonsense and themes akin to a PG-13 version of iconic punkrock transgressor G. G. Allin. The intelligent, abstract metal thrust and downplaying of vocalist Tomas Antona’s polarizing screech makes tracks like “My Best Friend’s Wife,” “What,” and “Telebloodprintmeadiadeathwhore” stand above anything the band previously accomplished. An instrumental version of Black Sabbath’s “War Pigs” (with the vocal line provided by a trombone) actually rocks while wearing a smirk. Critics tended to despise Alice Donut, even as the “alternative nation” blew up and became a household cultural happening in the wake of Nirvana’s success. Alice Donut broke up in 1996 but regrouped in 2001 and has been sporadically active since. AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB Everclear (1991, Alias) San Francisco’s American Music Club’s third album was good. (California, from 1988, was the band’s first step on the ladder to a cult following.) The next one was better. (United Kingdom in 1990 was only available in its namesake.) But the band’s fifth release, Everclear, made founder/leader/vocalist/multiinstrumentalist Mark Eitzel a songwriter for the ages. Often incorrectly called “slowcore” due to down-tempo material and a loose association with fellow Bay Area band Red House Painters, American Music Club’s arrangements are much more varied, and the nakedly catastrophic lyrical themes commonly benefit 14 GIMME INDIE ROCK

from an impassioned, two-minutes-this-side-of-a-breakdown vocal style that is unbelievably strong stuff—and perhaps best reserved for a good day if the listener is susceptible to fragility. The album features the two best examples of the band’s many heart-shattering songs about AIDS: “Sick of Food” and “Rise,” with the latter gaining some attention on MTV’s 120 Minutes. Everclear was ranked the year’s No. 5 album by Rolling Stone, and the same issue named Eitzel “1991’s Songwriter of the Year.” But the accolades reportedly left the AMC leader more freaked out than appreciative. AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB Mercury (1993, Reprise) If Everclear perfected AMC’s brand of cathartic release, then Mercury took it up a notch. Critical speculation abounded as to why the band would, for its major-label debut, release such a dark, starkly honest, and potentially alienating album. To many, it seemed like a reaction to the placement of AMC and Mark Eitzel on a pedestal after Everclear. But while this indeed may have been the most depressing album released by a major label since the big boys first steered any attention toward the American underground in the mid-’80s, Mercury is also the band’s best and most varied work. It covers a full spectrum, from minimal arrangements all the way to bone-rattling noise, all in support of Eitzel’s tales of human desperation. ANASTASIA SCREAMED Laughing Down the Limehouse (1990, Roughneck/Fire) With a band name like Anastasia Screamed, a tendency to turn up in dollar bins, and cover art suggesting an allergy to guitars (of the goth alternative variety favored by mid-to-late-’80s clove cigarette enthusiasts), this album makes it easy for potential buyers to write it off. The minimal buzz this band generated during its brief (1987–92) existence has been all but erased by history, rather than flowering into a posthumous legacy of respect and influence, like those bestowed upon fellow Bostonites Pixies and Mission of Burma. Anastasia Screamed had moved from Beantown to Nashville by 1990, signing to the Rough Trade– distributed and funded Fire Records subsidiary Roughneck. But Rough Trade’s cataclysmic 1991 bankruptcy landed an untold

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number of albums by unknown-to-legendary bands in cutout bins. This album was one of the many casualties. Among the contemporaneous influences that work their way into this amazing collection are Squirrel Bait (especially in the rural-feeling, multifaceted style of vocalist Chick Graning), Dinosaur Jr, Volcano Suns, Thin White Rope, Big Dipper, Giant Sand, and Uncle Tupelo. (No Depression was released the same year as Laughing Down the Limehouse.) But this stuff doesn’t have a ruling reliance on any other band’s sound; the LP pulls off being wildly varied in a natural manner. Graning’s singing can reach a reedy high register, a sound that would emerge as rule-of-thumb about five years later with a great many bands in the decade’s emo movement. More explosive tracks like “Lime” and “The Skinner” are where the band really pulls out the goods. Each pulls off a weird trick: the song shifts into a fake collapse of structure that follows a dramatic and beautiful vocal hook down the hole to freeform noise or silence; then everything stops and the band locks back into the previous tempo. It’s quite effective. Curious readers are truly encouraged to put aside a buck or two for this one—and listen immediately. You’ll get your investment back in spades. ARCHERS OF LOAF Icky Mettle (1993, Alias) Archers of Loaf emerged from the same Raleigh-DurhamChapel Hill scene as Superchunk and Polvo, and like the former, became one of many bands that the music press, covering both the aesthetic and sonic aspects of the band, made sure was immediately synonymous with the term “indie rock.” Archers’ stunning debut, Icky Mettle, embraces a hint of melodic hardcore (or the post hardcore of the era) and has one of the best uses of quiet-to-loud dynamics up to that time. Sincerely impassioned vocals occasionally give way to screamed discontent, yet the album never strays from some application of warm melody. Another secret weapon used throughout the album (and unleashed in a brilliant fashion live) was the band’s fully formed dual-guitar interplay, alternately recalling or updating the approaches of bands like Television, Dream Syndicate, Fugazi, and Sonic Youth. The album’s final five songs (or most of the vinyl’s second side), beginning with “Learo, You’re a Hole” and concluding with the beautiful “Slow 16 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Worm,” cannot be topped as an amalgam of the components that could elevate good indie rock into the realm of great indie rock. Response to Icky Mettle was quite positive. The album spent twenty-two weeks on the CMJ charts, was voted Best Indie Rock Album of the Year by Interview magazine, and was given an “A” in Robert Christgau’s “Consumer Guide” column. As the decade closed, Pitchfork’s original “Top 100 Albums of the 1990s” ranked the Archers’ debut at No. 32. ARCHERS OF LOAF Vee Vee (1995, Alias) The band hailed from North Carolina’s “triangle”—Chapel Hill, Raleigh, and Durham—one of the country’s healthiest and least corruptible regional scenes (home to Polvo, Superchunk, Small (23), Pipe, Flat Duo Jets, and the area’s indie rock stamp of quality, Merge Records). But Archers of Loaf showed a strong and confident identity all its own on the band’s excellent first album, Icky Mettle. Though things don’t always work out this way for similarly talented and inspired bands, Archers’ debut netted the returns a great entrance should bring its makers: positive accolades and new fans across the country. It didn’t hurt that anyone unfamiliar with the band’s recorded output could catch the band passing through town during the intense touring schedule that followed Icky Mettle. An adventurous or curious concert attendee was bound to come away from these incendiary, passionate performances a dedicated convert. What all this means is that Vee Vee’s release in March 1995 was preceded by high anticipation. And while unrealistic expectations directly impacted the album-to-album sound and creative flow of their contemporaries in various ways (Pavement is a perfect example), Archers of Loaf channeled their early reception like pros and used night after night of gigging in front of tiny-tomoderate crowds as a tool of refinement. Vee Vee is an album of greater strengths and maturation (but rest assured, the M-word here is not a kind way of saying the band unwisely watered down its sound).

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ARCHERS OF LOAF All the Nations Airports (1996, Alias/Elektra) Archers of Loaf remained on Alias while a distribution deal was struck with Elektra specifically for their third full-length, All the Nations Airports. The album is essentially an extension of Vee Vee—and more of what made that album so great is a good thing. Of note are the instrumental songs and the long instrumental sections of other songs, which together occupy a conspicuous amount of sonic real estate on the album, wielding the power to earworm into one’s head for days. Elsewhere, the title track, “Bones of Her Hands,” and the swelling intensity of “Distance Comes In Droves” would sound at home on Icky Mettle. The piano ballad “Chumming the Ocean” is melancholy gold, and the similarly played instrumental “Bombs Away” closes the album in fine form. ARCWELDER Pull (1993, Tough and Go) This Minneapolis trio was originally known as Tilt-A-Whirl until the manufacturer of the same-named carnival ride sued the band over copyright infringement. So, instead of undertaking a court battle that surely would not come out in the musicians’ favor, the band quietly changed its moniker to Arcwelder, after an instrumental that appeared on its 1989 debut full-length, This. Arcwelder straddled a fine line between finely crafted indie rock and its less-friendly cousin (and offshoot), noise rock. Pull was the band’s third full-length and the first to see the band packing an entire album with what it was good at. Comparisons to Hüsker Dü and Sugar were common due to drummer and vocalist Scott MacDonald’s dead-on Bob Mould–style singing, but Pull has enough aggro-rock Big Black/Naked Raygun-isms to distance it from the more accessible approaches used by what was nonetheless a very, very big influence (regionally and otherwise).

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ARCWELDER Entropy (1996, Touch and Go) Skipping over Arcwelder’s fine and endorsed fourth album, Xerxes (1994, Tough and Go), to land on the band’s next-to-last fulllength, Entropy, we see the Minneapolis workhorse offering up one of the mid-’90s best indie rock albums at a time when such a thing was promptly going out of favor in the underground. Side two’s opener, “I Promise Not To Be An Asshole,” is as great a song as any that Arcwelder’s better-known contemporaries would release in the 1990s, and it is the encouraged go-to for readers curious as to what exactly it is that makes this band a cut above the din of the day. AUTOCLAVE S/T (1991, Mira) One of many early-’90s surprises from a label that uninitiated listeners and critics often misunderstood as an incubator for Fugazi clones, Autoclave was an all-girl quartet with a prodigy-like knack for crafting catchy and complex post-hardcore material. The band’s output achieved extremely high quality during its mere eleven months of existence, and only consisted of this EP; a three-song, 7-inch EP; and a compilation track. Helium, Wild Flag, and Slant 6 fans take note: while it sounds nothing like any of those bands, this is the recorded debut of both Mary Timony (of the former two) and Christina Billote (of the latter). But don’t skip the record due to early-career misstep phobias. Rest assured; from the get-go, these ladies knew exactly what they were doing.

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BABES IN TOYLAND — BITCH MAGNET

BABES IN TOYLAND Spanking Machine (1990, Twin/Tone) Singer/guitarist Kat Bjelland—formerly of San Francisco and once a roommate and bandmate of Courtney Love—formed Babes in Toyland in 1987 with Lori Barbero after the two met at a Minneapolis backyard barbeque. Originally, Love joined Barbero and Bjelland in Minneapolis to fill the new group’s open bass position, but the future Hole front woman was pinkslipped after just one practice. Michelle Leon then joined as bassist, and Barbero, who had never played drums, learned her instrument in public as the band honed its aggressive fusion of garage rock and noise rock, one often distinguished by Bjelland’s intimidating howl. Babes in Toyland debuted on vinyl in 1989 with the Sub Pop Singles Club 7-inch “Dust Cake Boy,” then released its first fulllength, Spanking Machine, the following year on hometown label Twin/Tone Records (with “Dust Cake Boy” as its next-to-last track). The album’s primal stomp was garage-rock-simple in nature but executed with such ferocity that any and all retro-leaning aspects of “garage” (i.e., any nods to Nuggets- or Pebbles-style ’60s garage or subsequent revivals thereof) were unapparent. Thus, Spanking Machine held up to the heaviest and most nihilistic of noise rock that was then coming out of another hometown outlet, Amphetamine Reptile Records. Sonic Youth’s members were such fans of the album that they invited Babes in Toyland to occupy opening slots of the European tour promoting the Goo album. This led to the Minneapolis trio being featured in the S.Y. Reading Festival concert movie 1991: The Year Punk Broke. Kat Bjelland’s tendency to wear white baby-doll dresses—in stark contrast to the vicious sound of the band—resulted in the press bestowing the unfortunate musical tag of “Kinderwhore” upon the band, which in turn prompted Courtney Love to make the (fraudulent) claim that the fashion was stolen from her.

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BABES IN TOYLAND Fontanelle (1992, Reprise) Touring behind its debut full-length (and a follow-up EP) tightened and crystallized Babes in Toyland’s femme-driven (but not actively feminist) blitzkrieg and built the band a following that unsurprisingly (in the days immediately following Nevermind’s success) attracted major-label suitors. The band went with the mostly artist-friendly Reprise imprint of Warner Bros. for its 1992 major label debut, Fontanelle. Expertly produced by Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo, the record not only marks Babes in Toyland’s career peak, but also easily stands as one of the more potent, accomplished (relative to its subgenre’s purposes), plus all-around sonically intense and challenging releases to not only appear on a major label (even then), but to result from the era’s notable increase in all-girl bands that was the source of media-generated blanket categorizing (riot grrrl, foxcore, etc.) Today, despite Babes In Toyland’s brief time as one of the better-known bands to emerge from the noisier corners of the underground, and the fact that Fontanelle sold over 250,000 copies, the album remains an overlooked gem. BAD BRAINS Rock for Light (1983, PVC) Brothers Earl and Paul “H. R.” Hudson, Gary “Dr. Know” Miller, and Darryl Jenifer are four African American musicians who grew up together in the Capitol Heights neighborhood of Washington, D.C., and formed a jazz-fusion band while still in high school. When punk rock blew their minds in 1977, the bandmates cribbed a new moniker from the Ramones song “Bad Brain” and parlayed their instrumental virtuosity into something so tight and fast that Bad Brains’ 1979 vinyl debut on the 30 Seconds Over D.C. compilation and the band’s first 7-inch, 1980’s “Pay to Cum,” are together widely considered the birth of East Coast hardcore. The quartet’s early live shows were frenetic, explosive, and life-changing for many crucial movers in the D.C. scene, including Minor Threat/Fugazi/Discord Records founder Ian MacKaye. Already into the reggae-leaning Clash records of the era, the members of Bad Brains became practicing Rastafarians after viewing the film Rockers and attending a 1980 concert by Bob Marley.

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Relocating to New York City in 1981, Bad Brains released a self-titled debut on the cassette-only ROIR label that resonated throughout the hardcore community. A few professionally played reggae songs made the album—a precursor to the reggae-rock movement of the late ’80s—but the recordings suffered greatly from a brittle lack of dynamics resulting from a restrictive budget. Those problems were remedied on 1983’s Rock for Light, Bad Brains’ first true full-length, which was recorded by the Cars’ Ric Ocasek. More than half the cassette’s tracks reappear here as newly recorded versions with a big, brutal clarity afforded to few hardcore albums of the day. Reggae numbers professionally knocked out with effortless authenticity are interspersed with new thrash-core gems that retain the band’s note-perfect lightspeed treatment. Rock for Light is a record of transcendent power and easily one of the ten most important full-length albums released during the 1980–1983 coalescing of first-wave American hardcore. BAD BRAINS I Against I (1986, SST) I Against I is exalted as immensely influential, yet it’s nearly impossible to cite another album that sounds anything like it in the almost three decades since its release. Bad Brains’ third studio album took the idea of hardcore’s mid-decade crossover movement way beyond the mere incorporation of metal or melody (when most crossover hardcore bands could only handle one of those two stylistic shifts), and exhibited the band’s weird idea of pop, several strains of reggae, soul, funk, and metal. It should mean something that this is the only entry in these pages where the words “funk” and “metal” exist in harmony. Black Flag’s Henry Rollins brokered a deal between SST and Bad Brains in 1985, and the three years that had passed since Rock for Light saw the band dealing with, and causing, a mindblowing array of problems. The band spent all of 1985 rehearsing with a new drummer and one of many vocalists who tried to fill the shoes of the departed H.R., but once the studio sessions were on the horizon, H.R. and the band reconciled and managed to get Diana Ross producer Ron St. Germain to helm the board (and lend them money for the very expensive studio). To quote Steven Blush in his book American Hardcore, “I Against I rates as one of the 24 GIMME INDIE ROCK

greatest albums in Rock history.” The album made the original printing of the famous book, 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die and has appeared on many historical “best of” lists over the years. It’s one of the best-selling albums in SST’s history. BAD RELIGION How Could Hell Be Any Worse? (1982, Epitaph) Like the Replacements’ Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash, this is punk rock abandon speckled with rock-and-roll flourishes (like split-second guitar leads), but revved up way beyond standard punk energy by the timeless engine of fist-in-the-air songwriting. Also like the Mats’ Trash, this work is one of America’s best lightning-in-a-bottle hardcore albums. While not quite as fast as Bad Religion would get in the late ’80s and early ’90s (after recovering from its mid-decade identity crisis), How Could Hell Be Any Worse?, gets the listener’s blood pumping as well as—or better than—many albums released by the titans of the same era. BAD RELIGION Suffer (1988, Epitaph) After Bad Religion’s self-released-and-distributed debut album sold roughly 12,000 copies (an achievement, given the circumstances and era), the group returned in 1983 with the disastrous Into the Unknown, an album of keyboard-driven, mid-tempo drivel that owes more to AOR outfits like Asia than to anything resembling the hardcore environment that bred the band. The ambitious but fatally flawed sophomore effort was so reviled by fans and, soon enough, the band itself (guitarist Brett Gurewitz has, many times, called the album a “misstep”), that Bad Religion only released the return-to-form EP Back to the Known in 1984 before going quiet for a four-year hiatus. Bad Religion returned in 1988 with Suffer. The second-wave melodic hardcore classic (by first-wavers, it’s worth noting) set the pace and more or less provided the model the band would work from for the high-output legacy of anthemic albums and legendary status among fans that continues today. Stuffed with breakneck tempos, amazing harmonies, and smart, thesaurus-worthy lyrics from the first track to the last, Suffer is pop-core gold that obviously influenced a new generation of bands (many of which would be on Bad Religion’s own Epitaph label) over the next decade.

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BAILTER SPACE Vortura (1994, Matador) Vortura was Bailter Space’s first album as an American band, having relocated to New York City from New Zealand during the recording process for their previous album, Robot World, the trio’s first for Matador Records (and third overall). Alister Parker, John Halvorsen, and Brent McLachian played together as New Zealand post-punk band the Gordons until 1987, when Parker formed Nelsh Bailter Space. Halvorson joined up by the time debut full-length Tanker was released in 1989 under the shortened moniker Bailter Space, and McLachian was back playing with his former bandmates for the next album, Thermos, released in 1990 (both albums were on New Zealand’s legendary Flying Nun label). During these early days of the band, the trio bounced around different home bases in Germany, New Zealand, and the United States, but settled in the latter in 1993. Bailter Space’s several-year stint on Matador would produce the band’s best work and signal a noticeable change in direction from the industrial and almost gothlike flirtations of the trio’s earlier output, with a much more dissonant, full, heavy, and melodic sound influenced by American acts like Dinosaur Jr and Sonic Youth, while putting a fresh, sometimes crushing spin on the then-diminishing shoe-gaze/noise-pop movement. And never was this phase of the Bailter Space sound more dissonant, fuller, and heavier than on Vortura. Songs like “X” and “Dark Blue” stand among the most massive noise-pop ever created. Bailter Space was known as one of the loudest live acts of the era in terms of sheer decibels, while Vortura combined the trio’s noise-sculpting, an obsession with harmonics, and the catchiest pop hooks they’d put on record to date. BAILTER SPACE Wammo (1995, Matador) As a lot of previously noisy American bands moved away from dissonance in a number of ways and the shoegaze old guard in the U.K. either disappeared (My Bloody Valentine) or underwent a Brit-pop makeover (Ride, Chapterhouse, Boo Radleys, etc.), Bailter Space’s final album for Matador (fifth overall) finds the band showing everyone how skilled it was at erasing any lines of demarcation separating wickedly catchy pop songs and washes 26 GIMME INDIE ROCK

of guitar noise and toothy dynamics. Singles “Splat” and “Retro,” along with “D Thing” and several other tracks on Wammo have Bailter Space hitting a home run with unprecedentedly clean and soaring vocal lines and infectious songwriting. BAKAMONO The Cry of the Turkish Fig Peddler (1994, Priority) Drawing inspiration from Boredoms, Sonic Youth, Slint, and the many weirdoes with which they shared a regional scene (Bay Area and Santa Cruz, home to Steel Pole Bathtub, A Minor Forest, the spazzcore scene, insanity-pop geniuses the Thinking Fellers Union Local 282, and so on), the spastic and surprising Bakamono occupied the opposite end of the noise-rock spectrum from bands such as Helmet or Tar when it came to songwriting. Each of the six extended songs on Bakamono’s debut long-player, The Cry of the Turkish Fig Peddler, is a miniature suite of multiple moods, tempos, dynamics, and general capacity for variety uncharacteristic of the noise-rock faction. Bakamono drew from early-’70s space-rock pioneers Hawkwind and harder prog-rock/ Krautrock bands of the same era just as much as it did from more contemporary racketmakers, adding a lot of personality and surprise passages of rhythmic interludes midsong. (Each track turned on a dime several times and explored many methods to the madness.) The vocals were another plus: distorted (as if sung through a two-way radio or megaphone several feet from a mic) and mixed lower than most bands. Japanese-American band leader Elso Kawamoto Jr.’s singing and screaming both were melodic and eschewed the alienating, up-in-the-mix testosteronebark favored by many of Bakamono’s contemporaries. BAND OF SUSANS The Word and the Flesh (1991, Restless) The original lineup of this band indeed featured three women named Susan. And never did it have fewer than the same number of guitarists, though Band of Susans is perhaps best known for one guitarist in particular—a former Glenn Branca pupil named Page Hamilton who was around long enough to be credited on 1989’s Love Agenda before leaving to form Helmet. Formed and maintained for a decade of activity by the core of Robert Poss (guitar/vocals and a former member of Rhys Chatham’s

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ensembles), Susan Stenger (bass/vocals), and Ron Spitzer (drums), Band of Susans were part of New York’s post-no-wave scene that included Sonic Youth, Swans, Live Skull, and The Unsane, but one wouldn’t know it by their trademark sound of Anglophile shoegaze/drone-and-dream-rock meets the aforementioned gazillion-guitar composers. Guitarists Mark Lonegran and Anne Husick joined up for The Word and the Flesh, Band of Susans’ strongest rock-centric, song-concerned album, and their first with genuine hooks/catchiness rather than just melodies. BAND OF SUSANS Here Comes Success (1995, Restless) Band of Susans shifted to a slightly different sonic cause after the half-decade that coalesced with 1991’s The Word and the Flesh. While 1993’s Veil finds the quartet in too much of a reconnaissance mode, looking for what it would then perfect on its fifth and final record, the sarcastically titled Here Comes Success, whose nine songs average seven minutes in length and are often driven by the simple but mammoth bass lines of Susan Stenger (the album is her showpiece in the band’s discography). Ignored to this day, Here Comes Success deserves company with other seminal “guitar albums.” Some fascinating trivia: the band favored G&L guitars, along with Fender offsets (Jazzmasters, Jaguars, Mustangs, etc.), and let the world know by featuring or posing with these guitars on album covers. Leo Fender, the man responsible for bringing these brands and models into existence (G&L was his post-Fender venture), was a rabid Band of Susans fan and friend of Poss until his death in 1991 at age eighty-one. BARDO POND Bufo Alvarius, Amen 29:15 (1995, Drunken Fish) The “drone-rock,” “free-rock,” or “noise-drone” mini-genre offshoot of America’s indie underground really got its legs in the early ’90s, spearheaded by Kranky Records and this label, with some influence coming from outside the United States (mainly New Zealand’s Dead C and associated Xpressway label). Philadelphia’s Bardo Pond relied more on basic rock structure than many of its more freeform peers, and the band was clearly moved by the first-wave noisepop/shoegaze bands from the U.K. (Loop, Spacemen 3, My Bloody Valentine, and so on) as well as the heavier Krautrock notables like

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Guru Guru and Ash Ra Temple. With vocals by a statuesque blonde flutist with an angelic voice—and an instrumental onslaught of scuzzed-out, layered, minor-key guitar that threatened to willfully bury her role in the songs—Bardo Pond excelled when the band eschewed meandering jams for loose but exceptionally loud and heavy sludge-rock/pop. Bufo Alvarius, Amen 29:15 is that Bardo Pond, highlighted by the mournfully moving tracks “Adhesive” (the instrumental opener) and “Capillary River.” BARDO POND Amanita (1996, Matador) Longer than its predecessor, better recorded, and with superior song craft that justifies Bardo Pond’s fondness for extended jams, Amanita, along with the band’s next album, Lapsed (Matador, 1997) remains one of the highest quality works in a prolific discography that grows to this day. The album had a wide-ranging influence, blowing minds within the more experimental and adventurous indie rock–based realms (which the band called home), reaching into the then-blooming stoner-metal (or stonerrock) scene, and establishing a historical milestone for today’s right-headed bands that were too young the first time around. BASTRO Diablo Guapo (1989, Homestead) After the band Squirrel Bait broke up, founder and guitarist David Grubbs moved to D.C. to attend Georgetown. (He was in high school during Bait’s period of activity.) Soon, Grubbs started making a more aggressive type of post hardcore/noise rock under the moniker Bastro. Ex-Squirrel Bait bassist Clarke Johnson joined up, and the two made the Rode Hard and Put Up Wet EP with a drum machine and Steve Albini in the engineering role. The record was released by Homestead Records in 1988. After drummer John McEntire (formerly of My Dad Is Dead, and later with Tortoise) joined Bastro to add a human hand to the kit, the band scrapped original versions of ten of the twelve songs destined for Diablo Guapo and recorded much faster takes with engineer Brian Paulson. The result? A twenty-eight-minute gem. Its weird time signatures and abstract flourishes do not derail the intense velocity and prescient heart of this awesome noise-rock power trio.

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BASTRO Sing the Troubled Beast (1991, Homestead) David Grubbs spent some time in Bitch Magnet during the two years between Diablo Guapo and this, Bastro’s final album. The trio gained another future Tortoise member when Johnson’s departure brought in bassist Bundy K. Brown. A wider variety of instruments and weirdness (especially the growing obtuseness and distinct cadence of Grubbs’ vocal style, which will not sound unfamiliar to fans of his next project), do make for a somewhat different album, but Sing the Troubled Beast is still one of the early-’90s’ best examples of thinking man’s noise rock. The band toured with Codeine and then relocated to Chicago, where Grubbs attended graduate school at the University of Chicago and morphed Bastro into Gastr del Sol. Brown and McEntire contributed to the Chicago scene of experimentally minded (or “better than average”) indie rock and such, most notably as founding members of aforementioned post-rock poster band Tortoise. BEAT HAPPENING Jamboree (1988, K Records) Jamboree marked a big step forward from the naval-gazing pajama party that was this trio’s self-titled debut. Beat Happening is the Beat Happening of legend on this album—and the two that followed. The band’s signature sound also progressed over these three albums, with 1991’s Dreamy and 1993’s You Turn Me On (see entry) rounding out the trio of titles. The combination of founder/ vocalist/songwriter Calvin Johnson’s baritone singing and lyrics of a schoolyard-crush mindset, Heather Lewis’ simple but effective stand-up drumming, and Bret Lunsford’s minimal strum/jab/ jangle guitar could have been one of the more difficultly acquired tastes in American underground rock. But it had a distinct power to endear, providing one of the era’s most pointed reactions to the boys’-club post hardcore, proto-grunge, noise rock, and other prevailing indie rock sounds, all of which were growing in popularity in 1988, the year this album was released. Jamboree features definitive Beat Happening moments “Bewitched” and “Indian Summer.”

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BEAT HAPPENING You Turn Me On (1992, K Records) As its final proper album, Beat Happening’s You Turn Me On places the trio in one of rock-and-roll history’s most exalted secret-handshake clubs: bands that reach their A-game, release an album representative of this, and then promptly called it a day. You Turn Me On features exceptional if not infectious songwriting, long and hypnotic tracks with multitracked layers, a mature sexuality that was missing from previous releases (and so much of indie rock in general), and an overruling of the innocence factor that was, quite frankly, beginning to get a little creepy as Beat Happening progressed from album to album. (Calvin Johnson was thirty when You Turn Me On was released.) Johnson subsequently formed the frequently fantastic Dub Narcotic Sound System (with various side players) and the Halo Benders with Built to Spill’s Doug Martsch. BECK One Foot in the Grave (1994, K Records) Recorded in a single take as a tossed-off goof, Beck’s “Loser” was released as a 12-inch single in March 1993, originally in a tiny edition of five hundred copies. Picked up by numerous California radio stations, the song became a surprise hit, unwittingly typecasting a generation and making Beck the subject of a heated bidding war. This was the backdrop when, in November 1993, Beck traveled to Olympia, Washington, to record One Foot in the Grave, though it wouldn’t be released until the summer after his DGC debut, Mellow Gold, hit in April 1994. (An additional independent-label album, Stereopathic Soulmanure, a twenty-fivetrack noise-joke endurance test, was also released in the months following Mellow Gold, another testament to the level of creative control Beck managed to retain through his major-label contract.) One Foot in the Grave made sterling his credibility in the world of folk music interpreters and was recorded with a Pacific Northwest dream team of indie players, including Built to Spill/Spinanes/ Team Dresch drummer Scott Plouf, 764-HERO’s James Bertram on bass, and guitarist Chris Fallow, who’d soon sell a million records of his own as founder of the Presidents of the United States of America. On top of that, the album was produced and released by K Records/Beat Happening/Halo Benders/Dub Narcotic Sound

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System ringleader Calvin Johnson. The result of this highly credentialed collaboration is an impressive selection of folk and folk-blues originals (and one cover of the traditional “He’s a Mighty Good Leader”), all bearing an uncanny resemblance to material found on Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music. BECK Odelay (1996, DGC) Beck’s fourth full-length album was a fleshed-out, multilayered, multistyle mammoth accomplishment that actually did what his second and third independently released albums were supposed to do: silence any lingering chatter about Beck being an integrity-challenged, one-hit musical entity. As the first Dust Brothers production since the Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique in 1989, Odelay shares that album’s sense of artistic wanderlust and spot-on execution. The stylistic buffet includes the expected altindie hip-hop and electronica, but also goes into indie-fuzz-pop, underground nudge-nudge samples (like the Frogs’ “That was a good drum break” from the duo’s 1989 album, It’s Only Right and Natural), old school hip-hop, exotica, and even some stuff that could be classified as noise rock. Odelay set Beck on the wildly diverse career path that continues today. BEDHEAD Bedheaded (1996, Trance Syndicate) This album, somewhat superior to the band’s debut, presented a logically subtle progression of Bedhead’s sound and vision. Bedheaded was the band’s second triple-guitar contribution to raising indie rock’s mid-’90s approval rating. The 1998 Steve Albini–engineered Transaction de Novo was the band’s magnum opus—and its finale. The years that have passed since the six-piece’s 1999 breakup have seen a slow but noticeable reexamination of the band’s body of work—and a growing base of new fans too young to have found Bedhead the first time around.

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BIG BLACK Atomizer (1986, Tough and Go) After several years and a handful of EPs that felt like albums, Big Black released Atomizer in 1986 as its first true full-length. Like the barely posthumous Songs about Fucking that followed the next year, Atomizer is Big Black at the height of its two-guitarsplus-bass-plus-drum-machine powers, forging a line-straddling, industrial-meets-nascent-noise-rock force to be reckoned with. The album features the band’s best song, “Passing Complexion”; its best known song, “Kerosene”; its most controversial work, “Jordan, Minnesota” (about a 1983 child pornography ring busted in said town); and generally the harshest lyrical subject matter Big Black had yet to offer (with handy liner notes explaining each song’s little fictional foray into the American underbelly). It inexplicably cracked the Billboard 200 at No. 197, and it belongs in the collection of anyone with more than a passing interest in this book. BIG BLACK Songs about Fucking (1987, Touch and Go) With guitarist Santiago Durango deciding to enroll in law school, Big Black (two guitarists, a bassist, and an increasingly well-programmed drum machine credited on record sleeves as “Roland,” after its manufacturer) determined that Songs about Fucking would be its final release. Following the combo’s strongest effort to date, Atomizer (1986), Big Black’s swan song was no tossoff. Rather, it would guarantee founder Steve Albini’s first musical project (of an eventual three) a dignified and powerful exit. Without belying Albini’s electronic influences (Roland is front and center, and the LP included a cover of Kraftwerk’s “The Model”), Songs about Fucking was the heaviest, most lyrically poignant, and hardest-rocking of all Big Black titles to date (an EP, a live album, and a compilation would follow) and a certifiably essential part of any record collection, especially those that trod indie rock’s heavier paths. In fact, Songs about Fucking would prove a big influence on the growing “aggro” and “post-hardcore” corner of indie rock that would soon be the focus of the Amphetamine Reptile and Touch and Go Records in the late ’80s and early ’90s.

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BIG BLACK Pigpile (1992, Touch and Go) Like other inherently flawed formats (compilations of non-album material, remix albums, and so on), great live albums are hard to come by. But what about an incredible live record by a rock band with a lineup that includes . . . a drum machine? Big Black pulls off that rare feat with Pigpile, which documents one complete show at London’s Hammersmith Clarendon during the band’s final tour. Big Black’s breakup was actually announced before the release of 1987’s Songs about Fucking and the shows—including the one captured here—that followed. The band called it a day based on two factors: Guitarist Santiago Durango was to soon begin law school and the bandwide assessment that Big Black had reached the height of its powers. Therefore, on this album, the latter is just what the listener gets, from the first “One, Two, One, Two . . . fuck you!” count-off until Steve Albini and Santiago Durango stab through the last couple of scratchy riffs on “Jordan, Minnesota.” Many of these twelve live tracks are better than their studio counterparts, namely “Passing Complexion,” “Pavement Saw,” and pre-LP era (1986) material such as “Steelworker,” which suffered from a poor recording when originally released. BIG BOYS Where’s My Towel/Industry Standard (1981, Wasted Talent) Fronted by 250-pound Randy “Biscuit” Turner, a proud homosexual who would wear tattered dresses on stage (this took serious guts in early ’80s hardcore), with guitarist Tim Kerr and bassist Chris Gates behind him, the Big Boys were the first and perhaps only creatively successful punk-funk band to come out of the early hardcore scene. Released before 1982’s Fun, Fun, Fun 12-inch EP, this album (known as either Where’s My Towel? or Industry Standard, depending on the pressing or who you ask) is the band’s only full-length recording made at the height of its artistic powers. Two full-lengths came later on the Enigma label, but the fire had been snuffed by that point. Along with the Dicks, the Big Boys were kings of Texas hardcore, and they offered something different and of lasting influence to later generations of underground bands. Tim Kerr went on form and play in countless bands, including Poison 13 and Monkeywrench. Turner passed away in 2005. 34 GIMME INDIE ROCK

BIKINI KILL Pussy Whipped (1993, Kill Rock Stars) Perhaps one of the most misrepresented entities when it comes to the music press of the early ’90s, Bikini Kill wasn’t really the proprietary band of riot grrrl’s original early- to mid-’90s run, but it was the act most often associated with the movement. Based on artistic/musical merit alone, Bikini Kill released two killer albums of female punk rock for the ’90s (and beyond). This was the band’s proper debut, a raging, screeching beast with an engine built from equal parts X-Ray Spex, Slits, Adverts, and Avengers, but with none of the fat evident in the ill-coined “foxcore” sounds of the day (L7, 7 Year Bitch, Hole, etc.). Pussy Whipped showed that the basic traditions of punk rock could be brought into the ’90s with conviction, excitement, and quality. BIKINI KILL Reject All American (1996, Kill Rock Stars) When the riot grrrl movement suffered widespread media distortion, Bikini Kill’s Kathleen Hanna called for its principals to participate in a “media blackout” during the couple of years leading up to her band’s final album. Cultural adversity has helped or wholly created some of the great albums in this book, and perhaps that’s part of the reason Reject All American eats the earlier Pussy Whipped for lunch in regard to production qualities, real anger, songwriting, and dynamics (or maybe it’s just creative progression on the part of the minds at work). Either way, Reject All American belongs in the femme-led mid-decade canon of greats alongside the first two Sleater-Kinney albums and the two Team Dresch titles. BITCH MAGNET Umber (1989, Glitterhouse/Communion) Bitch Magnet remains one of the more confusingly named bands in underground rock history (it was active during the pre-ironic era). Formed in 1986 amid the same social circle at Ohio’s Oberlin College that would spawn the like-minded Codeine, Bitch Magnet released the debut 12-inch EP Star Booty in 1988, followed by this full-length debut the next year. Umber showed that this trio favored an aggressive and heavy approach to post hardcore/indie rock that had a lot in common with the aggro noise rock that

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dominated the Amphetamine Reptile and late-’80s Touch and Go rosters. But Umber lacked the unwieldy, testosterone-fueled depravity and nihilism that painted some of noise rock’s more homogenous participants into a self-defeating corner, relying instead on the hazy, often buried but melodic vocals of guitarist/ founder Soo Young Park (later of Seam) and a more tuneful wall of guitar riffs and distortion that actually compared favorably to early shoegaze techniques as much as it did the six-string onslaughts of stateside contemporaries.

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BLACK FLAG — BUTTHOLE SURFERS

BLACK FLAG Damaged (1981, SST) If this book’s 500 albums were to be arranged in exact chronological order by date of release, the opening statement of the resulting cultural and musical narrative would be this album. Black Flag’s Damaged is “overrating-proof,” if such a thing exists. The indelible mark it left upon its release—and the gradually growing influence it continues to exert upon underground rock— cannot be overstated. This was the first Black Flag album to feature Henry Rollins on vocals and the only full-length studio recording officially released by the band to feature its legendary two-guitar lineup. While earlier Black Flag material, spanning four years and employing as many vocalists, show the band excel at the really, really fast punk rock that was soon to be known as “hardcore,” Damaged is an altogether new development. The attack is not only incrementally more ferocious, direct, and lyrically introverted (or insane), but Greg Ginn’s songwriting and guitar work reaches its first adventurous peak with miniature atonal explosions of lead work flying from the the down-stroked fury of his riffs. Bracelets on drummer Robo’s left wrist can be heard rattling whenever he slams his snare—namely, during downbeats—and this became yet another audible quality mimicked over years to come. Henry Rollins’ vocals were recorded later than the backing tracks, and the closing dirge “Damaged I” is his first writing credit with the band. (He made up lyrics each night the song was performed.) Damaged was originally released through a distribution deal with MCA Records’ Unicorn imprint that quickly went south in a bad way. The complicated debacle cost the hardcore warhorses two years of productivity during which the band was legally disallowed any further releases under the Black Flag name. Though a valiant effort has been made within this book to keep to a minimum any attempts at ranking the works included herein, Damaged might come the closest to making that shortest of shortlists, the one inspired by the hypothetical scenario, “If your house was burning down and you could only save one album . . . ”

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BLACK FLAG My War (1984, SST) Due to the protracted, multilayered legal catastrophe that followed Damaged, My War arrived almost two and a half years later. The band’s second proper studio album is split in two stylistically disparate halves (that is, side one and side two). Five of the six songs on the first half are more or less an extension or expansion of the style originated and realized on Damaged. Side A closes with the completely unhinged “The Swinging Man,” a freakout of unbelievable proportions with Rollins convincingly losing his shit atop a performance by Greg Ginn that provides evidence the man never really got due credit as a phenomenal free-jazz/ improv/noise guitarist. Playing this one is an efficient way to clear out any party at four in the morning. Side B is just three tracks, each over six minutes long, played at a menacing crawl. It’s post-Sabbath sludge-metal or proto–noise rock, depending on how you wish to retroactively consider this stuff against the underground rock history that came before and has transpired since. What’s clear is that Greg Ginn and his close confidants were paying attention to the tiny but autonomous doom-metal scene that was fracturing away from the power- and thrash-metal movements (not such a reach considering that the new movement’s progenitor, Saint Vitus, had just released its debut full-length on SST a month before My War came out). Black Flag wanted to raise the bar set by fellow exploring hardcore colleagues Flipper, Void, and Fang. And, as with Flipper, part of the motive for such a drastic shift was the desire to aggravate narrower minded hardcore patrons who showed up to see Black Flag rip through a bunch of twochord, minute-and-half burners—a faction of fans and bands that had, unfortunately, grown into a nationwide movement majority by 1984. My War polarizes Flag fans to this day, but there’s no debating the mark it left on later trailblazers like the Melvins, Drive Like Jehu, Unsane, Mudhoney, and Nirvana—not to mention the influence it had on the seriously heavy and slow metallic rumblings of Kyuss, Sleep, and Earth.

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BLACK FLAG Slip It In (1984, SST) This occasionally misunderstood album (the title track is deeper than many thought upon its release) is actually Black Flag’s strongest studio full-length after Damaged, but rating this band’s albums against one another distracts from the big-picture truth that each is more or less its own creation. That said, Slip It In is the only Flag album to deliver the band’s entire past-to-future stylistic gamut, and it rocks more thickly and fiery than any of the other four studio full-lengths that followed the band’s release moratorium, which ended in early 1984. Black Flag released three studio albums that year alone—My War in March; the half-spoken-word (by Rollins)/half-instrumental Family Man in September; and Slip It In, in December—as well as a live record. Landing before the band’s final album, In My Head, Slip It In is the preeminent (though a little inconsistent, fidelity-wise) release by the lineup of Henry Rollins, Greg Ginn, bassist Kira Roessler, and Descendents drummer Bill Stevenson. BLACK FLAG Live ’84 (1984, SST) This good recording of a show at San Francisco’s Stone nightclub (also filmed and available through SST on VHS for a short time) features the Rollins/Ginn/Roessler/Stevenson lineup in fine form. It starts with the eight-minute instrumental “Process of Weeding Out” that promptly reveals bassist Kira Roessler as an unsung secret weapon. (This version is preferable to the studio version on the 1985 EP of the same name.) There is heart to Roessler’s playing that counters Ginn’s atonal “anti-hook” freak-outs and riffs, which were really coming into play (more so live) in ’84. Everyone should hear this polarizing lineup when it was firing on all cylinders.

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BLACK FLAG In My Head (1985, SST) Black Flag entered a different phase for its final year-and-a-half (1985 to the summer of 1986). Flag of 1983–84 was contrary and visionary at same time: getting people’s attention, blowing away live audiences when not befuddling or infuriating the them, challenging the community’s thinking when it came to artistic limitations, re: hardcore, and helping (as much as any band in this book) to spawn what would become “indie rock.” But in later years, Greg Ginn’s artistic singularity and other issues began to alienate the band’s audience—particularly in a live setting. Flag’s final two studio records—the slightly weaker Loose Nut and the superior In My Head (both from 1985, SST)—are still sinking their influential claws into the rock and metal underground. Gone were the days of Damaged, which sold more than 60,000 copies within months of its release—in L.A. alone. But In My Head, which Greg Ginn had originally written as his first solo album, is the band’s most structurally tight studio document. It burns as wild and heavy as Slip It In but boasts clearer production and a faster drive. This is the exemplary studio capture of Black Flag/Greg Ginn’s late-days mixture of underground metal, twelve-tone experimental composition, and hardcore intensity plus density. BLAKE BABIES Sunburn (1990, Mammoth) Bassist/singer Juliana Hatfield, drummer Freda Boner, and guitarist/singer John Strohm began playing together at some point in 1986 and did so without a moniker until Allen Ginsberg gave them one—literally. After a reading at Harvard, the legendary Beat poet and writer entertained some attendee questions. Hatfield/Boner/Strohm asked for a band name; Ginsberg answered with an indirect reference to William Blake’s Songs of Innocence. From that origin anecdote (a damn good one) we advance to the band’s final album, Sunburn (1990), not to dismiss the Blake Babies’ releases leading up to it, but to spotlight the stylistic trophy piece released just a handful of months before the band’s 1991 demise. The Blake Babies hailed from the same underground Boston/Amherst collective of bands that included

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the Lemonheads, Dinosaur Jr, and Buffalo Tom, yet the Blake Babies did not rely on piles of guitar distortion or an updating of regional forefathers Mission of Burma, and instead specialized in hook-savvy jangle-pop with an underground swagger, moody tension, and often-brisk delivery. However, most of the polite college rock coming out of the woodwork in the late-’80s and first year or two of the ’90s is put to shame by Sunburn. Shortly after its release and the band’s breakup, Hatfield went solo and, in 1992, released the album Hey Babe, one of the best-selling independent releases of the year. BLONDE REDHEAD La Mia Vita Violenta (1995, Smells Like Records) Named after a song by no-wave band DNA, Blonde Redhead was initially made up of Italian-born twin brothers Amedeo and Simone Pace and two Japanese-American women, Kazu Makino and Maki Takahashi. The band’s first two albums are unfairly dismissed as noise rock but are in fact a mix of Sonic Youth, Unwound, noisier shoegaze, and something that was all Blonde Redhead. The Smells Like Records label was run by Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley, and it’s not hard to imagine what he liked in the two records made by Blonde Redhead in 1995, though La Mia Vita Violenta, the band’s sophomore outing (the debut was self-titled), is the better of the two. Its instrumental and vocal bombast, inventive rhythms, and unique male/ female vocal interplay pushed right up front in the mix created a beauty-meets-chaos-in-the-future treatment of noise-pop that exemplified why Blonde Redhead was an invigorator for mid-decade indie rock. The album stands the test of time and is strongly recommended for fans of guitar-centric, aggressive, noise-embracing, and keenly melodic bands of today or since this band changed its sound mid-career. It’s worth noting that this incarnation of Blonde Redhead sounds very different from the one that has found a following in more recent years.

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BLOODSPORT I Am the Game (1985, Homestead) Chicago’s post-hardcore/hardcore/punk scene of the mid-’80s belied the fact that this is the third largest city in the country, as evidenced by the incestuous member associations of this one-album, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it gathering place for Chris Bjorkland. A vet of the all-legend/no-legacy early ’80s punk rock band Strike Under, which also featured his brother, Steve (who’d later join Breaking Circus) and Pete Kezdy of Naked Raygun, Bjorkland is joined here by drummer Joe Haggerty (later in the Effigies and Pegboy), bassist Tom Woods, and singer Dave Bergeron (who joined Haggerty in that late-’80s Effigies incarnation). Ok, with all that musical genealogy out of the way, Bloodsport’s only album, the seven-song I Am the Game, flattens what hometown colleagues Big Black and Naked Raygun had released up to that point (though each of those bands would reach comparable, if not greater heights with their respective 1986 full-lengths). This brief, largely forgotten record is a firm contender for Chicago’s best punk-rock/post-hardcore album of the mid-’80s, benefitting from a golden touch of soaring melody that doesn’t miss a song, and an off-the-charts energy level of admirable consistency. The band storms through each machinetight number (Haggerty pounds like a better, flesh-and-blood version of Big Black’s Roland drum machine) as if these four guys were somehow selected to make the human race’s final chunk of music before the apocalypse did its thing. If any band comes close to the splendid I Am the Game’s ahead-of-its-time punch, it would be the powerhouse of pop-punk redemption, Pegboy. BONGWATER Double Bummer/Breaking No New Ground (1987/1988 Shimmy Disc) NYC’s Bongwater was the duo of former Shockabilly bassist (among other ventures) Mark Kramer (better known simply as Kramer) and actress/performance artist Ann Magnuson. The twosome formed in 1987 and suffered an unfriendly breakup of devastating proportions in 1992 after releasing their final album, The Big Sellout. The Bongwater discography of four albums and one EP released from 1987 to 1992 is a distinct body of work in the

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pantheon of American underground rock. Kramer and Magnuson, with the help of guitarist Dave Rick and former Shockabilly drummer David Licht, created a sonic trademark of avant noise, wild psychedelia, a pop-culture palette of film/music/radio samples, a vast arsenal of cover interpretations (both drastic and loyal interpretations), and a wicked sense of humor and somehow made it a consistently exciting and listenable ride. Double Bummer/Breaking No New Ground is the band’s debut EP and a double-length album issued together on CD (though they were separate on vinyl). It’s the most commonly found version of this collection and the best way to experience the material. BONGWATER The Power of Pussy (1991, Shimmy Disc) Over the three previous albums Bongwater released since forming in 1986, the band invented a swirling, sample-and-sound-bitefilled, art/noise-damaged psychedelic rock that was riotously funny, often striking in its beauty, mind-bending in its scope and cleverness, culturally (especially musically) encyclopedic, and easy to identify. Cover songs make up a big part of the band’s body of work, and their third album was a huge college-radio hit, partly by way of the title track, but mostly by way of the closing cover medley “Folk Song.” This track presents a history of rock music that is funny without being ironic, plus it’s beautifully played and sung. Other songs that make this an essential Bongwater title: the haunting “Great Radio” followed by “What If,” the cover of the Weavers’ “Kisses are Sweeter Than Wine” (also a college radio hit), “Nick Cave Dolls,” and a cover of Dudley Moore’s “Bedazzled.” BOTTLE ROCKETS S/T (1993, East Side Digital) Originating in Festus, Missouri, the Bottle Rockets have roots that can be traced back to singer/founder/guitarist Brain Henneman and drummer Mark Ortmann’s ’80s band, Chicken Truck, which often played with a nascent Uncle Tupelo at the St. Louis club Cicero’s and other spots around the region. Henneman was later Uncle Tupelo’s roadie during the No Depression/Still Feel Gone era, and he recorded some demos that produced a solo single (on which he was backed by Jay Farrar and Jeff Tweedy) and the music that would become the Bottle Rockets’ self-titled 46 GIMME INDIE ROCK

1993 debut. By detouring around the punk-rock/post-hardcore foundation favored by the band’s alt-country contemporaries, and instead relying on a Crazy Horse/Marshall Tucker Band/ Outlaws influence when the band’s working-class, small-town narrative country-folk called for it, the Bottle Rockets’ debut— and each of their albums that followed—pushed the band to the forefront of the ’90s alt-country movement. BOWERY ELECTRIC S/T (1995, Kranky) Bowery Electric’s self-titled debut is one of several albums that made the Kranky label so exciting and prescient in the mid’90s. Sold short due to being one of the original inspirations for English rock critic extraordinaire Simon Reynolds to coin the term “post rock” (as leaders of a “distinctly American” stripe of the subgenre), the record does much to bring the then-limping shoegaze approach into the middle of the decade with some dignity. Bowery Electric also should be credited with adding some sex appeal, along with sonic muscle, to the usually dorky, hirsute reinterpretations of ’70s space-rock/Krautrock that were flourishing at the time. The band was essentially a duo consisting of Lawrence Chandler, who had studied under minimalist composer LaMonte Young, and vocalist/bassist Martha Schwendener. This album’s slow-building, mid-tempo tracks all feature a live drummer (the only B.E. album to do so), and a foreboding eeriness punctuates the entire record. “Slow Thrills” and the opening “Sounds in Motion” followed by “Next to Nothing” exemplify the best-with-less dynamics and quiet-topropulsive-to-lumbering structures that Bowery Electric would abandon for a different approach on its sophomore effort, the appropriately titled Beat (1996, Kranky).

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BRAINIAC Bonsai Superstar (1994, Grass) Brainiac wasn’t the only band to originate in the early ’90s as guitar-abusing aggressors, only to later scream off in the direction of dark and fiery synth-punk informed by late-’70s/early-’80s post punk pioneered by bands like Chrome, the Screamers, Devo, and Suicide, but they were one of the first and best. Brainiac’s first incarnation fell into the more common realm of spastic noise rock, and it wasn’t until second album Bonsai Superstar that the band came into its own. The album benefited from new guitarist John Schmersal (who would go on to form Enon), but what mostly knocked listeners on their asses was the band’s newfound affection for analog synth work, which was brought to the forefront of the mix—and sometimes just outright stole the instrumental spotlight (especially via singer Tim Taylor’s physical abuse of his mini-Moog). Also appealing was the band’s screw-thepast ambition and its newfound ability to write intense, futuristic songs with barely restrained histrionics (especially as carried out through the vocals). Brainiac could also bring all of this to the stage like pros, which helps account for the rapid growth of the band’s fan base and the press attention that followed Bonsai Superstar’s 1994 release. BRAINIAC Hissing Prigs in Static Couture (1996, Touch and Go) Following the release of the band’s sophomore knockout, Bonsai Superstar, Brainiac secured a slot on the second stage of the Sonic Youth–headlined Lollapalooza 1995. Even in that live performance environment, which removed all nuance and required competing with the roar of whoever might be on the main stage at the moment, Brainiac was not just any loud and energetic live band. The quartet blindsided audiences wherever it took to the stage, and this is how it amassed an unknown but substantial percentage of its fan base. The band’s live reputation landed it opening slots for Beck and the Breeders. At the Chicago stop-off for Lollapalooza, Brainiac’s live madness wowed the right people and the band’s next and final album, Hissing Prigs in Static Couture, appeared on the Touch and Go label in 1996 (following the excellent Internationale 7-inch EP).

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Hissing Prigs is a refinement of Bonsai Superstar but with an increased dose of electronic/synth/noise and songcrafting experimentation. Despite the band’s continued move away from guitars, the listen is a more organic one and the song construction is less claustrophobic this time around. The album would be Brainiac’s final full-length, as front man and keyboardist/synth player Timmy Taylor was tragically killed in a car accident in May 1997, one month after the band had released the influential Electroshock for President six-song EP (Touch and Go) and started what was to be its major-label debut for Interscope Records. Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails (referring to his With Teeth album), along with members of At the Drive-In, Mars Volta, Muse, and Death Cab for Cutie, all cite Brainiac as an influence on their work. GLENN BRANCA The Ascension (1981, 99 Records) After contributing to NYC’s late-’70s no-wave/post-punk scene with the bands Theoretical Girls and The Static, Glenn Branca, much like contemporary Rhys Chatham, began focusing on composing for multi-guitar ensembles. Following 1980’s Lesson No. 1 on the influential 99 Records, the same label released The Ascension, recorded with four guitarists, a bassist, and a drummer. The alternate tunings and textures explored here would inform many important later works, notably those of Sonic Youth and Swans. Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo is one of the four guitarists heard on this album. GLENN BRANCA Symphony No. 6 (Devil Choirs at the Gates of Heaven) (1989, Blast First) After The Ascension and the follow-up Indeterminate Activity of Resultant Masses, Glenn Branca began to write actual symphonies for electric guitar and percussion using microtonality and mathematics, among other compositional angles. One of the more “rock”-based Branca symphonies, this work features future Band of Susans member and Helmet founder Page Hamilton among its ten guitarists.

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BREADWINNER Burner (1994, Merge) Following the break-up of the Richmond, Virginia, band Honor Role, guitarist Pen Rollings formed the mostly instrumental trio Breadwinner, which lasted from 1990 until 1992 and released two 7-inches (on Merge). Burner compiles those 7-inches plus three previously unreleased tracks, and this tiny body of work has gone on to leave a huge mark on a variety of subgenres and noted musicians, including Lamb of God and Battles. As a progenitor of the subgenre that would, for better or worse, come to be known as math rock, Breadwinner used the traditional power-trio setup and Rollings’ precise and compact guitar riffing to create a stripped-down bent-askew form of instrumental metal. Rollings would go on to form Butterglove, Confessor, and, more recently, the instrumental metal trio, Loincloth. THE BREEDERS The Pod (1990, 4AD) Perhaps the biggest fissure that spurred major internal trouble for Pixies was Black Francis’ refusal of equal (or any, eventually) songwriting input from bandmate and bassist Kim Deal. She dealt with the snub by forming the Breeders, her side project that became a priority and managed to outshine Pixies in most ways. The Breeders put out two full-lengths and an EP before a hiatus in the mid-’90s. The Pod is notable for a couple of indirect reasons: its Steve Albini production job, which he called his favorite of the era, and Kurt Cobain’s claim that it stands as his favorite album of the time Nirvana was active. The band’s first lineup, as heard here, was Deal along with Throwing Muses’ Tanya Donnelly, Slint’s Britt Walford (pseudonymously credited as Shannon Doughton), and Josephine Wiggs of U.K. band Perfect Disaster. Other than Deal’s distinct vocals, this is a much different affair from Pixies. Alternately heavy, noisy, delicate, and wildly dynamic, but written like alt-rock/indie rock gold through and through, The Pod was a futuristic monument upon its proto-Nevermind release in 1990.

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THE BREEDERS Last Splash (1993, 4AD/Elektra) If 1992’s Safari EP didn’t show Black Francis that not giving Kim Deal any songwriting freedom in Pixies was a really stupid move, then second album Last Splash’s surprise runaway hit “Cannonball” surely had the man’s head in frequent conflict with many a wall, especially when it propelled the Breeders to a level of success Deal’s former band never came close to reaching. The song’s populist acceptance was merely proof of Deal’s excellent songwriting prowess—because that’s what it takes to make frat boys go bonkers over a really weird, experimental song. Such mass appeal was far from a bad thing. Listen to closer “Roi” and know that this album found its way into hundreds of thousands of dorm rooms around the country. Both the Safari EP and Last Splash (only one of the EP tracks resurfaces on the LP) combine to create a return that eliminated any fears that The Pod might have been a fluke of greatness. BRICK LAYER CAKE Tragedy Tragedy (1994, Touch and Go) Brick Layer Cake is the solo project of former Rifle Sport and Breaking Circus drummer Todd Trainer, who is probably best known for assuming the same position in Shellac. He plays all the instruments and writes all the music on the Brick Layer Cake albums released between 1990 and 1994, as well as on 2002’s Whatchamacallit. Lumped into the noise-rock subgenre by association, this music is slow, droning, and methodical. Tragedy Tragedy is the best album of Brick Layer Cake’s initial run (Trainer resurrected BLC for a 2002 album), and the best example of what close colleague and bandmate Steve Albini has described as “Nick Drake on downers fronting Black Sabbath, if Black Sabbath only played the good parts of their songs.”

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BUFFALO TOM Birdbrain (1990, Beggars Banquet/RCA) After a self-titled debut on SST, Buffalo Tom took its melodic guitar squall to the majors with this superior set of nuts-and-bolts indie rock. Like its debut, this album was produced by friendof-the-band and quasi-mentor, J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr In fact, critical detractors had taken to nicknaming the band “Dinosaur Jr Jr” But that wiseass dismissal overlooks the electrifying power and heart behind this rock-solid album. Birdbrain would be Buffalo Tom’s last foray into full-throttle and distortion-thick songcraft, as the 1992 follow-up, Let Me Come Over, is dominated by furiously strummed jangle-folk and balladry, much like the stylistic marriage Uncle Tupelo had successfully found a year or two before. BUILT TO SPILL Ultimate Alternative Wavers (1993, C/Z) Shortly after leaving the Seattle-based Treepeople, guitarist Doug Martsch returned to his hometown of Boise, Idaho, and formed Built to Spill. Unfairly dismissed by many Built to Spill fans, the band’s 1993 debut is misunderstood. However, in the early ’90s it took great big brass balls to make an indie rock record that incorporated the influence of late-’70s/early-’80s AOR (Boston, Asia, Journey, and so on) without any hint of cheesiness, and featured front-and-center guitar soloing throughout most of the song cycle. For a bit of context that may or may not make sense to those who were not around or paying attention at the time, think of Ultimate Alternative Wavers as the anti–Urge Overkill. Both bands drew from similar wellsprings of mainstream hard rock, but Built to Spill kept things less in-your-face than UO. With the exception of UO’s Saturation, Ultimate Alternative Wavers was unlike most indie rock albums of 1993, with layers and layers of guitar interplay (the band was a guitar/bass/drums trio), big arena-style keyboards here and there, and Martsch’s pristine vocals. Also notable for featuring a track called “Nowhere Nothin’ Fuckup” after the “hit” song by Jason Taverner, the protagonist in Philip K. Dick’s classic 1974 sci-fi masterpiece, Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said.

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BUILT TO SPILL There’s Nothing Wrong with Love (1994, Up) Moving from the older, more grunge-associated C/Z Records to Portland upstart label, Up Records, Built to Spill returned with sophomore album There’s Nothing Wrong with Love, the record that attracted a whole new audience as well as the interest of major labels. (BTS’s third album, Perfect from Now On, was released by Warner Bros. in 1997.) Doug Martsch left his Boiseto-Seattle outfit Treepeople right after that band released its best album to date, 1993’s Just Kidding, boomeranging back onto the scene with a new trio and debut that sounded unlike any other guitar band at the moment—a mean feat during indie rock’s period of condensed heterogeneity in the early ’90s. But the Boston (the band)–meets-Dinosaur-Jr-meets-bubblegum-pop hooks of Ultimate Alternative Wavers underwent a fat-trimming for There’s Nothing Wrong with Love, shedding the prog-rock density and late-’70s AOR hugeness so that the upfront and inyour-face vocal hooks could have a harmonious relationship with Martsch’s guitar-hero aspirations. In fact, along with Dinosaur Jr’s J Mascis, the Speaking Canaries’ Damon Che, and Crystalized Movements’ Wayne Rogers, Martsch belonged to an exclusive and brand-new club in the late ’80s/early ’90s: guitar virtuosos who regularly busted out solos and leads that gave already catchy songs a bigger hook than could be found in the chord progressions or vocal lines. These guys made soloing ok to like, and good enough to love, again. There’s Nothing Wrong with Love premiered the Built to Spill “sound”: heart-as-open-book sentimentality via front-and-center vocals and enough soulful, textured, and even noisy guitar fireworks to balance things out. Martsch would parlay this into eventual crossover and mainstream success on later albums and during tireless touring, joining My Morning Jacket as a band with true indie rock origins, but a future fan base split between said demographic and the jam-band masses that explored artists outside of their hippie-fied ground zero. This is not to be read as a derogatory opinion in any sense, as Built to Spill continues on the path of integrity to this day (2006’s You in Reverse is a powerhouse album, possibly its best).

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BUSH TETRAS Wild Things (1983, ROIR) Contortions guitarist and co-founder Pat Place formed the Bush Tetras in 1979 and followed a more dance/funk muse through the later years of downtown NYC’s no-wave/post-punk underground era (as did 99 Records’ Liquid Liquid). With bassist Laura Kennedy, sung/muttered vocals from Cynthia Sley, and Place’s scratchy guitar, the band landed a couple of tracks on the dance charts and were popular with underground disco DJs of the day. But Bush Tetras made organic, Americanized post punk that would resurface as an influence on the post-post-punk revivals that have occurred since the late ’90s. This was Bush Tetras only first-era full-length, and along with the band’s handful of previously released 7-inches and 12-inches, these songs have been reissued. The band regrouped several times, released more material over the decades since, and is currently active. BUTTHOLE SURFERS Brown Reason to Live (1983, Alternative Tentacles) Guitarist Paul Leary and six-foot-seven-inch spokesperson Gibson “Gibby” Haynes were friends from Trinity College, where the latter was captain of the basketball team, president of his fraternity, and recipient of the 1981 Accounting Student of the Year Award. Upon graduation, Haynes went to work as an auditor for the highly respected Peat Warwick firm, but he devoted the fullest application of his high intelligence and great work ethic to, as his spiritual brethren of fifteen years earlier might say, dropping out. After going through a now-notorious list of band monikers (this author’s personal fave: Eight-Foot Worm Makes Own Food) before settling on the unsettling Butthole Surfers, the band released its debut full-length. So much more than a sum of its most obvious motives and influences, Brown Reason to Live is usually considered the band’s reactionary stance against mediocrity in American hardcore and the geographical and cultural isolationism of original home base San Antonio, expressed while conveying a disturbing enthusiasm for the anti-hardcore drug, LSD. Opener “The Shah Sleeps in Lee Harvey’s Grave” begins the Surfers’ career-long campaign of confrontational gestures that seemed planned out so no one can accurately explain why they are offended. The band’s distaste for subtlety (something 54 GIMME INDIE ROCK

people would have to get used to) is on full display with Haynes’ howling the song title between blasts of barely structured musical outbursts that could be isolated to make one consider the statement “Grindcore was pioneered by a five-year-old who played guitar with a couch pillow” a plausible historical fact. Variety, as it applies to the Butthole Surfers’ world, plays out across the rest of the album. “Hey” isn’t that far from something Dr. Demento would hoist upon his public, and “Suicide” is one of several times the Surfers musically commented on hardcore. Those new to the band should hear “Bar-B-Q Pope” or “The Revenge of Anus Presley” and draw their own conclusions. BUTTHOLE SURFERS Rembrandt Pussyhorse (1986, Touch and Go) Though it would come back to bite the label in the ass in the late ’90s, the Butthole Surfers’ hand-shake deal with Touch and Go was on a release-by-release basis, and the band kept an open dialogue with Jello Biafra’s Alternative Tentacles, which was originally slated to release album number three, Rembrandt Pussyhorse. The challenging approach of the preceding Psychic Powerless Another Man’s Sac (1984) is increased dramatically on this album through tape editing, sound modulation, piano, strings, various insane sound bites and samples, and the band’s usual abuse of guitar, bass, and dual drumming. Rembrandt Pussyhorse is the first Butthole Surfers album to be filled with the band’s unique wobbly rhythms and time signatures. The cover of the Guess Who’s “American Woman” is one of the most bizarre pieces of music to come from the American underground in the ’80s. BUTTHOLE SURFERS Locust Abortion Technician (1987, Touch and Go) On this album, deservedly considered the Butthole Surfers’ best, the band adds the sonic characteristic of true, sludgy heaviness to the sociopathic and disturbing (though innovative and influential to contemporaneous and future music movements) melting pot of attributes and approaches heard on previous albums. The “cover” of Black Sabbath’s “Sweet Leaf”—here titled “Sweat Loaf”—that opens the album is a pretty good indicator of what will follow, though it turns out to be a much weirder ride without reliance on another band’s source material.

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BUTTHOLE SURFERS DBL Live (1989, Latino Bugger Veil) Self-released to offset the rampant distribution of live bootlegs during the mid- to late ’80s, when the band literally lived on the road, this is the sound of the Butthole Surfers’ live experience during the final year it was actually an experience. The record is expansive enough to cover a good cross-section of the band’s output and include almost every song on the recently released Hairway to Steven (which get actual titles in the track listing, replacing the doodles of junior-high schoolyard vulgarity assigned each song on the original album). The twenty-nine-track CD edition features ten more songs than the double-vinyl version, including a seven-plus-minute cover of R.E.M.’s “The One I Love.”

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B

CAMPER VAN BEETHOVEN — CRAYON

CAMPER VAN BEETHOVEN Telephone Free Landslide Victory (1985, Independent Project/ Rough Trade) Camper Van Beethoven was an anomaly of ’80s collegiate rock: an as-yet-unheard intersection of quirkiness (so prized by that scene); underground/post-hardcore sensibility and integrity (minus the unfriendly po-faced stylistic trappings or harsh music), parodic humor, virtuosic instrumental ability, head-spinning diversity, and encyclopedic knowledge and understanding of musical styles far beyond the boundaries imposed by its genre of origin. But the combination of all this in one band is not what made Camper Van Beethoven anomalous; it’s that they pulled off this eclecticism with class, heart, and consistency, and were completely free of the ever common “Hey, look what we can do” trying-too-hard trappings that ruin the work of so many genrejumpers in underground music. This album features the collegeradio smash “Take the Skinheads Bowling” and a cover of Black Flag’s Wasted done in counter-style mellowness. The all-over-themap stylistic shifts on Telephone Free Landslide Victory are drastic, but the album feels natural as a whole. CAMPER VAN BEETHOVEN Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart (1988, Virgin) Camper Van Beethoven’s move to Virgin Records and first use of an outside producer (Dennis Herring) did smooth out a lot of the band’s rougher edges, but the variety of extraneous musical styles explored on previous albums remains, and the songwriting and playing on this album and follow-up Key Lime Pie progressed enough for each to stand on its own merits. Aside from containing the minor MTV hit “Eye of Fatima,” this album features the band’s most moving song, “She Divines Water,” as well as other strong efforts like “My Path Belated” and “One of These Days.”

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CAMPER VAN BEETHOVEN Key Lime Pie (1989, Virgin) This album’s cover of the Status Quo’s “Pictures of Matchstick Men” became an alternative college-rock hit on radio and MTV, making Key Lime Pie the most successful Camper Van Beethoven title. But the record is the band’s darkest lyrically and thematically, with much of the previous albums’ playfulness gone. Regardless, Key Lime Pie has some of CVB’s best moments, like “Jack Ruby,” “June,” “All Her Favorite Fruit,” “(I Was Born in a) Laundromat,” “Flowers,” and “When I Win the Lottery.” Forays into World Music styles are less frequent than in the past; the album’s increased Americana feel predated the alt-country movement of the ’90s. The band broke up in 1990, with founder David Lowery forming the much more successful Cracker, and other members focusing on side project Monks of Doom. Camper Van Beethoven began sporadically reuniting and recording in 1999. CAP’N JAZZ Burritos, Inspiration Point, Fork Balloon Sports, Cards in the Spokes, Automatic Biographies, Kites, Kung Fu, Trophies, Banana Peels We’ve Slipped On and Egg Shells We’ve Tippy Toed Over a.k.a. Shmap ’n Shmazz (1995, Man With Gun) This twelve-track album with the mouthful of a title is the sole full-length by Cap’n Jazz, the band that served as the starting place for, among other musicians, Promise Ring’s Davey von Bolhen and Kinsella brothers Tim (Joan of Arc, The Sky Corvair, Friend/Enemy, Owls, etc.) and Mike (Joan of Arc, American Football, Owen, etc.). Burritos was recorded during the final five days of 1994 by noted Chicago producer Casey Rice at Idful Studios. It followed two 7-inches and numerous compilation tracks released since Tim formed the band in 1989. (Mike joined at age twelve.) Cap’n Jazz releases are among the fieriest of the ’90s post-hardcore movement that would soon evolve into that decade’s proper emo subgenre. Due to the band’s explosive and charismatic live shows and the scarcity of Cap’n Jazz records (even while the band was together), the quartet became legendary during its six years of activity—exponentially so after the group dissolved almost immediately following the release of Burritos, assuredly a ’90s emo/screamo holy grail album if ever there was one.

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CAT POWER What Would the Community Think? (1995, Matador) The mid-decade talent scouting work of Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley not only brought Blonde Redhead into the indie rock fold but was responsible for the discovery of Chan Marshall (when she was opening a Liz Phair show), better known as Cat Power. Marshall recorded twenty songs in one session, backed by Shelley and Tim Folijahn (who together also performed as Two Dollar Guitar). The tracks were split into Cat Power’s first two albums, Dear Sir (1995) and Myra Lee (1996). Though those albums are certainly recommended, it was her growth as a songwriter and the variety of styles on Matador debut What Would the Community Think? that attracted critical acclaim and justified the universal consideration of this album as the first Cat Power masterpiece. CAUSTIC RESIN Fly Me to the Moon (1995, Up) Caustic Resin (led by Brett Netson, original Built to Spill bassist) came from the same Boise, Idaho, scene as Doug Martsch’s band, Treepeople. Nelson’s outfit also relocated to Seattle as Martsch was there putting together Built to Spill in the early ’90s. Though the Built to Spill leader has cited Caustic Resin as a major influence on his own work, at times the two bands have had little in common, musically. C/Z Records released one fulllength in 1993 (Body Love/Body Hate), then Caustic Resin roared from the grunge-burned Pacific Northwest in 1995 with this double album of drugged-out rock that was heavy, psychedelic, and could be rather riff-oriented in a ’70s hard-rock/proto-metal sense. Fly Me to the Moon had some newly minted Built to Spill fans scratching their heads, as it came from the other side of the tracks when compared to the warm and fuzzy direction taken by BTS on its second album, There’s Nothing Wrong with Love (1994). Still, this massive and rewarding piece of indie-sludge rock is an overlooked, individualistic document well worth seeking out.

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CHARLES BROWN SUPERSTAR Days of Our Drive/Sweet Piece of Ass (1995, WIN) This band’s brief spurt of activity left behind an EP and this massive double album unlike anything heard in American underground rock/indie rock at the time. Principal member Bobby Hecksher can be heard backing Beck on his Stereopathic Soul Manure album and went on to form the Warlocks, while vocalist Bennett Rogers was in Aloha Wednesday and The Choir and had somewhat of a subsequent solo career. Days of Our Drive/Sweet Piece of Ass succeeds at mixing incomprehensible bedfellows such as the Melvins, Stereolab, My Bloody Valentine, and the Butthole Surfers. Only 500 copies were made, and because the entire pressing was mailed to college and freeform radio stations, music writers, and zine/magazine editors, the album has built a justified micro-legend of mini-mythical proportions over the years. RHYS CHATHAM Factor X (1983, Moers Music) Though his former collaborator Glenn Branca would have a more prolific release schedule and predate this album with a handful of guitar ensemble albums, Rhys Chatham can be credited for marrying multiple-guitar ensemble playing with the minimalist classical experimentism of his mentors LaMonte Young and Tony Conrad. After years playing with and learning from those composers (and others), it took a live show by the Ramones to give Chatham his directional, life-affirming muse. His ensemble performances and releases (especially “Guitar Trio”), which included Glenn Branca as a player, touched the late-’70s no-wave movement in NYC in a big way. Chatham’s ringing, alternately tuned, clean guitar sculptures are more melodic and pleasant than Branca’s more nihilistic works. The best example of this is the twelve-minute “Guitar Ring,” which appears on this album, Chatham’s 1983 proper full-length debut, Factor X. (Fun fact: members of Band of Susans honed their chops in Chatham’s ’80s ensembles before forming their band.) Chatham fell into relative obscurity until the three-CD/130page-book retrospective An Angel Moves Too Fast to See: Selected Works 1971–1989 was released on the Table of the Elements label in 2002. Since then, Chatham has remained active with

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touring ensembles. (Another fun fact: in 2007, Chatham was commissioned by the city of Paris—his birthplace—to perform a composition for 400 electric guitars titled A Crimson Grail, which was broadcast on national French television and seen by more than 100,000 viewers.) CHAVEZ Ride the Fader (1996, Matador) Following his time in Skunk (which released two albums on Twin/Tone in 1990 and 1991) and a stint in noise-rock band Wider, Matt Sweeney founded Chavez with Wider drummer Matt Lo, Bullet Lavolta’s Clay Tarver, and bassist Scott Marshall. The band released a 7-inch, an EP, and two full-length albums between 1994 and 1996, and though no new material has been released (aside from bonus content on Matador Records’ 2006 comprehensive collection Better Days Will Haunt You), the band has never officially broken up. Building from pillars of inspiration such as Bitch Magnet, Seam, Rodan, Slint, Treepeople, and Mission of Burma, Chavez’s second album is a gigantic wall of all-encompassing guitar wizardry (riffs, leads, and everything else) constructed over a massive rhythm section and majestic vocals. The result is a highly intelligent and unforgettably catchy form of grown-up post hardcore that smooths out all of the ragged, testosterone edges from noise rock, retains a metallic quality to the towering riff and chord structure, and plops a great big hook onto each of the multiple sections that make up one song. Guitarist Clay Tarver went on to direct films (including the fun horror film Joyride), TV shows, and commercials (notably, the “Got Milk?” ad campaign). Matt Sweeney became the most versatile and active journeyman guitarist, producer, and allaround make-shit-happen personality to ever emerge from the ’90s underground (Cat Power’s The Covers Record, Billy Corgan’s extra-Pumpkins project Zwan, Will Oldham/Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Johnny Cash’s American V , Neil Diamond’s 2008 comeback, Home Before Dark, and the Dixie Chicks’ Taking the Long Way, among many other works).

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CHEATER SLICKS Whiskey (1993, In the Red) If The Jesus Lizard’s early-to-mid-’90s run of albums constitutes the “Cadillac of noise rock,” then the Boston/Columbus, Ohio, Cheater Slicks’ decade (1993–2003) with In the Red Records does the same for the garage-rock/punk revival scene of the same era. Along with the Oblivians, the Slicks took a bassless approach to making the noisiest, meanest, and most soulful garage-punk in the land, sending patrons of multiband garage festivals out the front door, covering their ears during this band’s ear-bleeding sets. Whiskey is the Cheater Slicks’ third full-length but the first with In the Red Records, the label that emerged mid-decade as a peddler of excellence when it came to all things garage-punkrelated. The band’s thick and brutal agenda is in full effect here, as is the Slicks’ affinity for experimentation. Case in point? The covering of a Feelies/Velvet Underground–style riff in hollowbody distortion and stretching it out for almost twenty minutes. CHEATER SLICKS Don’t Like You (1995, In the Red) An early Cheater Slicks booster was Jon Spencer, who nabbed the band as openers on many occasions (including a 1995 tour) and produced Don’t Like You, an album that is not only the band’s artistic peak, but could possibly be the best album to come out of the ’90s garage-punk/rock revival movement. Desperation, angst, earth-flattening noise, awesome songs—it’s all here from ceiling to floor; the band never lets up. To quote writer Eric Davidson on the Slicks, from his book We Never Learn: The Gunk Punk Undergut,1988–2001, “within their ear-immolating burn, their über-distorted guitar gnash flails like Ghidra the Three-Headed Monster spitting sonic sparks all over the barroom, while lesser souls scurry off like tots on a Toho set. It’s all pretty confounding, sometimes catchy, and intermittently transcendent in ways that such gutter pounding usually isn’t.”

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CHERUBS Heroinman (1994, Trance Syndicate) This Austin, Texas, quartet seemed to support the surface notion that noise rock was an outlet for post hardcore/indie rock’s degenerate culture. The Cherubs released a debut album (1992’s Icing, also on Trance) and several 7-inch releases (including splits with Slug, Steel Pole Bath Tub, and fellow Austinites, Fuckemos) that showed the band to be an especially noisy but better than average player in its chosen genre. Then Heroinman, the band’s second and final proper album, blindsided listeners with an instantly recognizable propensity for pop hooks and better playing and songwriting, while retaining the Cherubs’ familiarly abrasive, beyond-the-red distortion levels and production techniques. This combination elevated the album (and the band behind it) to a sort of semi-legendary status over the years after the Cherubs’ mid-decade breakup. Also recommended is the band’s 1996 collection of odds-and-ends plus 7-inch material, Short of Popular (Trance). CHRISTIAN DEATH Only Theater of Pain (1982, Frontier) Counting former Adolescents guitarist and founder Rikk Agnew among its ranks, this original incarnation of Christian Death bears no resemblance to the band that, under the same moniker, released a ridiculous, patently overdramatic barrage of albums for many, many years after this band’s only recorded document was released in 1982. Rozz Williams’ one-album-only Christian Death was a byproduct of the L.A. punk and hardcore scene. Like many other blink-and-you’ll-miss-’em albums covered here, Only Theater of Pain was an unhappy accident that drew from the best of the darker U.K. post punk of the day (The Pop Group, early Cabaret Voltaire, Killing Joke, early Bauhaus) while taking a healthy dose of The Birthday Party along the way. An out-of-place classic dismissed and overlooked due to what came next, the 1982 album always packs an enjoyable surprise for the uninitiated.

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CIRCLE JERKS Golden Shower of Hits (1983, Allegiance) As an original member of Black Flag, Keith Morris was the vocalist on the Nervous Breakdown 12-inch, but swiftly left the band at the end of 1979 and reemerged with his own outfit featuring guitarist Greg Hetson, late of Red Cross. After releasing 1980’s Group Sex—fourteen songs in under sixteen minutes—and being one of the bands featured in Penelope Spheeris’ The Decline of Western Civilization, the Circle Jerks released a second album, Wild in the Streets, in 1982 on the I.R.S. Records–owned Faulty Products. But the best place to start the band—and to the populist side of hardcore (the Circle Jerks were one of a handful of American hardcore bands to take hardcore beyond its “high school loser/ outsider/loner” realm of fans in the ’80s)—is Golden Shower of Hits. The album is not a covers album, but the closing title track is a five-minute medley of Burt Bacharach, Paul Anka, and Neil Sedaka numbers, plus the songs “Afternoon Delight,” “Along Comes Mary,” and “D-I-V-O-R-C-E,” arranged so that the amalgam tells a story of love, shotgun marriage, and divorce. This band’s secret weapon—a classically jazz-trained rhythm section of Roger Rogerson on bass and Lucky Lehrer on drums—would be gone after this album. Two of the songs here, “Coup d’Etat” and “When the Shit Hits the Fan” would show up in Alex Cox’s Repo Man the following year, as would the band (its next lineup) in a cameo as a nightclub act. CODEINE Frigid Stars (1991, Sub Pop) The years 1986 to 1996 frame the first great explosion of stylistic fragmentation within the parent genres of underground metal and indie rock. Overlap happened and gray areas grew out of rapidly increasing complexity spreading on both sides of the fence. Nothing resembling metal can be heard in the brazen change Codeine made to the indie rock template, but it was right around the same time the Melvins gave underground metal the equivalent innovation: a deceleration in tempo so drastic that structural thresholds are compromised, seconds pass between every instrument’s contribution to the song, and aural processing of the composition’s “rhythm” requires serious concentration and patience.

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Drummer Chris Brokaw, bassist and vocalist Steven Immerwahr, and guitarist John Engle formed Codeine after Brokaw and Immerwahr finished their studies at Oberlin College in 1989. Their debut, Frigid Stars, was finished a year later and released by Sub Pop in 1991. The album makes it clear that the Codeine’s overall musical intent was probably in place from the start. The band built off of the aforementioned slowness to stretch out the kind of densely distorted guitar stylings favored by its contemporaries so that the sound no longer buried vocals but instead made the listener face the shattered melancholy of Immerwahr’s reedy singing. Brokaw took advantage of the very low beats-per-minute count to land particularly hard and heavy hits, and Engle’s Telecaster rung out on one down-stroke for what seemed like an eternity. The band stuck to this genuinely sad formula for the entire album, and the results were devastatingly pretty and very, very heavy all at once. CODEINE The White Birch (1994, Sub Pop) Bearing refinements heard on the six-song Barely Real EP released in 1993 on Sub Pop, Codeine’s second and final full-length kept the slowest-of-the-slow tempos but tightened up song structure and trimmed some of the distortion that tended to spill into the open spaces on the band’s 1991 debut, Frigid Stars. The White Birch is one of the most depressing albums ever released during indie rock’s heyday, but its prettiness keeps the vibe from reaching oppressiveness. By cleaning up Codeine’s approach without sacrificing any heaviness or volume, this album further cemented the band’s effect on the “slowcore” or “sadcore” movement that had begun to gently grow in the underground. More so, it became the touchstone of Codeine’s eventual and justified status as not only a groundbreaking band but a great band.

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COME Eleven:Eleven (1992, Matador) Boston’s Come was formed in 1990 by Codeine drummer Chris Brokaw (on guitar here) and former Live Skull/Uzi vocalist/ guitarist Thalia Zedek. The pair, along with a bassist and a drummer, added a bluesy detail to noisy indie rock that had little in common with how the extraneous style was approached elsewhere by trash/garage-rock revivalists. Zedek’s smoky snarl, the two guitarists’ slide and lead guitar fireworks, and an attractive angst to the band’s downbeat (but not wholly downtempo) gloom are just a few of the attributes that garnered an instant (mostly U.K.) following and critical acclaim for the band and album. Now recognized as a sleeper classic among Matador’s early-’90s releases, Eleven:Eleven is the first of Come’s three essential showpieces of brooding guitar mastery and mood. CORAL Pillowtalk (1994, Fistpuppet) Coral formed in 1990 as the post–Honor Role band of vocalist Bob Schick and released an exceptionally strong but small body of work: three 7-inches on Merge and Cargo Records, plus two albums on Fistpuppet/Headhunter (this is the debut) before breaking up in 1996. Coral releases, including Pillowtalk, its first LP, give an excellent personal and heartfelt alternative to the rigid, less humanistic feel that the Dischord and Touch and Go camp of post hardcore could get carried away with at the time. The band is more melodic and a degree more experimental than Honor Role, thanks in part to guitarist John Kovalcik’s forwardlooking and progressive post-hardcore style, which is much different from Pen Rollings’ metal-meets-post-punk work in Honor Role (and nothing like the full-on avant riffage in Rollings’ Breadwinner). In the late ’90s, Schick and former Honor Role bassist (and Coral producer) Chip Jones formed the great Dynamic Truths (Merge released their work).

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COWS Cunning Stunts (1992, Amphetamine Reptile) Based out of Minneapolis, this deranged noise-rock/posthardcore/punk-blues band released nine albums (along with seven 7-inches and two retrospective collections) during its eleven-year (1987–1998) history. But 1992’s Cunning Stunts begins the period in which the Cows perfected their approach to noise rock. By bringing the essence of the band’s unforgettable live performances into the studio (bolstered by the unhinged antics of front man/bugle-player Shannon Selberg) and adding newfound melody developments, producer Iain Burgess helps the Cows push far beyond the Butthole Surfers/Scratch Acid–like noise splatters of their previous albums. Among the Cows’ body of work, this became a favorite of fans and—when they got it—critics. COWS Sexy Pee Story (1993, Amphetamine Reptile) The Cows continued on a hot streak with 1993’s Sexy Pee Story, rising to the top of the noise-rock pile to join sonically different but more-or-less like-minded brethren The Jesus Lizard, Cherubs, Steel Pole Bath Tub, and so on. Returning producer Iain Burgess gives the band the dynamics it needs to keep the skewed melodic/ pop current and the push-pull/rise-and-fall rhythmic ride of prime-era Cows from being buried under what is otherwise a sludgy dissonance. After the Cows broke up in 1998, bassist Kevin Rutmanis played with the Melvins until 2005, and singer Shannon Selberg formed the Heroine Sheiks. CRAYON Brick Factory (1994, Harriet) The mid- to late-’80s proto-grunge/early-’90s grunge chestthumping, testosterone drawl-and-howl vocals found its polar opposite in the reedy, faux adolescent singing preferred by many American indie-pop bands. But while some bands were elevated out of the scenewide slumber party by pop super-skills, Crayon of Bellingham, Washington, added to those skills sheets of distorted guitar and flurried drumming. Crayon earned an A each time its power-twee tore from the speakers or ruled a stage. Sadly, this was the band’s only full-length.

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DAG NASTY — DWARVES

DAG NASTY Can I Say (1986, Dischord) Minor Threat guitarist Brain Baker formed Dag Nasty during the D.C. hardcore scene’s calculated reboot in mid-1985—a.k.a. Revolution Summer. But Can I Say is far different from albums by contemporaries Rites of Spring and Embrace. This album belongs in the gold-standard club of melodic hardcore, shedding the fat power chords, the arrested-adult vulgarity, and the skater-dude persona of the style’s California roots, while bringing in some noticeable D.C./Dischord touches of the day that would become ingrained in this era’s hardcore offshoot, as well as in ’90s emo and traditional indie rock. Brian Baker sprays every second of the ripping pop-core with rapid-fire guitar shards, premiering a new, tuned-up version of his invaluable lead and rhythm work on Minor Threat’s final album, Out of Step. Any fan of hardcore/ melodic hardcore—or, hell, of timeless rock-and-roll—who can keep the smartly sequenced album opener “Values Here” from bouncing around his or her head for a week isn’t someone to be trusted. THE DAMBUILDERS Tough Guy Problem (1994, spinART) Tough Guy Problem is comprised of five tracks and clocks in at just over twenty minutes, yet it represents enough growth over the preceding full-length, 1993’s Islington Porn Tapes, to be one of the few EPs strong enough to be included here. Eschewing the guitar-cloud blurriness and Pink Floydisms that marked spinART’s Lilys, and positively bullying the label’s twee-pop faction (such as Small Factory) with an advancement of Pixies’ manic-pop fury, Tough Guy Problem pointed toward a potential future for indie rock that was never realized.

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THE DAMBUILDERS Encendedor (1994, East/West/Elektra) Like Tough Guy Problem, this record includes a handful of superior versions of songs that appeared on the band’s 1993 album, Islington Porn Tapes. The Dambuilders’ major-label debut is the band’s best album and home to two minor alt-radio hits: “Shrine” and “Smell.” The opening (mostly) instrumental “Copsucker” is bolstered by head-rattling drums and a punchy bass line, and it builds into a climax of vocal shrieks (from violinist Joan Wasser), showing this band to be in a class of its own and anything but a victim of corporate compromise. The band went on to release two more proper full-lengths, the recommended follow-up Ruby Red (1995, East/West/Elektra) and the avoidable Against the Stars (same label) in 1997. Aside from Wasser’s work in Joan as Policewoman, members would go on to found or play with Gramercy Arms and Guided by Voices, among other acts. DAS DAMEN Triskaidekaphobe (1988) NYC’s Das Damen’s debut mini-album was the first title to carry the logo of Thurston Moore’s Ecstatic Peace label, but the band quickly signed to SST for a rerelease, which was followed by debut full-length Jupiter Eye (1987). But Das Damen should be remembered most for the high-energy/high-volume ’70s psych-metal—as translated through first-wave heavy-indie rock featuring big sticky hooks—of Triskaidekaphobe (which means fear of the number 13), an album that shares much of its charm and attack with what the Screaming Trees were doing at the same time (and lacks the head-cleaning noise detours of the band’s contemporaries). Triskaidekaphobe became one of the many lateperiod SST titles that could have ruled college radio but instead took over the cutout bins for the next twenty-five years. Das Damen would follow this album with a four-song 12-inch EP that boomeranged back into the SST warehouses when the band covered the Beatles’ “Magical Mystery Tour,” titled it “Song for Michael Jackson to $ell” (a nod to the Minutemen), and refused to pay royalties. Das Damen’s move to Twin/Tone for the 1989 too-commercial Mousetrap was followed by a live importonly album in 1990. A five-song 12-inch EP titled High Anxiety on Sub Pop would be the band’s last.

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THE dB’s Stands for Decibels (1981, Albion) Power-pop icons Chris Stamey and Peter Holsapple were the creative core on the dB’s’ first two albums; their individual unique styles complemented one another to make some of the best American collegiate pop of the ’80s. Usually touted as a landmark influence on the up-and-down future of this country’s tightly knit, dedicated scene of modern power-pop peddlers (that continues today), there’s enough U.K. post-punk, subtle psych-tinged song dressing and smart quirkiness at play here than is normally mentioned. Mix with early R.E.M., The Embarrassment, the first Dumptruck album, Game Theory, early Camper Van Beethoven, and the Feelies to get the best of American underground rock’s intellectual-pop faction—and an accurate history lesson on the initial rumblings of our nation’s college-rock movement. THE dB’s Repercussion (1982, Albion) Chris Stamey’s measured use of avant experimental hooks and Peter Holsapple’s more traditional power-pop share the fore on the final album by this Boston band to feature both songwriters. Therefore, it’s the final dB’s album recommended with absolute confidence to anyone with an interest in hearing the poppier side of the overall story told by this book’s 500 albums. Both this and the band’s debut were originally released as U.K. imports to little more than quiet critical acclaim on these shores, but they’ve since become exalted touchstones, loved by later bands like Yo La Tengo and many names in late ’80s and ’90s American indie rock, leaving an indelible mark on the ’80s college-rock scene. DEAD KENNEDYS Plastic Surgery Disasters (1981–1982, Alternative Tentacles) The Dead Kennedys’ seminal 1980 full-length debut is one of the first hardcore albums, and because of this, it is basically really fast punk rock. But in an amazingly short time period, the band developed into a musical force of intense power with a current of experimentation that would be crucial to keeping the hardcore movement from stagnating within its own narrow confines. Preceded by the In God We Trust EP in 1981 (the most traditionally “hardcore” of all DKs releases), this is harder, faster, tighter, and 76 GIMME INDIE ROCK

crazier—all of which is important in tempering (or distracting from) the polarizing vocal style favored by Jello Biafra, easily the most recognizably unique singing voice of American hardcore. No DKs album better showcases the band’s musical contributions, which often took a back seat to the then-shocking nature of its thematic content and live antagonisms. Far from being statements for the sake of making them— and way, way, way over the heads of those who bought into or produced the common denominator “Fuck You, Dad! Impeach Reagan! Incarcerate the Government!” style of hardcore—Dead Kennedys lyrics and song titles were also smarter and more subtle (“Trust Your Mechanic”; the downright pretty hard-pop of the album closer, “Moon Over Marina”). Three singles released right before this album (the DKs were hardcore’s “singles band”)—“Kill the Poor,” “Too Drunk to Fuck,” and “Nazi Punks Fuck Off!”— were immensely shocking for the time (1980, 1981), despite their humor and tongue-in-cheek intentions. Plastic Surgery Disaster’s two singles, “Bleed For Me” (a dark and disturbing account of CIA war crimes) and “Halloween” (about American social conformism), made the listener do what Biafra did in order to write them: some homework. An American original, the Dead Kennedys’ impact on the punk rock and hardcore communities is rivaled only by that of Black Flag and Minor Threat—if it is rivaled at all. Founder/ controversy magnet/singer/cultural personality Biafra had a knack for attracting controversy, then manipulating it into brilliant social commentary, a byproduct of which was worldwide publicity for his band, the biggest live draw of American firstwave hardcore. DEAD KENNEDYS Frankenchrist (1985, Alternative Tentacles) The release hiatus that followed Plastic Surgery Disasters was born of integrity: the band wanted to focus on running and growing its label, Alternative Tentacles, which was rapidly becoming the Bay Area’s answer to L.A.’s SST in scope and vision. A vastly different album from its predecessor, Frankenchrist offers ten songs that delve into urban psychedelia, surf rock, proto–noise rock, and moments of blurry hardcore that precipitate later deviations of the form, including grindcore and power-violence. Uniting this with

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previous DKs releases is, of course, Jello Biafra’s vocals, and they stay in one place throughout the entire affair: all up in your face. He may be the only punk rock/hardcore vocalist to ever successfully create a sonic manifestation of bulging eyes and wild facial contortions. “MTV Get Off the Air!” and “Goons of Hazard” don’t exactly put dangerous and controversial stuff in the crosshairs, seeing as how 1985 was the year that MTV was attacked with real substance by the Replacements’ “Seen Your Video,” and, um, occupying the Billboard No. 1 spot, Dire Straits’ “Money For Nothing.” “Jock-ORama (Invasion of the Beef Patrol),” an indictment of sports culture and fandom, came at a time when said demographic constituted a large portion of the audiences at Dead Kennedys shows. Thankfully, Frankenchrist is musically brave, fascinating, and great enough to make up for the downgrading of commentary. It’s also the album that destroyed the band in a brutally cruel twist of irony. Initial pressings of the album came with a reproduction of the H. R. Giger painting, Landscape XX, and when the parents of a Los Angeles teen found it in her room, the district attorney’s office became involved and the band was slapped with a charge of “distributing harmful matter to minors.” The complicated fiasco ended after two years, but the toll on the band members (who were experiencing inner turmoil anyway) was too much to take. The Dead Kennedys called it a day following the 1986 release of Bedtime for Democracy. DEAD MOON Crack in the System (1994, Tombstone) Forming in 1987 and releasing a ton of albums before disbanding in 2007, singer/guitarist Fred Cole, wife Toody Cole on bass, and drummer Andrew Loomis were Dead Moon, an underground selfcontained institution from Portland, Oregon, with roots that went way, way back. Fred Cole’s career in music began in the ’60s. He had several bands during the decade, with the Weeds ending up on the Nuggets anthology, and the Lollipop Shoppe’s “You Must Be a Witch” becoming an underground ’60s garage-punk favorite. Cole met his wife, Toody, after getting stranded in Portland while fleeing the draft in 1967. After one of Fred’s hard rock bands in the ’70s (King Bee) opened for the Ramones, the Coles became smitten with punk rock, formed the Rats, and self-released three 78 GIMME INDIE ROCK

LPs between 1980 and 1983. Following some forays into country and rockabilly, the couple formed Dead Moon. The band crafted its own punk rock sound, riding a middle ground between the Ramones, ’60s garage-punk, and the darker punk/hardcore of the Misfits. Engineering and mastering its own recordings on a mono lathe machine (the same one used for the Kingsmen’s “Louie Louie”), Dead Moon released the tracks on its own label, Tombstone (named after the musical equipment store that Fred and Toody ran in the late ’80s and ’90s). Dead Moon’s first album was released in 1987. The band’s best, Crack in the System (its eighth), appeared in 1994. That was right around the time that Dead Moon started touring the United States—its primary following was in Europe up to that point—and began blowing stateside audiences away with giant hooks, boundless energy, and a well-done (i.e., not cartoonish) classic B-movie horror aesthetic. A documentary about the band, Unknown Passage: The Dead Moon Story, was released in 2004. After Dead Moon’s demise, Fred, Toody, and drummer Kelly Halliburton formed Pierced Arrows, which remains active. DESCENDENTS Milo Goes to College (New Alliance/SST, 1982) If hairs are to be split, Descendents should be known as the first band to consummate the relationship between timeless pop hooks and authentic hardcore ferocity for the duration of an entire album. The outcome predated Hüsker Dü’s progress in this area. Another similarity between the two bands is that both released debut 7-inches that betrayed what was to come. In Descendents’ case, their 1979 “Ride the Wild”/“It’s a Hectic World” rocked a hybrid of surf-rock and power-pop borrowed from the band’s mentors, The Last. Very little of this carried over onto the 1981 Fat EP, which fires off five songs in less than five minutes (“Weinerschnitzel” could be the fastest song by any band to date) and serves as good documentation of something that arose during the two years that had just passed: hardcore. But what happened between March 1981, when the band recorded Fat at Total Access Studios with SST’s unofficial in-house producer Spot, and June 1982, when the same team crafted what would be Milo Goes to College? Who knows. But Descendents

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leapfrogged over punk and used hardcore as a framework on which to apply their newfound penchant for timeless hooks. “Hope,” “Myage,” “Suburban Home,” “I’m Not A Loser,” “Parents,” and “Marriage” are among the album’s treasures, which resonated in the sounds of thousands of (mostly California-based) bands through the ’90s. But it would be after that decade got mall-punk and altera-emo out of its system before Descendents got their just historical deserts. Listener be warned: lyrical tales of utter failure in several social and romantic contexts are told in ways that would never fly in this post-millennial age of extreme PC sensitivity. DESCENDENTS

I Don’t Want to Grow Up (New Alliance/SST, 1985) Milo (Aukerman, vocalist) did indeed go to college following the release of Descendents’ debut full-length in 1982. Upon his return, the band made what would be the high point of its ’80s work. Original guitarist/co-founder Frank Navetta burned all of his gear and took off for Oregon during the band’s hiatus from 1983 to 1985, a break also facilitated by drummer Bill Stevenson’s obligations to Black Flag. Navetta, who is only credited on one track here (the 35-second hardcore carryover “Rockstar”), was replaced by guitarist Ray Cooper, who had been the band’s replacement vocalist in the year following Aukerman’s departure to college (1983). Cooper and founding bassist Tony Lombardo had performed on and off as “the Ascendents” during the two years without Aukerman or Stevenson, leading up to the recording and release of this floodgate-opening, pop-core-meets-powerpop classic. It should be noted that much of the ageless and radiant pop acuity of I Don’t Want to Grow Up comes from drummer/ producer Stevenson’s flair for songwriting. “Can’t Go Back,” “Silly Girl,” “Christmas Vacation,” “Good Good Things,” and the somewhat darker but no less hooky closer “Ace” are all credited to Stevenson. Two other sugary confections, “In Love This Way” and the excellent “My World,” were contributed by Aukerman. The Black Flag–influenced instrumental “Theme” and the catchy but lyrically disturbing “Pervert” come courtesy of Lombardo, who left the band right after recording the album because of his full-time job with the U.S. Postal Service. Five of the aforementioned gems make for what might be the most consistently enjoyable Side B of 80 GIMME INDIE ROCK

any full-length American punk rock or hardcore album released during the 1980s. I Don’t Want to Grow Up is assuredly one of this book’s desert-island short list inclusions. DESCENDENTS All (1987, SST) Of Descendents’ studio albums released in the ’80s, this one is the proverbial runt of the litter as far as most critical assessments go. The record is loosely themed around the band’s long-running concept of “All” or “All-O-Gistics,” which combats personal mediocrity and complacency and encourages the individual to bring his or her A-game to every aspect of living one’s life. With guitarist Steven Egerton and bassist Karl Alvarez new to this lineup and writing much of the material on All, Descendents transformed into a more mature, instrumentally adept, slightly darker and all-around superior band compared to the one behind the 1986 scatological, somewhat misogynist, and otherwise spotty Enjoy! album. Like the many American hardcore bands that survived the movement’s first ’80–’86 phase intact without plunging directly into proto–indie rock, Descendents paved their road to post hardcore with a noticeable metal influence (which first showed up on Enjoy!). But unlike the former hardcore bands of the mid- to late ’80s identified by the crossover tag, Descendents boasted an unshakable knack for timeless pop hooks that placed a wide gulf between them and most bands associated with that movement. All’s “Cameage,” “Coolidge,” “Clean Sheets,” “Jealous of the World,” and “Pep Talk” are five of the strongest and catchiest songs in Descendents’ entire discography. Each employs a backbone of muscular metallic riffs and tougher delivery than the sugarcoated pop highlights of 1985’s I Don’t Want to Grow Up. Also of interest is the obtuse, experimental instrumental material that closes All, an obvious nod to all of the post-Damaged Black Flag albums that Descendents drummer Bill Stevenson played on. This was the final album credited to Descendents before Milo Aukerman’s second and longest departure (to get a Ph.D. in biochemistry) prompted the entrance of new vocalist Dave Smalley (of Dag Nasty, DYS and Down By Law) and a long, prolific run under a new band name borrowed from this album’s title— All. As a closing note, three post-All Descendents albums released

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during the band’s ’87–’95 hiatus almost earned inclusion here and are recommended. They are the two companion live albums Liveage! and Hallraker! (1987 and 1989, respectively, on SST) that cover the spring 1987 tour in support of All and that summer’s subsequent “FinALL Tour” (so named because of the band’s impending breakup). The third album is the comprehensive double-length “Best of” compilation Somery (1991, SST), a commendable survey of the best previously released Descendents tracks across the band’s 1981–1987 studio releases. THE DICKS Kill from the Heart (1983, SST) Originally part of the active early-’80s hardcore scene in Austin, Texas, where they co-released 1980’s Live at Raul’s Club split LP with sister-band Big Boys (both bands had flamboyantly homosexual lead singers), Gary Floyd’s the Dicks had moved to California by the time this seminal hardcore album was recorded. The Dicks’ contribution to their genre (and thus, to the future of American underground rock) was Floyd’s incorporating bluesy yelping to his vocals, not dissimilar to The Gun Club’s Jeffrey Lee Pierce. Floyd would assemble some different backing musicians for 1985’s These People, which was less a hardcore album than a punk-blues affair. Mudhoney covered this album’s “Dicks Hate the Police” in the late ’80s. DIDJITS Hornet Piñata (1990, Touch and Go) On this, the Didjits’ third full-length, the Champaign, Illinois, trio of Rick Sims on guitar and vocals, his brother Brad on drums, and Doug Evans on bass frequently blended hardcore velocity, an impervious wall of coarse, swarming riffs, and Rick’s snarlto-croon vocal range in a manner akin to a protracted version of the absurd, one-minute pop-core blasts the Dwarves delivered on 1989’s Blood Guts & Pussy. But the lack of political correctness here has a lot more humor to it than the Dwarves’ material. Hornet Piñata showed a drastic 180-degree shift in sound from previous Didjits’ albums, slapping a huge influence across the punk-metal-pop landscape it would soon share with New Bomb Turks, Supersuckers, and Gaunt.

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DIE KREUZEN Die Kreuzen (1984, Touch and Go) Milwaukee’s Die Kreuzen was the fourth band (after the Necros, Negative Approach, and the Meatmen) to release a full-length on the then-nascent Touch and Go label. Those who cite this self-titled debut as an example of hardcore’s original-era “crossover” with metal are committing critical insubordination by implying Die Kreuzen’s debut is similar to work by bands outside this book’s sphere of coverage (stylistically or inspirationally), like D.R.I., The Accused, Corrosion of Conformity, and Suicidal Tendencies. More relevant comparisons could be made with Void and side two of Hüsker Dü’s Zen Arcade—though both those examples are loose and sloppy compared to Die Kreuzen. Brian Egeness belongs in American hardcore’s Guitar Hall of Fame (a figurative thing at the moment) alongside fellow pioneers like Black Flag’s Greg Ginn, Bad Brains’ Dr. Know, Hüsker Dü’s Bob Mould, the Minutemen’s D. Boon, Void’s Bubba DuPree, and Minor Threat’s Brian Baker. A cubic inch of air wouldn’t fit between any two riffs on this album, even with the insane lead work machine-gunned across the top of its songs. Shifting from blazing force to a slower, meaner, heavier agenda, these tracks extended a strong line of influence at least a half-decade into the future on indie rock’s unfriendly and intense cousin-genre, noise rock. DINOSAUR (JR) S/T (1985, Homestead) The first Dinosaur album was self-recorded by the band— guitarist/singer J Mascis, bassist/singer Lou Barlow, and drummer Murph—at a home studio in the middle of nowhere for $500. Mascis wrote all of the songs earlier, following the mid-1984 breakup of his and Barlow’s hardcore band, Deep Wound. Friend of that band Gerard Cosloy, who dropped out of college to run Homestead Records, had included Deep Wound on his Bands That Could Be God compilation LP. When he heard Mascis’ new material, he promised that if a record got recorded, he’d release it. The self-titled album that Dinosaur made is the gold standard of mid-decade post hardcore. Mascis’ prodigious genius at songcraft throughout the album’s head-spinning song-by-song diversity is arresting, regardless of the admitted

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influence/inspiration-hopping said to have motivated the stylistic restlessness. This isn’t a band searching for a voice; it’s a band perfecting six or seven angles with post hardcore. The ultimate result was unheard of at the time. Mascis’ unmistakable vocal hooks—and the ones he wrote for Barlow—are laid over underground thrash metal; gothy post punk of the wiry guitar-savvy sort (a la The Cure’s Head on the Door album); heart-crushing country-rock balladry; roiling Minutemen rush; shredding ’70s proto-metal; mounds of sludgy doom; and deranged spazz-core. And that’s only a partial listing of what Dinosaur brings to the table. DINOSAUR JR You’re Living All over Me (1987, SST) While its 1987 release received far from anything resembling mainstream coverage or acceptance, Dinosaur Jr’s You’re Living All over Me had a ripple effect that only a few post-hardcore releases (Sonic Youth’s Daydream Nation, for instance) can claim. Let’s put it in simple but impossible-to-overstate terms: this might be the first perfect indie rock album, based on the sound and aesthetic at the heart of the term in the late-’80s/early-’90s. Sure, it can be argued that Hüsker Dü or Squirrel Bait or any number of bands with seminal albums between ’84 and ’86 beat Dinosaur Jr to the punch, but there’s just too much of the “feelers out” or laying-of-groundwork feel—and often a hardcore aftertaste—to those offerings to consider any of them the Book of Genesis for the bigger story that would transpire over the next decade. This album was the sound of unchartered territory, and it ingrained a deep desire to explore it among listeners, fans, writers, and fellow musicians. Never before had an American underground rock band woven such sonic gold out of these four things: 1. heaviness, 2. distortion/noise, 3. pop hooks and melodic sensibility that can only come out of an immensely gifted songwriter, and 4. emotion. Dinosaur’s (minus the “Jr”) self-titled 1985 debut album is an indispensable classic on its own terms, but it merely hinted at the wall-to-wall, rule-rewriting greatness of what would come next. You’re Living All over Me was released two years later, four days after founding songwriter/guitarist/singer J Mascis turned twenty-two. The band had jumped ship to SST, added the “Jr” to silence a litigious, same-named hippy band of no interest (and 84 GIMME INDIE ROCK

of the previous decade), and dropped all outside or past musical reference points. The result? An album that mixed beauty, chaotic guitar noise, and volume with an unprecedented magic that would write indie rock’s future. DINOSAUR JR Bug (1988, SST) That Dinosaur Jr’s third full-length, Bug, succeeds as a worthy follow-up to the band’s groundbreaking and rightfully legendary sophomore effort, You’re Living All over Me , is no small feat. As the band’s second album became relatively successful and original members J Mascis, Lou Barlow, and Murph found themselves touring the shit out of it in the confines of a van, internal relations quickly withered into mostly unspoken hostility between Barlow and Mascis, ending right after Bug was released on Halloween 1988. Though critics and fans alike often claim album opener “Freak Scene” to be the first true example of the (American) indie rock sound, soon to be embraced by the likes of Superchunk, Archers of Loaf, Buffalo Tom, and so on, the song has too much variety (shredding solo and other overt guitargod moves, quiet jangle-pop interludes, and more) to be thus pigeonholed. (Besides, genre building blocks can probably be found in earlier efforts, such as Hüsker Dü’s “Makes No Sense at All.”) Still, the track gained noticeable traction on college radio, with the single version reaching No. 7 during its twelve weeks on the indie chart. Elsewhere on Bug, the slower and sometimes sludgy “No Bones,” “Yeah We Know,” and “The Post” are tear-jerkers of the highest order, while the band’s expertise in raging barnburners is represented by “Yeah We Know,” “Budge,” and “Let It Ride” (a counterpart to You’re Living All over Me’s “Raisins”). The genuinely disturbing album closer “Don’t” remains an anomaly in the entire Dinosaur Jr discography (including the post-Barlow slew of dismissible-to-great titles released over most of the next decade). The lurching, impenetrably dense horror-metal contains the single vocal line “Why don’t you like me?” In an especially cruel passive-aggressive gesture, Mascis delegated the vocal duties to Barlow. Barlow’s inhuman screams tore across his vocal cords to the extent that the bassist was coughing up blood into a sink at session’s end.

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DINOSAUR JR Green Mind (1991, Sire) Dinosaur Jr’s Green Mind is really a J Mascis solo album, as it was recorded on and off in 1989 and 1990 after bassist Lou Barlow was bad-vibed out of the band, and it only features three tracks with original drummer Murph. Released on major label Sire almost a year before Nirvana’s Nevermind hit No. 1 and launched the music industry’s largest and last feeding frenzy, Dinosaur Jr’s fourth proper studio album, in more ways than one, lives outside of the band’s opening trio of paradigm shifters. Green Mind may have even alienated a few knee-jerk purists among the band’s fan base and peer group. But the album’s differences and big-label logo are easy to ignore given that not even one track remotely resembles filler or hints at creative bankruptcy. As with each Dino Jr album before it, Green Mind follows Mascis’ first-song-best-song tradition with “The Wagon” (previously released by Sub Pop in 1990 as a single). Only a terminally jaded (or very old) anti-rock listener could get this song unstuck from his or her brain. It’s one of those enviable feats of catchiness, where a big hook begins things, then ends to make room for another one, which ends to do the same, and so on. “The Wagon” could have been parsed into three or four Dinosaur Jr classics. “Thumb” adds organ and brings back the balladry of the band’s first album. The second, third, fourth, and fifth tracks interlock as a suite and rely on acoustic guitar in an increasing manner until the atmospheric psych folk of “Flyin’ Cloud” rolls in. “How’d You Pin That One on Me” is faster and heavier than 95 percent of the band’s output. And that covers just half of this wonderful album. DINOSAUR JR Fossils (1991, SST) This twenty-minute, eight-song mini-album compiles the frontand-flip of the three 7-inches SST released during Dinosaur Jr’s historic run on the label. Fossils is a blatant—and bandnonapproved—attempt to cash in on Dinosaur Jr’s move to Sire records. Released just months after Green Mind’s early-1991 street date, it’s got some serious gold from the band’s strongest era. There are three covers: the unforgettable treatment of the Cure’s “Just Like Heaven,” the smirking but awesome version of Peter

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Frampton’s “Show Me the Way,” and a crusty thickening up of obscure hardcore band Last Rites’ “Chunks.” Then there’s “Little Furry Things” and “In a Jar” —the two best songs off of what may be the greatest album in this book, 1987’s You’re Living All over Me. Big college-rock hit and Bug opener “Freak Scene” and that album’s “Keep the Glove” round things out, along with the teasing “Throw Down,” an acoustic stomper of strange beauty that’s over in less than a minute. DINOSAUR JR Whatever’s Cool with Me (1991, Sire) The U.S. release of this misleadingly tagged “maxi-single” is more than thirty-four minutes long, and it collects eight of Dinosaur Jr’s best major-label period recordings, betraying the fact that, barring the non-album single that is the title track, this is a collection of previously unreleased tracks, B-sides, and live content. Whatever’s Cool with Me is the perfect example of a subtle trend followed by established bands once they went with a major label. Majors would be exponentially more interested in mining a band, or a band’s album, for potential singles (for obvious reasons), and bands like this one and Sonic Youth took advantage of the practice to offer fans excellent, previously unavailable material instead of the kind of filler often associated with the terms “B-side” or “outtake.” Dinosaur Jr (or rather, J Mascis) was clearly creatively restless and productive when major-label debut Green Mind was recorded, because a lot of this album came out of those sessions or that general time period. The title track, however, was recorded after Green Mind’s February 1991 release date. (Perhaps the A&R folks at Sire could see into the near future; this little album appeared in fall of 1991—along with Nirvana’s Nevermind). Whatever’s Cool with Me is in this book on the strength of the following songs: Mascis’ chilling appropriation of David Bowie’s “Quicksand,” the thumping “Not You Again” (a “Freak Scene” part two if there ever was one), and the two heaviest songs in the band’s body of work, “The Little Baby” and “Pebbles and Weeds” (the most metal the metal-loving Mascis has ever been under the Dino Jr banner). Live versions of Green Mind’s “Thumb” and Bug’s “Keep the Glove” manage to translate nicely, despite the festival sonics apparent in the recordings. Last, “Sideways” shows Mascis

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can lend a fresh take on the by-then tiresome acoustic-to-rockingand-back-to-acoustic dynamic. DINOSAUR JR Where You Been (1993, Sire) This is the last stop for Dinosaur Jr allowed by this book’s chronological criteria, due to a temporary loss of plot that followed with the 1994 release of Without a Sound. (One review of that record began with “If only . . .”) Where You Been was released in early 1993, well into the major-label feeding frenzy’s infiltration of the underground and the above-ground culture’s multifaceted appropriation of the “alternative nation.” It was the band’s second effort for a major—a career move that didn’t play out so well for scores of other challenging bands that got into bed with the big boys after some time growing and slogging it out in the indie-label world. So while this is a markedly different album than Dinosaur Jr’s Sire debut Green Mind, no lessening of the band’s integrity or legacy as a pioneer can be found on Where You Been. It featured the highest charting Dino Jr single to date, “Start Choppin’ ” (No. 3 on Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks chart), which drove the album to peak at No. 50 on the Billboard 200. Had the song gained a little more traction, it would have made a refreshing mega-hit played ad infinitum against the backdrop of faux-grunge and alterna-fluff garbage that filled the newly reprogrammed X-station airwaves of the day. Curious readers interested in sampling this album’s best track should seek the propulsive fury of “On the Way.” DIS-* The Historically Troubled Third Album (1996, Sonic Bubblegum/ My Pal God) This Milwaukee trio formed in 1991, and on their first two albums, the band made a slowly developing yet usually solid style of early-’90s math rock/post hardcore that was balanced between the sonic stamps put on the style by both the Dischord/D.C. and Kansas City/Chicago/Midwest scenes. It wasn’t until the appropriately titled The Historically Troubled Third Album that Dis-* found their unique voice within the subgenre. Recorded by perfect-fit engineer Steve Albini and split-released by My Pal God Records and Sonic Bubblegum Records (the first two albums 88 GIMME INDIE ROCK

were on the Poster Children’s label, Twelve Inch), the final album by this confusingly named band is a tautly constructed (with almost Minutemen-like efficiency) and guitar-loving selection of songs, all precisely played with clean-to-distorted chords, riffs, and interweaving lines between bass and guitar. Plus the trackto-track pacing provides a relevant update of the quiet-to-loud dynamics common to Dis-*’s contemporaries. Guitarist/vocalist Chris Fuller had a deadpan delivery that was somehow very clean and melodic, plus the song titles and lyrics are endearingly humorous—introspective without being self-indulgent or heart-on-the-sleeve emo, and intelligent but approachably unpretentious (see “You May Get All the Ladies But I Got My Shit Together,” “Archivist of Smoke,” “Catch Me, I’m a Prick,” “Suddenly, Everyone’s a Smoker,” “Another Friend You Fuck,” and “Please Stop Blaming Your Personal Problems on Films”). DON CABALLERO For Respect (1993, Touch and Go) Let it be stated for readers not old enough to remember that metal of any type was rarely referenced by indie rock bands during the period covered herein for fear of appearing less than cool. Many noise-rock bands of the day did, however, include bastardized metal riffage at the core of their M.O.s. Don Caballero made up for the absence of a vocalist with riffs twisted and turned every which way. Part prog rock, part Metallica’s . . . And Justice for All (with better production, thanks to Steve Albini), For Respect doesn’t let up. DON CABALLERO 2 (1995, Touch and Go) On 2, one begins to hear the subtleties and guitar-tapping delay wizardry of Ian Williams, who would go on to take this band into new post-rock territory before forming the post-millennial wunder-band, Battles. Also on full display here are the talents of drummer Damon Che, whose concurrent act, the Speaking Canaries, can be read about elsewhere in these pages. Not nearly the bombastic test of eardrum strength of For Respect, but that’s why 2 should be of interest to the uninitiated.

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DOO RAG What We Do (1996, Dependability) Bob Log III and Thermos Maller’s first performance together was an impromptu jam in 1990 on a drastically altered guitar and some kitchen items used as percussion. Thus began Doo Rag, a duo whose recorded work draws musical and sonic comparisons to the Bassholes, the Gibson Bros., Hasil Adkins, the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, and Flat Duo Jets in its basic deconstructive spirit, but from there, shoots off into a world of its own. Unlike the duo’s earlier releases, which directed a paint-peeling middle finger toward anything associated with fidelity, Doo Rag’s third and final album fashioned the band’s personal little universe of sound. Though still ruled by Doo Rag’s frenetic updating of Mississippi Fred McDowell, Sleepy John Estes, folkblues era-John Lee Hooker, Howlin’ Wolf, and Muddy Waters, this album has enough weirdness to recall Captain Beefheart and the Groundhogs on occasion. Doo Rag’s sound was a byproduct of the band’s use of homemade or severely modified instrumentation. Bob Log III had an ultrafast finger-picking style and he was a demon with a slide, so he could cull an unholy racket from his self-built slide dobro with who-knows-what kind of homemade pickup system. Thermos Malling picked up the percussive end of things by punishing a kit made of a Budweiser box, a tin bucket, a film reel, and a shopping basket, among other found garbage. Malling also sang his extremely distorted vocals through various household items fitted with contact microphones. Doo Rag hung it up in 1996 after the release of three fulllengths, four 7-inches, and a compilation appearance, plus national and worldwide tours opening for Crash Worship, Beck, the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, and Ween, and a summer on the second stage at Lollapalooza.

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DREAM SYNDICATE The Days of Wine and Roses (1982, Ruby/Slash) Invariably the best album to come out of L.A.’s poorly named “paisley underground” movement of the early ’80s, The Days of Wine and Roses followed a self-released, self-titled 12-inch EP and preceded several full-lengths (all comprised of lesser material), which came in the wake of the decent amount of attention awarded this album by college rock stations around the United States. Steve Wynn’s Dream Syndicate, when firing on all cylinders, used The Velvet Underground and Television as musical reference points to build upon, in contrast to contemporaries who worshipped at the alters of the Byrds, Beatles, early Pink Floyd, and other psychedelic touchstones grounded in the late ’60s. The Days of Wine and Roses was marked by extended guitar rave-ups layered with more distortion than any other album associated with the aforementioned paisley underground community. Despite earning some attention, the band still found itself outside of the hardcore movement, but too loud and noisy for the post-power-pop crowds who would, within a year, make up the college-rock audience (by way of R.E.M’s Murmur and the dB’s Stands for Decibels albums). DRIVE LIKE JEHU S/T (1991, Cargo/Headhunter) When the well-beyond-their-years teenage post-hardcore band Pitchfork broke up in 1990, the two principal members (Rick Froberg and John Reis) went on to form Rocket from the Crypt (Reis only) and Drive Like Jehu (both Froberg and Reis). In conceiving of the latter, it’s as if Froberg took the respective chronological narratives of hardcore, post hardcore, noise rock, visceral indie rock, and prog rock, then did a quick inventory of all “guitar bands” that made “guitar albums” (regardless of genre or era). Then, as this study session wrapped, he trashed all his notes and built a sound from scratch, based on the conclusion that all of the above had to be done much, much better than before . . . and by just one band.

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DRIVE LIKE JEHU Yank Crime (1994, Interscope) Because Rocket from the Crypt’s John Reis was one-half of the dual-guitar engine in Drive Like Jehu—and because Interscope wanted Rocket from the Crypt bad enough—Reis’ “all or none” requirement was met and Drive Like Jehu’s Yank Crime CD was released on a major label while the vinyl LP-plus-7-inch version was handled by Headhunter/Cargo. Guitarist/singer/founder Rick Froberg, guitarist/singer Reis, drummer Mark Trombino, and bassist Mike Kennedy made a record that walked up to the bar they’d set almost four years earlier, wiped the dust off, and raised it to the point at which it remains today. Somewhat overlooked in its time because critics didn’t know what to do with them, Drive Like Jehu has achieved an appropriately legendary status across many listener demographics. The band also released an amazing single with Merge Records titled “Bullet Train to Vegas.” DLJ broke up in 1995, and Froberg and Reis went on to form Hot Snakes. Froberg then formed Obits. Froberg has said that a Drive Like Jehu reunion or new material wouldn’t be possible because music such as that cannot be recaptured and only comes during a certain stage of life. DUMPTRUCK D Is for Dumptruck (1983/1985, Incas/Big Time) The debut full-length by Boston-based Dumptruck is quite possibly the only start-to-finish album that achieves a middle point between the dB’s’ college-rock milestone, Stands for Decibels, and the rhythmic bass-led British post punk of Joy Division, Gang of Four, and early A Certain Ratio. Dumptruck was formed in 1983 by Kirk Swan and Seth Tiven with a revolving door of drummers and other backup players for most of its ’80s run. Swan and Tiven both wrote and sang, and the two switched off on bass and guitar for this release. The songs for D Is for Dumptruck were demoed, completed, and released that same year to a mostly positive reaction from the press and college radio. The album is a dark-pop anomaly from the American guitarbased underground of the early to mid-’80s and would be the only record of released type by Dumptruck, who turned its focus toward more accessible jangle-pop fare for the Mitch Easter– produced follow-up, Positively Dumptruck (Big Time, 1986). That 92 GIMME INDIE ROCK

album’s bigger label and cleaner sound, along with the band’s constant touring, would forever overshadow and therefore doom its superior predecessor with “promising but too dark” assessments that are better left ignored. DWARVES Blood Guts & Pussy (1990, Sub Pop) This band’s notoriety and the nature of what many have deemed “the most offensive album ever made” (based on several factors, starting with the infamous album art) have long overshadowed this record’s value as a benchmark of turn-of-the-’90s melodic hardcore. If the album art, song titles, and lyrics don’t stop the curious, they may bask in wonder over how these twelve songs whiz by in thirteen minutes in such a miraculous show of tight musicianship and pop-hook chops. DWARVES Sugarfix (1993, Sub Pop) This album is a far cry from the Dwarves’ first half-decade as a deviant and depraved psychedelic-garage punk/rock revivalist band (its identity up to 1988, while based out of the Chicago area). Sugarfix reins in some of the button-pushing lyrics and song titles of earlier works and will be forever attached to the prank-of-all-pranks the band pulled on its public and the ensuing fallout. Amid a time that was sensitive to frequent deaths of musicians (mainly from heroin overdoses, such as the then-recent passing of Unsane’s original drummer, Charlie Ondras), the Dwarves falsely claimed (through a press release) that guitarist HeWhoCannotBeNamed had been stabbed to death in a bar fight. Allegedly, the band had Sub Pop fooled, too, and the label joined in on the press-release announcement. When the label learned of the hoax, their relationship with the band was summarily severed. As for the music on Sugarfix, the Dwarves bring back some of the dark garage-psych of their past incarnation to engender a Dead Moon feel on many songs—plus, they throw in some Misfits for good measure. Opener “Is There Anybody Out There?” is one of the best garage-punk songs of the early ’90s.

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EARTH — FURTHER

EARTH Extra-Capsular Extraction (1991, Sub Pop) Dylan Carlson, Earth’s sole static member since the band formed in 1989, carries an extremely unfortunate distinction outside of the avant-metal/drone-rock world, where his band now flourishes: he was the close friend and confidant of Kurt Cobain who purchased the shotgun that was found in the Nirvana singer/ guitarist’s death-grip in April 1994. During Earth’s troubled first phase (1989–1997), the band was basically Carlson and whoever would join up in studio or on stage—except for the solid lineup featured on the band’s final Sub Pop album, 1996’s Pentastar: In the Style of Demons. The players on the band’s official debut on Sub Pop in 1991 were Carlson on guitars, Joe Preston (then bassist for the Melvins and founder and sole member of Thrones) on bass and drums, Dave Harwell also on bass, and Cobain providing vocals, along with Kelly Canary, then of the all-girl band Dickless and a future member of the Teen Angels. (She’s now a lawyer in Seattle.) With a running time of more than thirty-two minutes, Extra-Capsular Extraction more than qualifies as a full-length, but it is sold and marketed as an EP because the original release only featured three (loooonnng) tracks (a situation corrected by a 2010 reissue/ compilation). Later a revelatory mix that would influence an entire subgenre of underground metal, Earth’s first album took the ambient experiments of Brian Eno and added doom metal riffing at a slower pace than any band had ever attempted. The afterthought of percussion on this album helped to make it a heavy touchstone for bands like Sunn O))) and the highly developed Neurosis of the mid-’90s and beyond. EARTH Earth 2: Special Low Frequency Version (1993, Sub Pop) Doing away with percussion, the double-length sophomore album by Earth drew from U.K. experimenters like Main and Skullflower and, as the title suggests, the very lowest of frequencies for an immersive listen that the underground wouldn’t catch up to for a few years. If any of the early Earth albums perfected the marriage of Eno’s ambient works and the almighty power of the doom metal riff, this was it.

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EARTH Pentastar: In the Style of Demons (1996, Sub Pop) The first studio album by Earth to benefit, start to finish, from the proper rhythm section assembled behind guitarist/ singer/founder/ringleader Dylan Carlson features, perhaps unsurprisingly, a brand-new and relatively traditional sound that nonetheless left a huge mark on the same emerging stoner-rock/ metal subset that drew inspiration from Carlson and his cohorts’ four structurally challenged previous albums. Pentastar: In the Style of Demons would be Earth’s last studio outing before the band was dropped by the label, sparking a long hiatus, during which Carlson dealt with drug and legal issues that had mounted over the years. Pentastar is slow to mid-tempo throughout, heavy but conspicuously devoid of grunge trappings, with mostly minimal arrangements that create a haunting, ominous atmosphere. Album track “Tallahassee” turned out to be highly effective on the soundtrack of the 1998 documentary Kurt and Courtney, Nick Broomfield’s look into the circumstances surrounding Kurt Cobain’s death. (Courtney Love blocked any Nirvana music from making it into the movie.) This was also the first Earth title to have what could be called real guitar solos, though they do not dominate the album in any sense. The cover of Jimi Hendrix’s “Peace In Mississippi” is a nice addition to this moody achievement. EGGS Exploder (1994, Teenbeat) Eggs was formed by singer/guitarist Andrew Beaujon in the early ’90s and hailed from Washington, D.C. The Teenbeat/Simple Machine label axis supported that town’s more pop-oriented artists while Dischord Records covered the noisier/heavier/ faster post-hardcore end of the scene’s indie spectrum. After releasing a charming and very Unrest-like debut (1992’s Bruiser) of New Order-meets-indie-pop on Teenbeat that was basically a solo effort by Beaujon, Eggs returned two years later as a full band (minus a permanent drummer) to issue this ambitious and creative double album. Exploder journeys through the band members’ record collections, combining Eggs’ moxie, pop aptitude, and skilled hand at intense experimentation in a result

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that is captivatingly original, yet clearly influenced by T. Rex, Queen, America (the band), XTC, Love (“Willow, Willow” is covered here), My Bloody Valentine, the Byrds, Pink Floyd, and The Wedding Present, to name a few. (Note: The CD version features three one-minute tracks of silence to notify the listener when they would be flipping to the next side if they were listening to the vinyl version.) ELEVENTH DREAM DAY Beet (1989, Atlantic) A strange and overlooked early major label stab at the underground, Eleventh Dream Day’s second album (its first for a major) carried over the paisley underground and cow-punk styles of Americana attached to the early-’80s L.A. scene mixing these with the timely and visceral thrust heard throughout the middle to latter part of the decade from Hüsker Dü, Soul Asylum, Squirrel Bait, and so on. Topped off with a Stooges/MC5 fixation and a quite passionate delivery, Beet kicked off a string of forgotten but great albums by this band that extended through most of the ’90s, even after the band’s boot from major label-land. (1994’s El Moodio was the final transmission before the band went with friendlier bedfellows, Thrill Jockey.) Eleventh Dream Day was notable for having Tortoise founder Doug McCombs behind the drum kit and Janet Bean (Freakwater) on guitar and vocals. Beet opener “Between Here and There” sums up what this band was capable of. THE EMBARRASSMENT Death Travels West (1983, Fresh Sounds) Self-described “Blister Pop” semi-legends The Embarrassment came charging out of Wichita, Kansas, in the late ’70s/early ’80s with a rather American form of post punk that was equal parts R.E.M., Mission of Burma, and the Feelies, creating one of the more bulletproof proto-indie archetypes of the era. Bespectacled nerds way before that look was en vogue, The Embarrassment sprinkled many of its best moments across 7-inches and demo recordings. But the band did manage to put together one handsdown classic in 1983’s Death Travels West before breaking up (for the first time) that same year. “Drive Me to the Park” is the album’s cornerstone of power-pop/proto-indie gold. 98 GIMME INDIE ROCK

THE EMBARRASSMENT The Embarrassment LP (1987, Time to Develop) Half of The Embarrassment—guitarist Bill Goffrier and drummer Brent Giessmann—made the move to Boston, where the former started Big Dipper and the latter joined the Del Fuegos. The band would restart in 1988, but a couple of retrospective releases showed up during the interim. The first was the aptly titled Retrospective cassette-only release in 1984, and some of this impossible-to-find tape shows up on the B-side of the eponymously titled The Embarrassment LP—namely the livein-the-studio (from 1983) one-takes of two of the band’s best songs, “Picture Women” and “Rhythm Line.” But even better, Side A reissued the band’s amazing five-song 12-inch EP (self-titled, 1981). Both compilations are tough to find in original formats, which makes 1995’s Heyday: 1979–83 two-CD collection on Bar/ None highly recommended. THE EMBARRASSMENT God Help Us (1990, Bar/None/Restless) The Embarrassment regrouped in 1988 and released one more full-length before calling it a day for real (at least until sporadic reunion shows almost two decades later). Easier to locate than the band’s earlier releases and with different production in place (think very late ’80s compression-happy college-rock), God Help Us features an Elvis cover that’s worth multiple listens (“Burning Love”) and the amazing “After the Disco.” The Embarrassment guitarist Bill Goffrier’s other band, Big Dipper, had an excellent run of muscular, intelligent American indie-jangle in the late ’80s and early ’90s. EMBRACE S/T (Recorded 1985/Released 1987, Dischord) The legendary bands Minor Threat and The Faith, led by Ian MacKaye and his brother, Alec MacKaye, respectively, supplied the growing Dischord Records roster with not one but two flagship hardcore bands during the first half of the ’80s. Both acts were made up of highly intelligent, creatively restless personalities— precisely the types artistically fleeing from hardcore in droves by the time both bands broke up in 1984. The next year, Ian formed Embrace with all three nonfamilial former members of The Faith. Like Rites of Spring and Swiz, the

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short-lived, single-album Embrace came out of the scene-declared “Revolution Summer” of 1985. These purposely counteractive bands brought a fresh stylistic arsenal of personal, humanistic lyrics based on inward (and scene) examination, and sung with feeling over an instrumental framework of melodic, moody guitar work, pushed along by all manner of tempo experimentation. (The raging speed of hardcore was occasionally carried over.) This conscious and direct reaction to hardcore’s political hypocrisy and general macho posturing was described as “emotional hardcore” or “emocore” by critics, thus marking the first rumblings of what came to be known, abused, loved, loathed, and misunderstood as “emo” over the next two decades. Perhaps unsurprisingly, none of the musicians here have ever been amenable to the use of “emocore” or “emo” in describing their involvement in these developments. The uncanny energy and charisma that contemporaries Rites of Spring brought to live performance comes out on its self-titled LP, while Embrace’s also-eponymously titled album is the micromovement’s subtle and slightly more casual affair. MacKaye and his cohorts channel some New Order, Cure, and late-’70s/early’80s post punk observations (and affinities) through the filter of tuneful post hardcore that MacKaye’s next band (after the one-off Egg Hunt), Fugazi, expounded upon in a big way. (Please excuse the understatement.) ENGINE KID Angel Wings (1994, Revelation) The influence of Slint’s Spiderland stretched well beyond indie rock and made a lasting mark on both the metallic (often straightedge) hardcore and underground metal scenes of the ’90s. Engine Kid came out of the former, and while guitarist Greg Anderson would become a key player in the latter through his work with Sunn O))), Goatsnake, Burning Witch, etc., this band’s approach to hardcore/post hardcore was unbelievably heavy. Engine Kid released one full-length of blatant, well-meaning Slint worship with 1993’s Bear Catching Fish, but the band’s swan-song epic, Angel Wings, transcends such trappings to stand as one of the stronger offerings from indie rock’s early-’90s heavy-metallic and melodic camp. Note: side 4 is a cover of John Coltrane’s “Olé” with members of Silkworm and Iceburn filling in on horn duties. 100 GIMME INDIE ROCK

EVERGREEN Seven Songs (1994, Anomaly) Not to be confused with the project of Slint drummer Britt Walford that was active around the same time and which also released a sole full-length, this Evergreen was from California. While its few releases (Seven Songs, three 7-inches, and one split single with the like-minded Still Life) do not make for a large body of work and Evergreen wasn’t around that long, the band played a role in the development of what would be given the unfortunate (and promptly prerogative) term “screamo.” With vocals that are mostly buried (unless they are in, well, screaming mode), mournful arrangements, razor-sharp guitar work, and fresh use of the skeletal-to-raging juxtaposition so prevalent during this time, Seven Songs is, along with albums by Cap’n Jazz and the aforementioned Still Life, rightfully considered a holy grail of ’90s emotive hardcore that broke through that genre’s barriers. Therefore, it will strongly appeal to indie rock fans of all stripes. EVERGREEN S/T (1996, Hi-Ball) Not to be confused with the also obscure and great hardcore/ screamo combo from San Diego of the same name and era, this Evergreen hailed from Louisville, Kentucky, and was formed by Britt Walford, better known as a founding member of Squirrel Bait, Slint, and post-Slint post-rock band The for Carnation. (It’s worth mentioning that Walford was also the drummer on the Breeders’ Pod LP under the pseudonym Mike Hunt.) In 1994, Evergreen released a limited 7-inch (the fantastic “Pants Off” b/w “The Queen Song,” also on Hi-Ball) that forecasted the topshelf garage-punk that would pack its lone full-length from start to finish. By the mid-’90s, the indie underground’s garage-punk submovement was treading water in a big way, with dedicated labels like Estrus and Crypt saturating the marketplace with an avalanche of sound-alike bands. There were some greats that proved exceptions to this situation, of course, but Evergreen fell pretty far outside of the scene to be noticed. Nevertheless, Evergreen fashioned its own brand of garage-punk rather than

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another example of a played-out form. There’s not one track of filler on Evergreen’s criminally overlooked self-titled LP, from the slower numbers to the blown-out ragers that check in at nearhardcore tempos. This album has a wide enough appeal to be a cherished acquisition for fans of punchy Midwestern heavy-indie rock (see late-’80s/early-’90s Touch and Go) as well as those who are into Gaunt, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, New Bomb Turks, Gas Huffer, Railroad Jerk, Cheater Slicks, Oblivians, ’68 Comeback, and the Bassholes. THE FAITH/VOID S/T Split LP (1982 Dischord) The Faith featured Ian MacAye’s younger brother, Alec, on drums. The band’s half of this split (like its Subject to Change 12-inch from 1983) is good-to-great first-wave hardcore done the typical D.C. way. A punishing contrast was Void’s half of the LP, the primary reason thirty-plus years of hardcore (in its countless guises) has been, and will continue to be, in awe of a band that lasted only a couple of years, represented by a pretty limited officially released discography. Creating in the vacuum of proto-sprawl that connected D.C. with Baltimore, Void was the first band to bring metal to hardcore, and it did it by way of half-black/half-Filipino guitarist Bubba Dupree, whose histrionic guitar-work was a hurricane of Eddie Van Halen, Greg Ginn, and Bad Brains’ Dr. Know. Band member connections and the violent chaos of its live shows brought Void into the D.C./Dischord hardcore sphere, where some got it and others were reviled or terrified by it. Regardless, nothing at the time sounded like Void, a fact that becomes immediately apparent to the uninitiated upon first listen, regardless of the three decades that have passed since the release of this now-legendary album. FANG Where the Wild Things Are (1985, Boner) The version of Fang that matters was responsible for this fulllength debut, as well as the fourteen-minute Landshark EP released in 1983 as the inaugural title on guitarist Tom Flynn’s Boner Records label. (Fang’s recorded debut was “Fun with Acid,” which appeared on Alternative Tentacles’ legendary 1982 hardcore compilation, Not So Quiet on the Western Front). One 102 GIMME INDIE ROCK

of the more notorious exports from the early-’80s Berkeley, California, punk/hardcore scene, pre-1986 Fang was always motivated by button-pushing within the hardcore scene, but its proto-crossover metallic H.C. was more metal-punk, with lyrics and song titles that put an irreverent (albeit offensive, toiletbased, and anything but politically correct) smile on the depraved antics of bands like Flipper. In addition, Fang was nowhere near as anti-human or acutely nihilistic as No Trend. Singer Sam “Sammytown” McBride left the band after the release of Where the Wild Things Are, but fronted an inferior band later that released three albums under the name Fang. In 1989 McBride strangled his girlfriend to death in a drug-fueled rage and was convicted of voluntary manslaughter, for which he served six years in prison. THE FEELIES The Good Earth (1986, Coyote) The release date of this band’s debut Crazy Rhythms (1980, Rough Trade) almost single-handedly extended this book’s chronological criteria back one year on the strength of that album’s nowsterling, inimitable nature. The Feelies’ core members—Glenn Mercer, Bill Million, Brenda Sauter, and newish (joining in 1983) drummer, Stan Demeski—stayed active for half a decade in side projects/offshoots, along with a casual performance schedule as the Feelies that was primarily limited to holidays and the region surrounding their home of Hoboken, New Jersey, before going into the studio with R.E.M.’s Peter Buck as co-producer (with Million and Mercer) in 1985. The awesome albums Buck’s own band recorded during its early 1981–1985 climb sometimes felt like an alternately more organic yet artier post-punk interpretation of Crazy Rhythms, but it doesn’t take long for The Good Earth to reveal this to be a two-way street. The frantic, hyper-speed Velvets-meets-Television alchemy of the debut album only shows up on a few tracks here; elsewhere, it’s replaced by an atmospheric and hypnotic acousticbased (sometimes manically strummed) folk rock that became the band’s next trademark sound, and a huge influence on the Feelies’ like-minded regional buddies, Yo La Tengo.

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THE FEELIES Only Life (1988, A&M) Only Life presents the Feelies comfortable and confident with their second musical phase and unafraid to let loose with a greater focus on speedy jangle-strum rockers. In a sense, this is 1980’s Crazy Rhythms in updated and mature form. That means fewer acoustic jams than on this album’s precursor (but with the same lineup). Unsurprisingly, Only Life closes with a cover version of “What Goes On” by the Feelies’ biggest influence, The Velvet Underground. This major label debut attracted more critical praise than The Good Earth, ranking at No. 28 on the Village Voice’s Pazz & Jop “Best Albums of 1988” poll. FIRE PARTY S/T (1988, Dischord) Along with Scrawl, Salem 66, and Frightwig, Fire Party was one of the few all-girl bands of the mid-to-late-’80s American underground. Formed in 1986 and crucial to the D.C./Dischord scene’s soon-to-be legendary mid-’80s break from the hardcore doctrine (a.k.a. “Revolution Summer”), Fire Party released two mini-LPs, toured the country and Europe with Scream, and recorded a Peel Session before splitting up in 1990. Of both titles the band released (the other is 1989’s New Orleans Opera, also on Dischord), this self-titled debut is undeniably the best example of Fire Party’s melding of Chairs Missing Wire and the more timely sounds of early post hardcore/indie rock. FIREHOSE Ragin’, Full On (1986, SST) In the spring of 1986, a twenty-one-year-old Ohio State student and obsessive Minutemen fan named Ed Crawford was allegedly fed a fraudulent rumor by the members of Camper Van Beethoven after a Columbus, Ohio, gig by that band. They supposedly told Crawford that the Minutemen bassist Mike Watt and drummer George Hurley were already auditioning replacements for guitarist/ founder/singer D. Boon, who had perished in a single-vehicle automobile accident on Christmas Eve of the previous year. Crawford then located Mike Watt in a phone book and cold-called him to express his strong desire to come out to California and try out for the band. But the bassist, still mourning the death 104 GIMME INDIE ROCK

of his childhood best friend, lacked any enthusiasm for playing music at the time. Crawford’s intense persistence—he showed up unannounced in San Pedro, California, to repeatedly follow up with Watt on location—eventually landed him an audition with the former Minutemen rhythm section, and fIREHOSE was formed shortly thereafter. Dubbed “ed fROMOHIO,” Crawford lived with Watt over the next nine months when fIREHOSE wasn’t touring or recording. SST released the trio’s debut full-length Ragin’, Full On by the end of 1986, and in October and November of that same year, the band supported Sonic Youth on an eighteen-date tour of the eastern United States. Minutemen and fIREHOSE comparisons immediately became an apples-and-oranges affair due to what Crawford brought to the band: a euphonious voice and singing style and an inescapable affinity for hummable melodies in his songwriting. Plus, he turned out to be quite the accomplished player with a hyper-speed jangle and strum on both acoustic and electric guitar. Ragin’, Full On added an infectious early-indie rock feel to its progressive college-rock attack, and it features some of the best songs in all of the fIREHOSE discography, including the instrumental “Under the Influence of the Meat Puppets” (which it most assuredly is), “Perfect Pairs,” “Things Could Turn Around,” and “Caroms.” FIREHOSE fROMOHIO (1989, SST) Surpassing the San Pedro, California, band’s sophomore fulllength If’n, fROMOHIO serves up twice as many indispensable and quintessentially fIREHOSE songs, including the captivating opener “Choose Any Memory,” the slow-and-heavy (for fIREHOSE) “The Softest Hammer,” the equally pretty but rocking “Some Things,” and “Riddle of the Eighties” (the SST-sanctioned video of this got a little rotation on MTV’s 120 Minutes). The most noticeable growth heard here (compared to Ragin’, Full On) is an increase in the acoustic, folk-informed presence carried over from the band’s second album, best used on the strikingly pretty ballad “Understanding” and the appropriated John Fahey–like traditional workout, “Vastopol.” fROMOHIO would be the final SST album for guitarist/singer Ed Crawford, bassist/singer Mike Watt, and drummer George Hurley, but the trio did return as an early

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and unlikely (as in, pre-Nevermind) major label signing with the (much) harder rocking Flyin’ the Flannel (1991). FIREHOSE Flyin’ the Flannel (1991, Columbia) Two popular myths about the initially quiet then suddenly mercurial narrative of major-label involvement in indie rock/ alt-rock/noise-rock underground: 1. The success of Nirvana’s Nevermind in late 1991 was this trend’s genesis, and 2. Compromised integrity, polished edges, and comprehensive commercialization ruined 100 percent of the major label debuts released by independently established bands. Here’s the real story: fIREHOSE joined Dinosaur Jr, Screaming Trees, Sonic Youth, Eleventh Dream Day, the Flaming Lips, the Meat Puppets, and several other categorically underground bands of risky commercial potential in making a pre-Nevermind jump from indies to majors. The fourth album from fIREHOSE—two former Minutemen and one Minutemen super-fan—was released in early 1991 and is a more challenging affair than either of the three preceding fIREHOSE albums released from 1986 to 1989 on SST. Here the trio used the increased (but not extravagant) recording budget and good timing (fIREHOSE was at the peak of its powers at this point) to unleash a creative fire as yet unseen up to this point. Speedier, heavier, and more layered than ever before, fIREHOSE was also at a songwriting peak, as evidenced by “Up Finnegan’s Ladder,” “Can’t Believe,” “O’er the Town of Pedro,” “Lost Colors,” “Too Long,” “Toolin’,” “Epoxy, for Example,” and the title track. Elsewhere, Daniel Johnston’s “Walking the Cow” was rendered unrecognizable by a pensive, funk-jazz makeover that actually works to great effect. In truth, fIREHOSE has always incorporated funk, jazz, and other extraneous influences with a pretty high rate of success, all things considered, but never as seamlessly as it did on Flyin’ the Flannel. fIREHOSE’s career pinnacle was followed in 1992 by a charming EP of covers and the 1993 misguided last hurrah, the J Mascis–produced Mr. Machinery Operator, an unfortunate close to an otherwise wonderful discography.

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THE FLAMING LIPS Oh My Gawd!!! . . . The Flaming Lips (1987, Restless) The Flaming Lips’ first phase of albums started off as a songoriented alternative to the disconnected influx of wild, insane, hilarious, and depraved acts—Drunks with Guns, Happy Flowers, the Frogs, Strangulated Beatoffs, Doc Dart’s Crucifucks, Kilslug, and the fathers of it all, the Butthole Surfers—peppering the American post-hardcore underground of the late ’80s. The Lips’ first great album during this period was Oh My Gawd!!! . . . The Flaming Lips, their third full-length since the band’s 1985 selftitled recorded debut. Self-produced (the Norman, Oklahoma, trio was led by songwriter/guitarist Wayne Coyne), Oh My Gawd didn’t sink under the retro-regressive psychedelic tendencies of the band’s previous two albums, and it distanced the Flaming Lips from the above-listed collection of miscreants and other garagerevival deconstructionists of the day, pointing forward much more so than backwards and predicting a future for the band beyond that of being a cult favorite (which, as we now know, is exactly what happened). THE FLAMING LIPS In a Priest-Driven Ambulance (with Silver Sunshine Stares) (1990, Restless/Enigma) Whether fans or historians consider this to be Flaming Lips Phase 1 or 2 is beside the real point. The proudest export of Norman, Oklahoma, had most assuredly returned in their finest form following lineup uncertainty (this is the first Lips album to feature Mercury Rev’s Jonathan Donahue and drummer Nathan Roberts), some general surrounding chaos, and the misstep that was 1989’s Telepathic Surgery. Dipping into a seemingly bottomless well of songwriting inspiration and flaunting a new proficiency at merging noise with elegant pop hooks, In a Priest Driven Ambulance rightfully assumed a place in the hearts of critics everywhere and was an ideal gateway to the Flaming Lips’ pre-Nirvana venture into major-label territory via the more open/like-minded taste-making minds working within Warner Bros. Unrecognizable when compared to the friendlier gianthamster-ball-era Flaming Lips of a decade later, the outfit’s fourth full-length reveals a magnificent turning point for both the band

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and a specific strain of (U.K.) shoegaze-influenced psychedelic noise-pop that flourished in those salad days of early-’90s American indie rock. Arguably the Flaming Lips’ first masterpiece, In a Priest Driven Ambulance pointed nowhere but into the future with career/genre absolutes like “Unconsciously Screamin’,” “Five Stop Mother Superior Rain,” “Rainin’ Babies,” and the paradigmchanging “Mountain Side.” THE FLAMING LIPS Hit to the Death in the Future Head (1992, Warner Bros) The Flaming Lips were signed to Warner Bros. in 1990 after a label rep traveled across the country and saw the unpredictable combo come very, very close to burning the American Legion Hall in hometown Norman, Oklahoma, to the ground during one of their then-frequent dances with danger in the name of live performance. This was another case of a band being a risky, audience-challenging move for a major label (during the preNevermind days), but debuting in the big leagues with the album they’d worked years toward making. The Flaming Lips’ inaugural offering on Warner Bros. (their fifth album overall) featured the same lineup that made magic out of a mess in 1990 with In a Priest Driven Ambulance. Wayne Coyne’s homegrown vision of urban psychedelia, noise-pop/rock, and authentically drugderanged madness (think Butthole Surfers obsessed with classicrock/bubblegum-pop hooks instead of America’s serial-killer suburban underbelly) undertook a head-on collision with artistic/ creative pay dirt on Hit to the Death in the Future Head. With a colossal sound and all-out weirdness (the Lips videos on MTV’s 120 Minutes would have made the aforementioned Butthole Surfers proud), the band struck out like never before with rockers—“Magician vs. The Headache,” “Frogs,” and “Talkin’ ’Bout the Smiling Deathporn Immortality Blues (Everyone Wants to Live Forever”)—reaching heights only previously hinted at, and more woozy, experimental drone-psych tracks (“The Sun,” “Felt Good to Burn,” “Halloween on the Barbary Coast”) ranking next to moments by Mercury Rev (which featured Lips guitarist Jonathan Donahue) as the best headphone music of the early ’90s (outside of U.K. masters My Bloody Valentine, of course). But all of this shrunk in comparison to the album’s second track, “Hit Me Like You Did the First Time,” an infectious yet abrasive pop tour 108 GIMME INDIE ROCK

de force that should have reached “Smells Like Teen Spirit” levels of public awareness. The release of Hit to the Death in the Future Head was delayed for over a year due to prolonged procedures clearing a sample from Michael Kamen’s score for the film Brazil, which the band included in the song “You Have to Be Joking (Autopsy of the Devil’s Brain).” This is a mandatory classic that remains relatively overshadowed by the Flaming Lips’ immensely successful second act (put into motion by the breakout album The Soft Bulletin in 1997). THE FLAMING LIPS Transmissions from the Satellite Heart (1993, Warner Bros.) Employing a miniscule shift toward more pop-savvy songcraft— or perhaps the trimming of a thin layer of noise/discordance to expose the pop that was always there—the Flaming Lips’ sixth studio album (and second for a major label) contained, in essence, more of the magic found on the discography peak Hit to the Death in the Future Head released the previous year. The hair-splitting sonic differences can most likely be attributed to the departure of guitarist Jonathan Donahue (to focus on his primary outlet, Mercury Rev) and this being the first Lips album since the dismal Telepathic Surgery (1989) to be recorded without producer/studioshaman Dave Fridmann (also a founding member of Mercury Rev who shared his excused absence with Donahue). Transmissions comes barreling out of the gate with “Turn It On” (the album’s first single and somewhat of a regularly rotated success on MTV’s 120 Minutes) and gets really obtuse for a couple of tracks before giving up one of the early ’90s’ least likely radio hits, “She Don’t Use Jelly.” The song found a larger audience almost a year after the album’s release when it was accessed by two of the era’s most influential cultural critics, Beavis and Butthead. The band was then invited to perform on the Jon Stewart Show, and the song’s ascent up the Billboard Hot 100 and the Modern Rock Tracks chart (where it peaked at No. 9) led to an appearance on an episode of Beverly Hills 90210, featuring the Flaming Lips playing the Flaming Lips during a live performance at the series’ hangout spot, The Peach Pit. Actor Ian Ziering’s character Steve Sanders delivers the riotous line, “You know, I’ve never been a big fan of alternative music, but these guys rocked the house!” It is the only Flaming Lips track to chart on the

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Billboard Hot 100 (at No. 55) and one of the only songs from their pre-The Soft Bulletin albums to be performed live after the band found crossover fame as festival headliners around the turn of the millennium. FLAT DUO JETS Go Go Harlem Baby (1991, Sky) The Flat Duo Jets—primarily a two-piece comprising Dexter Romweber on vocals and guitar and Chris “Crow” Smith on drums—released several full-lengths before breaking up in 1999, when Romweber launched a notable solo career. Inspired by the Cramps, backwoods maniac Hasil Adkins, and other rockabilly and roots-oriented weirdoes, the duo was based out of both the Carrboro and Chapel Hill area of North Carolina and Athens, Georgia (the band is featured in that town’s underground scene documentary, Athens, GA: Inside-Out). The lively pair recorded their second and best album, Go Go Harlem Baby, with Memphis icon and producer Jim Dickinson (the Replacements, Big Star, Alex Chilton, Tav Falco, etc.) at Easley McCain Recording (one of the earliest releases to come out of the legendary studio), and all of the retroactive praise Jack White has given the album and Dex (see the acclaimed documentary It Might Get Loud) makes perfect sense. In fact, White’s Third Man label reissued Go Go Harlem Baby in 2013, and Romweber is often cited as the godfather of the whole guitar and drums “power duo” revival that sprang up in the wake of the White Stripes’ circa-Y2K-and-beyond mega-hugeness. THE FLESH EATERS A Minute to Pray, a Second to Die (1981, Ruby) The second album by early-’80s L.A. punk rock band the Flesh Eaters was one of four influential regional albums released by Ruby Records in 1981. (The others were The Dream Syndicate’s The Days of Wine and Roses, The Gun Club’s Fire of Love, and the Misfits Walk Among Us.) Chris D.’s post-Beat-poet lyrics/singing and the all-star band behind him—X’s John Doe (bass) and D. J. Bonebrake (percussion) and the Blasters’ Dave Alvin on guitar, to name a few—made A Minute to Pray a distinct byproduct of the early-’80s punk/hardcore L.A. scene with seedy noir inflections, a soul-plus-punk feel, and boatloads of dark personality. Music 110 GIMME INDIE ROCK

writer/Forced Exposure editor Bryon Coley has called A Minute to Pray, A Second to Die his favorite album of all time. FLIPPER Generic (1982, Subterranean) The desire to antagonize live audiences, along with a need to create a musical alternative to the intellectual conformity and rigid stylistic boundaries that dominated early-’80s hardcore, combined to produce a regionally (and often sonically) unrelated slew of forward-thinking (whether they knew it or not at the time), fascinating, and all-out awesome bands that would lay groundwork for—and inform—the next ten to twenty years of inspirational, inventive, and influential music across numerous subgenres that fell under the comprehensive category of American underground rock. San Francisco’s Flipper is quite possibly the ultimate example (and best known) of these deregulated hardcore pioneers. Formed in 1979 by ex-members of the Sleepers and Negative Trend, Flipper released three 7-inches (beginning with debut “Love Canal”/“Ha Ha Ha” in 1980) before blindsiding punk-rock/ hardcore fans with its first full-length Generic (also known as Album or Generic-Flipper) in 1982. With Vietnam veteran Ted Falconi’s unprecedented approach to distorted guitar playing, twin vocalists/bassists Bruce Loose and Will Shatter, plus drummer Steve DePace, Flipper somehow attracted a large following in the Bay Area, but also enraged many audience members who preferred hardcore’s standard faster-and-faster rules of the day. The band earned the ire it drew by slowing down and bulking up with bastardized Black Sabbath riffing, incorporating a minimalist pummeling that the players applied to very, very long songs (especially exasperating to members of a community that favored the opposite). Add to all this a justified reputation for serious drug abuse and its attendant bad behavior that frequently spilled onto the stage, and the end result is a band set on self-destruction (which would eventually occur, more or less). Generic features the band’s most popular and timeless song, “Sex Bomb” (expanded to almost eight minutes from a shorter version that appeared on an earlier 7-inch). The song would be covered later by many Flipper fans (including R.E.M.). Other examples of greatness include “The Way of the World” and the

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eight-and-a-half-minute “I Saw You (Shine).” All-in-all, Generic doesn’t contain one second of filler. It’s one of this book’s untouchable benchmark albums. FLIPPER Gone Fishin’ (1984, Subterranean) In the two years that followed Flipper’s debut album, Generic, more imaginative hardcore minds awakened, and the movement’s influence could be heard all across the country (through bands like the Butthole Surfers, mid-period Black Flag, Fang, and so on). So Flipper did what any groundbreaking band would do for a follow-up: It tried something different. The sludge of Generic is trimmed by about 50 percent; in its place is a heavy dose of unique psychedelia mixed with a tighter, bassheavy rhythm section and more horns. (Generic was accented by demented sax on several tracks.) Flipper’s emphasis on melody is in prominent display on many of these eight good/ bad trips (depending on how where the listener is coming from), which perhaps fueled the increased critical dislike that met Gone Fishin’ upon its release. History and hindsight have been kinder, however, to this strange and singular album, the final studio recordings from the original Flipper lineup. The record was released with a cut-out-and-assemble album cover so that buyers could have a cardboard model of the band’s tour van and miniature standees of each member. Ironically, Gone Fishin’ somewhat resembles an American version of the first two albums by Public Image Limited, a band Flipper would soon take to task for stealing ideas. FLIPPER Public Flipper Limited (1986, Fundamental) After the cassette-only Blowin’ Chunks (1984, ROIR) that featured only one live set from 1983, Public Flipper Limited was released as a double-album live collection spanning 1980–1985. The recordings are better than average when compared to other live club performances captured and released around that time, and they offer an excellent sonic narrative of Flipper’s original-lineup development. The album’s title is a jab at Public Image Limited’s 1985 release, Album, which clearly took its name and design from Flipper’s 1982 debut, Generic. 112 GIMME INDIE ROCK

FLY ASHTRAY Clumps Takes a Ride (1991, Shimmy Disc) This book features a decent number of bands who were generally overlooked or misunderstood within the loose framework of the indie rock community circa 1986–1996, despite releasing albums that were devoid of the “acquired taste” curse elements and were not weighed down with impenetrable weirdness. These bands could have made fanatics out of the same folks who were then being enlightened by the works of Guided By Voices, Slanted and Enchanted–era Pavement, or Sebadoh, but for reasons not known or worth ruminating upon, it didn’t happen. Of these inexplicably neglected bands and their albums, none gives a greater reward of discovery than the works of Fly Ashtray. The NYC band formed in 1983, but did not see the official proper release of an album until joining the appropriate Shimmy Disc roster with 1991’s Clumps Take a Ride. This album is packed with twenty-six tracks if one finds the CD version— which is strongly recommended for its extra dose of what Fly Ashtray is best at: guitar-layered (but not shoegaze-style) noise-pop with skewed but highly inventive arrangements and other nonalienating experimental qualities. While initially unassuming, the band’s songs are knocked out of the park by an uncanny frequency of pop hooks and catchy arrangements of exceptional magnetism. These qualities are so strong that the listener doesn’t get acclimated to their repeated use but, instead, wonders how the band could possibly write so many gems of such consistent power. FLY ASHTRAY Let’s Have Some Crate (1992, Hemiola) This eleven-track mini-album opens Fly Ashtray’s spectrum of tempos and variety of instrumental layering while revisiting one of the band’s biggest influences: the Minutemen. (Said affection makes sense, given F.A.’s prowess with fluid guitar and bass lines and comfort in the higher registers.) Let’s Have Some Crate also features the band’s “new listener converter”: the track “Brumaire 18 L.B.” that opens side two is of such arresting infectiousness that even casually exposed uninitiated listeners find themselves asking, “Who is this?”

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FLY ASHTRAY Tone Sensations of the Wonder-Men (1993, Shimmy Disc) As stated in the entry for Clumps Takes a Ride, this band is responsible for the absolute gold standard in experimental psych/ noise-pop that too few heard then or know about today—outside of the band’s small group of NYC contemporaries and a clutch of fans that adore Fly Ashtray to this day. This album was the band’s peak recorded performance during the first half of the ’90s. The tracks are longer than before, they take on a touch of prog-rock tempo and dynamic shifts, and they demand close, immersive listens. Like Clumps, the album was produced by Kramer, but this time the former Bongwater/Shockabilly leader (and thenproprietor of the Shimmy-Disc empire) was on his A-game as an engineer, making Tone Sensations of the Wonder-Men among the most wonderfully nuanced of all the albums he made. (There are a ton, and many are now exalted classics.) This record is the place to start when discovering Fly Ashtray; and Fly Ashtray is the place to start when seeking to unearth the unfamiliar among these 500 titles. The band remains active to this day, and has released several albums since 1996. FOO FIGHTERS S/T (1995, Roswell/Capitol) Famously comprised of songs written and privately demoed by Dave Grohl over the five years he spent behind the drum kit in Nirvana, the Foo Fighters’ self-titled debut full-length was recorded entirely by Grohl (aside from one track that features Afghan Whigs’ Greg Dulli on guitar) in a matter of days. Undertaken as a way of combating depression following Kurt Cobain’s death, originally the project was to be released only via a miniscule pressing for friends and musical colleagues. The rest of the story, as they say . . . Once fleshed out in the studio, the album became something that defied the Nirvana comparisons critics seemed bent on making. In reality, the first Foo Fighters record owed more to the sound previously hammered out by Bob Mould’s Sugar (and, to a lesser degree, his previous band Hüsker Dü, whom the Foo Fighters would cover live), offering a refreshing radio alternative to the “grunge-lite” and early nu-metal that was choking up radio airwaves in the mid-’90s. The album debuted at No. 23 114 GIMME INDIE ROCK

on the Billboard 200, sold 40,000 copies in its first week of release, and produced three hit singles: “This Is A Call,” “I’ll Stick Around,” and “Big Me,” the latter of which reached No. 12 on the Billboard Top 20 Pop Charts. Despite the album art’s depiction of a full band (including exGerms guitarist Pat Smear and ex-Sunny Day Real Estate rhythm section, Nate Mendel and William Goldsmith), this Foo Fighters lineup was not involved in the recording of the debut disc; it was assembled later for touring purposes. THE FOR CARNATION Marshmallows (1996, Matador) This is the one heavily Slint-informed act here that deserves everything it cribs from that band, due to the fact that it was founded by Slint’s mastermind, Brian McMahon. But actually, other than McMahon’s telltale spoke/sung vocals and a tendency to let songs crawl along well under mid-tempo while remaining airtight and tense as hell, The For Carnation’s debut full-length is quite different from Slint’s Spiderland. The land-crushing heaviness that ended or punctuated most Slint songs—usually by surprise or blasting out of the opposite sonic dynamic—is nowhere to be found here. Instead, the clean minor chords, minimal bells and keyboard flourishes, and ominous mood puts Marshmallows closer to (or firmly within) the post-Codeine “slowcore” mini-movement, while at the same time, a distinct songwriting angle removes the album from that pack. The threesong Fight Songs (also on Matador) that preceded this album is also highly recommended. THE FROGS It’s Only Right and Natural (1989, Homestead) Milwaukee duo the Frogs’ second full-length (the first pales in comparison) either befuddled and offended first-time listeners or made lifelong fans of them. Formed in 1980 by brothers Dennis and Jimmy Flemion, the band existed in two simultaneous incarnations: one was a relatively tame and too-often forgettable college-rock power-pop/glam band; the other was what made this album a true original, a home-recorded, folk-psych-outsider-pop entity of rare delicacy and pulchritude that also happened to have the wickedest sense of humor of any act found in this book.

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This album’s cover juxtaposed its title with the image of a toddler wearing a big button bearing the universal pro-gay pink triangle symbol. That served as a gateway to lyrics and song titles that were pornographically homoerotic, graphically drug- and deviant-related, sexually explicit on a general level, religiously controversial, or all of the above. However, it was all piped through the brothers’ absurdist in-your-face, dirty-oldman faux-idiot savant manner that, for folks who didn’t take any of it seriously (as was the intent), proved rewarding in a wildly hilarious way. Naturally, this was meant to contrast prevalent (at the time) musical arrangements of prettiness or fractured elegance. (Think pre-electric Tyrannosaurus Rex, Tim Buckley, early folk recordings of David Bowie, etc.) Album opener “I’ve Got Drugs (Into the Mist)” is the quintessential Frogs moment. Beck famously sampled the line “That was a good drum break” from the song “I Don’t Care If U Disrespect Me (Just So You Love Me).” Homestead Records’ humorous claim that the Frogs were leaders of a “new gay supremacy movement” was eaten up by the press, lending to controversy that surrounded the album. THE FROGS My Daughter, the Broad (1996, Matador) The Frogs’ career narrative that connects It’s Only Right and Natural with third album My Daughter the Broad is one of rockand-roll history’s most entertaining, fascinating, and profoundly weird stories. Though delving into it within this book’s format isn’t feasible, it’s required reading (found through a variety of online and print outlets) for the many readers who are understandably unaware of its existence. For now, let’s just note that the Frogs’ follow-up to It’s Only Right and Natural was the also-home-recorded Racially Yours (1991), a collection of songs presented from the perspectives of white and African-American characters, mixing nuanced social commentary with biting satire, and featuring the band’s Dennis Flemion in full, Al Jolson-style blackface on the album cover. It’s not hard to surmise how the duo was received by the labels they approached. So five years later, the Frogs hooked back up with their previous booster and album-release benefactor Gerard Cosloy, and this equal-opportunity offensive album ended up on Matador Records. My Daughter, the Broad demonstrates the Frogs’ knack 116 GIMME INDIE ROCK

for transforming below-the-belt eighth-grade boy’s restroom humor into what is genuinely some of the funniest art ever made. The band’s highly skewed vision is applied to handicapped people (“Where’s Jerry Lewis”), drugs (“Which One of You Gave My Daughter the Dope”), sexual fringes (“I Had a Second Change Done at the Shop (Now I’ve Added Animal Cocks)”), homosexual culture (“The Boys with the Boys”) and—this album’s premiere target, due to the refinement of the duo’s old-man charactersinging—the elderly. (“Who’s Sucking on Grampa’s Balls Since Grandma Ain’t Home Tonight?” and “Grandma’s Sitting on the Corner with a Penis in Her Hand Going ‘No, No, No, No, No’ ” are just two of the album’s examples.) FUGAZI 13 Songs (1990, Dischord) Ian MacKaye figured in mastering the art of the perfect hardcore composition with Minor Threat, then he had a hand in pushing the form into smarter, more personal territory with single-album Embrace in 1985 and stranger areas with the even-shorter-lived Egg Hunt. But from 1987 until 2002, he was one of four musicians who together formed the principled democracy known as Fugazi and laid the foundation from which a huge chunk of American indie rock would be built in the coming years. The album 13 Songs merges Fugazi’s self-titled seven-song debut 12-inch (1988, Dischord) with the band’s sophomore sixsong Margin Walker EP (1989, also Dischord). The self-titled set contained Fugazi’s best-known song, “Waiting Room,” with its classic bass-line opening, plus six other forward-thinking postpunk compositions split between MacKaye and Fugazi’s secret weapon, former Rites of Spring howler Guy Picciotto (co-guitarist and co-vocalist in this band). The Margin Walker EP pushed the preeminent foursome into the future with a then-unprecedented Gang of Four–style funkiness and mountains of melodic guitar riffs and stabs when needed (“Lockdown”). The sound of American post hardcore circa 1990–’95 traces its birth to these two EPs, and no collection is complete without each in its original proper EP format or this compilation of both.

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FUGAZI Repeater (1990, Dischord) Repeater is where the already lock-tight Fugazi raised the bar it originally set with an angrier, faster, tighter, and denser modus operandi than anything demonstrated on either of the band’s previous two EPs. Beginning with instrumental “Brendan #1” (track 3), leading into one of Fugazi’s better-known songs, “Merchandise,” then advancing to “Blueprint” and the furious miniature guitar riffs that interlock for “Sieve-Fisted Find,” this collective of songs can be heard as a go-to referential influence across multiple strains of ’90s post hardcore more so than the work of any of Fugazi’s contemporaries. This is a classic album regardless of what type of indie rock one prefers. FUGAZI Steady Diet of Nothing (1991, Dischord) Fugazi played more than 250 shows between the March 1990 release of Repeater and the July 1991 street date of its follow-up, never charging more than $5 at the door during that time and appearing only at venues that permitted entry to all-ages crowds. Crowds of 1,000-plus soon became the norm. By summer 1991, Repeater sold more than 300,000 copies, and pre-orders for Steady Diet of Nothing exceeded 160,000 units. The fact that this was the first self-produced Fugazi album is certainly not to its detriment, but the sessions themselves were allegedly hard on the band. Steady Diet is the Fugazi album on which the band discovers the art of heaviness. Songs like the mammoth “Reclamation,” with its dense Sonic Youth layers of guitar shards, is good proof of this. But a track like the classic “Long Division” shows Fugazi grasping the interlocking guitar subtlety that would make later albums continue to shine through the overcrowded underground that the band itself had such a hand (through no fault of its own) in mapping out. Elsewhere, it’s no stretch to understand how “Polish,” “Exit Only,” and “Nice New Outfit” became immovable inclusions in the unofficial Fugazi canon.

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FUGAZI In on the Killtaker (1993, Dischord) Knocking itself off its own throne with album three, Fugazi lets the attack breathe where subtlety is needed, and, when the opposite is called for, lets things get ten times more vicious. In a discography that more or less wrote the rulebook for ’90s post hardcore, this is the ultimate Fugazi album. Points of interest are the instrumental “Sweet and Low” and perhaps the quintessential Fugazi song, “Cassavetes.” Thought to be autobiographical for some reason, it’s simply an ahead-of-the-curve tribute to an independent filmmaker the band appreciated before the rest of the world did. In on the Killtaker came at the all-time peak of the band’s (grassroots-built) popularity, selling more than 180,000 copies in its first week and getting tons of positive words in the mainstream music press. As this occurred within the thick of the major label feeding frenzy, Atlantic Records offered Fugazi an “anything goes” contract, complete with a $10 million dollar advance and a subsidiary label—which the band turned down. That is the picture of career integrity; and this is its essential soundtrack. The album broke the Billboard 200 and peaked at No. 153. FUGAZI Red Medicine (1995, Dischord) A hard left turn into weirder waters, Red Medicine is the sound of Fugazi using its deserved freedom and following various creative muses. This means much of the band’s previous anger and bombast gets left behind, with sadder, more ambient-sounding tracks (“Forensic Scene”) and a greater pop sense taking over where outright journeys into experimental and retro-future visions don’t. Several songs show a newfound fascination with late ’70s dub-reggae. (Once again, the band was ahead of the pack with that particular backward glance in underground rock.) Despite its disparate nature in the Fugazi body of work to date, Red Medicine would appeal to fans and critics and grab the band a lot of new followers due to its fresh take on what indie rock could do with guitars in 1995.

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FURTHER Griptape L.P. (1992, Christmas) Further was formed by brothers Brent and Darren Rademaker, who had previously led a neo-psychedelic major-label collegerock band called Shadowland (they released two albums on Geffen in 1989 and 1990), and who—after their time in Further— would gain greater notoriety with the ’60s/’70s Beach Boys/Laurel Canyon/Byrds–influenced bands The Tyde and Beachwood Sparks. On this debut album, Further sounded nothing like the brothers’ earlier or later endeavors. Here, Brent and Darren flaunted an almost divine gift for ultra-distorted shoegaze-y noise-pop, lo-fi experimentation, thick and fuzzy Dinosaur Jr-ish indie rock classicism, and unfairly catchy hooks, which they stuffed into every available space no matter where the stylistic minor details took the album. “Real Gone,” “Greasy” “Still,” “Smudge,” and the Sebadoh-response “Gimme Indie Fox” are near-perfect instances of how indie rock songs could be a transformative force. FURTHER Sometimes Chimes (1993, Christmas) The ground covered on the Griptape LP is expanded to include stylistic nods to the nonmetal underground rock spectrum circa ’93, entering Further’s own (very strong) entry into the blown-out masterpiece sweepstakes. Twenty-five tracks exhibiting free-roaming, individualistic indie rock spirit place Sometimes Chimes next to Eggs’ Exploder, Kramer’s The Guilt Trip, Thinking Fellers’ Mother of All Saints, and other works that characterized how easily an ultra-ambitious work of vast artistic scope and sprawling length could gain very little, if any, critical exposure or fan recognition.

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GALAXIE 500 On Fire (1989, Rough Trade) Like many bands featured in this book, Galaxie 500 was a big influence on a successive subgenre of bands within indie rock. In the case of this seminal Boston trio, they are seen as progenitors of what the music press came to call “slowcore,” an unfortunate term often attached to bands such as Codeine, Low, Seam, Mazzy Star, Bedhead, and Rex, or any act known for really slow tempos and a general prettiness or melancholy tendencies. Harvard students and alumni Dean Warham (guitar and vocals), Naomi Yang (bass and vocals), and Daman Krukowski (drums—he borrowed his first kit from roommate Conan O’Brien) formed Galaxie 500 in 1987 and released three highly regarded albums before an acrimonious split in 1991. Galaxie 500’s inventive, mostly peerless (at the time, and in the United States) sound and style was fully realized from the beginning. A usually slow to mid-tempo amalgam of The Velvet Underground, the Feelies, the U.K.’s proto-shoegaze/drone rock icons Spacemen 3, The Dream Syndicate, and Television gently pushed through a hazy dream-pop filter, creating a sound that was all this band’s own. The best album in Galaxie 500’s consistently solid but small discography is the captivating, confident, catchy, downcast but not suffocating second album, 1989’s On Fire. Like all Galaxie 500 titles released while the band was active, On Fire was recorded by Mark Kramer, proprietor of the Shimmy-Disc label, ringleader of the anomalous Bongwater, and producer of note (Ween, Low, Urge Overkill, and many others). Krukowski and Yang are the still-active Damon and Naomi and have released eight albums since 1991 (and were Magic Hour’s rhythm section for a spell). Luna was Dean Warham’s next endeavor, attracting a fan base that dwarfed what Galaxie 500 drew while active.

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GAME THEORY The Big Shot Chronicles (1986, Enigma) By 1986, northern California’s Game Theory had a mob of former members plus three albums and an EP of largely spotty psychtinged jangle behind it, but something seriously clicked with The Big Shot Chronicles, an album that emphasized the “rock” in college-rock and marked band leader Scott Miller’s coming out party as a songwriter par excellence. Opening with the massive hooks, multitracked guitars, and pounding drums of “Here It Is Tomorrow,” the album is a succinct and suitable precursor to the band’s certifiably indispensable, epic, and experimental double set Lolita Nation (1987). GAME THEORY Lolita Nation (1987, Enigma) Continuing the stride-hitting progress that started with 1986’s The Big Shot Chronicles, Game Theory’s next move was sort of a curveball—though not unheard of in these kinds of career trajectories. Lolita Nation is a double album of the razor-sharp, pre-indie rock psych-pop that elevated the band’s previous album, intercut with quizzical if not transfixing shorter numbers that explore an as-yet unheard obtuse (but not noisy) side of Game Theory/Scott Miller. It’s an ambitious epic that delivers a payoff equal to—and perhaps greater than—any Game Theory or Loud Family (Miller’s next project) title that came before or after it. GASTR DEL SOL The Serpentine Similar (1993, Teanbeat/Drag City) When the band Bastro relocated to Chicago so guitarist and founder David Grubbs could attend graduate school, the trio (Grubbs, along with future Tortoise founders Bundy K. Brown and John McEntire) changed their name to Gastr del Sol and took a radical hard left turn with a quieter but comprehensive experimental makeover. The Serpentine Similar retains a few traces of the avant-aggro thinking man’s noise-rock trio the band used to be, but the artistic voice Grubbs comes very close to establishing here would return as fully developed and unequaled over this entity’s following releases. His sonic stamp on the more esoteric, rock-removed landscape that grew out of the post-hardcore/indie rock underground of the ’90s would be

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unparalleled, especially after Gastr del Sol shifted into duo mode with Grubbs joined by Jim O’Rourke. On this debut, however, the Gastr del Sol trio (or just Grubbs accompanied by piano or acoustic guitar or silence) lands on some Mayo Thompson/Red Krayola–influenced, inside-out folk; rhythmically throbbing avant-shred acoustic guitar instrumentals; and a few moments that could have been on a Bastro album. This is the most cohesively “band-unit” sounding Gastr del Sol we’d hear until 1998’s Camofleur, an album that found the duo applying its odd techniques and frequently heard John Fahey influence to inverted ’70s AM afternoon rock and chamber pop. GASTR DEL SOL Crookt, Crackt, or Fly (1994, Drag City) On this sophomore album, David Grubbs returned with Gastr del Sol in a new form: a collaboration with Jim O’Rourke, who had recently integrated himself into the more experimental and post–no-wave abstract areas of the underground noise-rock/ noise world with his super group Brise-Glace (with Dazzling Killmen’s Darin Gray and Dylan Posa) and its sole full-length, When in Vanitas (1994, Skin Graft). Over the previous few years, O’Rourke, a compositional prodigy, had released several titles of guitar-based musique concrète improvisational noise or dronerelated works. In Gastr del Sol, he helped establish the duo’s peerless artistic vision of boundless innovation with Crookt, Crakt, or Fly, a predominantly acoustic album in which Grubbs goes new distances with his vocal acrobatics and surreal lyrics, often accompanied by piano and guitar structures often played with a wide-open sparseness that can bring silence to the forefront as a sonic element itself, though it’s just as likely to be interrupted by sheets of metallic noise exactly where the listener least expects it or change into tone experimentation that recalls the second This Heat album, Deceit. But nestled in the second half of this double-length album is “Is That a Rifle When It Rains,” a succinct, minute-and-a-half rocker from a future that never happened, though it could easily be what Bastro (Grubbs’ previous group) would have sounded like if that band had continued down its path of progressive math/noise rock.

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GAUNT Yeah, Me Too (1995, Amphetamine Reptile) Gaunt rounded out a trio of Columbus, Ohio, bands—the other two being Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments and New Bomb Turks—that collectively offered a history lesson in everything great about punk-rock from the mid-’70s up to (then) the current day. Gaunt’s specialty started out as a meaner, dirtier, garagepunk scuzz, but became refined into snarling, tightly wound working-class punk-rock with hook after hook that refuses to leave the listener’s head long after the record has left the player. This was Gaunt’s first of two full-lengths for the Amphetamine Reptile label (previous Gaunt albums had been on Thrill Jockey), and it beats out the other three by a tiny margin. Later in the ’90s, Gaunt released a final major label album that was misunderstood (and perhaps misguided). In 2001, singer Jerry Wick died from injuries sustained from being struck by a hit-and-run driver while he was riding his bike. THE GERALDINE FIBBERS Lost Somewhere Between the Earth and My Home (1995, Virgin) Carla Bozulich led the eclectic-to-a-fault combo Ethyl Meatplow (one out-to-lunch, genre-hopping album on a major label in 1993, plus several 7-inches and EPs) before forming what was probably the loudest and ballsiest band ever billed as “alt-country,” the Geraldine Fibbers. The Fibbers released a ton of singles and EPs, plus four full-lengths. Much of its output was on major Virgin (or the Virgin-owned Hut), while a lot of the vinyl releases were licensed to Sympathy for the Record Industry. Lost Somewhere . . . is the Fibbers’ first proper album, and it was followed by the Fibbers’ masterpiece, Butch, in 1997 (with pre-Wilco Nels Cline on guitar). The debut holds its own with no problem. The Geraldine Fibbers were less an alt-country band than a band that sounded like The Gun Club crossed with Hole’s bruiser of a first album, Pretty on the Inside.

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GIBSON BROS. The Man Who Loved Couch Dancing (1990, Homestead) Memphis-by-way-of-Columbus, Ohio, underground legend Monsieur Jeffrey Evans formed the Gibson Bros. in the ’80s underground scene of the latter city with future Bassholes founder Don Howland. By the time The Man Who Loved Couch Dancing was released, the band also featured Pussy Galore/future Blues Explosion founder Jon Spencer. The Gibson Bros. lo-fi hybrid of folk-blues, gospel tradition and avant-deconstruction, mixed with some garage-punk energy/style, was way ahead of its time. The band has never gotten due credit for the influence it laid across the ’90s garage-rock/revivalist scene. This album, along with the Sun Studios–recorded Memphis Sol Today! (1993), are the best starting points for discovering the Gibson Bros. Evans went on to form ’68 Comeback and countless other notable bands, he collaborated with scores of known underground personalities, produced a ton of records, and built one of the largest bodies of work credited to anyone mentioned in this book. He also is the subject of the 2007 documentary The Man Who Loved Couch Dancing. In 2012, Memphis mayor A. C. Wharton officially declared April 5 Jeffrey Evans Day. GIRLS AGAINST BOYS Venus Luxure No. 1 Baby (1993, Touch and Go) With three former members of the Dischord Records post-hardcore band Soulside, and with a two-bass rather than two-guitar lineup, this quartet released both a mini-album and a full-length in 1992. But Girls Against Boys really found its voice with this milestone of ’90s post hardcore/noise rock. Venus Luxure No. 1 Baby demarcated the band’s sound from not only its specific genre mates, but also from the rest of the indie rock pack. Producer Ted Nicely (Fugazi’s go-to guy) shapes the robust double-bass drive into a lead instrument of uncomplicated force that doesn’t overwhelm the album with low end. He brings out little details (the band’s way with backing vocals, for instance), and turns them into big hooks. And, within the overall mix, he perfectly positions guitarist/vocalist Scott McCloud’s oneof-a-kind, menacingly sexy spoke/sung phraseology (vaguely resembling a narcotized, deeper version of The Fall’s Mark E. Smith, minus the madness). Venus Luxure is timelessly strong, 128 GIMME INDIE ROCK

anchored by trademark Girls Against Boys compositions, including “In Like Flynn,” “Learned It,” “Get Down,” and the unstoppable “Bulletproof Cupid.” The band went on to release two more albums for Touch and Go (both are recommended), a moderately successful but musically disparate and fan-alienating major-label album titled Freak*on*ica in 1998, and the somewhat better full-length parting shot You Can’t Fight What You Can’t See in 2002 on the Jade Tree label. A hiatus followed—although the band performed Venus Luxure No. 1 Baby from start to finish at the 2006 Touch and Go Anniversary celebration and for the All Tomorrow’s Parties–curated Don’t Look Back series. In 2013, the band went back on the road in support of a new EP. THE GITS Frenching the Bully (1992, C/Z) The random rape and murder of the Gits’ Mia Zapata by a drifter in mid-1993 shocked and united the Seattle music community, which would see more than its share of darkness during the years the grunge/alternative explosion proceeded to turn the scene upside down and inside out before wringing all positivity out of it by the end of the decade. The Gits’ sole album, Frenching the Bully, with Zapata on vocals, is an underground punk-metal benchmark of the early ’90s. The raging, working-class punch to the gut is pushed beyond other similarly minded efforts, thanks to Zapata’s rough but electrifying blue-collar wail, which soars along with a charging, modernized, no-bullshit hardcore/ Motörhead/Dwarves/AC/DC musical attack. Consider this album a fist-in-the-air necessity for rock fans of all stripes. GODHEADSILO The Scientific Supercake LP (Kill Rock Stars, 1994) Unlike the decade that followed, two-piece bands (guitar/bass plus drums) were a little hard to come by in the ’90s. But when they did surface (Ween, Kicking Giant, Heavens to Betsy, Frogs, etc.), each had its own special way of making the instrumental downsizing count. godheadSilo, of Fargo, North Dakota, did so by using a bass guitar, distorted-yet-melodic vocals, and a drum kit of absurdly large proportions to make some of the most noisecaked, lowest-register, deregulated, indie rock–informed metallic roars that also managed to be a great listen for fans of many

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subgenres. Like works by the Melvins and Hammerhead (the other band from Fargo), delivered with a fun-loving smile, godheadSilo’s debut full-length literally held the potential to destroy speakers and stereo systems not ready for the absurdly low and nasty frequencies found in some of these songs. GODHEADSILO Skyward with Triumph (1996, Sub Pop) After a decent number of releases in a short time (the band formed in 1992), the Fargo, North Dakota–based godheadSilo was signed to Sub Pop during the label’s mid-’90s fast-andloose post-Nevermind vacations into weird and heavy waters. With a, shall we say, “safer” production than the band’s debut (and better songs), Skyward with Triumph was an aptly titled sophomore effort from a still-neglected duo of ahead-of-the-curve noisemakers. Also recommended is the band’s third full-length (and last for Sub Pop), 1998’s Share the Fantasy. GOVERNMENT ISSUE Government Issue (1986, Fountain of Youth) Government Issue’s leader and singer, John Stabb, one of the more striking personalities in first-wave hardcore, followed a muse through several musical and personal stylistic phases (and lineup changes that drew from about half the DC scene) before his band called it quits in 1989. The eponymously titled (or G.I. ) album came two EPs, three studio albums, and a live LP into the band’s long (for hardcore) career. After bouncing around several labels, including Dischord, Fountain of Youth Records, and West Coast skate-core specialists Mystic Records (known for a regional form of hardcore called “nardcore”), Government Issue returned to Fountain of Youth for this 1986 album. It strikes a perfect balance between what made Government Issue a great hardcore band and what made it a forward-thinking post-hardcore band. The prevalent sonic themes here are influenced by the midperiod goth punk-era work of the Damned, Mission of Burma, and Hüsker Dü, while paying a nod to some U.K. industrial music and taking a strange angle on psychedelic rock.

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GREEN DAY Insomniac (1995, Reprise) They had a lot of help from other bands, but Metallica, Nirvana, and Green Day comprise the triumvirate that brought loud guitars to the masses in the early ’90s. The latter did it with 1994’s Dookie, the mega-smash album that preceded Insomniac (the three full-lengths Green Day released before Dookie document a young band mapping its way to pop-punk gold, though 1992’s Kerplunk! was more or less Green Day as a trio that had arrived). Insomnia, Green Day’s fifth full-length, benefits as a clichéd response to unexpected world domination that makes it a heavier, more caustic affair than any of the four albums that came before. The band’s secret weapon to stardom, producer Rob Cavallo, returned for Insomniac and helped the band make huge guitar walls out of riffs and grow away from the shiny-happy lockerroom dip-shittery of Dookie. “Brain Stew/Jaded,” the album’s third single, is one of the better mainstream radio moments of the ’90s. GREEN MAGNET SCHOOL Blood Music (1990, Sub Pop) Many musicians experience what I like to call “the prescient curse,” where a band is too ahead of its time to enjoy the fruits of that reality because it takes too long for the rest of the world to catch up. But in the case of Green Magnet School (like many other bands in this book) the curse takes on its cruelest form: the world has yet to catch up as of this writing. Green Magnet School was a Boston band that, like contemporaries Six Finger Satellite, Brainiac, and The VSS, took the psychotic, dark-wave post punk (mostly that of Chrome) from a decade earlier into the ’90s. Actually, Green Magnet School’s Blood Music beat all of the above-mentioned bands to the punch—but that timing wouldn’t matter (nor would the album be on this list) if the music wasn’t strong enough to give the album a timeless shelf-life.

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GREEN RIVER Dry as a Bone (1987, Sub Pop) Green River (named after a Creedence Clearwater Revival song) is better known for providing an early musical home to two future members of Mudhoney (Mark Arm and Steve Turner) and two future Pearl Jammers (Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament) than for the trailblazing syrupy psych-metal-punk on its two proper minialbums and one full album released between 1984 and 1988. The second of those mini-albums (and the first noncompilation release by Sub Pop), 1987’s Dry as a Bone, dials up the ’70s hardrock/proto-punk/proto-metal sleaze factor (more so than on its debut album for Homestead Records, 1984’s Come on Down). The thick application of Alice Cooper Band, Black Sabbath, and Stooges to heavier post-hardcore sensibilities was ahead of the pack, influential to the approaching “grunge” movement, and totally refreshing at the time. Even thirty years after the fact, Green River’s brew of dark heaviness and nightmarish howls from vocalist Arm (recognizable but crazier and more unhinged than most of his work in Mudhoney) holds up honorably and must have made for a shocking listen in the context of the regional vacuum from which it emerged. Jack Endino’s production is an early example of what made him the go-to guy for the region’s heavier acts over the next few years. GREEN RIVER Rehab Doll (1988, Sub Pop) The contrast between Mark Arm’s desire to remain independent and the commercial aspirations of Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament made this the final Green River album. The supposed stylistic influence of Gossard and Ament’s goal is not all that noticeable compared to the how the better production just brings out more of the band’s Motörhead/Black Sabbath-plus-Stooges-plus-noiserock hybrid sound. Green River might not have been as ahead of its time here as it was earlier in its career, but on Rehab Doll, they still crafted what remains today a formidable and toothy rock concoction.

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GRIFTERS So Happy Together (1992, Sonic Noise) Despite its influence on the future of submainstream concerns, Big Star wasn’t categorically an underground band, so that leaves Tav Falco’s Panther Burns, the Oblivians, Jay Reatard, and the Grifters as the greatest bands in the history of Memphis, Tennessee, underground music. The Grifters, formed out of the unfortunately named A Band Called Bud, were Dave Shouse (guitar and vocals), Scott Taylor (guitar and vocals), Tripp Lampkins (bass and vocals), and drummer Stan Gallimore. The band self-released two 7-inch EPs prior to the release of So Happy Together. As the credits state, the album was captured in “A Kitchen, Two Living Rooms, and The Flower Shop” on an analog four-track cassette, then touched up at Easley McCain Recording. This is the noisiest and most lo-fi of the Grifters’ albums, but recording techniques are the only shared factor between it and works by the era’s better known lo-fi practitioners. Unique to So Happy Together is the darkly atmospheric feel and the fourin-the-morning “when the drugs turn against you” demeanor of the work as a whole, set against the world-class hooks of prickly noise-pop disasters like “Wreck,” “Dry Bones,” “Tat,” and “Love Explosion.” The heart-crushing desperation and scorchedearth sonic landscape of album centerpiece “The Want” is one of indie rock’s most convincingly dark moments, but it never veers anywhere near the nihilistic, hell-is-other-people mindset prevalent in the noise-rock scene. GRIFTERS One Sock Missing (1993, Shangri-La) After the demons were dealt with on So Happy Together, the Grifters released the first of two full-lengths on local Memphis label (and record store) Shangri-La Records. One Sock Missing is considered by many to be the band’s apex. Critical revisionists still lump the band’s entire body of work into the lo-fi camp based on the sound of the debut record as well as associations with other acts in which the category is far more accurate (like the Guided by Voices that was concurrently unfolding). But One Sock Missing is in fact one of the best-sounding albums to come out of Easley/ McCain Studios, and it had a lot to do with the influx of other bands that subsequently beat a path to the studio’s door. The

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Grifters’ bag of stylistic tricks is opened up here, and the muchimproved dynamics provide a dizzying punch where needed and reveal the multi-layered econo-psych sonics (see “Encrusted” and “Just Passing Out,” for example) the band was learning to hone. And because critics are always snooping for any hint of the blues or other regionally indigenous sounds from decades past (the seasick and noisy psych-blues deconstruction of “Tupelo Moan,” “Side,” and “Shark” are truthfully the only tracks based on this) when it comes to underground rock exported into into the world at large from the town that birthed rock-and-roll, delta blues, rockabilly, and southern soul, the press still goes off the speculative deep end with copious references to the blues. Among the diamonds in the Grifters discography to be found here are “Bummer,” “She Blows Blasts of Statis,” “Teenage Jesus,” “Corolla Hoist,” plus the aforementioned “Encrusted,” and the wildly psychedelic sound of indie rock’s best experimental pop song collapsing into a nightmare of noise, “Just Passing Out.” GRIFTERS Crappin’ You Negative (1994, Shangri-La) The Grifters’ finest moment was also its final album on indie-label Shangri-La. As indie rock fans and audiences processed Crappin’ You Negative, the Grifters were one of a handful of somewhat established indie rock bands—all friends and tour-mates—who found themselves subjects of a fair amount of next-big-thing music journalism. Courted aggressively by bigger labels, the Grifters went with Sub Pop for an astonishing, only-in-the-mid’90s amount of money for a label that was still, well, sort of independent. None of this is surprising when you consider the strength of this masterful collection of the Grifters’ proprietary brand of indie rock gold.

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GUIDED BY VOICES Propeller (1992, Rockathon) American indie rock’s late-’80s/early-’90s heyday was largely immune to the ageism, classism, and fashion snobbery baggage that saddles much of what’s been uselessly termed “indie” or “indie rock” since around Y2K. Guided by Voices operated in a near-invisible state of obscurity for almost a decade before the release of Propeller, in 1992. So when this band of thirtysomething factory employees led by an elementary school teacher (all working-class inhalers of beer) broke loose and became indie rock royalty, dominating stages all over the country with karatekicking rock moves and basic-wear looks, it was just awesome. Since forming in 1983, GBV operated as a home-recorded safety valve for Robert Pollard’s million-song mental inventory. The band’s stock and trade was (and, for the most part, remains) a blatant use of hooks bearing an uncanny resemblance to those of the Beatles, many ’70s power-pop bands, and other historical purveyors of catchy rock. GBV incorporated those hooks into songs that stylistically veered between sound-bite choppiness, Pere Ubu weirdness, ’70s fairies-in-the-forest prog-rock themes, traditional classic rock goodness, melodic post-hardcore, college-rock realms of the ’80s, and good ol’ indie rock. Oh, and most of these conglomerations clocked in at under two minutes. Propeller is the first exemplary GBV album of the ’90s. It was originally released on vinyl in a limited edition of 500 pressings, each with its own cover hand-designed by the band. GBV classics “Exit Flagger,” “Weedking,” and “Quality of Armor” are contained here. GUIDED BY VOICES Vampire on Titus (1993, Scat) Very similar to the album before it, Vampire on Titus was also jointly released on CD with Propeller by Scat, and both are chockfull of songs that fit together like parts of the same engine. Increased praise from other bands (including Sonic Youth, R.E.M., the Breeders, Pavement, and the Grifters), a growing grassroots fan base, and the immiediacy of these lo-lo-lo-fidelity and (purposely) poorly edited pop diamonds got the band a distribution deal through Matador, then a full-on deal for two more indispensable Guided by Voices albums (and one merely “really good-to-great” one in 1996).

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GUIDED BY VOICES Bee Thousand (1994, Scat/Matador) Band leader Robert Pollard said this album (Guided by Voices’ seventh) was inspired by “the four Ps: Pop, Punk rock, Progressive Rock, and Psychedelia.” Can’t argue with that. Recorded using lo-fi production, and mostly culled from Pollard’s backlog of songs, Bee Thousand is a homerun and then some, with the life-affirming dirge-pop of “Smothered in Hugs,” the fantastical “Kicker of Elves,” the popular single “I Am a Scientist,” and heartbreaking nuggets like “Gold Star for Robot Boy,” “Awful Bliss,” “Ester’s Day,” and “The Goldheart Mountaintop Queen Directory” (to name but a few reasons to be deeply familiar with this thirty-six-minute indie rock holy grail). Bee Thousand was also released as a deluxe fifty-five-song, triple-LP “Director’s Cut” version. GUIDED BY VOICES Alien Lanes (1995, Matador) Achieving a pretty high level of alt-rock/indie rock stardom/ exposure for the time (boosted by features in Spin and other mainstream music press outlets), and earning a rabid fan-base to go with it, Guided by Voices properly joined the Matador roster with Alien Lanes, the next-to-last GBV album made by the band’s original classic lineup (Robert Pollard, Tobin Sprout, Mitch Mitchell, and Kevin Fennell), and the last of the band’s offerings that can be considered essential “desert-island” indie rock. Matador allegedly advanced the band close to $100,000 for the project, an extremely high amount for that (or any) era. According to rock writer (and sometimes GBV bassist and guitarist) Jim Greer’s book about the band, the actual production cost came to around ten dollars (if the beer expense was subtracted), because Alien Lanes was culled from already written and recorded archival material, just like each GBV album before it.

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THE GUN CLUB Fire of Love (1981, Ruby/Slash) Melding punk and hardcore with traditional American forms such as country music, the blues or rockabilly was commonplace in the huge and fractured late-’70s/early-’80s L.A. underground scene, but no album captured that alchemic potential like Fire of Love. Partially produced by Flesheaters singer Chris D., the record flawlessly combines the raw energy of punk with American roots music, thus influencing the next three decades of garage-punk revivalists, the psychobilly movement, and countless notable torchbearers of what’s classified as, for lack of a better term, “Punk Blues.” (Its practitioners include the Gibson Bros., Pussy Galore, Boss Hog, Bassholes, ’68 Comeback, and Jon Spencer Blues Explosion family tree of bands. Jack White once asked in a 2007 interview with The Guardian, “Why are these songs not taught in schools?”) Founded by former Blondie Fan Club president Jeffrey Lee Pierce, The Gun Club momentarily featured the Cramps’ Kid Congo Powers in its ranks, but the guitarist departed before the recording of this modern classic. Fire of Love contains the trio of legendary The Gun Club moments, “Sex Beat,” “She’s Like Heroin To Me,” and “For the Love of Ivy.”

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HALF JAPANESE — HÜSKER DÜ

HALF JAPANESE ½ Gentlemen/Not Beasts (1981, 50 Gazillion Watts) This selection provides a fascinating and exhaustive look at an extremely distinct, far corner of the (worldwide) punk/post-punk/ experimental/outsider-rock-based world of the late ’70s and early ’80s—a musical landscape so remote it was restricted to two brothers—Jad and David Fair—and their musical vehicle, Half Japanese. Based out of their parents’ house in Uniontown, Maryland, the Fair brothers recruited various others for backing help on their now-legendary 1977 “Calling All Girls” 7-inch EP and on the 7-inch single “No Direct Line from My Brain to My Heart”/“(I Don’t Want to Have) Mono (No More),” which were released on the brothers’ own 50 Skidillion Watts label. Three years later, the self-released box-set ½ Gentlemen/Not Beasts became the only triple-album debut in rock-and-roll history, spanning a thirty-eight-song backlog recorded since the band started documenting itself in the mid-’70s. (In truth, if the final two tracks of live cover medleys were separated, song by song, the number of selections shoots to almost eighty.) Amateurish musical ability and a penchant for particularly harsh paint-peeling abrasion combine with a particular form of teen boy punk rock angst, producing what comes off like an apocalyptic temper-tantrum. On the original Half Japanese material here (filling four of the album’s six sides), the immense outpouring of creative expression can be boiled down to a teen male lust for the opposite sex, communicated in Jad Fair’s inyour-face terms. To determine the band’s outside influences, just look at the artists covered in the live medleys: The Velvet Underground, Modern Lovers, Stooges, MC5, 13th Floor Elevators, Rolling Stones, Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Beach Boys, and Bob Dylan—though the spirit of these acts is more detectable than their sounds.

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HALO BENDERS God Don’t Make No Junk (1994, K Records) A collaborative effort between Treepeople/Built to Spill founder Doug Martsch and Calvin Johnson of Beat Happening and K Records fame, the Halo Benders made albums that sounded absolutely nothing like either man’s main gig. Once heard, the duo plus revolving cast of backing help easily transcended the trappings of a tossed-off side project. Goofiness (or, in fairness, a lack of seriousness) prevailed, but the band succeeded despite the associated high risk of failure when side projects are built on quirkiness. Halo Benders’ forays into prescient (for American artists) dub reggae influences, psych workouts, and raging rock benefited from Martsch’s golden touch with vocals and guitar work, and fans who might have avoided Beat Happening during that band’s decade-plus existence found themselves drawn here to Johnson’s love-or-it-or-leave-it baritone and unapologetic lyrical libido exercises (which could venture into the creepy zone with Beat Happening). Pre-album single “Canned Oxygen” shows up here and remains a musical high point for both principal personalities; it’s hard not to be moved by this song. But rest assured: God Don’t Make No Junk is no receptacle for filler gathered around a single instance of genius. There’s plenty more to like. HALO OF FLIES Music for Insect Minds (1991, Amphetamine Reptile) Named after a classic Alice Cooper Band song, Minneapolis’ Halo of Flies was formed in 1986 by Tom Hazelmyer, who was then a marine but would soon be the owner and operator of the noiserock movement’s ground zero, Amphetamine Reptile Records, the label initially started as an outlet for early Halo of Flies 7-inches. Halo of Flies was: (1) the ground zero for the noise-rock subgenre Hazelmyer would nurture and grow for a decade with his label, (2) the ultimate realization of that style, and (3) a band with a singular style unlike any before or since. The latter claim is supported by several elements of the band’s constantly evolving attack: Hazelmyer’s Hendrix-by-way-of-Chrome’s Helios Creed guitar pyrotechnics; extremely tense songcraft that crams free-form noise freak-outs between tautly structured rhythmic backbones, a worldview that places nearly anything (and anyone)

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underground-rock-related into the “part of the problem” category, and a deranged sense of melody. This 1991 compilation collects the band’s entire five-year discography (the band was resurrected in 2007 as H-o-F), and ranks in the top five most essential noise-rock documents of all time. Material is mostly culled from nine 7-inches and three 12-inch EPs, most of which were originally released in limited quantities. HAMMERHEAD Into the Vortex (1994, Amphetamine Reptile) In many ways, Hammerhead was both the quintessential Amphetamine Reptile band and an unofficial flagship of noise rock’s journey to the middle of the decade. The band was louder, noisier, authentically angrier/darker/more desperate, and, most of all, heavier than the vast majority of what came out of the noise-rock subgenre during the early to mid-’90s. Hammerhead released three full-lengths (among other formats) from 1993 to 1996. Its second album, Into the Vortex, is among the most intense and enjoyable albums to come out of indie rock’s less friendly back streets. The seven-minute closer, “Journey to the Center of Tetnus 4,” is one of the greatest examples of heavy, in sound and essence, to be found in this book. GRANT HART Intolerance (1989, SST) The solo debut full-length by former Hüsker Dü drummer Grant Hart, Intolerance, was released by SST in late 1989 and was preceded by the related 2541 EP (SST), released in October 1988, making Hart the first ex-Hüsker to turn out solo material. Intolerance was unfairly overshadowed by—and constantly in critical competition with—Bob Mould’s solo debut Workbook, which appeared eight months before this album. But Hart’s record draws from a much wider stylistic frame of reference and is generally a better listen. This song cycle of post-collegiate balladry, pop songs, synth-pop, folk-rock, and piano balladry is all over the place, but when it lands on beauties like “The Main” (a piano and vocals torch song of sorts) and the astonishingly catchy and heartfelt centerpiece, “Twenty-Five Forty-One” (a different version from the earlier EP’s), named after the address where 142 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Hüsker Dü practiced and recorded, Mr. Hart proves that he is a timeless songwriter. HARVEY MILK Courtesy and Goodwill toward Men (1996, Reproductive Records) While Harvey Milk’s first official album, 1994’s My Love Is Higher Than Your Assessment of What My Love Could Be is a nearmasterpiece in its own right, there’s a fighting chance that the Athens, Georgia, trio’s second official full-length, Courtesy and Goodwill toward Men, can claim the distinction of being the most beautiful, bizarre, challenging, melancholy, and, above all, heaviest album to ever come out of America’s rock-and-metal undergrounds of the ’80s and ’90s. A bracingly experimental (expect the hugest slow-motion riffing you’ve ever heard to stop on a dime in order to make room for a Scott Walker-meets-Tom Waits-style torch singing, for example), incredibly long, and somewhat disturbingly depressed album that will stand as a unique listening experience for anyone who has yet to make the commitment. To Harvey Milk virgins who are fans of the Melvins, Scott Walker, Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen (who is covered here), Gastr del Sol, John Cage, and the heaviest of underground heavy metal but wonder whether there’s an album out there that could flatten all of it, listen to this album once, on headphones, even if it’s the first and last time. Like all of Harvey Milk’s three properly released albums during the ’90s, Courtesy was basically ignored for more than a decade (save for a limited-edition CD reissue by A Minor Forest founder/Aquarius Records owner Andee Conners on his tUMULt label in 2000) until the combined efforts of Relapse Records and Chunklet magazine’s Henry Owings sparked a reexamination (through respective reissue campaigns in 2006 and 2008) and Harvey Milk began releasing new material again around the same time. Today, the band commands the cult following its discography deserves.

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HAZEL Toreador of Love (1993, Sub Pop) The first full-length by Portland’s Hazel brings together some basic ingredients of great indie rock: a solid rush of huge male and female vocal hooks, tempos at breakneck velocity (and the energy to match), and songwriting that should have made Breeders-level stars out of this band. The album’s single “Dayglo” would easily make a thirty-track short list of this book’s best songs. Drummer/singer/songwriter Jody Bleyle was also paramount among the reasons her other band, Team Dresch, is held in such high esteem. HEAVENS TO BETSY Calculated (1993, Kill Rock Stars) The sole full-length by this guitar and vocals-plus-drums twopiece is arguably the most caustic and frightening document to come out of the original riot grrrl movement of the early ’90s. From Olympia, Washington, Heavens to Betsy is also notable for being the first band of Sleater Kinney founder/guitarist Corin Tucker, whose unmistakable wail is a key ingredient in the band’s intimidating delivery. Making up for the spare lineup and minimal approaches to each instrument is an urgency and complete lack of childishness that set Heavens to Betsy apart from many of its contemporaries. These ladies mean business, and Calculated was a formidable and worthy precursor to Tucker’s next outing. HELIUM The Dirt of Luck (1995, Matador) Fomer Autoclave (and recent Wild Flag) member Mary Timony and bassist, then-boyfriend Ash Bowie (of Polvo) are the two creative columns that made Helium’s first full-length a beacon of progressive noise-pop during a time when more and more earlydecade indie rock stalwarts were weathering identity crises and abandoning the “rock” part of that term. Timony shines with a tough singing style and amazing guitar work. This album is also a must for Polvo fans, as well as for those with an affinity for the lady-led bands, circa mid-decade, that took underground guitarrock into the future (think Sleater Kinney and Team Dresch).

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HELMET Meantime (1992, Interscope) To outsiders, neophytes, and nonfans, the noise-rock subgenre of post hardcore/indie rock appeared to be a rather onedimensional, testosterone-fueled boys’ club. But in reality, this particular rainbow was one of many different colors. Helmet pursued—and became the best-known purveyors of—the noiserock agenda that favored a thinking man’s (artsy or avant-garde) treatment of chunky, thrash-informed metal riffing in addition to barked or gruffly yelled vocals. Another noticeable quality that Helmet shared with a few other noise-rock bands (like Tar, Jawbox, and others) was its look, which consisted of buzz-cuts or very short hair, khaki shorts, and t-shirts that could have easily been purchased at The Gap. Helmet was formed in 1989 by ex-Band of Susans/Glenn Branca guitarist Page Hamilton. The band cut its teeth on noise rock’s leading label of the era, Amphetamine Reptile, which released Helmet’s debut 7-inch and first full-length (1990’s Strap It On) before Nirvana and a few other heavier success stories pointed the majors in the direction of loud, distorted guitars and metaphorically couched male angst. As was the case with some of its contemporaries, Helmet’s major-label debut was the best full-length title in the band’s ’90s discography. It’s rumored that Interscope paid the band a signing advance of more than a million dollars and contractually allowed the quartet a vast amount of creative control over its releases. This was a huge gamble on a decidedly noncommercial sound, but it more-orless paid off when the single “Unsung” (one of the only tracks on Meantime that featured melodic singing) took off and the album went gold within two years. This album and, to a lesser extent, Helmet’s follow-up, Betty (1994, Interscope), went on to be a major influence on the “post-metal” or “metal-gaze” movement of the late ’90s and early aughts.

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HOLE Pretty on the Inside (1991, Caroline) May I request that you momentarily suspend any biases based on events, actions, or statements post-1994 as you consider Hole’s 1991 debut full-length, Pretty on the Inside? Admittedly, it’s a lot to ask, but this album is worth it. Courtney Love has worn a lot of masks, before and after she found fame, but the visage of bandwagon-jumping charlatan is not one of them. For someone who seemingly emerged from the womb with top-of-the-world aspirations, her chosen route was strewn with obstacles prior to her union with one Kurt Cobain. Placing an ad in 1989 that stated “I want to form a band. My influences are Big Black, Sonic Youth, and Fleetwood Mac” was not the path of least resistance to the ultimate goal of becoming a household name. With several non-starter band situations under her belt, including a couple with Babes in Toyland singer/guitarist Kat Bjelland and a brief moment as the singer in an early version of Faith No More, Hole came together with one of the twelve-plus guitarists who answered the ad, Eric Erlandson, because he had, as Love has been quoted as saying, a “Thurston Moore quality about him.” Once the two decided to get serious about Hole’s future, the lineup was rounded out by bassist Jill Emery and drummer Caroline Rue. Following the release of two 7-inch singles, “Retard Girl” (1990, Sympathy for the Record Industry) and “Dicknail” (1991, Sub Pop), Hole found itself on Caroline Records and recruited Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon (with assistance from B.A.L.L./Gumball leader Don Fleming) to produce the brick-heavy Pretty on the Inside. Recorded and mixed in one week, the album is a crushing mix of Mudhoney at its heaviest, sludge-metal, Sonic Youth, and Love’s terrifying but also moving vocal performance. (The singer allegedly used copious whiskey and cigarette intake to add sandpaper coarseness to her vocal cords.) Pretty on the Inside may be the antithesis of its title, but this isn’t all noise and antagonism for its own sake. Having little to do with the two megahit albums—or the career in general—that followed, this album’s expressive songwriting and skillful arrangements elevate it above similarly minded exercises of the early ’90s. If apprehensions persist, seek out “Garbadgeman” (chosen for the album’s sole official video), Pretty on the Inside’s most representative and powerful track. 146 GIMME INDIE ROCK

HONOR ROLE The Pretty Song (1986, Eskimo/No Core) Those bands that chose to break up with hardcore by letting in the (thrash) metal or the pop melodies far outnumbered those that chose to drink from the inspirational well of late-’70s/early’80s first-wave angular (primarily U.K.) post punk. But copying Gang of Four or Wire is pointless unless a band’s originality and creative merits override the influential framework to produce something unique and special. The second phase of Richmond, Virginia’s, Honor Role produced two albums that invariably meet those qualifications. Starting out in hardcore around 1983 as a band of innocuous intent in an increasingly innocuous genre (they made compilation appearances and released a 7-inch EP in 1984), Honor Role reappeared two years later with The Pretty Song. Co-released by the band and Corrosion of Conformity drummer Reed Mullin’s No Core label, it’s a wellspring of amazing ideas, mainly realized through guitarist Pen Rollings’ developing dominance of the instrument (agile, angular, and nimble downswipes, small chunks of avant-metal riffing, rhythmic dub-reggaeinfluenced chug-chang-chug, odd affected noise) and Bob Schick’s unmistakable vocals (melodic and transfixing delivery with an embittered, fatalistic, and sometimes angry cynicism pervading the tone and cadence even if the lyrics fall outside of those mindsets). The Pretty Song showed a band progressing so fast it missed many potential fans in the process. HONOR ROLE Rictus (1989, Homestead) Never enjoying more than a secret club of admirers and benefactors with exceptional taste, Honor Role closed its own book by dissolving the same year that this, its final album, was released. The album was the band’s creative peak, refining and moving beyond everything that made The Pretty Song so inventive and enjoyable: dubby post hardcore; angular post punk with trebly underground metal riffing; themes of human jadedness; Bob Schick’s proprietary vocal style and the life-worn wisdom of his lyrics (mixed with some paranoia that would do The Fall’s Mark E. Smith proud); and the kind of visionary guitar work that would become Pen Rollings’ trademark. Rictus is full of amazing songs begging to be sampled by prospective future superfans.

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“Listening to Sally,” “Following Footsteps,” “Skippy,” and basically anything else from this record will do. Bob Schick’s next band was the equally essential Coral, and Pen Rollings went on to form Butterglove and Breadwinner. Merge Records has always been the biggest supporter of this creative family tree, and in 1997, the label released Album, which collects the entire Honor Role discography minus the band’s skippable first EP. HOOVER The Lurid Traversal of Route 7 (1993, Dischord) As Dischord Records’ roster and profile grew in the late ’80s and early ’90s, so did a tendency to write off many of its bands as clones of the label’s flagship band, Fugazi. In reality, there were two, maybe three, bands of this nature on Dischord, but at least fifteen visionary acts had to contend with the comparison to some degree, and Hoover was one of them. The band released only this one proper full-length during its first period of activity (1992–1994). It’s a collection of tension-filled post hardcore that ranks among the best creative output filed within the subgenre. Bassist and vocalist Fred Erskine was in a grocery list of other bands before, during, and after this one, including June of 44 and The Crownhate Ruin. HUM You’d Prefer an Astronaut (1995, RCA) Hum was one of many entries into the early-to-mid-’90s majorlabel sweepstakes that could have only exercised such a career move once the Nirvana-spawned feeding-frenzy phenomenon was going full-bore and before its 1996–1997 bursting. The modest success of this album’s second single, “Star,” meant that Hum—along with the Breeders, Pavement, the Flaming Lips, and Helmet—provided a moment of great respite from what usually choked the “X-station” playlists of the mid- to early ’90s. The Champaign, Illinois, quartet went through several lineup changes before settling on the one that would carry them through two great albums on major-label RCA. (You’d Prefer an Astronaut and 1997’s Downward Is Heavenward). Hum found a slow-tomid-tempo meeting place between shoegaze wall-of-guitar and hardened, almost metallic riff-crunch that hasn’t aged in the least, and during the mid-’90s, it helped the band become a huge 148 GIMME INDIE ROCK

influence on the then-burgeoning emo scene. “Star” peaked in the upper realms of Billboard’s Modern Rock Charts (No. 11) and actually reached No. 28 on the Mainstream Rock Chart, pushing You’d Prefer an Astronaut to move 250,000 units and getting the band appearances on the Howard Stern Show and Space Ghost Coast to Coast. Hum has sporadically reunited over the last decade, playing to large audiences of converts too young to have seen the band before it quit full-time work in 2000. HÜSKER DÜ Metal Circus (1983, SST) Numbering fewer than twenty, and spread throughout the fifteen-year period framed in these pages, an upper echelon of bands and artists could be culled based on the importance of the albums chosen herein. On Metal Circus, Hüsker Dü finds the popmeets-hardcore-energy proto–indie rock sound that earns the Twin Cities trio a spot in that exclusive club. This was the band’s first official release on the SST label. The seven-track album starts with guitarist and singer Bob Mould’s “Real World” and “Deadly Skies,” both farewells to the hardcore innovations heard throughout the two albums, two singles, and smattering of compilation cuts the band had previously released. The unapologetic pop of drummer Grant Hart’s “It’s Not Funny Anymore” is a lyrical jab at the rigid conformity and go-nowhere constraints of the hardcore scene. Without debate, the strongest cut here is “First of the Last Calls,” a song that addressed Mould’s growing concern over his drinking habits. (In a perfect show of this man’s extreme willpower, he would instigate overnight sobriety two years later.) Another parting shot at hardcore, “Lifeline,” comes before Hart’s notorious “Diane,” a chilling and usually misunderstood song about the 1980 abduction, rape, and murder of Minneapolis waitress Diane Edwards at the hands of serial killer Joe Ture. The powerful ballad would go on to be the band’s first real “hit” on college-radio. As would be the custom on albums to come, Metal Circus closes with a heavy, chaotic, and experimental detour of sorts, “Out on a Limb.”

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HÜSKER DÜ Zen Arcade (1984, SST) Until the release of Zen Arcade forced the American underground to sit up and take notice, no band within (or branching out from) the American hardcore genre had yet produced a sprawling, epic double album. Hüsker Dü’s Zen Arcade changed that in the summer of 1984. Based loosely around the concept of a homosexual teenager’s first long-distance departure from home, Zen Arcade is the best-known, most-loved, and go-to default title in the Hüsker Dü discography. It’s the undisputed starting point from which to start familiarizing oneself with the band’s legacy. The instrumental and songwriting variety across these four sides is astonishing and indicative of a band that matured at a lightning-fast rate. Highlights include (but are not limited to) the melodic, hair-raising starter “Something I Learned Today,” with its unforgettable opening bass line; the acoustic-only “Never Talking To You Again”; the beautiful but raging “Chartered Trips”; the ultra-catchy pop of Grant Hart’s haunting tale of heroin overdose, “When Pink Turns to Blue”; and the Mould-dominated second side of extreme noise rock that would go on to become a major influence on the heavier, nastier side of indie rock over the next decade or so. For those who plan to use this book as a roadmap to a better record collection, there are few better introductions to the way the groundwork was laid for indie rock, or indie rock as a whole, than this masterwork from a truly essential band. SST scheduled April 15, 1984, for the simultaneous release of Zen Arcade, the Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime , and the Meat Puppets’ II, making that day somewhat historical in the annals of underground rock. Double Nickels and Zen Arcade were promoted in a unique manner for SST releases. Rather than normal copies of the albums marked for promotional DJ and magazine consumption, 12-inch vinyl-only sampler EPs were pressed in editions of five hundred per title. Zen Arcade’s sampler is special because the B-side features the band’s non-album cover of the Byrds’ “Eight Miles High” (also released as a 7-inch), one of the greatest rock moments of the ’80s, and becaue one hundred of the EPs had their plain white outer sleeves signed and decorated by the band.

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HÜSKER DÜ New Day Rising (SST, 1985) Zen Arcade’s liner notes end with the smirking “Carducci wants another album.” (Joe Carducci more-or-less ran SST from 1981 to 1986 because touring commitments put Greg Ginn and the rest of Black Flag on the road so much.) SST got that album within six months of the double album’s release. A testament to Hüsker Dü’s unrivaled degree of productivity (six proper full-lengths and three 7-inch singles released between January 1983 and March 1986), New Day Rising was not “Zen Arcade sides five and six.” Rather, it stood its ground as a distinctive chapter in the band’s history. It didn’t toy with stylistic disparity like the epic that came before it. In rough terms, New Day Rising did not fuck around. A roaring and very, very loud record from beginning to close, Hüsker Dü’s fifth full-length expanded the pop-core perfection of previous recordings like “Chartered Trips,” “Something I Learned Today,” and “First of the Last Calls” into an entire album. SST producer Spot was flown to Minneapolis to assist with the recording process—this was the band’s first shot at completing an album on its home turf (not counting Hüsker’s debut, Land Speed Record, recorded live at First Avenue’s 7th St Entry). The recording situation lacked the time- and cost-related stress that was inherent in making three previous albums in L.A., while the band was on tour; yet on New Day Rising, a heightened urgency comes through. Bob Mould’s live and college-radio chestnuts “Celebrated Summer,” “59 Times The Pain,” and “I Apologize” are here, as are Grant Hart’s “The Girl Who Lived On Heaven Hill,” “Books About UFOs,” and the album’s collaborative benchmark, the amazing “If I Told You.” The SST Blasting Concept II compilation (1985) includes the only unused song from the New Day Rising sessions, the great “Erase Today.”

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HÜSKER DÜ Flip Your Wig (1985, SST) Hüsker Dü’s sixth album was recorded and ready to be sent to SST when the band signed with Warner Bros. in the summer of 1985. Warner and a certain band member or two gunned for putting Flip Your Wig on the major, but ultimately it was given to SST out of loyalty, despite constant distribution problems and other growing issues the band had with the label. Like New Day Rising, Flip Your Wig was recorded in the band’s home of Minneapolis, and it pushes the trio’s genre-building noise-pop/proto–indie rock yet another step into the future. Released in August 1985 (a mere seven months after NDR), Flip Your Wig was the first Hüsker album to come out of multiple sessions and more than two to three weeks in a studio (March to June of that year). The album is actually more representative of why this band is so revered than the other fan favorite, Zen Arcade. After a couple of just-short-of-great tracks, the album hits you with Bob Mould’s “Makes No Sense At All,” one of two Hüsker Dü songs that many non-fans are fans—or at least aware—of. As the album’s only single, “Makes No Sense At All” was worn out by college radio, resting at the top of the College Music Journal (CMJ) charts for months, and even getting a taste of commercialrock-station rotation. Plenty of distorted guitar soaks the song, but not enough to hide the first-class power-pop the band had glued to the foundation of American post punk/hardcore to create the blueprint for the what would become musically known as traditional indie rock in the late ’80s and early ’90s. The song was also Hüsker Dü’s first music video, timed nicely to get years of rotation on MTV’s 120 Minutes, which first aired in March 1986. Boston Rock, a supplement to the nationally distributed trade magazine U.S. Rock, reported at the time that the single had “broken commercial barriers, getting the Hüskers airplay on a number of AOR stations that one would never imagine to play such a vitally original band.” But one song alone doesn’t carry Flip Your Wig. Grant Hart’s “Green Eyes” was the drummer’s best song to date, a sort of follow-up to his songwriting arrival, Zen Arcade’s “When Pink Turns to Blue.” Mould’s “Divide and Conquer” and “Private Plane” continue the trajectory plotted by “Chartered Trips” “First of the Last Calls,” etc.— what I called “Mould Gold” in my 2010 book 152 GIMME INDIE ROCK

about the band, Hüsker Dü: The Story of the Noise-Pop Pioneers Who Launched Modern Rock. Flip Your Wig earned the band coverage in mainstream music mags and sold more than 50,000 copies in just four months. Many have speculated about what a major label’s promotion machine could have done with the album and, more specifically, with “Makes No Sense at All,” but this was six years before Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” changed the entire industry. Therefore, it’s reasonable to presume the world at large was just not ready yet. HÜSKER DÜ Candy Apple Grey (1986, Warner Bros.) Hüsker Dü had attracted major label suitors with increasing intensity since the April 1984 release of their breakthrough moment, Zen Arcade, an album that got them a four-star review in Rolling Stone and exposure that transcended the band’s longtime comfort zone of the American underground touring circuit, network of independently owned record stores, and college radio. Knowing exactly where they fit and what they wanted, Bob Mould, Grant Hart, and Greg Norton released two more full-length albums on SST before signing with Warner Bros. Cries of “Sell-outs!” turned up in the usual places (militantly anti– major label MaximumRockNRoll, for one), but Hüsker Dü’s major label debut, Candy Apple Grey, silenced most naysayers upon release in March 1986. Continuing (and ultimately closing) the band’s hot streak that started with Metal Circus in October 1983, Candy Apple Grey is sort of a sister album/expansion of the preceding Flip Your Wig, with any noticeable differences being the product of natural creative growth on the part of the band’s primary songwriters, Hart and Mould, not to mention the competitive tension and other issues between the two that had matured quite nastily by the time the band entered the studio in October 1985. The album peaked at No. 140 on the Billboard Top 200 and sold a healthy 120,000 units before 1986 came to a close.

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HÜSKER DÜ Warehouse: Songs and Stories (1987, Warner Bros.) Hüsker Dü’s contract with Warner Bros. granted the band an unprecedented amount of creative control, hence its use as a template for future indie-to-major moves like that of Sonic Youth at the end of the decade. Still, there were ways a major could influence and shape a band regardless of what might be contractually binding. The reality that a band like Hüsker Dü was on a major label was unheard of to begin with, but getting Warner Bros. behind a double album as the band’s second full-length for the label? That move took balls. Beyond some grumblings at the start of things, however, Warner Bros. moved aside and let Hüsker Dü release the 110-minute Warehouse: Songs and Stories in 1987. Two factors influenced the album’s length: anxiety about resounding “sell-out!” feedback (triggered by the band’s mid-1985 announcement that it was leaving SST for a major), and the compositional competition taking place between Bob Mould and Grant Hart. (Warehouse’s songwriting credits are split 50/50.) This negative dynamic, along with other issues causing internal damage within the band, would make this Hüsker Dü’s final album. Though it’s not a fan or critic favorite, readers must understand that Warehouse is still a Hüsker Dü album through and through, which positions it ahead of the pack by default. The production is odd in that compressed ’80s manner that befell many mid-to-late-decade post-hardcore bands, and the songs themselves show a progression toward more lush and melodic realms. But the album also contains some of Hüsker Dü’s best moments, like the album’s two singles: Mould’s heavy and mean “Ice Cold Ice” and his college-rock staple “Could You Be The One?” (countering the pair of Hart-penned singles on the band’s first Warner Bros. release, Candy Apple Grey). In addition, Mould’s “It’s Not Peculiar,” “No Reservations,” and “Up In The Air” best anything from his two subsequent solo albums (1989’s Workbook and 1990’s Black Sheets of Rain). But as the band’s album-byalbum narrative has made apparent, Grant Hart was the laterblooming talent of the two songwriters, and his songs tend to be the stronger set here: “Charity, Chastity, Prudence, And Hope,” “Back From Somewhere,” “Tell You Why Tomorrow,” “She’s a

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Woman (And Now He Is a Man)” and two majestic winners, “She Floated Away” and the closer “You Can Live at Home” practically make this album. Warehouse: Stories and Songs peaked at No. 117 on the Billboard 200. To promote the album, Hüsker Dü performed on The Today Show and The Joan Rivers Show. Despite what many critics, fans, and other musicians over the years have voiced, proper Hüsker Dü discography closed with integrity in place.

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JANDEK Lost Cause (1992, Corwood Industries) Between 1978 and 2004, this elusive Houstonian self-released thirty-nine albums and conducted just three interviews. In 2004, he dropped jaws at the Instal 04 festival in Glasgow, Scotland, when he joined Richard Youngs (Skullflower) and drummer Alex Neilson (Ashtray Navigations, Bonnie Prince Billy) on stage. And though his identity is rarely referenced out of respect (born Sterling Richard Smith), he has since performed in public more than thirty-five times. In total, and including recordings of live performances released since 2009, Jandek has released seventyfour albums as of this writing. His artistic trajectory has gone through several phases, but the most popular among his fans (who regard him with religious fervor), and the stretch that appeals to more casual listeners, is the late-’70s up through the ’80s, culminating with this album (his twenty-first)—an “end-of-an-era” stylistic overview on side one, and a nineteen minutes of harsh guitar-strangling catharsis on the other. For the uninitiated, Jandek has not only a polarizing singing voice, but a guitar-playing and arranging style that varies within his own overarching sound—the antithesis of musically traditional. Blue Corpse (1987) is perhaps a better gateway album for the beginner, but Lost Cause features his prettiest and most abrasive sides on one record. Two documentaries have been made about Jandek, in 2004 and 2013, respectively. JAWBOX Novelty (1992, Dischord) Government Issue’s J. Robbins formed Jawbox with then girlfriend Kim Colletta on bass and Adam Wade on drums in 1989. The band’s 1991 full-length debut Grippe was done when the band was still that trio. It’s a solid collection of noise rock done with admiration for the band’s tighter contemporaries like Tar, with some Sonic Youth and Band of Susans thrown in, along with, naturally, automatic bleed-over influence from labelleaders Fugazi (not a bad thing when it doesn’t consume a band). Adding second guitarist Bill Bardot beefed up Jawbox’s sound considerably. Meanwhile, the band’s songwriting progressed and Robbins’ singing developed, offering visceral melodies now complemented by Barbot’s tuneful backup or responding 158 GIMME INDIE ROCK

vocal work. With all this in place, Novelty dropped the Fugazi touches and tore straight down a middle ground between prime Jawbreaker and what a much less masculine Helmet might have sounded like. JAWBOX For Your Own Special Sweetheart (1994, Atlantic/Desoto) Original drummer Adam Wade departed for fellow Dischord band Shudder to Think, the only other band on the label besides Jawbox to make the jump to a major label (which both did at roughly the same time). The contribution of new drummer Zachary Barocas, who had skills and an interest in music that went well beyond underground rock, was one of the qualities that helped third album For Your Own Special Sweetheart assume the most exalted spot in Jawbox’s discography. Jawbox was now something of a standout within the world of heavy alternative rock, and single “Savory” is the best example of what the band sounded like at this point. Complicated but interesting and enjoyable arrangements, better vocal interplay, big and dense production, and top-notch songs and here’s another established band hitting its stride—and a major label—at the same time. This is even more notable because Dischord’s (and, by direct association, Fugazi’s) staunchly independent aesthetic and work ethic easily spread to fans of the label and its bands, so news of Jawbox’s defection to the majors was met with brief but louder than usual disdain. (One fan even wished for the band to be hit by a car.) For Your Own Special Sweetheart was the perfect response. JAWBREAKER Bivouac (1992, Communion/Tupelo) Following heavy-music/metal (Metallica’s Black album, Soundgarden, Helmet, etc.) and grunge/alt-rock (Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Smashing Pumpkins, etc.), pop-punk was the final style to make the leap from deeply rooted underground movement to full-blown cultural phenomenon. Largely, this was done on the backs of two albums, both released in 1994: Green Day’s Dookie and the Offspring’s Smash. The movement also garnered the nastiest backlash, which thoroughly removed any positive connotations from the term “pop-punk” and historically

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downgraded many great bands that operated within the style’s boundaries in the twenty years between the Ramones’ and Buzzcocks’ proto-genesis and pop-punk’s mid-’90s hostile takeover of the nation’s malls. It took years for the gold-standard pioneers (otherwise known as Descendents) to start getting some deserved widespread credit and acclaim; so imagine the conundrum faced by an exceptional band with a body of work that chronologically paralleled Green Day’s rise from DIY act to Woodstock ’94 headliner. Thankfully, the legacy of Jawbreaker eventually survived via the band’s profound connection with its fan base while it was active, and the legions of younger converts that gradually arose during the post-millennial age. Compared to the band’s debut full-length, Unfun (1990), Jawbreaker’s 1992 sophomore album Bivouac sounds like a totally different band, despite both albums being made by the same three guys. But a lot happened between the release of the debut and the writing and recording of Bivouac, including a grueling cross-country tour that caused a temporary breakup and dispersal of band members at different ends of the country before reuniting in San Francisco (they had previously operated out of L.A.). Plus, there were the external, but no doubt influential, widespread changes permeating all forms of underground rock music as 1991 gave way to 1992. Jawbreaker’s sophomore full-length exuded a maturity years beyond not only its debut, but beyond many of the band’s contemporaries, as well. This is one of the only non-“extreme” metal albums to involve producer Billy Anderson (Sleep, Buzzov’en, Brutal Truth, Melvins, etc.). Bivouac’s use of samples from analog cassette loops (the band also incorporated them into live shows) was a trick passed along to Jawbreaker by fellow Bay Area noise-rock progenitors Steel Pole Bath Tub. This album was darker, smarter, moodier, and much more ambitious than Unfun. As such, Bivouac broke Jawbreaker through to other facets of the American underground, from fans of the aggro post hardcore fueling the growth of labels like Amphetamine Reptile, Touch and Go, and Trance Syndicate, to supporters of friendlier indie rock/alternative visionaries like Superchunk and Archers of Loaf. The members of Nirvana seemed to approve of Bivouac, and Jawbreaker was invited to open six dates of the In Utero tour in October 1993, a

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move that provoked far more anger from Jawbreaker fans than from the Nirvana audiences the band played for. Nonetheless, Bivouac is still grounded by what the band exceled at, illustrated by the raging hook-filled rush of “Donatello” and the fan-favorite single “Chesterfield King.” But the real payoff is the album’s closing ten-minute title track, a song that bridges many a gap between the Jawbreaker of before and the previously mentioned subgenres of the day (along with the entire decade that followed). JAWBREAKER 24 Hour Revenge Therapy (1994, Communion/Tupelo) A fan-and-critic favorite for good reason, 24 Hour Revenge Therapy is one of the special albums of this era that fans of many different substyles—’90s emo, Bay Area pop-punk, indie rock, noise rock, and so on—could unite around. Recorded with Steve Albini, the engineer who should have done all of Jawbreaker’s albums, this nearly flawless record of modern melodic underground rock rightfully amassed a cult following of obsessed fans while also attracting major-label attention. 24 Hour Revenge Therapy is Jawbreaker as the band’s creative and artistic wave crested. Lyrically similar to the best works by the Replacements, it’s a force of deeply affecting, dark desperation that makes no bones of the fact that the band planned to break up after its promotional touring cycle was completed. Yet that isn’t what happened. The band signed with major-label DGC for $1 million based on a relationship forged with Nirvana A&R man Mark Kates during the short run of opening slots Jawbreaker played a few months before this album’s release. The album that resulted, Dear You, triggered one of the nastiest backlashes against a band in underground rock’s five-decade history. It’s a misunderstood work undeserving of such derision.

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THE JAYHAWKS Blue Earth (1989, Twin/Tone) Minneapolis’ Jayhawks formed in 1985 and were one of America’s first true alt-country bands. The band came out of the Twin Cities’ college-rock scene with a straightforward mid-to-late-’80s modern country sound that was on a different planet compared to the alt-country pioneers who used punk, post hardcore, or other forms of underground dissonance as a sonic counterpoint. (Think Jason and the Scorchers, Rank and File, the Long Ryders, and later, Uncle Tupelo, who cited the Jayhawks as a big influence.) The Jayhawks’ self-titled and self-released debut (also known as The Bunkhouse Tapes) came out in 1986 and lacks the atmosphere and mood of its follow-up, Blue Earth, an accomplished and note-perfect update of Gram Parsons, the Flying Burrito Brothers, and later-period Byrds. The songs that make up this album were originally intended as demo material to attract a major-label deal, but the band’s manager brokered a deal with local independent powerhouse Twin/Tone, the recordings were renamed Blue Earth, and the album rightfully attained its present status as an alt-country classic. JESSAMINE S/T (1995, Kranky) Jessamine’s first Sub Pop 7-inch (1994) and debut self-titled full-length drew from the best American and U.K. shoegazer, drone-rock, and noise-pop of the half-decade before this Seattle band’s 1994 formation, then added an equally fervent fascination with the two albums released by American bizzaropsych/musique concrète rock duo Silver Apples from 1969 to 1970 (Jessamine covers that band’s “A Pox on You”) while also revealing a clear affinity for Germany’s early-’70s Krautrock scene and avant-composers like Morton Subotnik and John Cage. But this album balances these long stares in the rearview with a vision for moving experimentally motivated indie rock into the future. The record is the most structurally rock-based of the several Jessamine titles released through the ’90s, and it has the potential to appeal to a wide range of specific tastes: indie, underground, noise, drone, ambient, electronica, and the mind-boggling array of micro-concerns that have popped up over the last twenty years. Jessamine’s self-titled debut 162 GIMME INDIE ROCK

is the best album from Kranky’s first five or so years as a groundbreaking presence. JESSAMINE The Long Arm of Coincidence (1996, Kranky) Jessamine’s second long-player is a long arm of something compared to the band’s debut, but what exactly is for the listener to decide. Kicking the album off with the dual headspace lumberers, “Say What You Can. . .” and “. . . or What You Mean,” Jessamine makes an even bigger mark as a forward-pointed band intent on taking the psych, noise, and left-field faction of the underground into the late ’90s. Much longer and largely improvisational numbers fill this double-length whopper, but little meandering is to be found here. THE JESUS LIZARD Head (1990, Touch and Go) To borrow from the lexicon of antiquated dad-talk, this band is the Cadillac of the noise-rock/punk movement. The Jesus Lizard vocalist David Yow and bassist David W. Sims were both members of the Austin, Texas, much-exalted Scratch Acid until that band broke up in 1987. Sims founded Rapeman with Steve Albini (guitar and vocals) and drummer Rey Washam shortly thereafter. Meanwhile, Austin-based guitarist Duane Denison asked Yow to play bass on some recordings, but Yow wanted to sing. By this point, Rapeman had broken up, so Sims was brought in to play bass, and the fledging version of The Jesus Lizard recorded and played out with a drum machine. This was the lineup on the band’s debut EP, Pure (all its albums have single-word titles), released in 1989 on the Touch and Go label. The following year, for the band’s real coming-out attack on its first full-length, drumming secret-weapon Mac McNeilly made The Jesus Lizard into a brand-new band. If Head is just short of the ear-opener and mindblower that follow-up Goat would be, it’s by a hair; many of the pieces are in place on this exceptionally solid debut. No other noise-rock band could sound like The Jesus Lizard, though scores tried. The band possessed a magical amalgam of sonic and aesthetic traits: David Yow’s maniacal man-child vocals and unique cadence; the airtight drums/guitars/bass precision of the playing; songwriting

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that rocked like no other and was put together like the handbuilt engine of a racecar; and a lot of other qualities The Jesus Lizard brought to the party (a.k.a. “the ’90s”) to eventually make the band the unparalleled influence it is today. All of this comes together on Head’s “7 vs. 8,” “One Evening,” “Waxeater,” the troubling but thrilling “Good Thing,” and the instrumental “Tight ’n Shiny.” But don’t go thinking there’s any filler here. It should be noted that Head features the beautiful “Pastoral,” an authentic ballad by way of noise rock and, for the most part, a songwriting anomaly in The Jesus Lizard’s body of work. THE JESUS LIZARD Goat (1991, Touch and Go) As claimed in the previous entry, The Jesus Lizard’s sophomore full-length Goat will indeed clear out any cobwebs between the ears of the uninitiated, but it will do so in a manner that will leave most of its songs firmly stuck in the listener’s head, regardless of one’s propensity for the quieter or less incendiary corners of indie rock. Goat, like the band’s two albums that came after it, packs real crossover power and appeal. “Monkeytrick,” “Mouth Breather,” and “Then Comes Dudley” (to mention but three of the nine all-out killers here) are good examples of how the Chicago quartet went from “great” on 1990’s Head to “peerless” on this album. Like a select few other bands featured in this book, The Jesus Lizard found a language between the vocals, bass, guitar, and drums that was all its own. Goat drives home the reality that if one has yet to see this band live, doing so should race to the top of the priority list. It makes good sense that this was one of the favorite bands, if not the favorite band, of Steve Albini at the time (he was known to state that he’d produce them for free), as these albums are among his consummate accomplishments as a producer and engineer.

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THE JESUS LIZARD Liar (1992, Touch and Go) Everything written about this band in the previous entries on 1990’s Head and 1991’s Goat could be stated triplefold on the band’s third and best album, Liar. Contained here is “Gladiator,” the song that has made many a convert out of folks who otherwise lack a taste for the noise-rock style The Jesus Lizard will forever rule with impunity. Liar makes overrating The Jesus Lizard futile and wrong-headed, and the album coincided with the band’s run as one of indie rock’s greatest live experiences. It should be an early addition if one uses this book as a guide to expanding a great music collection. THE JESUS LIZARD Down (1994, Touch and Go) Though it is with this album that The Jesus Lizard starting looking outside the boundaries of their own perfect invention (as heard on 1993’s Liar), the adjustments are subtle enough to undeniably work. Bands only make one Liar, even the ones like The Jesus Lizard that occupied one of the figurative corner offices of ’90s indie rock as ultimate purveyors of their subgenre. On Down, song structure is toyed with more, and when the result is a slight shift toward the traditional or accessible, it works, and it’s where the album shines (best examples: “Fly On The Wall” and “The Best Parts”). This would be the last record recorded with The Jesus Lizard’s longtime associate in album engineering, Steve Albini, and the final J.L. title on Touch and Go before the band went over to the majors, where it made two albums with Capitol before dissolving in the late ’90s. The Jesus Lizard’s classic run of Touch and Go material was reissued by that label in 2011 after the band reunited in 2008 and performed live for a couple of years. In 2013, The Jesus Lizard’s self-published Book, a coffee table tome to serve as an illustrated and written history of the band.

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JFA Untitled (1984, Placebo) Phoenix, Arizona, was the great unsung wellspring of the thinking man’s hardcore during the genre’s first heyday, and JFA’s second album deserves to be considered alongside the best early works by fellow Arizonans the Meat Puppets and the Feederz. Touring nonstop, keeping a prolific schedule of releases, and selfidentifying as skate punks endeared JFA (“Jodie Foster’s Army”) to the growing sub-scene occurring around one of the more important and popular nonmusical sports activities of the day. Variety in tempo and a wonderful knack for moody riffs (not to mention some occasional surf-leaning guitar work) sort of make Untitled the follow-up to Living in Darkness that Agent Orange never recorded. This was a seminal album in the creative unshackling of hardcore that blossomed mid-decade. Fun fact: Alan Bishop of Placebo Records label mates the Sun City Girls played bass in JFA from mid-1984 until 1986. DANIEL JOHNSTON Yip/Jump Music (1983/1986 Stress/Homestead) Approaching the discography of America’s preeminent musical outsider artist—whose cognitive world seems to exist somewhere on the periphery of reality—offers many choices for suitably representative starting points. Of his early albums that were originally self-released on cassette and aggressively handed out to people in the vibrant underground music scene of Austin, Texas, from 1981 until around 1988, Yip/Jump Music is hard to beat. Johnston released this one in 1983, then it was self-re-released in 1986 (both times on cassette), and ultimately reissued as a double LP by Homestead Records in 1988, the first of several titles to get this treatment from the label. Yip/Jump Music features what would soon be Johnston’s identifying instrument, the chord organ, and the album was captured in his brother’s garage on a late-’70s $59 Sanyo boombox that recorded monaurally. Yip/ Jump’s “Speeding Motorcycle” has been covered by Yo La Tengo and The Pastels, “King Kong” was covered by Tom Waits, “Casper the Friendly Ghost” was featured in the film Kids, and “Worried Shoes” was covered by Yeah Yeah Yeahs front woman Karen O. on the original soundtrack for the film Where the Wild Things Are.

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DANIEL JOHNSTON Continued Story (1985/1991, Stress/Homestead) Continued Story is a great halfway point between the homerecorded, one-man albums of Johnston’s first phase, and his later titles that were assisted, each in various capacities, by a producer, a studio environment, and backing musicians. Having reached a level of local fame, Johnston showed up on MTV’s pre–120 Minutes half-hour show, The Cutting Edge, during an episode that covered Austin’s “New Sincerity” scene of musicians. Johnston recorded Continued Story with the band the Texas Instruments. It was the first time he had any of his material worked on in a studio. The album opens with one of Johnston’s most hauntingly beautiful songs, “It’s Over.” Continued Story was reissued by Homestead Records on vinyl in 1991. DANIEL JOHNSTON 1990 (1990, Shimmy Disc) In 1988, Daniel Johnston traveled to New York City and began recording his eleventh album with Kramer at the Shimmy Disc mogul’s Noise New York studios. This either caused, aggravated, or coincided with a serious worsening of Johnston’s mental condition, which disrupted the original plan of having all the songs be first takes in the studio, as the singer-songwriter could not complete a full session due to his illness. Therefore, 1990, which turned out to be Johnston’s musical triumph, is a mix of studio material, previously done home recordings, and live content. Sonic Youth’s Lee Renaldo and Steve Shelley provide backing help on the song “Spirit World Rising,” and Kramer (of Shimmy Dics, Noise New York, and Bongwater fame) appears on “Some Things Last a Long Time,” a holdover from the collaboration with Jad Fair that was released as It’s Spooky in 1989.

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KARP Mustaches Wild (1994, K Records) Kill All Redneck Pricks is now the name of a 2012 documentary about Karp, but it began in 1990 as the title of a high school manifesto by Tumwater, Washington, high school buddies Chris Smith, Jared Warren, and Scott Jernigan. The phrase provided the trio with a band name (in acronym form) and inspiration during after-school practices that took place in a shed behind Warren’s mom’s house. Karp started with no skills or tools or much musical frame of reference beyond regional legends the Melvins. But once the band moved to Olympia, Washington, Karp found a quick fan in K Records’ founder Calvin Johnson and became the flagship act of the heavy and noisy handful on K to offset the label (and town’s) reputation as America’s twee/indie-pop/love-rock ground zero. Mustaches Wild is the first of three proper full-lengths Karp released, along with a supporting cast of several split EPs and 7-inches, before breaking up in 1998. The band’s distinct way of creating a metallic underground/post-hardcore “heavy’s heaviness” was not to use chug-a-chug riffing or song structures or vocals usually connected to related styles. Karp incorporated a low-register density made of bass plus guitar and pounding Melvins-like drumming. On top of this din were vocals that sounded like a little kid wailing out a temper tantrum in simple pop-song or even nursery rhyme candences. Accenting this is the innocent weirdness of the song titles and lyrics that show up here and there on the album, something that lent yet another unprecedented (at the time) quality to the complete package. This album (along with Suplex) was, as history has shown, rather ahead of its time when one considers the permeations of underground “indie-metal” and other related forms that have risen up since the early aughts. Mustaches Wild is also chillingly great, as any member of the band’s posthumous cult following will also attest.

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KARP Suplex (1995, K Records) Karp’s second full-length is a classic case of a band expounding upon what was inaugurated with a previous album, so Suplex is more of a great thing, but better this time around. Descriptions of Karp tossed around at the time were reductive yet, at the same time, appropriate. (For example” “Little Melvins” or “Judas Priest meets Steve Martin.”) A better indicator of the anythinggoes mindset of the day that’s shot through this album and the music scene that birthed Karp is the diversity of acts on bills and tours—Unwound and Bikini Kill were common Karp stagemates—that helped transmit Karp’s metallic mirth to many communities around the world. In 2003, drummer Scott Jernigan was killed in a freak boating accident, which makes Kill All Redneck Pricks a very bittersweet and sad rock-doc. In 2004, Smith formed the bass-and-drums duo Big Business with former Murder City Devil Cody Willis, which, in a full-circle fairytale of sorts, was absorbed into the Melvins lineup in 2006 (an amazing double-drummer incarnation that continues to this day). KICKING GIANT Alien I.D. (1994, K Records) Kicking Giant was the early-’90s duo of guitarist/singer Tae Won Yu and drummer Rachel Carns. The band formed in NYC while both were students at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, and they eventually relocated to Olympia, Washington. After recording and self-releasing several albums on cassette and one on CD, Kicking Giant’s final full-length, Alien I.D., was released on K Records. An album that suggests the band’s breathtaking live capabilities, Alien I.D. presents aggressive noise pop, indie punk, and even garage rock wrapped in a songwriting angle that recalls classic power-pop. Yu’s swirling tornado of Rickenbacher riffs and melodic, sexy lyrics/vocals plus Carns’ skilled smashing assault of her complex stand-up drum kit. Post-Kicking Giant, Carns played an important role in the midto-late-’90s queercore movement centered around the Portland/ Olympia axis, playing in and forming a number of bands (the most fascinating of which was The Need) that operated alongside notables such as Sleater Kinney and Team Dresch. She is now a

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well-known and successful musician, composer, artist, performer, and graphic designer. KING MISSILE Happy Hour (1992, Atlantic) Writer and poet John S. Hall has led King Missile in one way or another since 1986, when he and guitarist friend Stephen “Dogbowl” Tunney formed the hilarious King Missile (Dog Fly Religion). The act was rounded out by additional musicians, releasing two albums on Mark Kramer’s Shimmy Disc Records before Dogbowl departed and released several albums of his own on the same label. In 1989, Hall and Bongwater guitarist Dave Rick (then of Bongwater) formed the core of King Missile’s second incarnation (minus the “Dog Fly Religion”), and recorded the Mystical Shit album, which produced the college-radio smash, “Jesus Was Way Cool,” that shot to No. 1 on the CMJ charts in 1990. This led to the band landing a major label deal with Atlantic and releasing The Way to Salvation in 1991 (which went to No. 2 on the CMJ). But is was Happy Hour that made this band/ big label pairing one of the weirder ones during the first year that found underground bands being chased down by the majors left and right. Happy Hour generated a surprise hit with “Detachable Penis,” which ventured beyond King Missle’s earlier college-radio staples by getting some rotation on commercial alt-rock radio. (This was one of many new and temporary developments in the “alternative nation” climate of the day). Another single, “Martin Scorsese,” runs less than two minutes but features one of the album’s most inventive arrangements, over which Hall screams “he makes the best f**king films!!” and explains how he’s such a fan of the director that he could rip the man’s head off. (The song’s video was one of the more surreal MTV moments of the day.) The sixteen remaining songs on Happy Hour collectively make up an early-’90s alt/indie stylistic one-stop shop, offering everything from clever folk-pop to awesome noise-pop to heavier faux-metallic arrangements—all bolstered by Rick’s highly innovative guitar work.

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KILLDOZER Twelve Point Buck (1989, Touch and Go) One of the earliest examples of post-hardcore outputting some proto–noise rock, Killdozer, from Madison, Wisconsin (named after the 1974 bulldozer-on-a-killing-spree-after-being-hit-by-analien-meteor made-for-TV movie), formed in 1983 and debuted a year later with the album, Intellectuals Are the Shoeshine Boys of the Ruling Elite on the Tar Babies/Mecht Mensch–run local label, Bone-Air. This was followed by Snake Boy in 1985, a six-song EP titled Burl (with Mr. Ives on the cover), and the Little Baby Buntin’ album in 1987 (all on Touch and Go). Over the course of these releases, the trio became instrumentally crushing and added a debased country-blues vibe. Plus it got funnier. That shift came courtesy of the band’s bassist/vocalist/lyricist Michael Gerald, who adopted a knowing deviance with his Killdozer-generated persona and vocalized with a gravelly, purposefully unmelodic smoker’s voice used to narrate vignettes of societal depravity and tales of everyday yahoos gone wrong. (Think the subject matter of Big Black, but add some below-the-belt content with some satire for good measure.) The culmination of all of this was 1989’s Twelve Point Buck, the best starting place for discovering Killdozer if one has the guts. Fun fact: all of the aforementioned Killdozer albums were produced by Butch Vig at his Smart Studios in Madison. The band was Vig’s first repeat customer (he also honed his chops on ’80s records by Laughing Hyenas and Die Kreuzen), and it was the production quality of Twelve Point Buck that led Kurt Cobain to request Vig for Nevermind. KRAMER The Guilt Trip (1993, Shimmy Disc) Indie rock producer extraordinaire and Shimmy Disc mogul Mark Kramer released this triple album after an entire year of obsessive work at his Noise New York studios, which paralleled and followed the tumultuous breakup of his band Bongwater. This epic work is both a narration of—and a response to—the romantic hijinks and hateful split that occurred between Kramer and his creative and conceptual partner in the band, actress and performance artist Ann Magnuson, and the destruction of his marriage that it caused. The album as a whole is like the best of Bongwater’s developments minus Magnuson, while also

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representing a move forward. Stylistically, it runs a ridiculously wide gamut but is cohesively psychedelic in that Bongwater art/ noise-informed fashion, while extending that band’s fixation on ’60s psych-pop and ’70s acid-rock/hard rock. It is so overindulgent that it works—amazingly well. KYUSS Welcome to Sky Valley (1994, Elektra/Chameleon) Like many bands in this book, the Palm Desert, California, Kyuss (named after a Dungeons and Dragons character) enjoyed only a tiny fraction of the respect it now commands while the band was active. In that sense, Kyuss is now compared to The Velvet Underground in the context of the heavy music/metal landscape of the last two decades. Kyuss was formed in 1990 by recent high-school graduates John Garcia (vocals), Nick Oliveri (bass), Brant Bjork (drums), and future Queens of the Stone Age leader Josh Homme. (The guitarist famously tuned down to C and ran his instrument through a bass amp/cabinet.) The band brought worldwide exposure to its specific regional scene (also home to the paisley underground’s darkest and heaviest band, Thin White Rope, as well as area notables, Across the River), and effectively launched the underground metal offshoot movement known as “stoner rock” (a.k.a. “stoner metal” or “desert rock”) that continues on healthily to this day (albeit in a more multifaceted form). Though the band’s Blues for the Red Sun (1992) was responsible for gaining Kyuss its first taste of critical acclaim and increased exposure— and continues to beat out this record as an easy touchstone— third album Welcome to Sky Valley is the one that partially dictated the future of underground heaviness. Kyuss deserves its respected position in the modern history of heavy-rock/metal and underground—and this album is the reason why.

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LABRADFORD Prazision LP (1993, Kranky) Labradford’s debut album is not “rock” in any stylistic or structural sense, but rather a statement of musical individualism that was one of many found among the melting pot that flourished under the general banner of indie rock. This was the first album released on Kranky Records, one of the leading labels in the move to take American experimental underground rock into the future and home to Jessamine and Bowery Electric. Labradford was instrumental in establishing the analog keyboard/ synthesizer as an accessory to or in place of the guitar in the underground, something that would prove a popular move in later times. Labradford was a duo and sometimes a trio, and on Prazision LP, the approach was to fashion very thick and distorted layers of ambient drones and noise into minimal twoor three-note melodies, all with analog synths, keys, and other effects, and then sing over it in the ethereally updated style of the vocals heard in shoegaze. The album is best compared, if it can be compared to anything at all, to the ’70s ambient work of Brian Eno, but made noisier and evolved into droning pop songs. As for contemporaries, this album was unlike anything to come out of American underground rock at the time, but it does have a spiritual counterpart in some of the works by the U.K.’s Main, the project formed by Loop guitarist Robert Hampson after the breakup of that band. LAUGHING HYENAS You Can’t Pray a Lie (1989, Touch and Go) Negative Approach singer John Brannon formed this band with lady-friend Larissa Strickland on guitar, her brother Kevin on bass, and Jim Kimball (brother of The Jesus Lizard’s Dennison Kimball) on drums. Many albums throughout rock-and-roll’s history could carry the additional signifier of “hard-living set to music,” but few are as convincing as the albums made by Laughing Hyenas. “You Can’t Pray a Lie” hits with immense power and is part John Lee Hooker/Howlin’ Wolf blues, part Stooges dirtbag proto-punk, part drug-mired Rolling Stones, and 100 percent noise-rock nihilism and aggression. Strickland’s unique abuse of her guitar produced riffs that were long sheets of pain crammed into wherever they might fit within the stomping rhythm work. Brannon’s imposing

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roar sounded like it came from a man who could beat the shit out of you with nothing more than a mean stare. LAUGHING HYENAS Hard Times (1995, Touch and Go) There was more melody and precision to the band by the time its third and final full-length Hard Times came along. Strickland had developed into a one-woman deluge of uncomplicated guitarplaying force, and the rhythm section was now Ex-Necros’ Todd Swalla on drums and Ron Sakowski on bass. But this was still the Laughing Hyenas, a band that genuinely walked the walk that it talked. The 1992 LP Life of Crime was barely edged out of the running for inclusion here and is also recommended, but Hard Times is the best place to start with the Hyenas, as working one’s way backward through the band’s body of work is probably the way to go for most prospective fans or admirers. THE LEMONHEADS Creator (1988, Taang!) Everything good about the Lemonheads’ 1987 debut Hate Your Friends—serviceable Hüsker Dü noise-pop and melodic hardcore à la Descendents, with a touch of J Mascis/Dinosaur Jr —resurfaced as great on sophomore effort Creator. Additionally, there’s serious studying at the altar of another Boston institution, Mission of Burma (evident on “Clang Bang Clang,” the LP’s strongest track), a fantastic cover of Charles Manson’s “Home Is Where You’re Happy,” and the first signs of Evan Dando’s jangle-folk-pop brilliance to conflict with the more aggressive songwriting of original guitarist/songwriter Ben Deilly. The latter’s departure following 1989’s Lick would turn the Lemonheads into the Dando-dr that found a much, much larger audience a few years later with a (relative) hit album, the excellent It’s a Shame about Ray. While that album was the band’s final certifiable classic, Creator was most assuredly its first.

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THE LEMONHEADS It’s a Shame about Ray (1993, Atlantic) Following the 1989 departure of co-guitarist/co-songwriter Ben Deilly, after the release of that year’s Lick album (a minor college-rock hit propelled by the cover of Suzanne Vega’s “Luka” that was also released as a single), the Lemonheads became Evan Dando’s show on all subsequent albums, including major-label debut Lovey (1990) and the follow-up that would transform the band (and Dando) into a temporary household name: 1993’s It’s a Shame about Ray. Assisted by fellow Bostonian and frequent collaborator Juliana Hatfield (of Blake Babies and solo fame), an artistic sabbatical down under, and some Aussie musician friends, Dando crafted a well-timed indie/alt-rock powerhouse of an album (the band’s fifth overall). Supported by ripping noise-pop gems like “Alison’s Starting to Happen,” a post-release addition of the band’s cover of Simon and Garfunkel’s “Mrs. Robinson” (which went to No. 8 on Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks), and the plaintive ballad that was the title track (also an alternative hit), It’s a Shame about Ray peaked at No. 68 on the Billboard 200 and has gone on to be heralded as a classic of the era—a status it surely earned with its start-to-finish top-shelf songwriting and agile delicate-to-rocking stylistic tip-toeing. LILYS In the Presence of Nothing (1992, Slumberland/spinART) Of the many stateside albums informed by the U.K.-birthed shoegaze movement, the (then) D.C./Pennsylvania-based Lilys’ full-length debut is among the best that resided at the top without much of an American touch. The biggest specific reference point here is My Bloody Valentine’s Isn’t Anything (1988), the rocking predecessor to that band’s genre-shifting Loveless, but most critics missed that point and compared In the Presence of Nothing to the latter MBV album (due to timing, perhaps). The Lilys’ sole static member, Kurt Heasley (who has, to date, gone through no less than seventy-two bandmates) wrote and recorded much of the album himself with help from members of Velocity Girl, the Ropers, and Suddenly Tammy! Admittedly, “There’s No Such Thing as Black Orchids” and “Tonebender” could have come off the aforementioned masterpiece by MBV, but the intense fervor of “Periscope” and

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the pop-gold of closer “Claire Hates Me” contribute more to this album’s deserved semi-legendary status and often-missed originality than any supposed “elephant in the room” influence from across the pond. LILYS Eccsame the Photon Band (1994, spinART) A completely different listen, from what was mostly a completely different band (aside from ringleader and songwriter Kurt Heasley), the second Lilys full-length, Eccsame the Photon Band, sheds most of the guitar distortion and blatant shoegaze/My Bloody Valentine influence of the band’s debut in exchange for, among other things, what often sounds like a creatively successful indie rock interpretation of Meddle-era Pink Floyd, ethereal ’70s AM radio pop (e.g., 10cc’s “I’m Not In Love”), and other atmospheric reference points of past, present, and (as it would turn out) the future. Rightfully tagged by critics (in an increasing fashion since its release) as a benchmark of the indie rock subset known as “dream-pop,” Eccsame the Photon Band is certainly one of the great “headphone albums” to come out of the American underground of the ’90s. Note: the album that came right before this one, A Brief History of Amazing Letdowns (a mini-album), and follow-up full-length, Better Can’t Make Your Life Better, released in 1996, are quite unlike Eccsame (though not in a bad way); they saw the ultra-prolific Heasley going from orchestrated ’60s pop to more contemporary Pavement-like indie rock. This album, however, is more of a singular vision. LORELEI Everyone Must Touch the Stove (1995, Slumberland) The 1992 7-inch and 1993 7-inch/CD EP released (both on Slumberland) by the Virginia-based Lorelei (not to be confused with the early-century Pittsburgh band of the same name) might have hinted at what was to come but in no way prepared listeners (the few who were paying attention at the time, anyway) for the band’s one and only full-length album, 1995’s Everyone Must Touch the Stove. Self-recorded (an amazing fact given the era and the results), the album blasts a vast musical palette into the future, yet remains a cohesive statement regardless of which stylistic wonder-world is being explored by each song. A strange 176 GIMME INDIE ROCK

sexuality to the lyrics and a blatantly European vocal style (in and of itself something very hard for an American band to pull off) persist throughout the album, but otherwise, things careen from the angular dub-reggae rhythmic backbone and noisy shards of guitar on the anchoring tracks “Inside the Crimelab” and “Day,” to the sky-puncturing shoegaze rock of “Quiet Staid Debt,” “Newsprint,” and “Thigh for a Leg,” to the mid-period-XTC folkbounce of “Today’s Shrug,” to many other yet (or never)-to-bescaled heights in underground rock. Lorelei sort of disappeared from the radar shortly after the album’s release, but Slumberland Records knew all along that Everyone Must Touch the Stove was something special, and it got the band to reunite and perform at the label’s twentieth-anniversary festival in 2009. LOVE 666 American Revolution (1995, Amphetamine Reptile) Lyrically and aesthetically, this band adopted the Vietnam-era anti-establishment “stick it to the man” sentiments of the MC5 and other such voices and added little updating for the early ’90s. Weirder still was that it remained unclear as to whether the band was aware of how cartoonish it all seemed some twenty-plus years after the fact. So this left the music itself as a redeemer, and what a saving grace it is. Imagine My Bloody Valentine/shoegazer guitar sounds lifted in bite-sized chunks, inserted to fit between pounding, early-Melvins-ish drum patterns, with male/female vocals spoken or sung in a style that is at once “out-of-song” disconnected and wonderfully melodic. American Revolution wasn’t just a musical anomaly within the Amphetamine Reptile noise-rock roster; it drew zero comparisons to any other piece of ’90s underground rock. LOW I Could Live in Hope (1994, Vernon Yard) Of the bands grouped into “sadcore” and “slowcore” classifications by critics in the early ’90s, none were slower—or perhaps sadder (though Red House Painters might win that contest)—than Low. The band’s roots lay in a live prank pulled off by guitarist/founder/singer Alan Sparhawk’s pre-Low band Zen Identity, in which the band performed a set of excruciatingly slow, sonically stripped, low-volume songs to a grunge/alt-rock-hungry

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audience. Reaction notwithstanding, Sparhawk liked the musical result and formed Low to carry out this vision. His wife, Mimi Parker, took a brush-and-stick approach to a drum kit consisting of a floor tom and a single cymbal. Bassist John Nichols rounded out the lineup that would record Low’s debut for major label subsidiary Vernon Yard. I Could Live in Hope is eleven songs of indie rock minimalism pushed to the limits of its guitar/bass/drums structural threshold. As previously suggested, this music is played sloooowly—an unprecedented pace in the then-flowering underground. Parker (who possesses a strikingly beautiful voice) and Sparhawk often sang in unison. The guitar and bass lines were clean and minimal, but mixed loud enough to alleviate fragility from Low’s stylistic agenda. Only Half Japanese and Beat Happening, two bands that otherwise had nothing to do with Low, shared this band’s ability to make a lot from very little. I Could Live in Hope does indeed emanate a joyful or hopeful mood on some of its single-wordtitled tracks, offsetting the sometimes overpowering despair communicated elsewhere. Fun fact: most writings about I Could Live in Hope mention opening track “Words” as an original Low composition, attributing its lyrical theme of “too many words” to the band’s issues with crowd conversation or tendency toward repeated vocal lines. In fact, “Words” was a hit single for the Bee Gees in 1967 and has been covered by everyone from Elvis to Rita Coolidge, and was a No. 1 hit for Irish boy-band Boyzone in 1996. LOW Long Division (1995, Vernon Yard) Low’s quick follow-up to 1994’s I Could Live in Hope certainly proved that Vernon Yard Recordings owner Virgin Records let this faux-indie label release whatever it saw fit, even as other major labels started to drop bands, shutter seed labels similar to this one, and basically dial down the Wild-West aspect of the feeding frenzy that had gone unchecked over the three years following Nirvana’s success. To imagine anything off of Low’s Long Division as a part of the programming for the country’s proliferation of alternative/grunge-focused “X-stations” is to imagine phones lighting up incessantly, courtesy of seriously depressed Offspring fans. 178 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Long Division is without much of the “hopeful” or “joyful” disposition that stabilized I Could Live in Hope. In fact, this album brings in a subtle underlying menace to Low’s aesthetic and is unequivocally one of the biggest downers this side of the doom metal subgenre. It’s not recommended for bad days or post-breakup listening. Long Division was the first Low album to feature bassist Zak Sally, who would remain in the band through the recording of The Great Destroyer from 2005. LOW The Curtain Hits the Cast (1996, Vernon Yard) Even within the ultra-restrictive musical boundaries Low set for itself over its previous two albums, the band did (and still does) follow an arc of creative progression, and The Curtain Hits the Cast marked the first of several stylistic shifts in the band’s stillgrowing discography. There’s essentially only one direction Low could go after the suicide-watch soundtrack, Long Division. On that album as well as the debut I Could Live in Hope, the longer tracks took the form of dark dirges. Here, similarly stretched songs never betray the overall lightening of vibes heard and felt on the album’s shorter tracks. The saintly single, “Over the Ocean,” adopts Low’s new hymn-like approach to the sonic brand the band itself invented. This isn’t to suggest The Curtain Hits the Cast contains any Monday Night Football moments, but the brighter temperament and relative widening of musical vocabulary, along with the band’s admirable tenacity, did bring Low to a larger audience as it transitioned from a lesser-known underground entity to one of this book’s hiatus-free survivor stories (along with Built to Spill, Flaming Lips, Wilco, and so on). LUNGFISH Pass and Stow (1994, Dischord) Baltimore-based post-hardcore institution Lungfish released its first album in 1990, its fourth (this one) in 1994, and its eleventh in 2005, shortly before the band went on semi-hiatus. A twelfth album from a previously unavailable session appeared in 2012. (In addition, singer/founder/visual and solo artist Daniel Higgs— also formerly the singer for ’80s Dischord/hardcore band Reptile House—has released fifteen albums since 1998.) A bit of a cult following surrounds Higgs and the band he fronted for more than

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eighteen years (Lungfish formed in 1987). Aside from 1990 debut Necklace of Heads (released by Simple Machines) every Lungfish album was released on Dischord Records, and every Lungfish album is no waste of time. But the band’s trademark hypnotic formula was sharpened into the sublime on album number four—Pass and Stow (1994)—and its follow-up, Sound in Time (1996), then was further tweaked on each release that followed. Marked by Higgs’ sung or sung-screamed poetry (it’s literally poetry—he’s carved a niche in that world, too), guitarist Asa Osborne’s genius with repetitive arpeggios, and the locktight rhythm section, Lungfish is disciplined and in no way short on heart or personality, usually doing what it needs to do with no more than two chords. Pass and Stow kicks off with three tunes that are hard to mistake for any band other than Lungfish—“Cleaner than Your Surroundings,” “Straightaway,” and “Washing Away”—then increases its payoff with the subtle detour into prettiness “The Trap Gets Set” and the start-stop riffing and chanted chorus of “Astronaut’s Prayer.” LUNGFISH Sound in Time (1996, Dischord) Compared to Pass and Stow (1994), Sound in Time carries a touch more melody and a little less venom in Higgs’ signature vocals. (“Venomous” is only one of the man’s many singing styles.) Running a succinct forty minutes, the (comparatively) subtle album (Lungfish’s fifth) is the perfect entry point for exploring this band, particularly if the “post-hardcore” tag or Dischord affiliation summons apprehension, or if one is among those who like the band’s hooks or need a break from the consistently visceral. LUXURIOUS BAGS Frayed Knots (1994, Twisted Village) By the 1994 release of Luxurious Bags’ third and final album, countless home-recorded acts were flooding the area of indie rock known as lo-fi. Not a band, per se, but mostly comprising future Major Stars member Tom Leonard with some help from members of St. Johnny, Luxurious Bags first showed up with the From Heaven to My Head album in 1989, followed by Voluntary Lifelong Quarantine in 1992. Recorded, according to the liner notes, 180 GIMME INDIE ROCK

“sporadically between 1992 and 1994 at Twisted Village and Masonic Temples throughout the Northeast” (the former being the record store and label run by Crystallized Movements/Magic Hour/ Major Stars leaders Wayne Rogers and Kate Biggers), Frayed Knots is the best showcase of Leonard’s gift for weaving beautifully sad, lumbering, psychedelic (especially his guitar soloing) indie rock– informed compositions with a huge sound and feel . . . all out of a very minimal recording setup. LYRES On Fyre (1984, Ace of Hearts) Boston’s DMZ was one of several underground bands snapped up by Sire Records’ Seymour Stein in the mid- to late ’70s. (Others included the Pretenders, the Ramones, Radio Birdman, and Talking Heads.) It was all part of his dubious rebranding campaign that gave the world the term “new wave.” DMZ’s selftitled Sire album tanked in 1978, however, and the band broke up shortly thereafter. Singer Jeff “Monoman” Conolly then formed the Lyres in 1979 to further flesh out the ’60s Nuggets-style psych-garage-rock influence heard in his previous band. Firmly associated with the (mostly) East Coast ’60s garage-rock revivalist movement of the ’80s—but also much more interesting than most if not all of the other bands in this troubled subgenre—the Lyres released their debut, On Fyre, in 1984 on the Ace of Hearts Label, run by eccentric Bostonian Rick Heart and also home to Mission of Burma. The album is a seminal work of garage-rock/ punk shot through with an artless American post-punk/collegerock sensibility and stuffed with rock-and-roll gold. Check out “Help You Ann” for a sampling.

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MALIGNUS YOUTH More to It (1992, Youth Inc.) Coming out of Sierra Vista, Arizona, in 1987, Malignus Youth remains, almost twenty years later, one of the best-kept secrets in the (now) thirty-five-year chronology of every musical strain or style that falls under the umbrella of “hardcore.” By the time Malignus Youth wrote and recorded the full-length More to It, the quartet was able to perfectly capture a style of hardcore it had been developing since the band formed. It is an unbelievably spirited collection of extraordinarily fast tempos, three-part harmonies where there had once been shouted vocals, a single guitar accompanying lead-like bass lines that beautifully “sing” the song along with the vocals in rather high registers across complex arrangements—in other words, completely different and superior to the ultra-busy schizophrenic genre- and tempojumping style that was also developing in hardcore and would become more popular in the ’90s. Malignus Youth incorporated a working knowledge of classical music in its work, structuring songs with four-part polyrhythms and authentic cadences. The songs achieve their furious melodic rush by piling up progressions of five to six chords at an inhumanly fast tempo, creating a tension-then-release-thenrelease that has an immediate physiological effect on the listener. In addition, all three vocalists take turns on lead within a song, which sounds like one ultra-fast singer who doesn’t take a breath for the entire duration. Some songs even employ minor and modal chord progressions in the canonic variation. Conceptually, More to It is deeply influenced by the writings of philosopher Immanuel Kant. If that, combined with the band’s firm grasp and use of music theory, sounds like it would make for a stiff, pretentious, or po-faced listening experience, rest assured: it is exactly the opposite. Today, this music sounds like what great hardcore might become by 2024. It is 100 percent organic, extremely human, absurdly melodic and catchy, and ultimately one of the most thrilling listens created in American underground music during the last three and a half decades.

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MAN SIZED ACTION Five Story Garage (1984, Reflex) Reflex Records was the imprint Hüsker Dü created in 1981 for the sole purpose of appearing on the sleeve of the band’s debut 7-inch to provide the illusion of professionalism. This trick was employed by many of the late ’70s/early-’80s artists that made up America’s first true DIY movement, as the underground music history covered by this book is sometimes, accurately, termed. Reflex grew into a band-run entity that served outside acts the Hüskers were enthusiastic about. Unlike certain other imprints that began in the same fashion (such as Black Flag’s SST and the Dead Kennedys’ Alternative Tentacles), Reflex didn’t go on to become a cultural and musical force; but it did release fifteen titles, including records by Ground Zero, Minutemen, Articles of Faith, Rifle Sport—and Man Sized Action—before quietly ceasing to operate in 1985. Man Sized Action formed out of “The Veggies,” an oddly named core group of Minneapolis Hüsker fans in the early ’80s. Soon the fidgety and frantic four-piece found itself on both of the cassette-only compilations (Kitten and Barefoot and Pregnant) that Reflex released in 1982 before going on to release its 1983 debut Claustrophobia and the following year’s much better sophomore effort, Five Story Garage. It was on this album that Man Sized Action expanded to a quintet with second guitarist Brian Paulson, who would become a highly respected and sought-after producer and audio engineer after manning the board on such ’90s landmarks as Slint’s Spiderland, Uncle Tupelo’s Anodyne, Son Volt’s Trace, Wilco’s A.M., and Archers of Loaf’s All the Nation’s Airports. Claustrophobia is an adequately solid debut, but Five Story Garage is the sort of album that becomes a reference point for future forward-thinkers regarding titles that have managed to rise above the legacy afforded a historical footnote. This one has not, and it remains an overlooked obscurity. The songwriting hits the mark on each of the eight tracks on this seventeen-minute album. Paulson’s contribution moves the riffs away from the jab-and-stab borderline no-wave brittleness of Claustrophobia, but the band still favors the trebly, sometimes funky, and all-around skeletal interpretation of post punk usually associated with the late-’70s and turn-of-the-’80s sounds of the Fire Engines, early Mekons,

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Wire’s Pink Flag and Chairs Missing, and the faster material on Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures. It’s just that Five Story Garage perfects that interpretation with an injection of distinctly American post-hardcore ingenuity. J MASCIS Martin + Me (1996, Sire) This mostly forgotten curio happens to be J Mascis’ first solo album and is made up of the best recordings from the Dinosaur Jr CEO’s solo acoustic tour of late 1995. Undeservedly marginalized by critics who labeled the album with the “for completists only” death-knell, Martin + Me (“Martin” is the brand of guitar Mascis plays here) remains a lesser-known title in Mascis’ vast body of work. But he attacks the acoustic just like he does an electric, and the arrangements rebirth the included Dinosaur Jr tracks, most of which are pulled from the band’s five years on a major label. A big part of what makes this album such a charming achievement are the selected covers: The Smiths’ “The Boy With the Thorn in His Side,” Wipers’ “On the Run,” Carly Simon’s “Anticipation,” and Lynyrd Skynyrd’s best song, “Every Mother’s Son.” MATERIAL ISSUE International Pop Overthrow (1991, Mercury) At opposing ends of the sonic spectrum, deregulated/adventurous metal and revived power-pop were the two undercurrents during indie rock’s ’86–’96 heyday that weathered the most neglect at the time then left the longest marks on the future of underground rock. One look at the cover of this record will tell readers that Material Issue wasn’t playing generator parties in the middle of the desert like Kyuss or opening for Helmet with night after night of 8:00 p.m. slots playing to the echoing emptiness of theaters that won’t be filled for another two hours. That said, it’s hard to properly describe how weird Material Issue’s unapologetically retro mod-pop look and Cheap Trick-meets-The Jam-meets-The Posies crunch-pop seemed next to Superchunk or Sebadoh in 1991. But the songs on the band’s breakthrough debut are about as perfect as rock gets. The band had been kicking around since 1985, scoring some regional radio love in Chicago with the self-released 1989 single “Renee Remains the Same,” which led to major label attention 186 GIMME INDIE ROCK

and a deal with Mercury. The album took two years to complete, and the label only expected to move 70,000 copies. But this college-radio hit (which also made a minor splash on mainstream radio) went on to sell more than 300,000. The album’s unforgettable earworms “Diane” and “Valerie Loves Me” got major rotation on MTV’s 120 Minutes in the split-second before Nirvana changed the whole game in early 1992. Material Issue released two more full-lengths, each selling less and garnering little respect from the grunge-crazed press, and Mercury dropped the band in 1995. Tragically, founder/ singer/guitarist Jim Ellison took his own life in 1996. The band is now justifiably recognized as leaders of a power-pop revival that continues today. An annual festival dedicated to the subgenre is named after this very album—just one example of the band’s retroactive legacy of rabid fandom and respect. MAZZY STAR She Hangs Brightly (1990, Rough Trade/Capitol) When vocalist and bassist Kendra Smith (formerly of The Dream Syndicate) left Opal in 1989, singing duties were quickly assumed by Hope Sandoval, a friend of guitarist and founder David Roback, and the band’s name was changed to Mazzy Star by year’s end. Sandoval’s distinct free-floating vocal style and Roback’s more ambient guitar work (softening some of the rougher edges heard on the Opal record), met at a point between shoegaze/dream pop and The Velvet Underground, but without the noise associated with the former or invading the stylistic turf of any of the other bands that had attempted the same general mix. The sound on Mazzy Star’s debut full-length, She Hangs Brightly, was welcoming, accessible, fresh, and fueled by artistic integrity, granting the album a historical place within the musical landscape into which it was dropped. But fame would wait until the follow-up, So Tonight that I Might See (1993), and the success of its single “Fade Into You,” a hit that has aged gracefully and sounds great in waiting rooms and office lobbies to this day.

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MEAT PUPPETS S/T (1982, SST) This now-legendary American underground institution debuted in 1981 with the In a Car 7-inch EP (strongly recommended), which contained five songs that spazzed out and blew by in five minutes. But Phoenix, Arizona’s, Kirkwood brothers (Curt on guitar and Cris on bass) and drummer Derrick Bostrom didn’t make under-a-minute hardcore explosions like, say, the early Descendents or Bad Brains did during the same era. Early Meat Puppets was an unhinged and, in a way, a scarier interpretation of fast-blast hardcore. But the irony is that, if one listens close enough, these three guys were as accomplished on their instruments as Bad Brains or the Minutemen, shredding and locking together like psychics. (The brothers are surely connected by a musical telepathy all their own.) Following In a Car, this self-titled album took three to four days to record (by SST in-house producer Spot), and it’s mostly first takes. One seemingly nonsensical fact that makes total sense upon close listen is that the entire band (according to numerous interviews with the Kirkwood brothers) was blazing on LSD for 100 percent of their time in the studio. This is hardcore from the heart (as well as from the drug-damaged mind), motivated by a desire to disturb and freak out everyone else in the then-escalating HC scene—a goal that it met time and time again. This Meat Puppets album differs greatly from all later releases by the band, but at the same time, there are moments that point to the future. The band’s take on Americana or country music makes its way onto songs like “Saturday Morning” and the twang-meets-scorching noise of “Our Friends.” Elsewhere, “Electromud,” “Litter Box,” “Melons Rising,” “The Gold Mine,” “Reward,” and many other tracks push the wild-ass performance of In a Car to the next level. This is one of hardcore’s peerless and most colorful showpieces.

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MEAT PUPPETS II (1984, SST) This wasn’t the first (and it sure as shit wouldn’t be the last) country-roots-punk-hardcore hybrid album to come out of America’s spiraling-every-which-way underground of the early to mid-’80s. But if it’s not the best, it’s but a hair shy of that distinction, and there’s no question that nothing sounded like Meat Puppets’ II in 1984. The scary, hot mess that was this band’s self-titled debut seems three whole careers away from most of II, yet that doesn’t mean that things were necessarily calmer this time around. The Meat Puppets’ love of ZZ Top and other masters of fried ’70s boogie rears its head a tad here, but for the most part, the trio’s sophomore album (their best by far) is all over the place. It was one of those classic early-SST moments that made no sense at the time, only because it was looking so far into the future. Nirvana, during its 1993 MTV Unplugged performance, famously covered three songs from II while joined by members of Meat Puppets, thus resurrecting the band for its ’90s resurgence. MEDICINE Shot Forth Self Living (1992, Def American) The shoegaze movement was a branch of underground rock pioneered by U.K. bands and interpreted in a distinctly American manner once stateside acts caught on around 1990 or 1991. This reciprocal relationship had been in place since the dawn of rock and roll: one side invented a form then the other side brought its own unique interpretation to the table a year or two tardy. Shoegaze was heavily influenced by American torchbearers like Dinosaur Jr, Hüsker Dü, and Sonic Youth (all of which were more popular in the U.K. than in the United States during their respective salad days), but that influence was outweighed by the originality (and distinct Anglo-sound) of My Bloody Valentine, Chapterhouse, A. R. Kane, Loop, the Boo Radleys, and other British progenitors with releases that predated 1990. Not counting a few bands that toyed with the style early on (including Ultra Vivid Scene, Galaxie 500, The Belltower, and For Against), the best American shoegaze bands started popping up with 7-inches in 1990 and 1991. But after My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless album (released in November 1991) changed the way a lot of people

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heard indie rock of any stripe, 1992 turned out to be the year American shoegaze came into its own with several distinct and preeminent full-length albums. By and large, the belated American contribution to this movement was more organic, noticeably indebted to late-’80s noise-pop, and more amenable to the influence of heavier music. It rocked harder and shoveled on more guitar distortion compared to that of the U.K. bands from which the basic source material was derived. Medicine was founded in 1990 by L.A.based keyboardist/guitarist Brad Laner, an underground scene vet with a decade of bands and band membership behind him (Debt to Nature, Steaming Coils, Pilgrim State, Savage Republic, and the L.A.M.F. collective, etc.). Medicine was soon one of the first American bands to be signed by British shoegaze safe house Creation Records (for its U.K. releases). In the states, the band was picked up by Rick Rubin’s Def American imprint of Warner Bros. (soon to be known as American Records and easily the most forward-thinking major-label option at the time). Medicine’s 1992 debut full-length, Shot Forth Self Living is enough of a singular take on shoegaze to be just as groundbreaking and challenging as Loveless. The album starts off with the nine-minute “One More,” a paint-stripping attempt at the harshest marriage of dissonance and beauty to come out of America’s independent underground since, well, an applicable precedent doesn’t readily come to mind. That’s followed by “Aruca,” the album’s single that kicks off with a full minute of room-clearing noise worthy of power-electronics nihilists Whitehouse before it morphs into a demented take on the guitar-over-rave-rhythms shoegaze favored by bands like Curve and Chapterhouse. Elsewhere, two longer tracks—“A Short Happy Life” and closer “Christmas Song”—move along at a crawl, providing plenty of room to pile heavily effected guitar, thick bass, and hard-hitting drums on top of Beth Thompson’s angelic vocals. The result is nothing short of breathtaking. Brad Laner’s unique guitar sound was achieved by running his instrument through a cheap Yamaha four-track machine. The result, along with Thompson’s singing style, help anchor Shot Forth Self Living’s eventual status as a groundbreaking work within America’s history of noise/dream-pop and shoegaze music.

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MELVINS Gluey Porch Treatments (1987, Alchemy) Famously emerging from the same logging industry hellhole (Aberdeen, Washington) as their famous prodigy-turned-mega-star associate, Kurt Cobain, the Melvins had been kicking around a very, very heavy variety of hardcore for half a decade (released on several compilations and the 1986 EP, 6 Songs) before the band’s first full-length, Gluey Porch Treatments, unofficially launched a legend-making artistic journey that continues with the most prolific and creatively restless of outputs some twenty-five-plus years after its 1987 release. Even in the midst of the simultaneously blossoming metal underground, Treatments’ nine-minute opener “Eye Flys” exuded an as-yet-unheard degree of “heavy.” The track takes what was heard on side two of Black Flag’s My Way and on Flipper’s Generic and draws it out so slowly and methodically that breaths are taken between each eight-ton riff, inaugurating the Melvins’ trademark “weirding” of the fledging doom-metal style concurrently plied by bands like Trouble, Candlemass, and Saint Vitus. For the few that heard it at the time, this was something brand new and bewitching—as were singer/guitarist/band guru (and one-time Cobain hero) Buzz Osborne’s passionate howl-to-growl singing style splattered all over the place and Dale Crover’s surgical plod on the drums. The rest of the album is mostly shorter songs played at a similar or incrementally brisker tempo, intercut with tracks resembling the band’s earlier strain of rolling metallic hardcore. The cover art, the vague creepiness of song titles and lyrics, and the band’s silly name added more layers that both confused and captivated listeners. The seeds for what would hypnotize a huge cult following some years later were already in place. MELVINS Ozma (1989, Boner) Ozma lacks any of the glacially propelled, epic-length sludge that punctuated Gluey Porch Treatments, but the thirty-five-minute, sixteen-track blow to the senses is the ideal complement to the Melvins’ debut full-length. Back when a deep understanding, appreciation, and realization of heaviness (in essence and dynamics) was the prominent peace-making olive branch extended between the communities of metal and post-hardcore

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indie rock, Ozma was a mind-blowing move to the next level. Soon after its release, Ozma was combined with Gluey Porch Treatments on one CD, but it has since overshadowed its predecessor in the extremely big picture (which is getting bigger by the year) that the Melvins’ body of work has become. The band’s lineup would suffer from some turnaround in the bass position up through the early-’90s, and Ozma is notable for featuring Lori Black (credited as “Lorax”), daughter of Shirley Temple, on the instrument in question. MELVINS Bullhead/Eggnog EP (both 1991, Boner) As far as the two Melvins techniques that had dominated the band’s output up to this juncture, this album and EP update the metal-based outsider crawl of heaviness pioneered by the two preceding albums (and predicts the perfection of it on the following full-length, 1992’s Lysol). The trio’s third album (along with its sister four-song 10-inch EP, Eggnog) is the release that promoted this always good (but often great) band into a subgenre of one. These two titles would birth the “stoner-sludge/rock/ metal” movement of the ’90s that (add to this claim a couple of Kyuss albums that would appear in ’92 and ’94, respectively), like the band itself, thrives to this very moment in a much wider variety of ways. Essential stuff. MELVINS Lysol (1992, Boner) At a pace that would make a funeral procession seem like a record-breaking luge run, Lysol’s first track “Hung Bunny” opens with six-and-a-half minutes of a towering two-note riff progression and ethereal, mixed-low vocal “aaahhhs” before drummer Dale Crover slams a single strike to his kit. The next drum beat comes exactly thirty seconds after the first, but within a few more minutes, listeners are surrounded by the half-hour, three-part suite that is rightfully regarded as the pinnacle of the Melvins’ particular brand of doom-metal. Closing with a spot-on cover of Alice Cooper’s “The Ballad of Dwight Fry,” Lysol is both a heavy-music landmark and one of the pioneering works from the Ameri-Indie underground of the early ’90s. Note: Lysol became a Melvins self-titled album, starting with the album’s second 192 GIMME INDIE ROCK

pressing, due to legal actions by the aerosol air-freshener’s parent company, the Reckitt Benckiser Corporation. MELVINS Houdini (1993, Atlantic) As of early 2014, the Melvins have been consistently and prolifically active for more than three decades, averaging a high degree of quality throughout nearly forty studio and live fulllength titles, along with countless 7-inches and EPs. So it should mean something that the two studio full-lengths Atlantic released in 1993 and 1994 collectively constitute the band’s artistic zenith, with Houdini barely bumping Stoner Witch to second place. Third major label album, Stag, is fine but suffers from too much of the side of Melvins that often comes off as brazen fucking around for the sake of it. This Kurt Cobain–“produced” album (he is alleged to have napped through most of the sessions and his input is questionable) seamlessly mixes two basic styles of Melvins: a noticeably better variety of the slow, ungodly heavy, yet melodic off-kilter doom-metal with which the band made its mark in previous years, and speedier fare, like a thick and weird sludgethrash driven by catchy, inspired songwriting. Best tracks for the curious are “Night Goat,” the cover of KISS’s “Goin’ Blind,” and the mind-shattering awesomeness of “Honey Bucket,” often named as the Melvins’ shining moment. Houdini is the best starting place for future fanatics (which vastly outnumber casual fans within the Melvins’ respectably sized cult following). MELVINS Stoner Witch (1994, Atlantic) The motive behind the previous entry’s ranking of Houdini above Stoner Witch is probably based solely on personal taste. Both albums are basically locked in a tie at the top of the Melvins’ mountain of releases. Stoner Witch is a hair more accessible and even prettier in parts, but by and large, this is the same walk down the middle between slow, huge, and hair-raising sludge/ doom-metal perfection, and fast, huge, punk-thrashing hookmetal perfection. The first four songs on Stoner Witch might be the heaviest pop songs of all time.

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MERCURY REV Yerself Is Steam/Lego My Ego (1991, Mint Films/1992, Columbia) The Flaming Lips’ Jonathan Donahue (second guitar) left that band after the recording of 1990’s In a Priest Driven Ambulance, and he formed Mercury Rev in 1989 with producer Dave Fridmann, flutist Suzanne Thorpe, singer David Baker, and a guitarist who goes by the pseudonym “Grasshopper.” Clearly Donahue was holding back on some ideas during his Flaming Lips tenure, because Mercury Rev invented a new and arresting form of psychedelic/experimental noise-pop across its first three albums. The 1991 debut, Yerself Is Steam, draws from U.K. shoegaze/drone rock (Loop, My Bloody Valentine, etc.); that country’s modern indie-psych powerhouse of the ’80s, The Bevis Frond; and late-’80s American bands like Galaxie 500, Crystallized Movements, and of course, the Flaming Lips. But otherwise, Mercury Rev was in a class of its own on three albums that gained little attention and remain overlooked today. (Later, the band found some fame in the U.K. after transitioning into an often gorgeous but less daring wide-screen indie-pop band.) Yerself Is Steam features the greatest underground rock single of the early-90’s, “Car Wash Hair,” a song sure to make a fan out of any first-time listener. But the longer opener, “Chasing a Bee,” and the mid-album anchor track “Frittering” are the foundational tracks for Mercury Rev’s gift (phase 1 of the band). After Mercury Rev’s first label, Rough Trade, went bankrupt in 1991, Columbia Records snapped up the band and re-released this album in 1992. Within the alt-rock explosion taking hold, this was one of the more bizarre band-label unions (based on the challenging nature of Mercury Rev’s music). To note: only the CD version of this album includes “Car Wash Hair,” and because the band played a prank on its public by sequencing the next-to-last song into ninety-eight fragments, that final selection is track 99.

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MERCURY REV Boces (1993, Columbia) On Mercury Rev’s second album, Boces, the band uses debut Yerself Is Steam—which had established a prodigious, still anomalous form of indie-psych-rock ear-worms and blasts of multilayered noise that was unlike anything previously heard in underground rock—as a launching pad to bypass contemporaries and shock listeners and fans, with everyone left behind to scratch their respective heads and wonder if Mercury Rev was even human. At almost eleven minutes, opener “Meth of a Rockette’s Kick” is perhaps the greatest feat of tension and release on any of this book’s 500 albums, and that’s tension for nine minutes and release for one and a half, by the way. Elsewhere, the band covers Sly and the Family Stone’s “If You Want Me to Stay” but this depends on one’s idea of a “cover” and capacity for headspinning insanity. Track three, “Bronx Cheer,” could be imagined as a competitive jab at pals the Flaming Lips, the kind that says, “See? We can do what you do if we want—and do it about ten times better!” Fun fact: Perry Farrell was a fan of Mercury Rev and invited them to play the second stage at Lollapalooza 1993. On the Denver stop, the city’s mayor dropped by and infamously described Mercury Rev as sounding like “a gymnasium of idling buses.” He was so angered and disturbed by the band drowning out whoever happened to be on the main stage that Mercury Rev was forcibly removed by security midsong. (The band’s traveling soundman was carried away in a headlock.) Perhaps needless to say, that was Mercury Rev’s final Lollapalooza appearance. MERCURY REV See You on the Other Side (1995, Beggars Banquet) See You on the Other Side is the first Mercury Rev album without singer/founder David Baker, and it’s a subtle move toward the big-screen, orchestrated indie rock/pop that the combo would embrace fully on 1998’s Deserter’s Songs (a sound that would garner the band a sizeable following in the U.K.). Baker’s absence is only felt in the lack of his anti-melodic Zappaesque singing, which had only turned up previously in a sporadic manner on songs that were collaborative efforts to begin with— songs that were arguably their albums’ weakest links.

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As with Yerself Is Steam and Boces, this album’s three knockout punches are delivered in sequence at the onset. “Empire State,” “Young Man’s Stride,” and “Sudden Ray of Hope” all show that Mercury Rev had yet to abandon its easily identifiable “and-thekitchen-sink” apocalyptic noise bursts. (For the best evidence, check the final half of the almost eight-minute opener). At the same time, the pop/populist sensibilities of band principles Jonathan Donahue, Grasshopper, and Dave Fridmann lean toward more ambitious ends over the whole of the album. The video for the rocking “Young Man’s Stride” was directed by Moby. MINOR THREAT Out of Step (1983, Dischord) A book’s worth of narrative history on American hardcore had already transpired in the three years leading up to the 1983 release of Minor Threat’s only full-length LP, Out of Step, on bandleader Ian MacKaye’s scene-making East Coast answer to SST, Dischord Records. MacKaye’s Teen Idles (he played bass and sang backup) was, along with Bad Brains, among the first East Coast HC bands to tour and record. Teen Idles broke up in 1980, but the band’s two years of activity provided enough money for MacKaye and drummer Jeff Nelson to form Dischord. MacKaye’s desire to front a band led to the formation of Minor Threat, which was filled out by Nelson on drums, Lyle Preslar on guitar, and Brian Baker on bass. Minor Threat was a band of great power, both live and on record, thanks to tight musicianship, considerable songwriting skill, plus an untiring work ethic and drive. No other band of this era was a more profound inspiration on the nation’s young but growing hardcore movement and other corners of the DIY underground community. Minor Threat released two seminal 7-inch EPs, Minor Threat and In My Eyes, in 1981 on Dischord, then went on a brief hiatus when Preslar left to attend Illinois’ Northwestern University. But the band’s earth- and mind-shattering live shows, performed throughout the East Coast and Midwest in 1981, had garnered fervent fandom and word-of-mouth interest. Bad Brains singer H.R. reported this to the band and talked them into reforming in March 1982. Adding Steve Hansgen on bass so that Baker could switch to guitar, Minor Threat became the first band on the

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East Coast to follow Black Flag’s lead by exploring the crushing, air-moving potential of a two-guitar lineup within the context of hardcore. This incarnation was unstoppable live and in the studio, and Minor Threat’s first and only full-length, Out of Step, captured lightning in a bottle (a truly justified use of the cliché). The album is a full-bodied, guitar-centric classic. Its shockwaves permeated and informed not only the hardcore/post-hardcore world, but also the metal underground to a great degree, making it a touchstone for the thrash metal and crossover bands over the years. Out of Step is more than the showroom model of American hardcore at its creative peak; it’s an indispensable development in rock music—both under and above the ground. As many have stated in the past, if you only own one hardcore album, this better be it. MINOR THREAT Minor Threat (1984, Dischord) This posthumous self-titled mini-LP collects the Minor Threat and In My Eyes 7-inch EPs and was released in March 1984. This is the pre-hiatus, original four-piece lineup of the band; faster but slightly thinner-sounding than the version on the more mature Out of Step LP. Nonetheless, it’s a crucial piece of hardcore history. The personal, not preachy, “Straight Edge” was misinterpreted by Minor Threat’s contemporaries, who used it as the inspiration for pushing a militant declaration of sobriety and abstinence in the hardcore underground—a crusade embraced by certain branches of hardcore to this day.

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MINUTEMEN — MY DAD IS DEAD

MINUTEMEN The Punch Line (1981, SST) Aside from flagship founders Black Flag, the other name synonymous with SST’s golden era (early to mid-’80s) would have to be San Pedro, California’s, Minutemen. The trio’s 1980 debut 7-inch EP Paranoid Time was SST 002, a record Black Flag guitarist/ SST founder Greg Ginn released after witnessing Minutemen’s first-ever live performance. Inseparable friends since junior high, Dennis (“D.”) Boon (guitar and vocals) and Mike Watt (bass and vocals) hooked up with surfer-dude drummer George Hurley after high school (in pre-Minutemen band the Reactionaries). Minutemen’s blue-collar deconstructionist post punk was fully realized on the debut 7-inch EP, and it was unlike anything in American punk rock, post punk, new wave, or nascent hardcore at the time. That never changed. As punk rock gave way to hardcore and its outbreak of sub-styles/reactions, and power-pop morphed into college rock/jangle, which itself spawned the explosion of noisier, weirder, and more interesting proto–indie rock, Minutemen were the preeminent rugged individualists of American underground rock. Any historical narrative of the subject is compromised without immersion, understanding, and enjoyment of least one of the four Minutemen albums included here. Start anywhere, but know that this debut full-length or 1983’s Buzz or Howl under the Influence of Heat will do the trick if only fifteen minutes can be dedicated to the task. MINUTEMEN What Makes a Man Start Fires? (1983, SST) Each band in rock-and-roll history probably has an opinion on how the terms “ambitious” and “indulgent” should apply to the making of a record. In 1982, this was how Minutemen voiced their opinion on the matter: three nights in the studio, some songs that break the two-minute barrier, vocals entirely handled by D. Boon (but songwriting done by all three members, together), and guest appearances by Saccharine Trust guitarist Joe Biaza (on “Beacon Sighted Through Fog” and “East/Wind Faith”), all coming together in the form of eighteen tracks running a total of twentyseven minutes. Released in the first month of 1983, What Makes a Man Start Fires? extended Minutemen’s singular sonic and social manifesto (at that point solidified by The Punch Line, three 7-inch

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EPs and twelve tracks scattered across eight compilations) with the trio’s trademark songs. “Bob Dylan Wrote Propaganda Songs,” “The Anchor,” “Polarity,” “Colors,” and “Split Red” punctuate this age-proof classic. MINUTEMEN Buzz or Howl under the Influence of Heat (1983, SST) As previously suggested, potential fans in a crunch for time have the option of diving into Minutemen by way of either the debut album (The Punch Line) or Minutemen’s third 12-inch gift to the developmental timeline of underground/mainstream rock and roll, 1983’s Buzz or Howl under the Influence of Heat. However, usefulness as a Minutemen primer is one of the only similarities between these two records. The first three tracks on Buzz or Howl were recorded by Blue Cheer keyboardist Ethan James in exchange for a song contribution to his Radio Tokyo Tapes compilation LP. The remaining four tracks get their amazing sound from the band going with Spot’s suggestion that they try live-to-two-track recording. James charged the band a grand total of $50 for his work, making that the total production cost for the album. Among Minutemen’s vast body of work, “Cut” (track 2) is the two minutes and two seconds one might land upon if attempting the daunting endeavor of singling out the band’s “most Minutemen” moment. But not to worry: “Dreams Are Free, Motherfucker,” “Little Man With A Gun In His Hand,” “I Felt Like A Gringo,” “The Product,” “Self-Referenced,” “Dream Told By Moto,” and “The Toe Jam” promise a letdown-free listen of the remaining thirteen minutes. The cover art by Saccharine Trust’s Joe Biaza is a depiction of bassist and vocalist Mike Watt and guitarist and vocalist D. Boon engaged in a face-to-face argument amid a swirling storm of garbage and household items, and the back cover features a letter from Richard Meltzer—Minutemen hero, rock-critic royalty, and lyric writer on early works by Blue Öyster Cult. He is apologizing for missing an invite to do the same for the Minutemen.

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MINUTEMEN Double Nickels on the Dime (1984, SST) One of the motives for doing this book—however idealistic it may read to some—was the potential for it to be used as a road map for anyone wishing to build the foundation of an awesome record collection. In that regard, Minutemen’s next-to-last proper album is one of the easiest pitches on the list. A great number of selling points can be found courtesy of several thorough sources. The album is the subject of its very own book (by Michael T. Fournier, published in 2007 as part of the Continuum Books 33 1/3 series), and it’s discussed at great length in the Minutemen documentary We Jam Econo, which should be readily available. Worth nothing is Double Nickels’ rarity (within the musical and cultural era from whence it came) as an album conceptualized and released in the double-album format. In fact, most of the epic-length works on this list are the size they are because the gate was opened by Double Nickels on the Dime—but credit should really go to Hüsker Dü’s Zen Arcade, as Minutemen were driven to release an album of such size only after learning of that similarly scoped record Hüsker Dü already had in the can. SST released both titles on the same day in July 1984, a day that could mark the highest point in SST’s arc of immense underground impact. MISFITS Walk Among Us (1982, Ruby/Slash) The Misfits’ proper full-length debut—and this could also be said about the two albums that followed—is as pivotal a piece of the American punk-rock/hardcore historical narrative as (to name but a few records in this point-making exercise) each of the Ramones’ first three albums, the Germs’ G.I., or any title by the Dead Kennedys. Assembled mostly from songs recorded at different, earlier junctures, with remixing and additional guitar dubs from leader Glenn Danzig, Walk Among Us is thirteen songs that race by in twenty-six minutes with not a sub-par second to be had. Danzig had arrived as a musical genius. The supremely talented songwriter took dark, dramatic, and otherwise sterling pop hooks and made them soar across the top of a frantic, comic-book/cartoonish blowout of punk/hardcore for the ages. Alongside The Gun Club’s Fire of Love and The Dream Syndicate’s

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Days of Wine and Roses, Walk Among Us was part of Ruby’s trio of stellar albums released in 1982; they are the only three titles that survived Warner Bros.’ buying of parent label Slash. MISFITS Earth A.D. / Wolfs Blood (1983, Plan 9) The Misfits hooked up with the Black Flag/ SST crew, and inhouse producer Spot recorded this historical footnote of musical violence (through the filter of what made the Misfits legendary— see Walk Among Us entry) with Flag’s Robo on drums. It would be the final studio album of the Misfits’ original late-’70s-to-late-’80s career of instability and notoriety; the band broke up shortly after its release. Danzig’s golden croon is mixed low (Spot-style) while the Mach 3 detonation of guitar, bass, and drums is jaw dropping. This album is why the Misfits are revered by, and heard—literally, with covers; and figuratively, through inspiration—within the thrash metal community that was just starting to germinate at the time. But attentive listeners will pick up on the hooks and songwriting that also left a mark on every other corner of underground music—despite suggestions to the contrary by many critics and fans who have weighed in on Earth A.D./Wolfs Blood over the years. MISSION OF BURMA Signals, Calls, and Marches (1981, Ace of Hearts) It’s difficult to deny Mission of Burma the grandest of lifetime achievement awards for predicting (to a spooky degree) many of the aesthetic and sonic properties that turned up in indie rock a decade or so after the band’s heyday. Formed in 1979 (out of the short-lived band Moving Parts) by guitarist and songwriter Roger Miller, bassist and songwriter Clint Conley, and drummer Peter Prescott, Mission of Burma debuted on record in 1980 with the single “Academy Fight Song” b/w “Max Ernst” (two songs originally in the Moving Parts oeuvre). However, that release prepared no one for the untouchable future-vision and bloodmoving excitement of the next year’s Signals, Calls, and Marches mini-album, which kicks off with the moment of musical clarity in American post-punk/early-’80s underground rock: Clint Conley’s “(That’s When I Reach for My) Revolver.” The song has since been covered by Moby (who had a minor U.K. hit with his

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version), Blur guitarist Graham Coxson, The Catherine Wheel, Fucked-Up, Pegboy, and many, many others. “Revolver” might have set a high bar for the rest of the album, but each of the five tracks that follow it—“Outlaw,” “Fame and Fortune,” “This Is Not a Photograph,” “Red,” and “All World Cowboy Romance”—is a classic in its own right. MISSION OF BURMA Vs. (1982, Ace of Hearts) Mission of Burma toured the country by skillfully capitalizing on an airline ticket special of the day, thus hitting a fair amount of spots and influencing the formation of at least five to ten bands per decent-sized city. But the band’s real work was done on stages in the Boston area, where MoB had been a constant live presence since 1979. This led to the louder attack of Vs., as the band was unhappy with how Signals, Calls, and Marches differed so much from the live Mission of Burma—and Mission of Burma was best heard live. The follow-up offered a selection of new songs, each in a class of its own, which would resonate for the next fortyplus years. “Secrets,” “Train,” “Trem Two,” “Mica,” “Learn How,” and the slow pulse and brooding beauty of “Dead Pool” inspired new bands to form and prompted existing bands to step up their game, contributing to strains and styles across the spectrum, from the least aggressive but well-crafted collegiate jangle pop to the most intimidating, brutal but intelligent post hardcore or noise rock. This album is a lifetime resident of a special place in American underground rock history. MISSION OF BURMA The Horrible Truth about Burma (1985, Ace of Hearts) This posthumously released live album is here because Mission of Burma could transfer the greatness of its studio works to the stage, and because the sound is great—amazing, actually, considering how hard it was to properly capture bands of this type in their era, due to crappy P.A. systems and myriad challenges soundmen faced in clubs and theater-sized venues. The set includes covers of the Stooges’ “1970” and Pere Ubu’s “Heart of Darkness,” along with Burma classics like “Revolver,” “Tremelo,” “Dumbells,” and “Peking Spring.” The latter song is one of several post-Vs. tracks that Mission of Burma recorded in 204 GIMME INDIE ROCK

the studio but that never made it onto any proper release while the band was active. MISSION OF BURMA Let There Be Burma (1990, Emergo/Taang!) A fair amount of Mission of Burma titles saw releases between the band’s early-’80s breakup and Matador Records’ deluxe reissue campaign in 2008, a few years after the band reformed. There’s also a fair amount of disinformation online about what is what and what came when. So instead of listing the mini-album, Mission of Burma, and the full-length, Forget, that appeared posthumously in the mid-’80s on Taang!, here is the 1990 release that combines both. Those two titles are often thought to be entirely comprised of table scraps the band didn’t see fit to include on either of its proper releases, but Forget is the entire album Mission of Burma recorded as a follow-up to Vs., and it’s a killer. Along with the thorough double-length compilation (also titled Mission of Burma) released by Rykodisc in 1988, this collection helped bring Mission of Burma’s groundbreaking work to the first generation of indie rock aficionados and helped sufficiently spread the band’s legend until inclusion in Michael Azzerad’s book, Our Band Could Be Your Life (2001), set a M.o.B reunion in motion. MODEST MOUSE This Is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About (1996, Up!) There was absolutely no hype before or immediately following this album’s release; it just started showing up on distribution lists and as a cardboard-sleeved promo CD sent to every record store and college radio station in the country. The band held up the live end of the deal with extensive touring of an exhaustive variety of venues: from opening slots for the spreading epidemic of bloated, mature indie rock acts to the skankiest of co-op crust-punk squats. Isaac Brock (guitar and vocals), bassist Eric Judy, and drummer Jeremiah Green spread their own grassroots gospel, one blown mind at a time if need be. A comparison to the Minutemen made sense based on the telepathic instrumental language shared by these three musicians live and on record. Brock was clearly a new kind of guitar god with magnetic appeal

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(and not just to other guitar players), but Pixies and Black Francis comparisons were overblown and due largely to an unprecedented from-the-ground-up type of album that many critics had no idea what to do with. Brock’s expansive vocal range goes from energetic coo to galloping yelp to cathartic calmshattering howl in protracted songs that wrap unpredictable arrangements around instrumental swells of building intensity and scorching release. Any cursory reflection on This Is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About is guaranteed to be incomplete. So intrigued readers should get to know this record themselves, as soon as possible. For the sake of base covering, this debut is rather different from Modest Mouse’s later work that brought the band fame. THURSTON MOORE Psychic Hearts (1995, DGC) Given the dearth of catchy, moving, and driving rock and roll on Sonic Youth’s 1994 head-scratcher, Experimental Jet Set, Trash, and No Star (its highest charting album to date, oddly), and the band’s hard time recording it, the creative success and immediacy of frontman Thurston Moore’s first solo LP makes total sense. Psychic Hearts has fourteen concise, hook-driven but scraggly pop/rock songs by Moore, who plays guitar, bass, and other instruments with backing help from Youth drummer Steve Shelley and extra guitarist (and Shelley’s Two Dollar Guitar cohort) Tim Folijahn. The running theme throughout is older than the rock and roll form itself: girls. The live-in-the-studio-sounding album has a fitting closer in “Elegy for All the Dead Rock Stars,” an almost twenty-minute study of minimalist riff hypnosis that never dissolves into a noise maelstrom like it might have had it been featured on a record by Moore’s primary musical outlet. This was exactly what Sonic Youth fans needed at the time. The 2006 reissue adds five bonus tracks.

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MOSS ICON Lyburnum Wits End Liberation Fly (1994, Vermiform) In the mid- to late ’80s—two to three years after its first phase collapsed under the weight of several logical (and what would come to be fortuitous) developments, hardcore was still a thriving subculture in the underground coalition of rock-based forms, and everything crammed under its umbrella was undergoing an increased micro-genre fractionalization that would continue unabated throughout the ’90s and into the next century. Such a situation is designed to spit out bands like Moss Icon, who sprayed their surrounding musical domain with a sometimes stretchedout, off-center variety of next-gen hardcore distinguished by the prodigious and unhindered guitar vision of a young Tonie Joy (later of Born Against, The Convocation of . . ., The Great Unraveling, Universal Order of Armageddon, etc.). Vocals that are sometimes stream-of-consciousness spoken and sung, and sometimes furiously screamed, along with unpredictable and explosively dynamic softto-loud shifts on a dime, are hallmarks of this band’s important sound. Temporary Residence released a deluxe and comprehensive Moss Icon discography retrospective in mid-2012. MOVING TARGETS Burning in Water (1986, Taang!) A shamefully overlooked band, Moving Targets had been knocking around Boston since 1983 and had contributed three of the better tracks on Gerard Cosloy’s Bands That Could Be God compilation (1984). With its skillful mix of Mission of Burma, Hüsker Dü, and Southern California melodic hardcore, the trio of vocalist and guitarist Kenny Chambers, bassist Pat Leonard, and powerhouse drummer Pat Brady put twelve tracks of invigoratingly emotional melodic punk/hardcore (considered post hardcore by some) on tape in January 1986 and released this creative triumph later that year. Burning in Water added to a slew of fantastic albums coming out of the Boston area in the mid’80s. (Others included releases by Volcano Suns, Dinosaur Jr, Sorry, Salem 66, and The Proletariat.) Moving Targets’ chosen style is one the band perfected rather than pioneered, and lesser attempts (or slight variations thereof) would soon be crowding the American underground. But it’s safe to say that not one second of Burning in Water’s 39:17 running time falls short of the sublime.

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MUDHONEY Superfuzz Bigmuff Plus Early Singles (1990, Sub Pop) So long as it’s the 1990 extended reissue (of a six-song EP originally released in 1988), which includes appended singles, this is a vital slab of Mudhoney’s metallic, blown-out garage-core Stoogeisms that first brought a deserved degree of attention to the Sub Pop label and Seattle in general. The collection features the single that took Sub Pop to its first notch on the ladder, “Touch Me, I’m Sick,” plus its B-side and the band’s best premajor-label moment, “Sweet Young Thing Ain’t Sweet No More.” Other points of indispensible grit and thump include the cover of Sonic Youth’s “Halloween,” the same treatment of the Dicks’ “Hate the Police,” and original classics “In ‘n’ Out of Grace” and “Need.” MUDHONEY Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge (1991, Sub Pop) Nirvana saved Sub Pop from an operational curtain call because the label had negotiated a sweet deal with DGC—the major that released Nevermind—which gave the band’s former recording home a piece of that album’s sales to the tune of $2.50 for every unit sold. And as we all know . . . every unit sold. It’s a pleasant anecdote that many people have repeated; far fewer folks realize that without the 1991 Mudhoney album we are here to praise, there would not have been a Sub Pop for Nevermind to rescue. As writer Everett True wrote in a 2002 issue of Seattle’s The Stranger, “[Mudhoney] kept the label alive through the dark days of 1991, when the minimally promoted Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge shipped 50,000 copies through word of mouth alone.” Revisionism vigilantism aside (thanks for the help, Everett), none of this would matter here if Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge didn’t realize—and surpass—the potential heard on the band’s previous three years of releases, when the decisively simple Mudhoney formula was “1980s underground garage rock/punk plus the Stooges and some Black Sabbath where needed.” Every Good Boy appends “real pop sensibility” and “focused aggression” to the equation. For the best examples, listen to “Pokin’ Around” and “Good Enough” for the hooks, and “Thorn” and “Shoot the Moon” for the hooks with a punch to the gut.

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MUDHONEY My Brother the Cow (1995, Reprise) Mudhoney’s Piece of Cake (1993, Warner/Reprise) wasn’t a bad record by any stretch, but too much of it served as an example of why the phrase “major label debut” grew into such a terrifying bogeyman in this era. By 1995, Kurt Cobain’s death and the music industry’s exhaustive Viking-like annihilation of Seattle’s music scene had left some broken, bitter human damage. On top of this, Mudhoney had spent the previous three or four years battling the same demons (music biz bullshit; drugs) that had begun to claim a long list of contemporaneous casualties. But as history has shown for as long as rock and roll has been around, a buffet of negative fallout can make for a moving and badass record—an accurate description of My Brother the Cow, Mudhoney’s fourth full-length. The album delivers several heartfelt sonic and lyrical messages of personal tumult, along with a seething indictment of the unsavory aspects of the band’s surrounding culture and the multilayered machine responsible for putting the record on the shelves. MY DAD IS DEAD The Taller You Are, the Shorter You Get (1989, Homestead) Over the three proper albums and full-length odds-and-ends collection that mapped the way to this double-length, careercrowning sprawl, Cleveland’s Mark Edwards (recording under the moniker My Dad Is Dead) was a one-man fount of metaphor-free, personal, social, and—if he was lucky—romantic problems, usually centered around a lack of female attention (or a propensity for fucking it up once he finally garnered some). All of this was set to a musical backdrop that drew heavily from mid-’80s U.K. frowning favorites such as Felt, Durutti Column, This Mortal Coil, In Camera, and of course, Joy Division. But at its heart, My Dad Is Dead was American collegiate rock/post hardcore. (Edwards formed the act the day after his hardcore band, Riot Architecture, broke up.) On The Taller You Are, the Shorter You Get, Edwards advanced from being an “acquired taste.” (His singing can be monotone and off key, but that only adds to the honesty and laid-bare quality of his material.) This overlooked powerhouse of life problems and ruined moods showcases his varied talents. The dense, heavy

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and fast “The Big Picture” will wow those familiar with the first Interpol album, while the Echo and the Bunnymen–clean “So Much to Lose” covers a whole different corner of the album’s sonic geography. From home-recorded Moving Targets–style rockers to the sparsest of U.K.-informed C86 melancholy, there’s much to be found across these four sides.

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NAKED RAYGUN Throb Throb (1985, Homestead) In a way, Naked Raygun was Chicago’s answer to Boston’s Mission of Burma—albeit a less arty and more working-class and anthem-heavy version, flexing punk-rock muscle by the time its proper full-length debut, Throb Throb dropped in 1985. (The album carries three songs first released in 1983 on the band’s debut 7-inch.) Many lineup changes had occurred since the band’s formation in 1980 (Big Black’s Santiago Durango was a founding member), and this was the first Naked Raygun release to feature guitarist John Haggerty, whose skill and propulsive tunefulness would make an excellent fit with Jeff Pezzati’s soaring vocal hooks and fist-to-the-ceiling “Ahh Ahhhhs.” Throb Throb announced Naked Raygun’s mid-decade heyday, and it—along with similarly timed albums by Hüsker Dü and related ChiTowners the Effigies—would be instrumental in establishing the Midwest as a source for melodic but powerful punk-rock/ post-hardcore developments. NAKED RAYGUN All Rise (1986, Homestead) Though the material was written by guitarist John Haggerty and vocalist Jeff Pezzati before Naked Raygun began recording sophomore full-length All Rise, it certainly benefits from the addition of new rhythm section Pierre Kezdy (bass) and Eric Spicer (drums), who supplied a noticeably fortified sonic backbone on the album and would continue to do so until the band’s 1992 breakup. All Rise finds Naked Raygun doing what they did best. Their brand of Midwest-post-hardcore-meets-second-wave-U.K.punk-rock-of-Stiff Little Fingers (whom Naked Raygun often covered) is exemplified by album opener “Home of the Brave,” which drafts an ultra-catchy outline from which the band would build the majority of its influential (relative to its somewhat overlooked status) run of albums. Although the three subsequent Naked Raygun releases each fall a little short of meeting the standard set by All Rise, and the band made a slight move into its own type of pop-punk as it approached the ’90s, the records are surely recommended for fans of the first two full-lengths. And it’s without question that the same can be said for John Haggerty’s work with his next band, Pegboy. Haggerty left Naked 214 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Raygun before the release of its 1990 final album, Raygun . . . Naked Raygun. The band has reunited several times since then, without Haggerty. NATION OF ULYSSES Pretty Plays for Baby (1992, Dischord) Part tongue-in-cheek, part serious counterstroke to what this band saw as run-of-the-mill indie rock/alterna-grunge, Ian Svenonius’ Nation of Ulysses was a chaotic soapbox for the singer and band’s confusing social/cultural/musical mission statement against the slacker mindset, irony, lack of energy, and other aspects of acts and subgenres that didn’t preach the living of life to its fullest. Dressing up in suits and always good for a crazy live show, Nation of Ulysses managed to mix bits and pieces of soul music, gospel, anti-establishment sentiment, and genuine individualism into its explosive brand of punk rock/ post hardcore, especially on its second proper album, Pretty Plays for Baby. (The 1991 debut full-length 13-Point Program to Destroy America is nothing to shake a stick at, either.) Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the incendiary nature of the band, Nation of Ulysses didn’t make it to album number three during its original period of activity (though a full record—The Embassy Tapes— was released posthumously in 2000 by Dischord). But the band was a huge influence on the burgeoning ’90s emo/“screamo” scene that would gain momentum mid-decade. Svenonius went on to form The Make-Up, and guitarist Tim Green founded the F**King Champs and established himself as a go-to producer and engineer. NEGATIVE APPROACH Tied Down (1983, Touch and Go) Negative Approach was one of the American hardcore’s elite bands that, like Minor Threat, refined the style to a creative conclusion within the form’s artistic boundaries. Frontman John Brannon led the band with an intimidating, scary, and violent (for the time) type of vocals that, when musically matched by the band’s aggressive assault, would make Negative Approach’s original few years of activity a strong influence on not only the future of hardcore, but on other sonically antagonistic types of post hardcore—primarily the noise-rock wing of

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late-’80s/early-’90s indie rock. The band, along with the Necros, played a role in establishing the Midwest hardcore scene. The two groups were the first to release full-length albums on Touch and Go Records, the label of which Necros bassist Corey Rusk assumed control in 1983 from original founder Tesco Vee of the Meatmen (who had started it as a ’zine in 1979). Negative Approach splintered right after the release of Tied Down, its sole full-length, and Brannon went on to form the amazing Laughing Hyenas (see entry). NEGATIVLAND Escape from Noise (1987, SST) Negativland is an experimental sound-collage collective formed in 1979 around the core membership of Mark Hosler, Richard Lyons, Don Joyce, David Wills, and Peter Conheim. The group’s directive during the ’80s was to make cut-up (derived from the writing style pioneered by William S. Burroughs) and “culture-jamming” (a term allegedly coined by the band) sound collages out of original electronic music, corporation-generated advertising content (radio and TV commercials), copyright-protected music from other artists, and additional found audio. These audio building blocks were edited into different narratives depending on the political or social message the band had in mind. Avant-garde composer John Oswald was doing similar work at the time (he coined the term “Plunderphonics” to describe the practice), and the Residents had delved into and out of copyright infringement on occasion. (Remember, the legal frenzy over sampling had yet to arise; but it soon would, due to hip-hop’s entrance into the mainstream and a later Negativland album.) After initiating a hit-or-miss run of releases on which one can hear Negativland honing its craft, one of the band’s primary angles of attack came to fruition on its fourth full-length (and first for SST) Escape from Noise: pranks-as-art-form and humor. The album was also Negativland’s most music-based outing up to this point, featuring rearranged audio content plus real music made by the band or like-minded guests and friends, including Jello Biafra, guitarists Henry Kaiser and Fred Frith, Devo’s Mark Mothersbaugh, the Residents, producer Steve Fisk, not to mention Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead. Escape From Noise is a concept album that makes many countercultural points about 216 GIMME INDIE ROCK

the media and society-generated noise that surrounds people each day. “Christianity Is Stupid” is the album’s focal point and the genesis of the band’s first prank that was successful on a national level. It uses audio from the 1971 the Rev. Estus Pirkle anticommunist Christian film, If Footmen Tire You, What Will Horses Do? Negativland takes a snippet in which public loudspeakers perpetually proclaim, “Christianity is stupid! Communism is good! Give up!,” then uses the sample out of context over a throbbing industrial metal song. This was initially to parody the “Satanic Panic” scare running through America at the time in regards to rock and metal music, but Negativland took it several steps further. In an explanation to fans and the media as to why Negativland wasn’t touring in support of Escape from Noise (the real reason was lack of funds and time), the band issued a fake press release stating that the FBI had put them on house arrest pending an open investigation into the possible role “Christianity Is Stupid” might have played in the David Brom killings, a very real 1988 mass murder in which a Minnesota teen killed his entire family with an axe. Without investigating anything to support the press release’s plausibility, the media ran with the story, taking it well beyond Negativland’s wildest expectations. Many local and national news outlets ran segments based on the fallacy that David Brom had listened to the song before he killed his family, and the band was contacted by Rolling Stone and other highprofile magazines for interviews. Though the incident may seem morbid, once one processes the blatant silliness and sardonic nature of the song that sparked it, it becomes a world-class prank that makes a pointed statement about the laziness and unprofessional behavior that runs rampant in journalism and mainstream media. The situation also conveniently provided Negativland with the concept for a followup album, 1989’s Helter Stupid.

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NEGATIVLAND Helter Stupid (1989, SST) Negativland was worn down by the fact-allergic media attention it received after issuing a fake press release stating it was a target of an FBI investigation based on the music’s influence upon a teen who murdered his family. But the sound-collage culture-jamming collective had the last word in the situation with 1989’s Helter Stupid, an uneasily prescient indictment of sensationalism-overfacts in the media and our society’s willingness to eat it up— serving after serving. Much of Helter Stupid’s opening title track is comprised of audio from a local news segment that ran on San Francisco’s CBS affiliate KPIX, in which the band is interviewed about the aforementioned controversy. The album ends with “Dick Vaughan Presents . . . The Perfect Cut,” a track derived from the band’s weekly Over the Edge radio show that slices and dices the underlying corporate-sponsored nastiness of rock-and-popformat commercial radio. Escape from Noise and Helter Stupid (including the booklet that accompanied the latter) collectively present a powerful cultural message, but one executed in a way that will cause cognitive dissonance because of the band’s opportunistic exploitation of a tragedy. But the bigger picture is that, almost three decades later, the basic agenda behind the making of this album is uncannily prophetic when applied to today’s Internet-centric culture. NEGATIVLAND Fair Use: The Story of the Letter U and the Numeral 2 (1995, Seeland) Perhaps fueled by hubris stemming from the band’s previous two albums and its collective overarching conceptual outcome, Negativland decided to take things several steps further with the ballsy 1991 EP titled U2. With a total playing time of thirteen minutes, the band spoofs U2’s huge 1987 hit “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” by sampling almost the entire song, adding kazoos and other devaluing sonics, then adding their own vocals that sing and speak the song’s original lyrics in a nasally monotone whine. But the best part of the piece is the overlain audio of American Top 40 household name Casey Kasem going bonkers with profanity-saturated outbursts captured in the studio while he recorded segments for his popular radio 218 GIMME INDIE ROCK

program. Among the selections—which include Kasem going off about having to do a “f**king dead dog dedication!!”—is the host’s comparatively calm assessment of U2: “These guys are from England, and who gives a shit?” The other incendiary quality of the Fair Use EP was its cover art, which featured “U2” in massive letters, a picture of a U-2 spy plane, and “Negativland” in tiny text at the bottom. In short order, Negativland was buried by a storm of copyright- and defamation-based legal action from Island Records and Casey Kasem. The band countersued in retaliation, eventually having to sue SST when things got too hot, and the label fled to the other side. The whole debacle became one of the most notorious and complicated intellectual property rights fiascos in the history of recorded music. Thankfully, in 1995, Negativland released this one-hour-and-seventeen-minute album, with an accompanying 270-page book, that provides everything anyone would ever want to know about the landmark event. The book also has tons of additional content such as essays on fair use, copyright, and the state of intellectual property. Now that the Internet has pulled such topics into a much more complicated, polarizing, and passionate cultural conversation, this 1995 album and book provides an essential prelude and overview. NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL On Avery Island (1996, Merge) Though overshadowed by Neutral Milk Hotel’s 1998 breakthrough album, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, the band’s debut from a couple of years earlier is no small feat of mid-’90s indie rock, and it helped keep the genre artistically relevant while other bands defected and other underground styles rose to prominence in the latter half of the decade. One of the best early transmissions from the Elephant 6 collective of indie-psych-pop bands, On Avery Island is a collection of songs written by bandleader Jeff Mangum, recorded on a four-track reel-to-reel, and accompanied by a different backing band than the one that would fill out the legendary lineup heard on NMH’s second release. Nevertheless, Mangum’s top-notch compositions here are musically held together by Neutral Milk Hotel’s trademark sound (albeit, an earlier version), distinguished by amplified and distorted acousticelectric guitars and bass. On Avery Island contains more than

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a few Neutral Milk Hotel classics and is highly recommended to anyone who might have skipped it in favor of the album that followed. NEW BOMB TURKS !!Destroy-Oh-Boy!! (1993, Crypt) Humbly recorded with no expectations whatsoever, Columbus, Ohio’s, New Bomb Turks’ debut full-length !!Destroy-Oh-Boy!! stood out for being thicker, faster, louder, catchier, and smarter than many of its brethren, and it was generally less mired (if at all) in backward stylistic trappings that bogged down the ’90s garage-punk/rock-revival scene that had started to come together by this time. The razor-sharp riffing here is so perfect that one must assume it had been done before in the history of punk rock; yet these were original chord progressions. Eric Davidson’s snarling hooks and wiseass lyrics also did loads to separate his band from the spreading troops of power-starved retro-robots that populated the trash-rock subgenre. This album and band are great complements to sister-outfit Gaunt and this era’s output by the Dwarves, Supersuckers, and the Didjits. NEW RADIANT STORM KING Rival Time (1993, Homestead) New Radiant Storm King’s 1992 debut My Little Bastard Soul is an excellent album and should appeal to anyone charmed by the blessing and eventual curse that was this band’s forte. But the search for sea legs slightly outweighs finding them on that album, so it didn’t make this book’s cut. Like many bands here, Amherst Massachusetts–based NRSK were poised to be the next (insert appropriate more successful and now revered contemporaneous act[s] here). In this case, the natural associations are with Pavement and Guided by Voices, though neither sounded much like NRSK. Links to the latter came from a split single and some touring the bands did together. In fact, this writer watched an opening NRSK blow both GBV and the Grifters off of a stage soon after sophomore album Rival Time was released in 1993. Much of NRSK’s power had to do with the band’s secret weapon at the time: drummer Elizabeth Sharp. She merited the overused “force of nature” description. Unlike many indie rock albums of the day, Rival Time has the guitar taking a back seat to 220 GIMME INDIE ROCK

the bass and drums, and the relatively intelligible (and intelligent) lyrics are connective in a humanistic manner (more so if one happens to be experiencing college life while listening—but regardless, the songs have aged well). Each of these twelve tracks is noise-pop brilliance—even the two instrumental cuts—and like the band’s later albums, this album proves the traditional mold of indie rock could be perfected during and well beyond the years it first experienced saturation and critical backlash. Bassist and primary songwriter Peyton Pinkerton has piloted this band through countless lineup changes and label disappearances, but he’s probably better known as a principle contributor to the works of the Pernice Brothers and the Silver Jews. NICE STRONG ARM Reality Bath (1987, Homestead) Of the three almost equally strong albums released by Nice Strong Arm from 1987 to 1991, debut Reality Bath does the best at liberating the band from the “Sonic Youth clone” criticism it often attracted—that is, when critics noticed the band at all. The New York-by-way-of-Austin outfit was clearly as inspired by original, pre-goth U.K. post punk (as purveyed by the likes of Crispy Ambulance, the Pop Group, and early Cabaret Voltaire) as it might have been by the surrounding American post-hardcore tendencies of the then-forming noise-rock movement. Joy Division–ish bass lines, scraping guitar, industrial rhythms and tempos, and down-in-the-dumps mood combined with more contemporary sonic attributes. Strains of this album (and Nice Strong Arm’s two that followed) can be heard in later works by bands as varied as Unwound, early Six Finger Satellite, and even Polvo. NIRVANA Bleach (1989, Sub Pop) Hardly the harbinger of what was to come, Bleach is nonetheless one of the top-shelf “true grunge” albums released by Sub Pop during the first invigorated rumblings of both the label and the surrounding Pacific Northwest scene. Kurt Cobain’s vocals are a perfect and distinctive match for the catchy, sludge-metal-meetsproto–noise rock musical presentation that dominates the record. The unapologetic pop of “About a Girl” might point toward the wide appeal of Nevermind, but it’s songs like “School,” “Negative

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Creep,” “Paper Cuts,” “Swap Meet,” and “Downer” (think Melvins + Black Flag + Cobain’s knack for a hook) that make Bleach an album that deserves better than what history has exacted upon it. NIRVANA Nevermind (1991, DGC) Based on Sonic Youth’s recommendation, DGC signed Nirvana from Sub Pop for $287,000 with the contractual agreement that the latter would get $2.50 for every copy of Nevermind sold, and the album would carry the band’s previous label’s logo on the back cover. It’s no small matter of fortuitous timing that as Nevermind was released on September 24, 1991, Sub Pop was teetering at the edge of bankruptcy and a shuttered office. The album skyrocketed to No. 1 in less than four months and went on to do $80 million in sales. No record in this book has sold more copies or been heard by more people than this one. Nor have any of the other albums here had a cultural impact that even remotely approaches that of Nevermind (hence, the many mentions of it in entries for other titles). So let’s take a brief look at the album itself. The night-andday difference between Nirvana’s debut full-length Bleach and Nevermind is mostly attributable to creative growth and the career-making production work Butch Vig provided, plus the shiny mix topped off by Andy Wallace. (The latter was brought in because he made Slayer’s seminal trio of late-’80s albums sound huge and clear without sacrificing the band’s heaviness.) The overwhelming popularity of “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” a stroke of songwriting genius that deserved to be stuck in the head of your grandmother and boss, has of course stolen some attention from Nevermind’s other instances of stellar inspiration. If millions of kids used this album as a gateway to the heavier indie rock underground from whence Nirvana hailed, it’s hard to think of better training materials than “Territorial Pissings,” “Stay Away,” and “Breed.” “Drain You” could have threatened mainstream infiltration, with a hook almost as addictive as “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” The album’s intended closer, “Something in the Way,” is one of the era’s most disquietingly pretty songs. A closing bit of telling trivia: imagine how many listeners were traumatized the first time they allowed Nevermind to play to completion on a CD player, only to have their ears and 222 GIMME INDIE ROCK

mind assaulted by the six-plus-minute hidden track “Endless, Nameless” in all of its Flipper-meets-power-noise glory. The song was intended to follow “Something in the Way” like a normally sequenced track, but an alleged mastering “miscommunication” left it erased from the first 20,000 CDs pressed, something the band was unaware of until it got its own copies. Cobain demanded the song be appended to all future runs, and Howie Weinberg (mastering) complied—but obviously not without some intervention from up the corporate ladder; hence the ten minutes of buffering silence. NIRVANA Incesticide (1992, DGC) Luckily for the approximately 478,981,813 new fans Nirvana had acquired between the October 1991 release of Nevermind and December of 1992, when Incesticide showed up under an inordinate number of Christmas trees, this band had a backlog of songs as good if not better than what made it onto Bleach and Nevermind. That negated the problem of subpar material on Insecticide—a rarity where compilations of singles, outtakes, B-sides, live tracks, and previously unreleased material are concerned. Spanning the band’s career to date (1988–91) and featuring six previously unreleased songs (but no new songs specifically recorded for this title), the collection ranks alongside the lesserknown Whatever’s Cool with Me by Dinosaur Jr for front-to-back consistency. “Sliver” almost rivals “Smells Like Teen Spirit” as an earworm while featuring some of Cobain’s most childish lyrics. (Surely many fans called this song “Grandma Take Me Home!”). The covers of the Vaselines’ “Molly’s Lips” and “Son of a Gun” are superior to the precious originals, and the BBC sessions (“Been a Son” and “(New Wave) Polly”) from November 1991 present the band at the height of its powers. Additionally, there’s a Devo cover (“Turnaround”) and six songs from 1988 and 1989 (five have the Melvins’ Dale Crover on drums) that didn’t make it onto Bleach. Their inclusion here no doubt prompted thousands more copies of that debut album to fly from the Sub Pop shelves. Incesticide sold 500,000 copies and peaked at No. 39 on the Billboard 200 chart.

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NIRVANA In Utero (1993, DGC) It’s probably safe to state that no album featured in these pages was written, recorded, or released under an overhanging cloud of anticipation quite like that which surrounded the conception and reception of In Utero upon its September 13, 1993, release (eleven days short of Nevermind’s two-year anniversary). Nor was any other album surrounded by such a ridiculous degree of rumors, or—conversely—trouble of a very real nature. And since no other band featured here experienced success on Nirvana’s level, it’s also a strong assumption that Nevermind’s popularity had a lot, if not everything, to do with what the band released as its third full-length (as opposed to a dissatisfaction with Nevermind’s polished and commercial sound). In Utero’s original version (meaning, what the band did with Steve Albini at Pachyderm Studios in February 1993) might have been partially touched up in post-production by R.E.M. and college-rock producer Scott Litt, but that couldn’t hide the aggression, true heaviness, and darkened mood of the album. It’s a record that surpasses, in every way, all else in a discography that would soon be tragically cut short. MOJO NIXON AND SKID ROPER Frenzy (1986, Restless/Enigma) Every one of these five hundred albums has its own handful of aesthetic/thematic/lyrical/visual characteristics that got its title in this book, but it should come as no surprise to find that these pages are not overflowing with the successful application of humor/comedy, as it is perhaps the one artistic path in music with the highest risk of total failure. However, on their second fulllength album, 1986’s Frenzy, Mojo Nixon and his drummer/multiinstrumentalist sidekick Skid Roper made it work by satirically/ critically riding the two omnipresent cultural forces of the mid-’80s: MTV and the right-wing/conservative political climate of the Reagan era. Musically in line with the roots-rock/psychobilly sounds heard in the ’80s underground, Frenzy’s real strength originates from Nixon’s ability to spread his sharp wit evenly across this album’s spectrum of mirth, from silly and pedestrian (“Ain’t Got No Boss,” “The Amazing Bigfoot Diet”) to sociopolitical commentary (“I Hate Banks,” “Gonna Put My Face on a Nuclear 224 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Bomb,” “Burn Down the Malls,” “Jesus at McDonalds”) to domesticity and fatherhood (the downright hilarious “I’m Living With a Three-Foot Anti-Christ”) to lockerroom vulgarity aimed at MTV VJ Martha Quinn (“Stuffin’ Martha’s Muffin”). Famously ironic was Nixon’s frequent hosting of MTV politically related promotional spots in the mid-’80s. He went on to collaborate with Jello Biafra during his ’90s solo career, act in several films, and work extensively in terrestrial and satellite radio, where he has hosted several shows over the years (including the weekly The Loon in the Afternoon on the Outlaw Country channel). NO TREND Too Many Humans (1983, No Trend) As the original hardcore movement in this country buckled under its own conforming rules, more of the societal, governmental, and cultural discord communicated by the increase in garden-variety bands was just too pedestrian, unintelligent, wrong-headed, or downright silly to take any of the flimsy nihilism seriously—which was ok, considering that much of the conviction did not come from the heart. Enter the antidote. No Trend ate and breathed a hatred of the human race that could be felt if the band was walking down the street five blocks over—and the enmity was particularly concentrated toward the hardcore/punk subculture. This carved out a place for them in underground rock history as the ultimate anti-hardcore band. Musically indebted to both Public Image Ltd. and Flipper, guitarist and lyricist Frank Price and vocalist and band conceptualist Jeff Mentges spearheaded No Trend’s malevolence toward the scene it was forced to toil in, with songs like this album’s “Kiss Ass to Your Peer Group” and “Mindless Little Insects.” Live performances of the latter were among the band’s legendary acts of audience antagonism. Mentges would enter the audience and sing the song while holding up a mirror to people’s faces. On Too Many Humans, No Trend’s jackhammer of industrial and post-punk-influenced hardcore was just what a minority of smarter fans needed, but the sometimes twenty-minute live versions of the band’s brutal grind-drone—intentionally done to negate slam-dancing and other audience activities— infuriated the H.C. droves. No other band from America’s first H.C. movement took inter-scene/culture/music obstructionistic

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motives as far as No Trend did during its three-album career, and things got weirder and more disturbing from album to album. Approach the 1985 album A Dozen Dead Roses and especially the band’s final album, 1987’s Tritoniam Nash: Vegas Polyester Complex, with the understanding that alienation of Too Many Humans’ few fans was only a small part of the purpose behind these insane endurance tests. NOMEANSNO Wrong (1989, Alternative Tentacles) Canadian brothers Rob and John Wright formed NoMeansNo, maybe one of the most listenable and musical (and enigmatic) vehicles of hatred toward society’s woes and generally less intelligent human beings (i.e., the rest of the world) to come out of the fruitful ’80s hardcore/post-hardcore/punk-rock underground. NoMeansNo released a debut 7-inch in 1981. Three albums and at least as many EPs followed. Quirkiness, poor production values, and a great big Devo/goofball crutch edges that stuff out of this survey, but whatever happened in the year separating 1988’s Small Parts Isolated and Destroyed and 1989’s Wrong was a case of artistic transformation in the right direction. At first a bass/drums/vocals duo, the Wright brothers rounded out as a trio in 1986, adding guitarist Andy Kerr, who liked to be pseudonymously credited with names like “Buttercup” and “None of Your Fucking Business.” (That contributed to some fan confusion about whether or not it was actually Rob Wright performing Kerr’s instrumental and songwriting duties.) Wrong is where listeners got smacked by the full force of NoMeansNo’s years-in-the-prepping perfection of King Crimson by way of hardcore by way of—your guess is as good as mine. The album is heady and intensely angry, yet it packs a mighty dose of charm and magnetism. It’s heavy (the pre-AmRep aggro bass of Rob Wright is punishing medicine), hooky, and tied to no single tempo. (There’s quite the hint of prog-rock here.) Jello Biafra’s Alternative Tentacles had the good sense to recognize the band’s potential early on, as the label did with many other prescient wunderkinds of post hardcore.

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OBLIVIANS Soul Food (1995, Crypt) Like Columbus, Ohio-by-way-of-Boston monsters Cheater Slicks, Memphis’ Oblivians transcended the trappings of the ’90s garagepunk/rock-revival scene with a ferocious, bass-free, ultra-scuzzy, distorted-beyond-the-red, all-around no-bullshit attack during the band’s 1993–98 reign as the movement’s top-shelf choice. Soul Food, recorded at legendary Easley Studios, is the Oblivians’ full-length debut and the best example of the band’s sonic intent. The instrument-swapping trio of Eric Friedl, Jack Yarber, and Greg Cartwright (the latter two were also founding members of the preceding and coinciding outfit, the Compulsive Gamblers) took on the “Oblivian” surname in this group. They would deliver together again on 1996’s Popular Favorites—as well as on a great many 7-inches and EPs released during the band’s five years of activity. Individually, the band members are also responsible for founding Goner Records (Friedl), The Reigning Sound (Cartwright), and the Tennessee Tearjerkers (Yarber). OPAL Happy Nightmare Baby (1987, SST) The Dream Syndicate’s Kendra Smith and Rain Parade’s David Robak formed Opal during the waning days of L.A.’s paisley underground scene, where their former bands made their marks. Opal’s sole full-length has gained some retroactive attention due to the success of the band this one morphed into. After Smith departed, Roback continued as Opal for a bit with Smith’s replacement, Hope Sandoval, before changing the act’s name to Mazzy Star. Happy Nightmare Baby is Velvet Underground-meets-T. Rex at the intersection of proto-shoegaze and neo-psychedelia. While Smith’s voice isn’t the ethereal human instrument that Sandoval’s is, and this album is more adventurous and challenging than the Mazzy Star formula, it should appeal to fans of the latter, and it deserves much more reverence than history has awarded it as of this writing. Mazzy Star’s debut full-length, She Hangs Brightly, is more or less the second Opal album.

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PAIN TEENS Stimulation Festival (1992, Trance Syndicate) Whether it was the trained ear of Trance Syndicate founder and Butthole Surfers drummer King Coffee or the inherent weirdness that informed much of the ’80s and ’90s Texas underground, noise rock from that particular region had a tendency to be allaround awesome but also depraved or fucked-up in a variety of manners. Houston’s Pain Teens took an industrial path to noise rock through music mostly composed by multi-instrumentalist Scott Ayers and are further recognizable by the tuneful but psychotic singing/lyrics of Bliss Blood, one of the few female voices of the original noise-rock movement. Forming in 1985 and signing to Trance at the end of the decade, the Pain Teens’ sound was a mix of Butthole Surfers, clanging industrial yet organic rhythms (sometimes courtesy of junkyard percussion), Blood’s little-girl singing style that told tales of serial killers or other societal ills, plus a strange and memorable poppiness that could cut through it all. This is best heard on the band’s fourth full-length, 1992’s Stimulation Festival. The album is a nightmare world of S&M nastiness and other lyrical deep ends, made engaging by tight songwriting and experimentation with guitar loops, tape manipulation, and other effects—plus the Pain Teens’ best statement of purpose, the must-hear opener “Shallow Hole”—make Stimulation Festival an American noise-rock achievement of the highest order. An added touch comes by way of the great cover of the Birthday Party’s “Wild World.” PALACE BROTHERS Days in the Wake (1994, Drag City) Long before Louisville native Will Oldham had to his credit two decades so prolific that new and curious fans must hire a logistics consultant to draw up a schematic (so his mountain of releases isn’t too daunting upon first approach), the early to mid-’90s saw him gradually gaining momentum with this introductory incarnation, Palace Brothers. Or Palace Music. Or just Palace. Regardless of the moniker he used, Oldham occupied the indie rock underground with a daring and delicate reading of folk/ country/bluegrass/Americana that recalls traditionalist hillcountry or Appalachian balladry and pre-pop/rock indigenous music associated with the Folkways/Harry Smith/Alan Lomax axis. 230 GIMME INDIE ROCK

It was so drastically separated from modernity that the Palace Brothers/Music output of four full-lengths, released from 1993 to 1996, remained outside of the then-rapidly unfolding altcountry movement. Days in the Wake is Oldham’s second album, following the 1993 debut full-length There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You (on Drag City, like much of his discography). Members of Slint are heard as his backing band on There Is No-One . . . . (Fun fact: Oldham is the photographer responsible for the iconic photo on the cover of Slint’s Spiderland.) But there is no backing band on Days in the Wake (save for one track recorded with Oldham’s brothers, Ned and Paul), making it a strong contender for the most intimate recording of the first half of the ’90s. Nor is there any period-piece perfection of some bygone musical antiquity to distance the listener from the heart-shattering sorrow and loss explored here that is so innately human it isn’t attached to any particular point in history. Songs that mine such poignant territory include “I Am a Cinematographer,” “I Send My Love to You,” “You Will Miss Me When I Burn,” “(Thou Without) Partner,” and “All Is Grace.” PALACE MUSIC Viva Last Blues (1995, Drag City) Backed by Sebadoh’s Jason Lowenstein on drums, Liam Hayes on organ, and Brian Rich on guitar, Will Oldham returns as Palace Music and goes for country-rock despondency (check “New Partner”) that brings to mind David Crosby’s career farewell and devastating cry for help, 1971’s If I Could Only Remember My Name. Oldham also picks up the pace a bit for “More Brother Rides” and select points elsewhere on the album. Viva Last Blues is the third Palace-named album, and each is the stylistic antithesis of the album that came before. (Meanwhile, Oldham’s prolific presence on the 7-inch format that he killed with so often, releasing eight between mid-1993 and the end of 1996—before he switched to the Bonnie “Prince” Billy moniker he continues to operate under to this day—almost seems like a stand-alone project.) As with the previous two Palace albums, ignore any claimed musical similarities (which are seemingly still being made in hindsight) between Viva Last Blues and lo-fi of the 1990s. Associating that sound with one minute of any of

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Will Oldham’s myriad releases is highly erroneous. The expressly anachronistic outdoor-plumbing-era production on the debut There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You is there because the scratchy treble and pre-fidelity sound was the only option for the Louvin Brothers and the artists found on 1930s- and 1940s-focused Folkways archival collections. Days in the Wake is sometimes considered “lo-fi” because that’s what popped onto the page when more removed (i.e., mainstream) media outlets processed “singer/vocalist + acoustic guitar.” In fact, Days has very full and immediate production. As for Viva Last Blues—this album was recorded by Steve Albini. PAVEMENT Slanted and Enchanted (1992, Matador) The 1992 release of Pavement’s proper full-length debut did not result in the permanent transformation of the musical landscape across the entire underground-to-mainstream spectrum the way Nirvana’s Nevermind did that same year. But Slanted and Enchanted was responsible for a kind of miniature variation of that same kind of change, when viewed from an indie rock perspective. The album caused a ripple effect that added substantial girth and serious momentum to the scene from whence it came. Recorded over two sessions in 1990 and early 1991, the album was circulated on a promo cassette among magazine editors and writers for almost a year before its release date. When those scribes summarily went ape shit over it, Slanted and Enchanted’s tens of thousands of pre-orders literally kept the lights on at Matador Records. Also around the time of (or shortly before) the album’s release, Pavement became a real band with bassist Mark Ibold joining up and percussionist and drummer Bob Nastonovich coming on to aid erratic and unreliable original drummer Gary Young (who was soon pink-slipped). Though Slanted and Enchanted at times feels effortless in execution, it contains an extraordinarily high quality of songwriting and arrangements, plus other groundbreaking attributes, packing the kinds of tracks that can literally change one’s life or be forever linked to the time and place at which they were first heard: “Summer Babe,” “In the Mouth a Desert,” “Loretta’s Scars,” “Here,” “Perfume-V,” and the riveting “Jackals, False Grails: The Lonesome Era” (on

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which an early-Fall influence helps out). Slanted and Enchanted is such an excellent album that it begat a sort of curse, generating unrealistic expectations of the band that created the record, while producing many would-be clones of that same band. PAVEMENT Westing (By Musket and Sextant) (1993, Drag City) Following Matador’s label-saving experience with Pavement’s genre-revitalizing Slanted and Enchanted, it made good sense for Drag City to issue this point-to-point-to-point map of the band’s progression up to that point. Featuring Pavement’s first three EPs, two compilation tracks, and the single version of Slanted’s extraordinarily good opener, “Summer Babe,” Westing is mostly material that exists in a totally different world than that of what’s found on the album that garnered the band the majority of its initial fan base. Hailing from Stockton, California, Stephen Malkmus and Scott Kannberg (or “S.M.” and “Spiral Stairs,” respectively) wrote most of these songs when Pavement was merely a recording project for the two songwriters and one of extremely low fidelity at that. Keeping press attention and live performances mostly out of the process helped build a mystique. The Slay Tracks (1933–1969) and Demolition Plot J-7 7-inch EPs, plus the Perfect Sound Forever 10-inch EP, were all hits on an underground level. The easiest-to-spot influence is the one that would follow the band for years (and for good reason)—The Fall—but Mark E. Smith’s legendary post-punk vehicle is followed in second place by another U.K. band of note, the Swell Maps. Still, the harsh and trebly no-fidelity production on the 7-inches and the bizarre originality that Pavement added to things had a way of putting great distance between the band’s songs and their seemingly obvious musical reference points. Throughout the chronology presented here, especially on tracks like Slay Tracks’ “Box Elder” and Perfect Sound Forever’s “Debris Slide,” one can easily pick up on Pavement’s future in mining more traditional indie rock gold.

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PAVEMENT Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain (1993, Matador/Atlantic) Among this survey’s selections, the pre-release hype and hoopla for this album was like a somewhat smaller-scale version of the anticipatory climate that awaited Nirvana’s In Utero. Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain was released through Matador’s wellintentioned but ultimately unsuccessful (and unprecedented at the time) partnership with Atlantic Records, an arrangement that had the latter handling manufacturing and distribution for a minimum of six Matador-chosen titles per year. Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain did in fact produce a radio hit with the scene-eviscerating “Cut Your Hair.” The song peaked at No. 10 on Billboard’s U.S. Modern Rock Tracks chart, but the album itself found exponentially more success in the U.K., where it entered the Top 20 and peaked at No. 15. Only “Unfair,” the album’s sole Fall copycat song (Slanted and Enchanted has several), “Hit the Plane Down,” and closer “Filmore Jive” resemble the Pavement of yore, but the charming excellence attributed to this and all later Pavement albums (in decreasing returns after Wowee Zowee) is the engine driving Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain’s inclusion here. PAVEMENT Wowee Zowee (1995, Matador/Sony) When Rolling Stone magazine alleged that Wowee Zowee’s buffet of styles and more experimental nature were calculated answers to the relative success of Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, Pavement’s founder, guitarist, and leading personality, Steve Malkmus, clarified the real cause to be “excessive marijuana use.” Well, whatever gets the job done. Pavement’s third fulllength is a markedly better album than Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain. Like Sonic Youth’s Washing Machine, another record made at the Memphis Easley McCain Recording (in fact, the SY album was the next job on the books at the studio), Wowee Zowee is a justifiably long, confident, relaxed, and awesome soundtrack to a band finally arriving at the creative destination it knowingly or unconsciously had been moving toward for some time. Rolling Stone also posited that Pavement was “afraid of success”—but a band that seriously considers Dick-Sucking Fool at Pussy-Licking School for an album title while much of the indie/alternative world is looking is not afraid of much. 234 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Album tracks “Grounded” and “Kennel District” are the power couple of the entire Pavement discography, and smoking weed is the last thing that comes to mind during the minute-and-ahalf toe-dip into spazzed-out noise-rock waters that is “Flux = Rad.” In all, eighteen songs collectively capture more variety than any other Pavement full-length, with a running mood of rambunctiousness and freedom. Wowee Zowee aged a little better than Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, eventually rising to become a critic and fan favorite (usually ranked just behind Slanted and Enchanted). It’s good to see an instance of logic prevailing as indie/alternative rock’s history plays out—especially since the opposite seems more common as this era becomes increasingly revisited yet only to repeatedly parse its well-known classic. The title of the single “Rattled by the Rush” refers to how the band was treated by success. A more representative look at how Pavement and mainstream recognition mixed appears on the DVD Slow Century, which includes footage of the band being hit with mud and rocks at the Lollapalooza festival, in response to the long, jam-oriented, inaccessible sets they selected for the event (another choice the band blamed on pot intake; this time, believably so). PELL MELL Flow (1991, SST) The instrumental oddity called Pell Mell went through several lineup changes and incarnations throughout the ’80s (the band formed in 1980), with its most notable member being producer extraordinaire Steve Fisk (Unwound, Nirvana’s Blew EP, Treepeople, Screaming Trees, Beat Happening, etc.). The band acquired a larger college-radio/underground audience once it signed with SST and released the 1987 album The Bumper Crop, a more cohesive collection than its prior releases despite being assembled from different recordings made during the first half of the decade. While quite diverse and exploratory in a playful but not overly quirky (and rarely abrasive) manner, Pell Mell most frequently applied its modernizing touch to the source material of surf rock, but with guitar work recalling such disparate underground greats as Television, the Residents’ Snakefinger, and even Robert Fripp. Though band members were based in different regions while the ’80s turned into the ’90s, they regrouped with

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strength to record the 1992 recording Flow, the most rewardingly tuneful and direct album in the band’s body of work. After Microsoft licensed one of Flow’s tracks for a TV commercial, Pell Mell signed to major label (!!!) DGC for the Interstate album (1995). After the band was dropped, they reemerged in 1997 with Star City on Matador Records. Both albums are recommended, but neither fully captures the intangible goodness of Flow. PEGBOY Strong Reaction (1991, Quarterstick) Formed by guitarist John Haggerty after he departed Naked Raygun, Pegboy was reminiscent of that band (minus the artiness) and a lot of acts that made Chicago’s punk rock and post-hardcore bands of the ’80s sound regionally distinct (including working man’s punk fixture the Effigies). On this full-length debut—as well as on the two that followed and the three EPs released by the band between 1990 and 1997—Pegboy doesn’t waste one second of the listener’s time with anything but brawny, gut-punching, expertly crafted and always arrestingly catchy no-bullshit punk rock. Haggerty’s bottomless well of anthem-ready hooks makes him and this band stand far, far outside of the pack normally thought of when “pop” and “punk” come together. The conviction evident in the lyrics and singing here also help Pegboy distinguish itself from many peers by appealing to mindsets attuned to adult issues. American meat-and-potatoes melodic full-throttle punk rock is one of the tougher tricks to pull off with integrity and distinction, but Pegboy—like Ohio’s Gaunt and New Bomb Turks—is an exception. LIZ PHAIR Exile in Guyville (1993, Matador) Based on self-circulated home four-track recordings that Phair did under the name “Girly Sound” and brought to life in the studio over the course of two years, Liz Phair’s debut album Exile in Guyville is an alternative/indie rock landmark. It’s empowered but not preachy; sexually and romantically direct but not personally discomforting (the songs are not about her); sparse but instrumentally fleshed out to the perfect degree by Brad Wood’s production and his and Casey Rice’s arrangements and backing band help; consistently catchy; and long as all get out. Allegedly 236 GIMME INDIE ROCK

a song-by-song response to the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main Street (though the sequenced connection is loose at best), the album struck a major chord with critics and fans alike, primarily due to the strength of the songwriting and lack of gender alienation that often came with much of the then-prevailing riot grrrl movement. Phair was the first act signed to Matador based only on demo material sent by a stranger, as opposed to the label having seen the artist play live, heard previous albums, or, at the very least, met the creator of the music. PITCHBLENDE Kill Atom Smasher (1993, Headhunter/Cargo) Before forming the post-rock saviors Turing Machine or the promising post-Y2K rockers Panthers, guitarist Justin Chearno was in D.C.’s Pitchblende, a band that, like many in this book, had that special something right from the get-go—and right at the get-go, with less of it on subsequent albums. Pitchblende’s first of three full-lengths, Kill Atom Smasher, turned out aggro noise rock that was charming and approachable thanks to the band’s inherent pop sense and refreshing lack of the machinelike tightness that some of Pitchblende’s fellow District-dwellers of a less-imaginative stripe were misusing to tiresome ends by 1992–93. Of course, Fugazi and the words “less-imaginative stripe” don’t belong together, and the Dischord flagship is one of Pitchblende’s reference points here, along with a guitar sound born from Sonic Youth, a touch gnarlier than Archers of Loaf, but not as hang-from-the-neck as the trained professionals in these matters, Polvo and Trumans Water. Remember, in indie rock, being derivative wasn’t a crime if a band could turn it into something profound that begged to be in one’s “regular play” stack for two decades and counting.

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PITCHFORK Eucalyptus (1990, Nemesis/Cargo) Eucalyptus is the sole full-length by San Diego’s Pitchfork, the young band that featured future Rocket from the Crypt founder Jon Reis and Drive Like Jehu principal Rick Froberg. (DLJ also included Reis as a member.) Pitchfork formed in 1986 as each guitarist and singer was finishing high school. The band released one 7-inch in 1989— an EP titled Saturn Outhouse that is included on the 2003 reissue of Eucalyptus (on Reis’ Swami label). Pitchfork will appeal greatly to fans of Drive Like Jehu more so than to those with an affinity for Reis’ Rocket from the Crypt. Pitchfork brought the sounds of prime Mission of Burma, Naked Raygun, Squirrel Bait, Black Flag, and other post-punk/hardcore/post-hardcore luminaries together with an adept mix of snarl and melody. Eucalyptus is incredibly accomplished considering the band members’ ages at the time of its conception and recording, but that’s just how things seemed to go during this era. Curious ears are encouraged to check out the fantastic “Rana” and instrumental “Flatland Farming.” PIXIES Come on Pilgrim (1987, 4AD) American indie/alternative-rock institution Pixies was formed in Boston by college buddies Joey Santiago and Charles Thompson IV (a.k.a. Black Francis) at the beginning of 1986 after Thompson/ Francis returned from a six-month student-exchange trip in Puerto Rico (which would prove to be an overt influence throughout the band’s history) and dropped out of the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Bassist Kim Deal joined up shortly after that when she answered an ad “seeking female bass player” who was into Peter, Paul, and Mary and Hüsker Dü. Once the band found drummer David Lowering, it gigged around Boston and eventually recorded a seventeen-song demo tape (in three days) at Fort Apache Studios—a recording now famously known as The Purple Tape. It found its way to 4AD label head Ivo-Watts Russell by way of band manager Ken Goes, who also handled the affairs of fellow Bostonians Throwing Muses. The story goes that Watts was ready to pass on the band (oddly enough, because he found the band too rock and roll and traditional) but was urged by his girlfriend to do otherwise, then spent some time walking around NYC with The Purple Tape in his Walkman until he “got it.” 238 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Eight songs Watts picked from The Purple Tape became Pixies’ debut mini-album, Come on Pilgrim, and only a minor remix was done to the demo versions so as to retain the urgency and punch of the originals. The band’s unique sound and artistic vision was realized to a stunning extent on this twenty-minute wake-up call to college/alternative rock: two tracks partly sung in Spanish (“Vamos” and “Isla de Encanta”); hardcore tempos and shouting with acoustic instrumentation (nearly every track); and, of course, the band’s sheer sonic power and songwriting prowess (“I’ve Been Tired,” “Ed Is Dead,” and “Levitate Me”). PIXIES Surfer Rosa (1988, 4AD) Six months after the release of Come on Pilgrim, Black Francis, Kim Deal, David Lowering, and Joey Santiago unleashed upon the world their debut full-length, Surfer Rosa—and, as the cliché goes, the world (in which Pixies existed, at least) would never be the same. Like two other bands that released genre-defining full-lengths between the end of 1987 and the fall of 1988—Sonic Youth (Daydream Nation, October ’88) and Dinosaur Jr (You’re Living All over Me, December ’87)—Pixies gained their first decent amount of attention (critically and commercially) in the U.K. The British were absolutely enamored with noisy, thematically scary, antisocial, and generally wild-ass American post hardcore as an antidote to the saturation of tamer fare that dominated their own indie and underground movements (twee pop, C86, jangle pop, goth pop/rock, synth pop, dance pop, etc.). Surfer Rosa was easily one of the best antidotes to that tedium. The first thing to strike the uninitiated was Steve Albini’s live-from-inside-the-kick-drum production job, one of his earliest successes as an engineer (and the reason Nirvana chose him to helm their sessions for In Utero). Opener “Bone Machine” is positively mammoth-sounding, primarily because of that drum sound. And for a post-hardcore landmark, Surfer Rosa certainly rocked a lot of lightning-fast hardcore tempos in songs (“Something Against You,” “Broken Face,” “Tony’s Theme,” “Oh My Golly,” and “I’m Amazed”) that stated their business in less than two minutes. But this was no hardcore album. Surfer Rosa set the template for the remainder of Pixies’ output until the band’s acrimonious breakup in 1993, with maniacally strummed acoustic

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guitar; several shades of screaming and shrieking; fresh pop hooks where none should sensibly be, and authentic heaviness. On top of all this was thematic content that delved into fetishism and invented depravity without even hinting at the silly, overdramatic baggage such subject matter would become in the hands of most goth-rock, industrial, or dark-wave acts. When Surfer Rosa was finally available stateside (through a distribution deal with the U.S. branch of Rough Trade), the CD version came with Come on Pilgrim’s eight tracks appended to Surfer Rosa’s fifteen, for an excellent crash course in the peculiar and wonderful indie rock this Boston band had created in a year’s time. It’s hard to imagine underground rock careening through the ’90s and reaching the many high points that it did without Surfer Rosa as an irreplaceable part of its genesis. PIXIES Doolittle (1989, 4AD/Elektra) A tiny notch south from Surfer Rosa in terms of artistic feats, Doolittle was still a creative zenith in its own way, and it brought Pixies a new level of exposure and success. In support of Surfer Rosa, the band did an eighteen-show tour of Europe in April and May 1988, and the band was treated like the second coming. The U.K.’s powerful music weeklies (Melody Maker, NME, etc.) tripped over one another in a race to put the band on multiple covers. A hilarious (but possibly true) story ran claiming that fans were so blown away by Pixies that they uncontrollably urinated from theater balconies, a la Caligula. Returning home to what must have seemed a deafening silence, the band road-dogged it through the states to smaller crowds, recording demo material for Surfer Rosa’s follow-up when time allowed. The demo tape went by the working title of Whore, but this had nothing to do with the fact that Pixies would soon begin a relationship with major label Elektra (and Polygram in Canada) for worldwide distribution. With only five albums under his belt (two of them by Pixies cohorts Throwing Muses), British producer Gil Norton was chosen to steer the proper sessions in late 1988 at Boston’s Downtown Recorders studio—a professional twenty-four-track venue for a band that found itself with an equally professional recording budget of $40K.

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Doolittle does lack some of the electrifying gut-level punch of Surfer Rosa, and there are fewer sub-two-minute blasts at blurry speeds (only “Tame” and “Crackity Jones” would qualify here). In fact, Norton often pushed the band to add choruses and stretch out songs. (Frontman Black Francis escorted the producer to a record store and pointed out a Buddy Holly album as evidence that two-minute songs work.) But despite its slower tracks and marked broadening of melodic tendencies, Doolittle prevailed as a brave, forwardly positioned, wildly influential, and—compared to that era’s albums by R.E.M., The Church, and They Might Be Giants—flat-out frightening album. It was a stylistic and sonic anomaly among major-label releases at the end of the ’90s. (Sonic Youth’s Goo appeared more than a year later.) Opening track “Debaser,” a paean to surrealism (the entire album is loosely conceptualized around said movement), kicks things off with Francis’ trademark scream in full effect; the song is among Pixies’ upper echelon of raging rockers. Two singles that entered the top five on Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks chart—“This Monkey’s Gone to Heaven” (with a ridiculous mustsee video) and “Here Comes Your Man”—display the band’s newfound penchant for slower song structures and dominating melody, which is also apparent on “Wave of Mutilation.” Doolittle sold more than 100,000 copies within six months of its release, reached No. 8 on the U.K. Album Chart, and, at home, spent a couple of weeks on the right side of the Top 100 on the Billboard 200. It was certified gold by the RIAA in 1995. The album was mostly praised by critics, and this time, the superlatives came more evenly from both sides of the pond. Sadly—but unsurprising to anyone familiar with this band’s tumultuous history—the sessions for Doolittle marked the beginning of tensions between Black Francis and Kim Deal that would end the band four years later.

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PIXIES Bossanova (1990, 4AD/Elektra) Bossanova is the first Pixies album written entirely by Black Francis (a.k.a. Frank Black), and it marks the opening of the second (and final) phase of the band’s original tenure of activity. The friction between Kim Deal and Black Francis that made the Doolittle sessions a negative experience paled in comparison to what transpired during the fourteen months between that album and Bossanova’s release in August 1990. A perfect storm of intraband turmoil included: the appropriately named “Fuck or Fight” tour that so exhausted the band, no one showed up for its wrap party; bassist Kim Deal losing her songwriting privileges, followed by radio silence between her and Francis; a brief hiatus; Francis partially reconvening the band in L.A. to record Bossanova; and Deal staying behind to write, record, and release a phenomenal debut album by her new band, the Breeders (The Pod). It’s a wonder that the Pixies name made it onto two more albums before the wheels totally fell off in early 1993. Despite a somewhat noticeable songwriting void (due to Deal’s lack of contributions), a new corniness to some of the material, and the subtle absence of the underlying, cryptic menace that added to the magnetism of earlier titles, Bossanova was still a ballsy prospect in the pre-Nevermind alternative landscape of 1990. POLVO Cor-Crane Secret (1992, Merge) Much harder to pin down than their fellow North Carolinians Superchunk and Archers of Loaf, Polvo took Sonic Youth’s guitar investigations into alternative tunings not just to the next level, but up many levels beyond that. Equally crucial to their authentically unique sound was a reliance on an almost Beefheart-ish looseness that made each song sound as if it might fall to pieces at any minute, but was actually rather complex and, if you will, “tight” to the most discerning of ears. Then a knack for pretty hooks and air-moving heaviness rounded out the deal. Dressed more conservatively than even the frat-boyish Archers of Loaf, Polvo looked like the coworkers with whom one might begrudgingly spend an evening throwing darts or watching

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Monday Night Football. Truly killers in disguise, this quartet blasted out of nowhere with a debut that still sounds like it was made in the future; it’s one of the most powerful, heartfelt, and progressively experimental examples of indie rock’s natural impulse to shut out the rest of the world and follow whatever felt right. Each and every record in this book is essential, but CorCrane Secret belongs in the top drawer. POLVO Today’s Active Lifestyles (1993, Merge) If Polvo’s debut was an out-of-nowhere shot in indie rock’s arm, the band’s second full-length was nothing short of a gamechanger. Today’s Active Lifestyles brought the band’s Middle Eastern influences full circle and experimented more heavily with structure—or what sounded like a lack thereof but really wasn’t. The album also somewhat dubiously (via critics) established the band as front-runners in a subgenre that would come to be known as math rock, even though this particular type of complex music sounded very little like that of other bands with which Polvo would share such accolades (including Drive Like Jehu, June of 44, and Slint). Guitarists Ash Bowie and Dave Brylawski used tunings so outside of tradition, they were often accused of playing out-of-tune instruments on this album—but that was not the case. When the band did lock together in its own singular way, as heard on “Thermal Treasure,” “Stinger (Five Ways),” “Tilebreaker” (the album’s sole single), and the astonishing “Action vs. Vibe,” it surpassed what Polvo had practically invented on Cor-Crane Secret and can only be described as breathtaking. And believe it or not, the best was yet to come. Fun fact: early versions of Today’s Active Lifestyle were issued with a painting of a cluster of African wild animals that was used without permission, so most copies come with a plain yellow cover that replaced it.

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POLVO Celebrate the New Dark Age (1995, Merge) This seven-song mini-album and the sprawling Exploded Drawing make up the nadir of Polvo Mk. I (1990–1998). Ash Bowie’s vocal hooks are moved up in the mix to share top billing with the rest of Polvo’s instrumental din, which itself had tightened into a new form of immediately identifiable indie prog/pop/post hardcore that not only sounded unlike any other band on the scene, but was superior to the vast majority of indie rock, from the traditionally minded to the chaotically obtuse. Celebrate the New Dark Age features the song “Tragic Carpet Ride,” a track that should go down in indie rock history as one of the genre’s unmatched golden achievements in which peerless songwriting skill meets inspired innovation. POLVO Exploded Drawing (1996, Touch and Go) Polvo’s final work of brilliance stretches over four sides of vinyl, with the drums and bass taking prominence at times over the band’s trademark guitar work. There are more Middle Eastern workouts here, usually as intermissions that hold together the proper songs. “Passive Attack” and “Feather of Forgiveness” are examples of how this album is heavier than any other Polvo release; the songs are also spellbindingly great, on par with the previous release’s “Tragic Carpet Ride.” Exploded Drawing should be put in a rocket or time capsule as the ultimate proof that indie rock could reach perfection, years into the game, while being so ahead of its time that future generations are still trying to catch up. Ash Bowie was a member of girlfriend Mary Timony’s Helium at this point, and Polvo would release one more album in the ’90s, the good but out-of-gas Shapes in 1997. Fortunately, the band reformed in 2008 to release two more amazing albums— 2009’s In Prism and 2013’s Siberia (both on Merge)—that pick up where Exploded Drawing left off.

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POSIES Frosting on the Beater (1993, DGC) After much touring in support of its 1990 sophomore album (and first for major label DGC), Dear 23, the Posies entered the studio in 1991 to record a follow-up. But the effort was aborted, resulting in recordings known as “the Lost Sessions” and the termination of bassist Rick Roberts after co-founders Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer found his contributions to be an ill fit for where the band was headed creatively. Sometime after, the Posies presented DGC with the fruits of an early-1992 recording session helmed by producer Don Fleming (B.A.L.L., Gumball, Velvet Monkeys; he was also a regular collaborator with Dinosaur Jr and Sonic Youth). The label pulled a predictable move (for a major) and sent the band back to the studio later in the year for the purpose of recording some “hits.” Thus what was originally titled Eclipse was changed to the working name of “the Hit Sessions” before a final title stuck: Frosting on the Beater. (It’s a metaphor for masturbation.) Turns out, the album did contain the band’s biggest hit (and best song), “Dream All Day,” which reached No. 4 on the Billboard Modern Rock charts and settled into a bit of regular play on alternative and college radio and MTV’s 120 Minutes. Frosting on the Beater shows the Posies giving in to the six-string-centric times and returning with a much toothier, heavier, and borderline shoegaze album. But this is no cash-in; it’s the Posies’ grand moment, artistically, featuring cross-genre earworms of the highest order, including “Dream All Day” along with “Solar Sister,” “Flavor of the Month,” “Love Letter Boxes,” and “Definite Door.” And at over six minutes, closing magnum opus “Coming Right Along” pointed at darker days ahead. POSIES Amazing Disgrace (1996, DGC) Between the releases of Frosting on the Beater and this album, the Posies weathered a lot of touring, a rhythm section turnover, and Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow’s stint filling in on guitar and bass in the newly reformed Big Star (though “weathered” is probably not the proper way to describe finding that particular pot of credibility gold). Amazing Disgrace follows a path common for albums that follow a title (Frosting on the Beater) known for moving away from the sound and style that preceded it (as

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heard on 1990’s Dear 23): it marries the qualities of each. So the shimmering sunshine pop of Dear 23 is beefed up with a more punk- and ’70s-hard-rock-informed sonic makeup, while the lyrics, aural moodiness, and song titles (“Daily Mutilation,” “Hate Song,” “Everybody Is a Fucking Liar,” and “Fight If You Want It”) tell a more cynical, world-and-relationship (professional and personal) weary story. Part of this tone can be traced directly to the Posies’ treatment by DGC, which once again sent the band back into the studio to record more “hit material.” (The track “Ontario” came out of this insulting gesture.) Rick Neilson and Robin Zander of Cheap Trick guest on “Hate Song,” though their contribution is lost in the album’s loud mix, and the punkish “Grant Hart” is a somewhat scathing takedown early-’90s majorlabel alt-rock bands who owe their exposure and record deals to the then-forgotten Hüsker Dü, who years earlier not only pioneered the musical style so hot at that moment but was also the first established act from the ’80s American underground to make the gutsy move to a major label. Amazing Disgrace would be the Posies’ final album for a major. Stringfellow released his solo debut This Sounds Like Goodbye in 1997, joined R.E.M.’s Peter Buck and the Young Fresh Fellows’ Scott McCaughey in The Minus 5, recorded and played with Lagwagon in the late ’90s, and contributed to most of R.E.M.’s post-millennial albums. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg as far as his musical career goes. Jon Auer produced albums by Love Battery, Truly, Redd Kross, and You Am I, among others. The Posies returned in 1998 with Success on PopLlama Records, then went on hiatus until the mid-aughts, when the reunion album Every Kind of Light appeared on Rykodisc (followed by 2010’s Blood/Candy on the same label). POSTER CHILDREN Daisy Chain Reaction (1991, Twin/Tone/1992, Sire) The long-running Poster Children of Champaign, Illinois, had released a collection of early demos and one proper full-length (1989’s Flower Power) when the quartet recorded this classic chunk of super-dynamic heavy indie rock with Steve Albini in 1990. After a slight delay in release due to the detrimental impact the bankruptcy of Rough Trade Distribution had on Twin/Tone Records (and practically every other indie label in the country), 246 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Daisy Chain Reaction appeared in 1991. Its powerful first single, “If You See Kay,” is one of indie rock’s greatest examples of the quiet/loud/quiet/loud juxtaposition, and it got some attention via MTV’s 120 Minutes. Daisy Chain Reaction featured the Poster Children’s fourth drummer, Bob Rising, who had previously played in Snaketrain with a pre–Smashing Pumpkins James Iha. He was also a member of Chicago’s criminally overlooked Repulse Kava (but would depart after this album and become the drummer for Seam). On this record, he’s a powerhouse, as is guitarist, vocalist, and founder Rick Valentin, indie rock’s best screamer this side of Pixies’ Black Francis. A bidding war ensued for the Poster Children and the band went with Warner Bros’ Sire/ Reprise for the re-release of this album in 1992 and four more full-lengths, making for one of the longer hitless relationships between an underground band and the majors during this era. PRISONSHAKE The Roaring Third (1993, Scat) Formed by Robert Griffin, founder and operator of Scat Records (which was responsible for bringing Guided by Voices to a larger audience), Prisonshake began in Cleveland during the late-’80s, and its debut album was an immense amount of material titled I’m Really Fucked Now, released in 1990 as a box set of one 7-inch, one cassette, one CD, and one LP. But the band’s next full-length, The Roaring Third, was Prisonshake’s creative summit (and last album for some time), a much-needed unpretentious and rock-informed whopper of real adult sentiments and problems, drunkenness, serious charm, incredible songwriting, and genuine presentation that put an American post-hardcore/indie rock spin on sounds pioneered by such past icons as the Replacements, the Only Ones, and Johnny Thunders.

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PUSSY GALORE Dial M for Motherfucker (1989 Caroline) This is Pussy Galore’s second or third proper album, depending on whether one considers a song-by-song evisceration of the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main St. released only on cassette in 1985 a proper album. The NYC-by-way-of-D.C. quartet was Jon Spencer’s pre–Blues Explosion three-guitar-plus drums lineup featuring future Royal Trux founder Neil Haggerty, former Sonic Youth drummer Bob Bert, and Julia Cafritz, who would later be in Free Kitten. The project of ultimate rock-and-roll deconstructionist intent was fueled by Spencer’s aspiration to combine his two favorite styles of music at the time: original industrial noise as practiced by bands like Einstürzende Neubauten, Throbbing Gristle, and early Swans; and ’60s Nuggets-style garage-psych. On this album, Pussy Galore comes closest to realizing what is more than likely an impossibility. Dial M for Motherfucker, also known by the title Make Them All Eat Shit Slowly, a.k.a. New Album by Pussy Galore, is nihilistic punk-noise-garage-rock antagonism and sweeping provocation—truly two arms extended to all other forms of rock-based music, with each ending in a great big middle finger. Which begs one to stop and consider the question: isn’t that the point of most of history’s greatest rock and roll?

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RAPEMAN — RUN WESTY RUN

RAPEMAN Two Nuns and a Pack Mule and Budd (1988, Touch and Go) Big Black broke up in the rarest of rock-and-roll manners: honorably, after announcing the amicable split to fans, then going on to release its best work (Songs about Fucking, 1987, Touch and Go). Founder Steve Albini formed his next band that same year with drummer Rey Washam and guitarist David Wm. Sims, both recently freed up by the breakup of their former band, Scratch Acid. (Washam also drummed for the legendary Austin, Texas, post punk/hardcore band, the Big Boys.) Never one to mince words, shy away from an honest but button-pushing opinion, or otherwise cause bristling where bristling was likely to occur, Albini decided to name his next band after the title character in a Japanese comic book, Rapeman. Widespread opposition to the moniker—gig protests became a tenacious issue—may or may not have contributed to the short lifespan of this amazing band, but internal tensions (some of them carried over from the rhythm section’s unresolved issues in the previous band) definitely did, and Rapeman lasted just long enough to release two 7-inches, a four-song EP (Budd), and the bar-raising landmark album of noise rock’s then-fledgling history, Two Nuns and a Pack Mule. After years in front of a drum machine in Big Black, the improved nature of Albini’s jagged, trebly-happy guitar work benefited immensely from Washam’s John Bonham-of-post-hardcore skills, and the album (combined with the four-song Budd EP by Touch and Go for release on CD) showcased the most forwardthinking, hair-raisingly exciting sound to come out of American post hardcore until Slint’s Spiderland album (notably produced by Albini) rearranged listener synapses some three years later. For fans of the more incendiary and visceral areas of indie rock covered by this book, immersion in Two Nuns and a Pack Mule is obligatory.

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RED HOUSE PAINTERS Down Colorful Hill (1993, 4AD) The Ohio-born Mark Kozelek (now of Sun Kil Moon and proprietor of the Caldo Verde label) assembled the first lineup of the Red House Painters in Atlanta, Georgia, then moved it to San Francisco in the late ’80s and recorded two demos that found a vocal fan in American Music Club leader Mark Eitzel. He, in turn, made sure the demos were heard in the U.K. offices of 4AD Records, and the Red House Painters found themselves with an offer from the label. As was 4AD’s habit with new signees, the first Red House Painters record on the label was a full-length containing both of the barely touched-up demos, titled Down Colorful Hill. Being privy to the album’s pre-release history is about the only way listeners would ever know that what they were hearing was something other than the debut by a band developed to its fullest. Down Colorful Hill and two eponymously titled full-lengths recorded in 1993 together form a linear block of music from which emotes, with unequivocal intensity, authentic sadness, disenchantment, desperation, regret, and general darkness— more so than on anything else found on this list of 500 albums (and possibly, with an obscure exception here or there, on anything in all of American underground music during the ’80s and ’90s). The bleakest front-page bad news is frontloaded on this album, a stark exposition, in minute detail, of the bombed-out human psyche and urgent suicide-watch worldview that happens to belong to the man behind the voice. The sonic foundation is desolate, delicate, and unforgiving once Kozelek’s tales start unfolding across the top. First-time listeners will come away from the album with, in the very best of scenarios, a newfound enthusiasm for lyrical metaphor. This is the first advance in a visionary trajectory of great creative and artistic weight; if one chooses the right day, it’s a gorgeous listen.

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RED HOUSE PAINTERS Red House Painters [I] a.k.a. Rollercoaster (1993, 4AD) Creatively energized after the release of Down Colorful Hill, Red House Painters entered the studio and recorded enough material for two very long full-length albums, released as Red House Painters [I], a.k.a. Rollercoaster, in May 1993 and Red House Painters [II], a.k.a. Bridge, the following September. Though the term shouldn’t really be used in earnest by any self-respecting adult, the “sadcore” category in which the Red House Painters’ work tends to be lumped is rendered hilariously ineffective as a descriptor for the music on these two albums. The first of the pair thankfully offers some breathing room after the tough ride that Down Colorful Hill can be, mainly via a more fluctuating array of song arrangements where textures and sonic landscapes rule next to, by Red House Painters standards, what is downright traditional pop by Red House Panters standards (“Grace Cathedral Park”). During this phase of the band’s lifespan, Red House Painters also had an interest in long cloudy sheets of noise, and in what is actual heavy music when combined with Mark Kozelek’s tales of everyday American people being crushed under the weight of long-term or irreversible life-ruining decisions, along with his fixation on his childhood. To the type of music fanatic who respects an album’s potential for personal connection and reward, Red House Painters [I] can be a great achievement. RED HOUSE PAINTERS Red House Painters [II] a.k.a. Bridge (1993, 4AD) The second of Red House Painters’ two companion albums released in 1993 (both recorded during the same session) and the final of their trio of mood-dampening master-strokes, Red House Painters [II] (a.k.a. Bridge) is a comparatively strange exorcizing of cover material that was at the time criticized as a misstep. Simon and Garfunkel’s “I Am a Rock” and a sitcom-length rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” are among the album contents, but more than two decades later, these moves feel charming and do not remotely suggest a compromise of integrity. The rocked-up version of the previous album’s most catastrophically desolate and raw human tale “New Jersey” is Red House Painters’ surprise jewel here. This album is the most experimentally restless and demanding of the six RHP albums released over a ten-year stretch, closed out 254 GIMME INDIE ROCK

by 2001’s Old Ramon on Sub Pop. After that, Kozelek shifted his focus to the somewhat more popular but not all that sunnier Sun Kil Moon, which attracted a devoted cult fan base. REDD KROSS Born Innocent (1982, Smoke 7) Formed by American punk/hardcore’s most precocious brothers, Steve and Jeff McDonald, in 1980 (when Steve was thirteen), this band’s original lineup (then called Red Cross) featured Ron Reyes on drums and Greg Hetson on guitar, but each had left for Black Flag and the Circle Jerks, respectively, by the time the band started work on Born Innocent. Drummer Janet Housden and guitarist Tracy Marshak backed the brothers in some capacity during the recording sessions, though it’s hard to say exactly how much they contributed. Regardless, the album is a blast, dishing out sloppy hardcore (or perhaps slop-rock at hardcore speed) and subject matter that reflects the brothers’ precociously vast pop-cultural frame of reference. Born Innocent was named after the made-for-TV movie starring the actress that the album’s first track is named after: Linda Blair. There are also references to Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, Tatum O’Neal, and Lita Ford, plus covers of the Carrie Nations’ “Look on Up from the Bottom” (from the Beyond the Valley of the Dolls soundtrack) and Charles Manson’s “Cease to Exist.” Redd Kross performed the entire album—which confounded hardcore audiences at the time of its release—in 2007 as part of All Tomorrow’s Parties’ Don’t Look Back concert series. R.E.M. Chronic Town (1982, I.R.S.) Among early college-rock recordings, this twenty-minute EP (R.E.M.’s second release; it followed the “Radio Free Europe” single in 1981) and the full-length that followed (1983’s Murmur) form the genre’s archetypical golden apple of concentrated integrity and unrivaled quality. The five songs on Chronic Town stunned via exclusion. Without hyper-speed riffs, screaming or yelling, thickly distorted guitars, ham-fisted artiness, substanceless abstraction (theirs was a more subtle obtuseness), overt politically/socially derived sermonizing, general nihilism, or alienating boys-club testosterone, the tracks still sounded

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refreshing, forward-thinking, and far removed from the powerpop movement that had just crested—while also eschewing the commercialized quirkiness that a band like Talking Heads had settled into by the early ’80s. The album is futuristic, yet rural (with a heavy Southern Gothic influence, in the literary sense); beautiful in a populist fashion, but devoid of traditional versechorus-verse cadence; lyrically nonsensical, yet deeply poetic. For a bit of music history trivia, Chronic Town was the first U.S. release by Miles Copeland’s (sibling of the Police’s Stewart Copeland) soon-to-be omnipresent quasi-independent label, I.R.S. Records. R.E.M. Murmur (1983, I.R.S.) No superlatives can do Murmur justice. Peter Buck dove into the guitar innovations of the ’60s (Byrds), ’70s (Television), and more recent progenitors (Feelies), and came out with something that was all his own. Vocalist Michael Stipe elevated mumbled vocals to an art form. Mike Mills (bass) and Bill Berry (drums) fused into a rhythm section on par with the best U.K. post punk (minus the interest in funk) and kept the tempo brisk. But all of this would be mildly interesting window dressing without the unwavering songcraft at hand, something so special that calling it accidental or fortuitous wouldn’t be insulting. The hooks anchoring the songs on Murmur are the glue that holds together musical ingredients that could otherwise be at serious odds with one another. (They’re described in the Chronic Town entry.) Murmur’s best tracks are “Laughing” and “Sitting Still,” both required listening for absolutely any fan of any style of American underground rock covered in this book. The record begins with a rerecorded version of R.E.M.’s first single, “Radio Free Europe” (the song that got them signed to I.R.S.), and it became the band’s first hit when it peaked at No. 78 on the Billboard Pop Singles chart and reached a not-to-shake-a-stick-at No. 26 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Chart. This pushed Murmur all the way to No. 36 on the Billboard 200, and the album sold more than 200,000 copies by the end of 1983.

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R.E.M. Reckoning (1984, I.R.S.) R.E.M.’s second proper full-length continued R.E.M.’s Chronic Townto-Murmur hot streak that grabbed the American underground by the neck without screaming in its face. In the process, “college rock” became the house that R.E.M. built. Production dream team Mitch Easter and Don Dixon returned to put things in order after R.E.M. demoed twenty-two songs with Neil Young producer Elliot Mazer in San Francisco. As with the Murmur sessions, I.R.S. Records put on its Major Label costume and tried to pressure the band into making commercial concessions. The suggestions were ignored by the producers and musicians alike. Wanting to capture more of the band’s “live sound,” due to R.E.M. being excellent commanders of a stage (especially for a band of that era that didn’t rely on volume or aggression), Easter and Dixon put a focus on the guitars, and Reckoning is truly Peter Buck’s show because of it. The darker “Pretty Persuasion,” opener “Harborcoat” (the album’s best track, hands-down), “So. Central Rain,” and “Camera” add to the previous album’s cluster of career pinnacles. The beautiful lament “(Don’t Go Back to) Rockville” would be one of the alt-country prototypes so many bands in that movement of a decade later would try— but fail—to draft. No singles from Reckoning gained any decent momentum, but anticipation for the album was so fervent within the college-rock community that it spent almost a year on the Billboard 200 album chart, where it peaked at No. 27. R.E.M. Document (1987, I.R.S.) With the possible exception of the good-but-not-great Fables of the Reconstruction (1985), R.E.M. artistically progressed on its own terms, and almost singlehandedly (or is it “singlebandedly”?) built the college-rock realm of the underground for which it served as the American flagship act. Along with this status came a bigger following of loyal fans each time a record hit. Life’s Rich Pageant (1986) freed the band of its college-rock shackles by reaching No. 21 on the Billboard 200 behind the gloomy little single, “Fall on Me,” which itself peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart and got some attention from commercial radio. Everything seemed to move forward in nice and neat increments—until Document came along and made

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R.E.M. a household name (albeit a confusing one for older family members). Good thing this album also happened to be R.E.M.’s most inspired outing since Reckoning. Document initiated R.E.M.’s long and fruitful stint with producer Scott Litt, who helped add a guitar-heavy sturdiness to the band’s formerly airy arrangements. This was a divine match for R.E.M.’s hardest-rocking album to date, one that boasted a reinvigorated sound and mood and served as a culturally literate (revisit the lyrics to hit single “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (and I Feel Fine)”) and caustic carrier of political messages. (“Exhuming McCarthy” compares the Reagan era with the devastating sociopathic blacklisting campaign of Senator Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s). “Finest Worksong” is a twisted and semi-dissonant affair (well, for R.E.M.), and the cover of Wire’s “Strange” works in spite of its quirkiness. Document’s jewel, however, was “The One I Love,” a dirge-y, rough-pop gem that shot all the way to No. 2 on Billboard’s Mainstream Rock Tracks chart and to No. 9 on the same magazine’s Hot 100 chart. This put Document on the Billboard 200 album chart for thirty-three weeks, where it peaked at No. 10. Sales led to the album being certified gold by November 1987 and platinum by the following January. Meanwhile, millions of radio listeners flooded request lines in hopes of getting an on-air dedication of “The One I Love” to, well, the one they loved—meaning that millions of radio listeners misinterpreted (or just didn’t pay attention to) the song’s rather disturbing and dark lyrics. THE REPLACEMENTS Sorry Ma, I Forgot to Take Out the Trash (1981, Twin/Tone) As a band that willfully existed outside of its hometown hardcore scene (mostly being built up by faux/friendly rivals Hüsker Dü), the Replacements are behind one of this book’s great little ironies: Sorry Ma, I Forgot to Take Out the Trash is one of the hardcore movement’s indispensible desert-island discs. The Replacements signed to Twin/Tone Records in 1980 on the strength of a four-song demo recorded in drummer Chris Mars’ basement. The band had found an extremely helpful impresario in Twin/Tone co-founder Peter Jesperson, who was so blown away by the tape that he called singer and guitarist Paul Westerberg within twenty-four hours of hearing it to ask, “So do

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you want to do a single or an album?” Because the young band (bassist Tommy Stinson had yet to turn fifteen when the album was released) had barely any live experience, no local following as of yet, and a label that had to wait until an August 1981 street date due to financial concerns, Sorry Ma . . . came together over a six-month period that saw the band in and out of Blackberry Way Studios. This cohort of dropouts and outcasts had soaked up the obligatory first-wave punk-rock influences retroactively, then turned up the throttle like so many of their peers. Still, Sorry Ma, I Forgot to Take Out the Trash was created in a slight vacuum, and this gives it an approachable, nonpolitical, and agenda-less humanism that’s lacking in so many American hardcore albums of the era. These were guys that listeners could relate to, and the wellspring of hooks and venerable rock-and-roll dynamism helped make the album the driving, ageless landmark it is. “I’m in Trouble” (the record’s only single), “Takin’ a Ride,” “Customer,” and the golden moment “Shiftless When Idle” form only a sampling of this undeniable H.C. classic. THE REPLACEMENTS Hootenanny (1983, Twin/Tone) After the 1982 EP, Stink—an appropriate punk-rock/hardcore extension of the band’s ’81 debut—the Replacements set about the casting of a wide net for what became their first of two allover-the-map, beyond-the-pale albums. Hootenanny follows up Stink’s standout brooder of a ballad, “Go,” with Paul Westerberg’s continued branching out as a songwriter. Checking in way ahead of the lo-fi trend that would come a decade later, his “Within Your Reach” is a love song the guitarist and singer played from the ground up with a drum machine and cheap synthesizer. “Run It” and “You Lose” let the band get some dangling punk/ hardcore velocities and sentiments out of its system, but much of this record is unclassifiable. “Buck Hill” beats the Meat Puppets at their own C&W-meets-punk-rock synergy; “Treatment Bound” is an acoustic guitar + vocals love/hate letter to the band’s excesses; and the album’s two dark post-hardcore rockers, “Color Me Impressed” and “Willpower,” point the way toward the band’s creative breakthrough, Let It Be.

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THE REPLACEMENTS Let It Be (1984, Twin/Tone) Let It Be ranks next to the Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime, Hüsker Dü’s Zen Arcade, and the Meat Puppets’ Meat Puppets II as recorded evidence that something very special was bubbling out of America’s underground rock/punk/hardcore scene in 1984. Let It Be is built with a mingling of styles held together by a glue of confidence that was not as apparent on the ’Mats’ sophomore album, Hootenanny. Let It Be still holds the special power to generate life-altering epiphanies for listeners years after its release. Perhaps the band’s most alluring quality here was the more organic, from-the-heart human touch it incorporated, compared to the normally detached and po-faced approach favored by most bands that outgrew punk/hardcore beginnings. Each of this album’s distinct classics—“I Will Dare,” “Favorite Thing,” “Unsatisfied,” “Seen Your Video” (an early negative sentiment toward MTV-catering bands), “Sixteen Blue,” “Answering Machine,” and “Androgynous”—represented an achievement the band had only hinted at in the past—and would fail to reach on later releases. Only “We’re Coming Out” (a possible hardcore parody), “Gary’s Got a Boner,” and “Tommy Gets His Tonsils Out” echoed the high-speed mess of the ’Mats’ past. The record was universally loved, placing No. 4 in the Village Voice’s year-end “Pazz & Jop” poll and getting a perfect five-star Rolling Stone review. Like the other three albums listed at the beginning of this entry, Let It Be provides a mandatory history lesson in early-to-mid-’80s American independent underground rock. REX S/T (1994, Southern) Building upon the mood and pace of Codeine, the postmodernizing roots route of Will Oldham’s Palace Brothers/Palace Music, and the heartfelt heave of Red House Painters, singer/ guitarist Curtis Harvey assembled some help and operated in rhythmic (though often at a crawl) infectiousness and protopost-rock experimentation to create this epic debut album of slow-building, rise-and-crash widescreen denseness. Though Rex was based in Brooklyn, the album conveys a believable rural loneliness and a very real sense of human desperation and shattered will. Nine-minute opener “Nothing Is Most 260 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Honorable Than You” is nothing less than stunning. It’s the best way to experience this overlooked at the time—and still mostly forgotten—band at its best. Follow-up album C tends to be the choice of the few critics who’ve chimed in on Rex, but too much of the raw feelings and heavy dynamics of this debut are missing from that release. RITES OF SPRING S/T (1985, Dischord) For a less-than-thorough rundown of the musical environment, social variables, and general (forward-) thinking points that led to the creation of emo’s first recorded documents that came out of the genre’s fervent D.C. scene, see the entry for Ian MacAye’s post– Minor Threat, pre-Fugazi band, Embrace. But know also that Rites of Spring’s untouchable benchmark debut, an example of this (then) new form of hardcore/post hardcore, is an infinitely timeless burst of perfection that should be one of the first albums in this book that unfamiliar readers cozy up to. Rites of Spring featured two future Fugazi members: guitarist/vocalist Guy Picciotto and drummer Brandan Canty. The best go-to track for the curious is the infenctious and explosive “For Want Of.” The band was active for less than two years and only played fifteen shows, but Rites of Spring performances were so passionate, incendiary, and chaotic that the quartet’s rabid fans treated R.o.S. gigs as major events not to be missed. Rites of Spring recorded this self-titled album in early 1985, released it that summer, then broke up in January of 1986. The four-song All through a Life 7-inch EP was posthumously released, as was a CD that combined both, titled End on End. All Rites of Spring releases were on Dischord. ROCKET FROM THE CRYPT Paint as a Fragrance (1991, Cargo/Headhunter) When John Reis and Rich Froberg dissolved Pitchfork, the latter formed Drive Like Jehu and the former formed Rocket from the Crypt (named after Cleveland mid-’70s proto-punks Rocket from the Tombs). Reis was also the second guitarist and vocalist in Drive Like Jehu, but RFTC was his show. The band’s original lineup could make the most incendiary of noisy but catchy punk rock, heard only on debut album Paint as a Fragrance, released in early 1991 and fired out across the punk-rock/indie landscape as a

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rapid succession of 7-inches (some of which were released on the artist Pushead’s label, Pusmort). Following the album’s release and the departures of backing vocalist Elaina Torres and drummer Sean Flynn, Reis remade Rocket from the Crypt with a bigger and cleaner sound, matching outfits for the band members, retrofuturistic stage names, and a horn section. RODAN Rusty (1994, Quarterstick/Touch and Go) From inspired interpretations to flat-out musical thievery, a halfdecade-long trail of influence followed Slint’s Spiderland after its 1991 release. Obviously, Rodan’s sole full-length Rusty falls into the former category or you wouldn’t be reading about it right now. In truth, the Slint reference points here are overshadowed by Rodan’s originality and self-invented dynamic fusion, and Rusty would influence its own future generation of adventurous bands. Rusty marks its own genesis of noisy indie rock—and the specific strain of noise rock/post hardcore that followed in its wake. Sorry. Calling it math rock would be using the album’s most popular descriptor, but it would also sell short the album and the band that made it. Solemn, moving, and rather pretty, seven-minute opener “Bible Silver Corners” bleeds into the complex attack of “Shiner” and the ten minutes of shifting tempos that is “Everyday World of Bodies.” Bassist Tara Jane O’Neill sings two of these tracks, providing a nice lady’s touch—perhaps the subgenre’s only example of such. Rodan broke up in 1995, and the projects of note birthed by its members are legion. O’Neill formed Retsin and The Sonora Pine before going solo. Guitarist Jeff Mueller was also in June of 44 and Shipping News. Guitarist Jason Noble formed Rachel’s along with Rodan drummer Kevin Coultas (who was also in The Sonora Pine with O’Neill). Noble died of synovial sarcoma, a rare form of cancer, in 2012.

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ROYAL TRUX Twin Infinitives (1990, Drag City) While still a teenager—and one of the three guitarist/vocalists in Jon Spencer’s pre–Blues Explosion middle-finger to rock and roll, Pussy Galore—Neil Haggerty formed Royal Trux with girlfriend Jennifer Herrema. The duo released a self-titled debut album in 1988, which is just too much unredeemable experimentation for the sake of it, and can be overlooked. The duo’s next album, however, is this sprawling sixty-three-minute exploration into the outer limits of underground rock, which does away with structure for a good part of the double album, but gives out plenty of fascinating, hallucinatory bits of deconstructed rock swank moments of Trux magic. It can be a polarizing album due to harsher abrasiveness and what many folks, even within the band’s own cultural demographic of fans, hear as “just fucking around”; but Twin Infinitives is feat of individualistic drive. ROYAL TRUX Cats and Dogs (1993, Drag City) By the time Cats and Dogs (Royal Trux’s fourth full-length) came along, Neil Haggerty and Jennifer Herrema were going into studios with a full backing band and writing über-solid songs influenced by previous decades of sleaze-rock and the early-’70s drug-informed work of the Rolling Stones—but pushed through the Royal Trux off-kilter filter and sung in Herrema’s smoky, intimidating drawl. Royal Trux cut a path of its own that was too weird and creatively free for garage-rock revivalism, and much too gross, deviant, and—again—weird to fit anywhere near traditional indie rock styles of the time. The duo (with a revolving cast of backing help) would continue to make this sort of album, to varying degrees of artistic success, and complete with their own insane major-label tale to tell—until the Royal Trux was dissolved in 2001. Herrema formed RTX (releasing four albums and counting), she’s made a name for herself as a record producer, and she’s an artist. Meanwhile, Haggerty has released a library’s worth of solo albums and written several books.

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RUN WESTY RUN Green Cat Island (1990, Twin/Tone) This band was part of Minneapolis’ second wave of underground bands that followed the mid-’80s crest of Hüsker Dü and the Replacements. Run Westy Run released two full-lengths on SST (the Hüsker’s Grant Hart produced the first) before switching over to hometown biggie Twin/Tone Records for the release of this Peter Buck–produced third album. Formed mid-decade by the three Johnson brothers—vocalist Kirk, bassist Kyle, and guitarist/bassist Kraig—and lead guitarist Terry Fisher, Run Westy Run picked up drummer Dan Davis before this album was recorded in Athens, Georgia. Green Cat Island has an eclectic restlessness similar to that of pre-fame Soul Asylum, with the band’s best hard-rock-meets-post-hardcore rockers (like a Midwest Mudhoney), plus some Neil Young/proto-alt-country acoustic/ electric prettiness here and there. It’s an overlooked charmer.

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SACCHARINE TRUST Paganicons (1981, SST) “I think we’ve been ignored because we’re actually too hard to ignore.” So said Saccharine Trust vocalist Jack Brewer in an L.A. Times interview that ran right before the band called it quits in 1986, after releasing four distinct full-lengths (and contributing several compilation tracks) of polarizing post-hardcore weirdness that consistently blew away the converted and repelled the unadventurous. Paganicons, the band’s eight-song debut mini-LP, was the sixth release by SST, and one of the early examples of the label’s legendary “what-we-think-is-great” way of unwittingly predicting the future of the American underground covered in this book. The band was guitarist Joe Biaza’s baby, so Paganicons is a deregulated hardcore treat, but Saccharine Trust was also defined by Brewer’s post-Beat poetic approach and thematic content. It was this that made the band a love-it-or-leave-it proposition (and still does). SAINT VITUS S/T (1984, SST) The eponymous debut by L.A.’s out-of-time, out-of-place Saint Vitus is widely considered to be one of the two first doom-metal albums (the other being Trouble’s Psalm 9, released the same year). Formed in 1979 and originally named Tyrant, the band soon changed its name to Saint Vitus. Their denim-and-leather biker style and long hair stuck out like a sore thumb on the SoCal hardcore scene, but the trend-oblivious Black Flag and the associated crew at outsider magnet SST took to the band immediately, eventually releasing four Saint Vitus full-lengths and some EPs. Vocalist Scott Reagers, guitarist Dave Chandler, bassist Mark Adams, and drummer Armando Acosta recorded this first album in ten hours at SST’s go-to overnight discount studio, Total Access, booked for $200 by in-house producer, Spot, who has claimed this session was one of his favorites. Opening with the band’s peppy (by Saint Vitus standards) namesake song, the five-song full-length is the first American album from the ’80s to capture the essence of Black Sabbath. (Trouble fell short of that feat due to the band’s psychedelic tendencies.) Saint Vitus is the band that, more so than Flipper, truly influenced Black Flag’s midto-late period transformation into a slow and heavy beast. 268 GIMME INDIE ROCK

SAINT VITUS Born Too Late (1986, SST) Original Saint Vitus singer Scott Reagers departed the band after the 1985 album Hallowed Victim came out. Given the band’s M.O.—peddling a perfect translation of Black Sabbath doom as shot through a more topical underground metal power-sludge sensibility, and looking like real metal heads (because that’s what they were) crossed with Hell’s Angels prospects while existing in the early-to-mid-’80s L.A. punk and (post/deregulated/artsy) hardcore subculture—finding another frontman was a daunting proposition. But while Saint Vitus was on tour, the singer for a like-minded band called the Obsessed had slipped them a cassette of his work. Thus began the second phase of Saint Vitus—as well as the rise, fall, and ultimate re-ascension of Scott “Wino” Weinrich, now known as the godfather of modern doom metal (due to his fantastic résumé of bands, including this one and The Obsessed, plus the Hidden Hand, Spirit Caravan, and many others). Born Too Late, Weinrich’s first album fronting Saint Vitus, is also the first bona fide classic work in the then-nascent “doom” outgrowth, underground metal. Like many other albums in this book, Born Too Late was created in an environment of adversity (indifference, social and critical negativity, etc.) by a band that forged ahead behind the powerful motivation of artistic vision. But Saint Vitus, as explained earlier in this entry, was also an eight-legged anachronism in sound and visual presentation. Saint Vitus would influence, subtly and not so subtly, several bands: Nirvana, L7, Kyuss, Queens of the Stone Age, Melvins, Helmet, High on Fire, Fugazi, Mudhoney, Dinosaur Jr, the Amphetamine Reptile roster, Soundgarden, and the entire (unfortunately named) “stoner metal” movement that began in the early ’90s. Though Saint Vitus was often thought to be thematically or personally tied to occult practices or Satanism, due to imagery and whatnot found in its work, the band’s members are Christians, just like their Chicago brethren in Trouble.

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SALEM 66 A Ripping Spin (1985, Homestead) Boston and the surrounding area produced so much top-shelf underground rock in the ’80s and early ’90s that it had an accidental side effect for some quality bands who, for whatever reason, didn’t stand out in the crowd at the time. Salem 66, for example, remains in almost complete obscurity some three decades after releasing A Ripping Spin. Beginning as an all-girl power trio that debuted on Gerard Cosloy’s Bands That Could Be King compilation, the band released a great self-titled mini-album in 1983, added a second guitarist (of the male variety), and then recorded this, its defining work of Mission of Burma proto–indie rock freshness meets the Feelies’ jangle drone power, as delivered by a (mostly) all-girl lineup. That latter attribute put Salem 66 in a lonely subgenre at the time, with only Frightwig, Fire Party, the like-minded, also-amazing Scrawl as reference points of note. THE SALVATION ARMY S/T (1982, Frontier) The greater L.A. area was just too spread out, populated, and varied to be known for one or two styles of the American post punk it birthed. The “paisley underground” ended up as one of the more polarizing—and swiftly watered-down—offshoots. The term was actually coined by Michael Quercio, bassist of The Salvation Army, a band with an almost ridiculous retro-fetish for the ’60s that took an accessible Byrdsian jangle-angle toward the college charts (though they never really hit that mark). Shame, as the fiery psych-punk on this exceptional 1982 self-titled fulllength never lets up; in reality, it looked more toward the future than at the past. Earlier, The Salvation Army had released a great debut 7-inch on Minutemen bassist Mike Watt’s New Alliance Records. Later, the band would release its second album as The Three O’Clock (after a particular humanitarian organization threatened legal action).

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SAVAGE REPUBLIC Tragic Figures (1982, Independent Project) Savage Republic’s Tragic Figures came out of the most fertile of experimental corners of the early-’80s L.A. underground. Like many of these 500 albums, it was absolutely unlike anything that preceded it within the American underground, though some European reference points can be tenuously drawn to such post punk and industrial boundary pushers as Einstürzende Neubauten, early Cabaret Voltaire, some Throbbing Gristle, The Pop Group (especially in relation to visual presentation), and This Heat. With only four members, Savage Republic created an album layered with its lead instrument of tribal percussion and drums, plus tribal bass lines, ping-ponging angular guitar stabs and chords, and monotone or shouted vocal lines. Within its wholly original sound, the album shifted through several moods and styles: from nightmarish soundscapes, to an exciting new post punk form, to an organic interpretation of the industrial heavyweights mentioned above. Guitarist Bruce Licher founded and ran the Independent Projects Label, which branched out and is now known the world over for its distinct hand-letter-pressed and numbered album packaging design. SAVAGE REPUBLIC Ceremonial (1985, Fundamental/PIAS Recordings) Almost a decade before the term was coined, Savage Republic’s second album foretold the sound of mid-’90s “post rock” to an uncanny degree. Trading the harshness of Tragic Figures for a melodic and ethereal—though no less forward-thinking— agenda, Ceremonial fits chiming guitar experimentation, like bite-sized versions of Glenn Branca and Rhys Chatham’s guitar ensemble work, into more complex song structures. The soaring instrumental title track is arresting in its prescience; “1985” is the last thing it brings to mind. The drumming and percussion are layered here, as before, but much of the band’s earlier tribal sound is eschewed for an industrial angle that drives aweinspiring works of prog-rock plus post punk plus original vision. “Ahead of its time” is an understatement here. Make sure to look for post-1990 pressings of Ceremonial, as they include the fantastic five-song, all-instrumental Trudge EP, also originally released in 1985.

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SCRATCH ACID The Greatest Gift (1991, Touch and Go) The Greatest Gift collects Scratch Acid’s entire released discography: the band’s 1984 debut album, full-length Just Keep Eating from 1986, and that same year’s wild-ass Berserker mini-album. (In addition, The Greatest Gift includes one previously unreleased early track from 1982.) The twenty-eight chronologically sequenced tracks here chart the progress of this band’s instantly recognizable brand of post hardcore, which had a stronger, deeper influence on the noise rock landscape when this posthumous compilation landed in 1991 than it did when the music was first recorded and released. Scratch Acid burned bright yet went largely unnoticed from 1984 until its 1987 demise following a disastrous tour. Scratch Acid is perpetually compared to Aussie post punk brooders The Birthday Party, but only because that was really the only noticeable outside influence active at around the same time. Scratch Acid’s lyrical themes of societal gallows humor, depravity, and adolescent-to-adult sociopathic nastiness are cloaked in a thick layer of disturbing playfulness that’s more subtle than the Butthole Surfers’ “messages” (to name another band to which Scratch Acid was often compared—an association mostly based on the bands’ common regional origins, but one that was misleading when musical styles were considered). Following Scratch Acid’s breakup, vocalist David Yow and bassist David W. Sims resurfaced in the upper realms of the noise rock subgenre their band had helped launch as two of the founding members of The Jesus Lizard. (Sims had also joined Scratch Acid drummer Rey Washam—also of the Big Boys and later, Ministry—for a short stop-off in Steve Albini’s post–Big Black effort, Rapeman.) The Greatest Gift was released the same year that The Jesus Lizard released its critical and creative breakthrough album Goat, thus multiplying the size of that band’s fan base several times over and shooting a good deal of attention into the rearview at this handy all-in-one prehistory lesson. That Scratch Acid’s guitar sound (courtesy of the stillunsung Brett Bradford) and other easily detectable facets of the band’s music were heard across the entire spectrum of noise rock from 1991 onward is a testament to this band’s prescience.

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SCRAWL Velvet Hammer (1993, Simple Machines) Scrawl formed in 1985 and, like Salem 66, was one of the only all-girl bands of the post-hardcore/proto–indie rock boys’ club. Though the band was feminist by default of being three ladies making music and doing what they needed to do, Scrawl is perpetually associated with the riot grrrl and sadly named foxcore movements of later years. After underdogging it through four albums and having to deal with the great indie rock hassle of 1990—Rough Trade’s bankruptcy (the band’s second and third full-lengths were released by the label)—Marcie Mays (founder, vocals, and guitar), Sue Harshe (founder, bass, and backing vocals), and new drummer Dana Marshall made Velvet Hammer with Steve Albini, who played an integral part in this album’s drastic step forward into heaviness and heartbreak. Fans of Team Dresch take note: musically, this album could be seen as an understated complement to that band’s Personal Best. But Velvet Hammer also holds its own as the career-defining, brutally honest, humanistic walk to the edge that it is. The pairing of Scrawl and Albini here makes the listener wonder what the producer could have done with the previous heavy-rock predicting Bloodsucker. SCREAM This Side Up (1985, Dischord) Scream became the first act on Dischord Records to release a full-length when Still Screaming came out in 1983. That raucous hardcore record wasted no time proving the band came to hardcore with an instrumental skill set not seen on the D.C. scene since Bad Brains showed up in the late ’70s. Scream then added a second guitarist and recorded This Side Up, a hardcore album quite unlike any that had come before. Aside from its six-minute straight-up reggae track and a shorter excursion into quirky college rock with “hardcore 101” lyrics, the album is overrun with guitar leads that move at unbelievably fast tempos while being chased by Peter Stahl’s melodic careening shout-sing vocals. This newfound take on hardcore (relative to the stule’s overall status in 1985) actually retains the ability to sound like the fastest and most electrifying rock and roll ever made.

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SCREAMING TREES Anthology: SST Years (1989, SST) Released to capitalize on the emerging Grunge takeover and the band’s 1990 move to a major label, this double album provides an excellent cross-section of the three albums Screaming Trees released on SST from 1987 to 1989. (It excludes the band’s 1986 full-length debut, Clairvoyance, as that was released on the tiny Velvetone label.) The good-but-not-great albums tapped for this Anthology do make for divine cherry-picking. The collection nicely follows the band’s appropriation of influences (Wipers, Nuggetsstyle garage-psych, post punk, and raging punk rock) from mess to occasional genius. Start with track No. 5, “Transfiguration,” the best song in the Screaming Trees’ entire discography, and work outward from there. SCREAMING TREES Uncle Anesthesia (1991, Epic) As one of the pre-Nevermind major-label grabs with established roots in the markedly noncommercial underground of posthardcore guitar bands (read: a big risk), Screaming Trees came to Epic after releasing four albums and two EPs in less than four years (for SST and Sub Pop primarily). While the band had formed and refined a distinctive sound over those records, Uncle Anesthesia presented a more brooding, heavier, and biggersounding Screaming Trees, one that sometimes bordered on what would soon be known as “stoner-metal” (a scene that Screaming Trees members would be involved with in the future). Barring the abnormally awful but very ’90s “alternative nation” style of cover art, Uncle Anesthesia stands as Screaming Trees’ best proper album. Its strongest single, “Bed of Roses” reached No. 23 on Billboard’s Modern Rock chart and got some concentrated rotation on MTV’s 120 Minutes. But in the end, Uncle Anesthesia failed to elevate Screaming Trees from the underground. It went on to be unfairly overshadowed when the band’s 1993 album, Sweet Oblivion, did the trick.

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SEA AND CAKE Nassau (1995, Thrill Jockey) Plenty of records in this book emerged from one of indie rock’s myriad styles—from the noisiest and heaviest to the most minimal and delicate—with pop hooks as a ruling component of their overall appeal. Among them is Nassau from Sea and Cake, a band formed in 1994 by Tortoise drummer John McEntire, former Shrimp Boat members Sam Prekop and Eric Claridge, and Archer Prewitt, formerly of the Coctails. Sea and Cake’s first three full-lengths (Nassau is the second and best) blend organic postmodern retellings of ’70s AM pop with jazz fusion. They are noticeably informed by the early post-rock scene that McEntire was simultaneously contributing to as a drummer and composer in Tortoise, along with the jangle-jazz-pop byproduct of former Coctails and Shrimp Boat members being in the same band. This album contains the quintessential song of Sea and Cake’s preelectronica-pop era, “Parasol.” SEAM Headsparks (1992, Homestead) Seam was formed by Bitch Magnet bassist and singer Sooyoung Park (on guitar in this band), his girlfriend Lexi Mitchell on bass, and—in the original lineup heard here—Superchunk guitarist, singer, and founder and Merge Records co-founder Mac McCaughan on drums. The band signed to Homestead for this debut of fuzzed-out pop downer anthems, a sort of advanced version of the melodic attention-getters that countered the less friendly, aggressive material on Bitch Magnet albums. By 1992, there was so much indie rock crowding the underground community that a traditional strain had emerged; something special was required if a band was going to elevate itself above the din. Seam had it. Fun fact: Headsparks features a great cover of Galaxie 500’s “New Years.”

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SEAM The Problem with Me (1993, Homestead) When Mac McCaughan vacated the Seam drummer’s stool to concentrate on his many other duties (for Superchunk and Merge Records), he was replaced by Bob Rising. Meanwhile, Craig White joined the band on second guitar. Seam also relocated to Chicago from North Carolina, signed to the more appropriate Touch and Go Records, and benefited greatly from the production skills of Brad Wood. With all this change in place, following the recording and release of the transitional four-song EP Kernel, Seam released The Problem with Me, its discography’s highest point and an album that would be hugely influential on the first wave of ’90s emo bands and related practitioners of semi-popular indie rock throughout the rest of the ’90s (Hum, Failure, Sunny Day Real Estate, Foo Fighters, Karate, etc.). Rising is one of indie rock’s criminally underrated drummers (he now drums in the post-Silkworm band Bottomless Pit), and it’s hard to say whether The Problem with Me would be the album it is without his hard-hitting, sharp, and rock-solid performance. The unbridled single-guitar fuzz heard on the earlier Headsparks is exchanged here for minor-chord strumming and interweaving lines from White and band leader Sooyoung Park. The best songs (“Rafael,” “Dust and Turpentine,” “Bunch,” “Road to Madrid,” “Stage 2000,” and “Something’s Burning”) use what was a venerable indie rock recipe by this point. Sonic restraint and prettiness (or pretty sadness) rule the first song section but get out of the way at some point during the second half or last fourth for an effective release of heaviness, downstroked chunks of distorted guitar, and—if one listens for it—the effective driving home of a lyrical point through more painful (seeming), slightly worked up vocals. The Problem with Me was the sound of “traditional” early-’90s indie rock ascending to its consummate level.

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SEBADOH Weed Forestin’ (1987–1990, Homestead) Indie rock’s first decade as a self-contained, fully realized genre of underground rock (1986–96) might not have a more complete “call to arms” than Dinosaur Jr’s 1985–88 trio of Dinosaur, You’re Living All over Me, and Bug. At the end of that run, bassist Lou Barlow was forced to hit the bricks following a firing offense of “excessive social ineptitude,” and he set about transforming a two-year homerecording project with buddy Eric Gaffney—called Sebadoh—into the band most synonymous with the first proper American subcultural music and aesthetic movement known as “lo-fi.” Sebadoh’s first phase is comprised of the proper albums Weed Forestin’, The Freed Man, and Sebadoh III, plus five 7-inch EPs, one of which happens to be the source of this book’s title—but more on that later. As far as more official vinyl and CD releases go, Weed Forestin’ is actually the second album in the Sebadoh discography, but it opens the band’s chunk of real estate in this survey because it was originally available before The Freed Man as a cassette-only release on Homestead in 1987. The release was prompted by some homegrown circulation of the material while Barlow was still in Dinosaur Jr—and, more so, by the unintentional Sebadoh preview “Poledo” that closes Dinosaur Jr’s You’re Living All over Me. (The track stood in stark contrast to the rest of the album.) Recorded in 1986 and 1987, Weed Forestin’ is twenty-three brief vignettes of Barlow and Gaffney on acoustic guitar, acoustic baritone ukulele (the instrument was one of the band’s early sonic calling cards), vocals, and infrequent percussion, punctuated by several instances of sound collages and tape samples for song linkage. Everything was recorded on a cassette four-track in the basement of Barlow’s parents. This album and its follow-up are the lowest-fidelity proper albums in Sebadoh’s entire body of work. The duo’s unique approach to four-track recording involved mixing a lot of the songs down with a crappy jam-box cassette deck, which gives these works their distinctly underwater-like sound and subtle lack of equilibrium. Overall, the early Sebadoh albums and others made by the band’s contemporaries make the post-Y2K lo-fi resurgence sound like Steely Dan, but that has a lot more to do with the latter’s aesthetic motivation than the financial necessity that drove the former movement from the late’80s into the ’90s.

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SEBADOH The Freed Man (1989, Homestead) This is a companion album to Sebadoh’s Weed Forestin’, with some minor differences of note: the recordings were made in 1988 in the Smith College dorm room of Lou Barlow’s thengirlfriend Kathleen, where he lived against regulations (as did Eric Gaffney in his girlfriend’s dorm room). And songwriting duties are more evenly split between Gaffney and Barlow than they were on the previously recorded Weed Forestin’. The Freed Man is Sebadoh’s proper debut full-length. SEBADOH III (1991, Homestead) With new member Jason Lowenstein on drums, Lou Barlow pulls a Highway 61 Revisited on the surrounding lo-fi movement he was so (unwittingly) instrumental in developing. Additionally, this album is the Daydream Nation, Zen Arcade, or Double Nickels on the Dime for early-’90s indie rock. A massive and beautifully diverse but cohesive statement of confidence and artistic intent, the twenty-five-track III was recorded for $1,300, and it reached an exponentially larger audience than Sebadoh had ever previously been exposed to. (A huge chunk of the band’s ’90s fan base came on board through this record.) The album also serves as Barlow’s moment of justified and expertly executed vindication in regard to the intensely negative experience of his final year or two in Dinosaur Jr, and he wastes no time in making that point. Opener “The Freed Pig” is Barlow’s side of the story as caustic indictment aimed precisely at Dinosaur Jr guitarist, founder, and singer J Mascis; it stops just short of calling the man out by name. But based on the song’s chronicling of how the relationship between the two high-school friends and bandmates progressed and then ended—and because the story was not readily accessible for the world to parse like it would be today, thanks to the Internet—many Sebadoh fans assumed the lyrics painted a classic tale of passive-aggressive miscommunication between a man and woman. Elsewhere, the album’s three general stylistic components are Barlow’s folky and melodic material; Eric Gaffney’s distinct noise rock, hardcore, and left-field underground metal agenda; and Lowenstein’s songs that shoot right down the middle of the 278 GIMME INDIE ROCK

two. “Scars, Four Eyes” veers from seasick rock to explosive sludgy rage; it still packs an unnerving punch. The taut, perfect rendition of the Minutemen’s “Sickles and Hammers” further shows III as Sebadoh’s first true full-band effort. As Barlow told interviewers at the time, “every facet of our power is exercised to its fullest on the record.” Like Pavement’s Slanted and Enchanted, it’s one of the prime historical markers of early-’90s indie rock. SEBADOH Smash Your Head on the Punk Rock (1992, Sub Pop) This album, Sebadoh’s first on Sub Pop, combines selections from two import EPs—Rocking the Forest and Sebadoh vs. Helmet— that were released by U.K. label Domino before it had American offices and distribution. (Rocking was the first-ever Domino title.) Smash Your Head on the Punk Rock surprised Sebadoh fans who were not expecting so much brutal heaviness in one place. The record is Sebadoh’s way of making sure there are no questions about the band’s ability to be the loudest beast in indie rock if the desire strikes—and it did on four Rocking the Forest tracks and eight songs taken from Sebadoh vs. Helmet. Nick Drake’s Pink Moon starts out heavi-fied, of course, but then it devolves into a terrifyingly maniacal blast of sludgy hardcore for the song’s closing repetition of the title. The cover of David Crosby’s “(Everybody’s Been) Burned” is phenomenal, turning the already heavy mood of the original into, well, you get the idea. Sebadoh noise-pop classics “Brand New Love” (once covered by Superchunk), “New Worship,” and “Vampire” are here. The insane “Mind Melt” (by auxiliary member Bob Fay) moves at hyperspeed from heaving deconstructionist folk-rock to brain-scraping noise—and back again. Opener “Crisis” is a bad trip of urban psychedelia and violently skewed hardcore that could still scare anyone out of a party, two decades after its release.

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SEBADOH Bubble and Scrape (1993, Sub Pop) Following the bombastically heavy, weirdly dark, full-on electrifying Smash Your Head on the Punk Rock (1992), Bubble and Scrape is first of several ’90s albums by Lou Barlow’s post– Dinosaur Jr concern that sees his band settling down into a mode of more traditional indie rock (Sebadoh-style, of course). The trio of Barlow, Eric Gaffney, and Jason Lowenstein trade off songwriting duties, and this is the first Sebadoh album to be entirely recorded in a studio (by up-and-coming engineer and Shellac bassist Bob Weston). The single “Soul and Fire” is a ballad that maintains a spot in the indie rock singles canon of greatness. Overall, Bubble and Scrape is a painful breakup album, and, in particular, the acoustic-rock ballad “Happily Divided” from Lowenstein (who begins to shine on this album) is devastatingly beautiful, as is Barlow’s “Homemade” (one of the sadder songs about masturbation). And these are just the (low) highlights. SEBADOH Bakesale (1994, Sub Pop) A more skeletal and succinct ride than Bubble and Scrape, Bakesale begins with a trio of Sebadoh’s best burn-pop moments—“Licensed to Confuse” (Barlow), “Careful” (Lowenstein), and “Magnet’s Coil” (Barlow)—along with the band’s two catchiest singles of the ’90s, “Rebound” and “Skull.” Drummer Eric Gaffney departed before the recording of the record, though he does contribute one song. His spot was filled officially by drummer Bob Fay, but most of the songwriting duties fall to Barlow and Lowenstein, making this album Sebadoh’s most accessible and most popular to date within the indie rock/alternative underground. Bakesale is the best realization of Sebadoh’s postlo-fi direction. Even during its forays into more bent noise-pop, it steadily rewards the listener, from front to back.

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SHELLAC At Action Park (1994, Touch and Go) By the time he debuted his ultimate musical vehicle, Steve Albini had already given the world of underground rock these things: Big Black; Rapeman; a much needed dose of honest attitude; and a groundbreaking, now paramount recording and engineering style that shaped what we now call “heavy music” in ways that could never be overstated. Guided by the notion that a band should be comprised of people who have a lifelong mental connection far beyond that of “shared tastes” and “ability” (see Fugazi for another example of such a lineup assemblage), Shellac is a trio of Albini on guitar and vocals, Todd Trainer (Rifle Sport, Breaking Circus, Brick Layer Cake) on drums, and bassist Bob Weston, who was in Volcano Suns and has had his soundengineering hands in a number of enviable pies (Polvo, for one; and he is the fourth member of the post-Y2K Mission of Burma). Shellac is about as perfect as modern rock-and-roll can get, rivaling The Jesus Lizard for a spot at the top of the noise rock/ aggro-indie mountain. The integrity held by this band is as strong as the sounds it makes, and on the essential-of-essentials album, At Action Park, all of Shellac’s positive attributes are in place. SHUDDER TO THINK Get Your Goat (1992, Dischord) Shudder to Think’s fourth LP has this band arriving at a sound and style incrementally promised on each of its three previous full-lengths (two on Dischord and a debut on Sammich Records). Craig Weldon’s honey-smooth croon and odd vocal placement, cadence, and phrasing over odd time signatures and a generally left-field approach to post-hardcore song structures came together like a composite of Roxy Music, Sparks, or Pulp and the Dischord post-hardcore sound of the late ’80s and early ’90s. Following this album, Shudder to Think left Dischord for Epic Records, becoming one of only two bands to leave the label for a major (the other was Jawbox). The late Jeff Buckley cited Shudder to Think as a big influence, and Pearl Jam had the band open an Australian tour in 1998. Shudder to Think remained active until 1999 and have appeared on the soundtracks of the films First Love, Last Rites and Velvet Goldmine (for which they wrote two original songs).

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SILKWORM His Absence Is a Blessing (Stampede, 1993) Silkworm’s first lineup—bassist Tim Midgett, guitarists and singers Joel R. L. Phelps and Andy Cohen, and drummer Michael Dahlquist—came together around 1990 in Seattle (the former three had played together since 1987 in the band Ein Heit, based in Missoula, Montana) and released the debut full-length L’ajre in 1992—the only Silkworm release that falls short of essential. That isn’t the case with the twenty-four-minute His Absence Is a Blessing 12-inch, which finds the band in, well, Silkworm mode. For starters, this is the first Silkworm recording engineered by Steve Albini, who would record all Silkworm albums from this point on. In the Silkworm documentary, Couldn’t You Wait?, Albini commented, “People who like Silkworm, really like Silkworm.” He is not simply stating that the band has a rabid cult following; he is pointing out there is no casual fandom involved with this band. His Absence . . . is sterling straight through, including the band’s cover of Loudon Wainwright III’s “Motel Blues,” a six-and-a-halfminute dirge ballad that makes the original obsolete. Strong stuff. SILKWORM In the West (1994, C/Z) Silkworm’s second full-length finds none of the grunge bleed of the debut L’ajre gone. As with the 12-inch His Absence Is a Blessing that preceded it, the band continues to find its voice with the help of producer and confidant Steve Albini. His engineering skills, especially the instrument separation, on this album are impeccable. This is Silkworm Phase 1 at the height of its powers: two guitars and three songwriters conflicting in the grandest of ways, offering punchy bass, guitar crunch and shred, and character-based storytelling as well as personal metaphoric and moody lyrics. The heartfelt power of this record might take a few listens to set in, and it sounds nothing like the more popular trends of the day, though it can get heavy and nakedly intense. Silkworm members didn’t care what was happening around them and were misunderstood at the time, but there’s a reason a documentary was made about the band in 2012.

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SILKWORM Libertine (1994, Matador/El Recordo) Silkworm’s third album finds the band perfecting their filtration of different musical influences—Mission of Burma, The Wedding Present, Dream Syndicate, Slint, Television, Sonic Youth, Rapeman, Polvo, Pavement, to name a few—and the first detectable focus on one of this band’s specialties: very literary storytelling in the first or third person set in present or past eras. The two tracks that open Libertine, “Party in Warsaw” and the dirge-ballad “Grotto of Miracles,” offer the album’s best examples of how Silkworm put its own individual stamp on this lyrical/vocal method acting. If other bands were doing it, they were not doing it as effectively as Silkworm, but at times it worked to their disadvantage, especially when tackled by critics who were seemingly on the perpetual hunt for creative anomalies to misinterpret. Lyrics read like snippets of Thomas Berger or Thomas Pynchon. There are a fair amount of personal songs, too, but to borrow another Albini quote, “Few bands make one great record. Silkworm made several, and this is the first.” This would be guitarist, songwriter, and singer Joel R. L. Phelps’ final album with the band. SILKWORM Firewater (1996, Matador) The departure of singer, guitarist, and songwriter Joel R. L. Phelps changed Silkworm into a power trio, and despite Phelps being behind the band’s most melodramatic (in the best sense) songwriting of past efforts, this lengthy album is the most downbeat and fatalistic of all Silkworm records. Andy Cohen emerges as a guitar god, with playing that should win the love of even the most ardent solo haters. Thematically and musically, the band is tight, intelligent, and profoundly moving on songs like “Severance Pay,” “Don’t Make Plans This Friday,” “Tarnished Angel,” “Drunk,” and the unbelievable downer “Slow Hands.” Firewater is a mid-’90s indie rock classic that indie rock didn’t appreciate at the time. Drummer Michael Dahlquist would be killed in 2005 when a woman tried to commit suicide by plowing into the back of the car he and his coworkers were in at a stoplight while returning to work from lunch.

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SILVER JEWS Starlite Walker (1994, Drag City) The Silver Jews were formed by poet David Berman and Pavement’s Steve Malkmus and Bob Nastanovich, but Berman was the only static member. After releasing a couple of 7-inches that are rightfully regarded as the lowest fidelity recordings of the first lo-fi movement, the band went into Memphis’ Easley Recordings and turned out this nugget, which mixes ’70s afternoon rock, Pavement’s indie balladry, Berman’s poignant lyricism, and lone troubadour folk of the ’60s and ’70s—all with decidedly better production qualities. The album kicked off a string of Silver Jews full-lengths that lasted into the aughts.

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SLEATER-KINNEY S/T (1995, Chainsaw) Heavens to Betsy’s Corin Tucker and Excuse 17’s Carrie Brownstein formed Sleater-Kinney as a side-project for their main outlets. But after traveling as a couple and recording most of this debut during an all-night session on their final day in Australia with then-drummer Lora Macfarlane, who rounded out the trio and moved back to the States with Tucker and Brownstein, they moved Sleater-Kinney to the top of their priority list. Unlike the virtuosic, bombastic rock assault of label mates Team Dresch (whose Donna Dresch founded and ran the Chainsaw label), Sleater-Kinney’s guitar + guitar + drums attack often brought up the wiry end (Delta 5, Au Pairs, etc.) of the riot grrrl/queercore movement that had grown out of the band’s Olympia, Washington, home base. However, this isn’t meant to suggest a lack of punk and posthardcore fire or to suggest the not-to-be-fucked-with nature of Tucker’s previous band might be a thing of the past. Nor is it to be confused with the minimal and shambling fall-apart-any-second approach of Bratmobile or Huggy Bear. This album is all about the rapidly interweaving and clean-but-overdriven down-riffing of the two guitarists, Macfarlane’s rock-solid drumming, and Tucker’s howl-sing. Along with the aforementioned and singular Team Dresch, the crazed metallic and wildly inventive sounds of The Need, and Bikini Kill’s shift into blazing dynamics with Reject All American, Sleater-Kinney helped give ladies-only underground rock a formidable and highly respectable push into the late ’90s. SLEATER-KINNEY Call the Doctor (1996, Chainsaw) Growing each quality that Sleater-Kinney brought to the table with its self-titled debut, Call the Doctor was hailed as the band’s first defining work—one that easily transcended any gender, sexuality, or political talking points so preferred by the music press when discussing the band and its music. As this sublime sophomore album announced, the three women of SleaterKinney were true believers who would carry an earnest rock torch through the end of the decade and well into the aughts, ignoring a succession of fawning major-label interests and going out with a monster of a record (2006’s The Woods, an album the world just didn’t understand but will one day). Tucker most 288 GIMME INDIE ROCK

recently fronted the Corin Tucker Band, while writer and funny lady Brownstein returned for a bit with the (sadly) now-defunct Wild Flag. (Note: longtime Sleater-Kinney drummer Janet Weiss joined Call the Doctor’s 1997 follow-up, Dig Me Out). THE SLEEPERS Painless Nights (1981, Adolescent) The Sleepers’ brief history and tiny body of work is divided into two chronological phases. Along with Negative Trend and the Avengers, the Sleepers were part of San Francisco’s first punk rock scene in the late ’70s, during which time they released one 7-inch five-song EP then disbanded in the second half of 1978. Vocalist Ricky Williams then formed Flipper but was kicked out before the band recorded anything. Williams reformed the Sleepers with a new lineup that included brothers Brian and Ron MacLoed as the rhythm section and Mike White on guitar and effects. The band released a new 7-inch followed by their sole full-length, 1981’s Painless Nights, and broke up that same year while on tour in New York after Williams passed out on a stage. Allegedly, this incarnation of the Sleepers was a new type of heavy live, like what the aforementioned Flipper had developed into by this time. As for Painless Nights, the omnipresent “America’s Joy Division” definition is based solely on the common denominators of depressive mood and atmospherics, two things that were omnipresent on both sides of the pond in the early-80s. In fact, Williams sounded like no one in American underground music at the time, sort of like a much understated David Thomas (Pere Ubu). Guitarist White strings fluid lines in and out of the bass and drums action, and the song arrangements are off-kilter but make complete sense. This album has nothing to do with the masculinity of punk and hardcore elsewhere during this era, and rather than being informed by Joy Division, it predicted the next half decade of dark, organically played, U.K.-based post punk like Stockholm Monsters, the Names, and early This Mortal Coil, as well as moodier American underground bands like Dumptruck on that band’s first album. Williams would go on to sing for the Toiling Midgets, but died of drug abuse complications in 1992.

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SLINT Spiderland (1991, Touch and Go) The second and final full-length album by this Louisville-based Squirrel Bait offshoot is universally, and correctly, regarded as a shining moment in American indie rock across a handful of substrata (math rock, post rock, avant-metal, noise rock—the argument-starting terms could go on). Realistically, no one could have seen this one coming after the nerve-wracking gallery idea fragments that comprise Tweez, the band’s 1989 full-length debut (also Touch and Go). Spiderland’s subsequent imitators could fill a separate book-length record guide, yet the album sounded like no other upon its release. With its skeletal arrangements, bombastic metallic chaos, spoken (or screamed), and a production job (courtesy of Steve Albini) that would prove to be almost as influential as the music itself, Spiderland had a huge impact on the rest of the ’90s. Unfortunately the band broke up shortly after this album’s release, but guitarist, singer, and founder Brian McMahon formed the also-great The For Carnation, drummer Britt Walford would lead Evergreeen through a couple of singles and a self-titled whopper of an album, and guitarist David Pajo would form Papa M and provide guitar for a multitude of notable entities. He remains a force (he’s also probably the nicest guy mentioned by name in this book). SLUG 3 Man Themes (1996, PCP Entertainment) L.A.’s Slug (not to be confused with the Twin Cities hip-hop personality) was, like contemporaries Steel Pole Bath Tub, Superconductor, The Jesus Lizard, and the Pain Teens, pushed to the forefront of the noise rock movement by the dual urges to experiment with sound while employing melody (if not outright pop hooks) in new and twisted ways. The band released two albums (the 1992 mini-album Swingers and 1994’s The Out Sound) and had quite the output via the 7-inch medium (including a split with the like-minded Unsane). Noted for usually having a three-bass lineup, Slug’s releases prior to this final bombshell are, in the very least, good noise rock. Two years after The Out Sound, Slug released this jaw-dropper of a double-length to little critical fanfare (and to some confused fans) before splintering into obscurity. Featuring longer tracks than its predecessors and 290 GIMME INDIE ROCK

an intelligent approach, the strongest influences in each (of the many) members’ record collections, 3 Man Themes, opens with “Unesque,” which swells with throbbing bass-and-drums tension, then climaxes in a storm of thunderous noise rock abandon. Other tracks venture into amazing stretches of full-on electronic and ambient music that could pass for a lost Aphex Twin album of the same period. And adding to the album’s statement of (many) purpose(s), 3 Man Themes closes with a cover of “Oh Yeah” by early-’70s Krautrock kings Can. This album is thinking man’s noise rock at its absolute best. SMASHING PUMPKINS Gish (1991, Caroline) Smashing Pumpkins should be credited with more artistic and musical accomplishments, but they will most likely remain in the shadow of some other things the band also deserves, like negative reactions to the way its mainstream success was handled and the justified dismissals of front man Billy Corgan’s ridiculous attitude in the ’90s (and the concerning weirdness of his public persona today). For one thing, Gish was on the cusp of the alternative/ grunge explosion and, upon re-evaluation, had little to do with it—or at least added some much-needed elements to what was about to take over the youth culture. The album is heavy as hell, ballsy, and well written. Massive metal riffing, spot-on drumming, and not one concern for what was super-hip in the underground at the moment, Gish belongs in this book just as much as any other record. THE SMITHEREENS Especially for You (1986, Capitol) To some, the Smithereens are the antithesis of two key words on the front of this book: “Indie” and “Underground.” But such an assessment overlooks the key facts about founder and singer Pat DiNizio’s long-embattled New Jersey band. Its efforts to bring ’60s psych and power-pop into the ’80s college-rock world were successful for a two- or three-album run, beginning with this debut full-length in 1986 (the band had formed in 1980) and its hit single, “Blood and Roses,” a guitar-driven powerpop gem of the day. But the more minor hit, “Behind the Wall of Sleep,” is better—depressing like great rock and roll can be.

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With a subtle urgency in its tone, this song is indicative of what Especially for You had to offer. That’s the thing that made this album, along with follow-up Green Thoughts, stand out among the jangle hordes crowding up college-rock margins between the underground and mainstream success: this stuff was dark and written with care, using pessimistic power chords rather than the optimist’s clatter. SMOG Julius Caesar (1993, Drag City) After a couple of years (and two previous albums) of taking a noisy, direction-challenged journey into lo-fi pop and singersongwriter greatness, Bill Callahan released this painful and honest work of homegrown genius under the Smog banner. Julius Caesar is a little less rough than what was flooding out of the Shrimper cassette label at the time (where the Mountain Goats got off the ground), but Callahan’s candor, pain, and knack for pulling big hooks out of unexpected places (witness “Your Wedding”) renders the boombox charm of his recording techniques irrelevant. The brilliant close to the first chapter in Callahan’s career. SMOG Burning Kingdom (1994, Drag City) Bill Callahan goes electric and beyond the limitations of no-track and four-track technology with this twenty-minute EP, a vehicle for releasing the emotional holocaust that lurked in his soul and mind at the time. The almost six-minute “My Shell” was unlike Smog before or since—a crawling, martial dirge of thick, distorted guitar down strokes, slamming drums, and a terrifying but catchy melody that far outshines any other singer-songwriter associated with the lo-fi movement (it’s the electric version of a 1991 7-inch of the same name). Cynthia Dall adds her angelic voice to “Renee Died.” The full band of guitar, drums, cello, violin, and vocals that accompanies Callahan where needed might be odd on paper, but given the heft of the temperment and material here, it proves a towering success.

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SMOG Wild Love (1995, Drag City) Bill Callahan’s deeper vocal style and too-much-information, metaphor-free lyrics always set him apart from other unwitting torchbearers (Sebadoh, Guided by Voices, early Beck, etc.) of the first American lo-fi movement to get any media attention, but Drag City cofounder and producer Rian Murphy made a concerted effort to open up the sonic palette on Wild Love and brighten the mood a bit after the amazing yet terrifying heart-of-darkness ride Smog seemed to be on with the Burning Kingdom EP and parts of the Julius Caesar album before it. Opener “Bathysphere” has been elevated to “classic Smog” status and was covered by Cat Power on her 1996 pre-breakthrough breakthrough, What Would the Community Think. SOCIAL DISTORTION Mommy’s Little Monster (1983, 13th Floor) An iconic album of SoCal punk rock, Social Distortion’s debut album was recorded after the band had returned from the national tour documented in the film Another State of Mind (named after the Social D song that became track two here). Social Distortion, along with Agent Orange and Adolescents, formed in 1978 and is one of the first hardcore (-related) bands from Orange County. Its first lineup featured the Agnew brothers, Rick and Frank, who soon left to form the Adolescents. Social Distortion released two singles and was a regular compilation presence in the 1980–82 pre-album period, these releases gaining a bit of regional popularity thanks to super-fan DJ Rodney Bingenheimer of KROQ-FM. Mommy’s Little Monster is a great American punk rock answer to second-wave British punk like Stiff Little Fingers and the Ruts. Best track: “Hour of Darkness.”

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SOLOMON GRUNDY S/T (1990, New Alliance) Screaming Trees bassist Van Conner formed Solomon Grundy in 1989 during a much-needed break not so much from the Trees as a band, but from his little brother and bandmate, Gary Lee, whose psychedelic obsessions turned 1988’s Invisible Lantern sessions into a mess. When the Conner brothers increasingly found themselves beating the shit out of one another (literally), the older Van rounded up three Bellingham, Washington, buddies and recorded what is hands-down the best album to come out of Seattle’s salad days. Solomon Grundy’s sole full-length (initially released as Stone Soup and Other Stories) is a potent mix of unforgettable, mournful power-pop hooks bigger than those of Cheap Trick, the Flaming Groovies, Big Star, and The Last, combined with song structures that alternately draw from driving, updated garage-punk, ’70s hard rock, and traditional indie rock gold (think the Posies’ harder material, Wipers, and a poppier Moving Targets). Solomon Grundy was released on the once-great New Alliance label three years after founders Mike Watt and Martin Tamburovich sold the imprint to SST’s Greg Ginn (who proceeded to use the label as a clearing house for his free, weird-jazz, spoken-word, instrumental, and generally non-rock interests). All of this no doubt contributed to this album finding an audience just this side of nobody when it was released. But criminally overlooked albums are at least part of what this book is about, so maybe this one is sitting in a cutout bin near you. SONIC YOUTH EVOL (1986, SST) Many great, game-changing bands have had a handful of releases before landing on what would make them legendary. Hüsker Dü, Unrest, My Bloody Valentine, Slayer, the Flaming Lips, and, without a doubt, Sonic Youth, come to mind. EVOL, Sonic Youth’s third proper full-length, initiated the band’s five-album run of certifiable classics that changed underground rock forever. After forming at the beginning of the decade, Sonic Youth made respectable forays into a stylistically unprecedented territory or two, like increasing the abrasiveness and depravity of the no-wave template. EVOL replaces the 294 GIMME INDIE ROCK

dabbling uncertainty with the sound of sonic and aesthetic epiphany. The overhaul is helped along by new member Steve Shelley (he previously housesat for the quartet while they were away on tour), who swiftly developed into one of alternative and indie rock’s most exciting and powerful drummers. EVOL applies the band’s growing mastery of various alternate tunings to easily identifiable rock dynamics, pop hooks, and sheets of noise that now came with increased moodiness and feeling. Highlights include Kim Gordon’s haunting “Shadow of a Doubt,” the awesome rave-up “Expressway to Yr. Skull,” the thick pop of “Starpower,” and ominous rock of opener “Tom Violence.” The album was Sonic Youth’s first of two for SST, after one full-length (1985’s Bad Moon Rising) on Homestead Records. SONIC YOUTH Sister (1987, SST) Things only got better on Sonic Youth’s second and final (fourth full-length overall) SST release, Sister. Live staple “Schizophrenia” starts off this loosely conceptualized album about sci-fi heavyweight Phillip K. Dick that places a much more noticeable concern on pop and rock song structures than earlier releases. Steve Shelley’s drumming really becomes the backbone of Sonic Youth’s sound that it remained until the band’s breakup in 2011. Sister also features gems like “Catholic Block,” “White Kross,” “Tuff Gnarl,” and the awesome cover of Crime’s “Hot Wire My Heart.” Though it didn’t sell all that well at the time of release, Sister did garner Sonic Youth critical acclaim of the sort it would become accustomed to in the coming years. In fact, Robert Christgau, with whom the band had previously nurtured a back-and-forth feud of words, gave the album an A when reviewing it for his influential “Consumer Guide” column in The Village Voice, stating that Sister was “finally, an album worthy of their tuning system” and that it had “a guitar sound almost unique in its capacity to evoke rock and roll without implicating them in a history few youngish bands can bear up under these days.”

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SONIC YOUTH Daydream Nation (1988, Blast First/Enigma) Daydream Nation stomped an influential footprint on its musical surroundings the moment it was released. When considering the music made in its wake, Daydream Nation is often compared to the Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime or Hüsker Dü’s Zen Arcade (usually both)—an inaccurate overstatement often made due to Daydream Nation’s similar length to those two albums. Yes, those albums influenced everything in their respective wake, including Daydream Nation, and have had an undeniable effect on each era since their respective mid-’80s releases, but Sonic Youth’s fifth proper full-length (sixth if the 1982 selftitled mini-album is counted) exacted an immediate, profound, and expansively linear mark on all rock-based music with more than the faintest of underground concerns. Considering just the latter half of this book’s chronological scope (1988 to 1996), and considering the wide, wide world of indie rock, then moving outward to the most tenuously connected micro-genres, Daydream Nation had an influence of exponentially greater magnitude than any underground or mainstream album from the quarter-century that led up to its release. This double-length album saw Sonic Youth at peak performance on every conceivable level, from the gently strummed intro of opener “Teenage Riot” to its closing moment of guitar squall. Though not to quite the same extent, one other American album of the same period has earned similarly strong accolades: Dinosaur Jr’s You’re Living All over Me (1987). SONIC YOUTH Goo (1990, DGC) In part because the band negotiated a deal that brought with it a then-unheard-of degree of creative control (who could imagine Sonic Youth coming within 500 miles of a major label otherwise?), Goo is free of the compromise some feared would come with the quartet’s move from Blast First and Enigma to newly formed Geffen imprint DGC. Many critics considered Goo a slight drop in quality from its predecessor (a few were straight-up disappointed), but how is a band to follow up an album like Daydream Nation? Making Goo wasn’t without its challenges. There was much confusion between the label, human “handlers” (A&R reps, 296 GIMME INDIE ROCK

managers, other go-betweens), and the band when it came to areas where the band had never experienced a great deal of stress before—like the lavish (in Sonic Youth’s world, at least) recording budget of $140,000 and the forty-eight-track Sorcerer Sound Recording Studios. Once again self-producing with the help of an engineer, the band elected to replace Nick Sansano behind the desk with dance and jazz big name Ron Saint Germain, who had worked on Bad Brains’ I Against I and several Ornette Coleman and Ronald Shannon Jackson albums. He was better known, however, for polishing Foreigner’s Agent Provocateur and made his bread and butter as a remixing track-tinkerer—his versions of Ashford and Simpson’s “Solid as a Rock” and Whitney Houston’s “How Will I Know” have been heard many times by anyone who has waited in grocery store lines. The open-minded Saint Germain had his work cut out for him, facing a mountain of guitar and vocal overdubs. He followed his maxim, “There is no reason an alternative record has to sound bad to be ‘alternative,’” and the end result, though a little inconsistent from track to track, drew production complaints only from those looking for something to complain about. What makes Goo an undeniable winner is Sonic Youth’s increased focus on song craft. “Dirty Boots,” “Disappearer,” “Cinderella’s Big Score,” and “Tunic (For Karen)” measure up to the best of the band’s previous accomplishments, but it’s the two songs that close each side, Lee Renaldo’s “Mote” and “Titanium Expose,” that beg the question whether the band had ever released anything as satisfyingly toothy and beautiful. It’s not a popular opinion that these two songs might have been the band’s best to date, nor is it popular to opine that lead single “Kool Thing” is the album’s weakest link. But can anyone really say that its go-nowhere tempo, Chuck D’s phoned-in-because-hehappened-to-be-recording-in-an-adjacent-studio performance, and the stuck-in-the-early-’90s gender politics haven’t made this song age worse than the movie Mallrats? Raymond Pettibon’s cover art put the artist in front of an audience that dwarfed any he might have garnered from the gazillion SST covers and flyers he never got paid for; it also briefly put the band in the doghouse with Geffen (the label unsuccessfully moved to delete the piece’s text). Goo reached No. 96 on the Billboard 200 on the strength of “Kool Thing,”

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which hit No. 7 on Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks and received an eye-catching (and way ahead of the curve, fashion-wise) video treatment directed by Tamra Davis (who had launched her directorial career with a Hüsker Dü video). SONIC YOUTH Washing Machine (1995, DGC) With Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore’s newborn daughter Coco, in tow, Sonic Youth headed to Easley McCain Recording in Memphis, Tennessee, in early 1995. The much-needed break from New York City was just what the band needed. Confidence bleeds from Washing Machine, a transitional album that pointed the way for most of the proper Sonic Youth records released afterward, right up to the band’s breakup in 2011. Easley McCain was one of the best-loved destinations of the ’90s for amazing sound on the cheap, having hosted the recording of Come’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion’s Extra Width, Velocity Girl’s Copacetic, Silver Jews’ Starlite Walker, the Gories’ I Know You Fine, But How You Doin’, Lydia Lunch’s collaborative album with the Birthday Party’s Rowland S. Howard, and the Grifters’ two best albums, One Sock Missing (1993) and Crappin’ You Negative (1994). Sonic Youth kicked off Easley McCain’s first breakthrough year, one that also saw the recording of what would become Pavement’s Wowee Zowee, Wilco’s A.M., Guided by Voices’ Under the Bushes, Under the Stars, and the Amps’ Pacer (Kim Deal’s post-Breeders band). For Sonic Youth, the results would be much different from the good but mildly fan-alienating and forced Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star, recorded under duress in 1993 and released in 1994. First, Lee Ranaldo writes and sings two tracks, “SaucerLike” and “Skip Tracer,” his songwriting contributions having been conspicuously absent from the previous album. Second, the overall sound of Washing Machine is lush, less abrasive, generally bigger, and actually quite beautiful compared to the last album’s lo-fi minimalism (the album was recorded on sixteen- and eighttrack analog machines). Washing Machine’s showpiece is the twenty-minute closer “The Diamond Sea,” exposing Sonic Youth’s newfound affinity for its own take on “jamming” (Lee Ranaldo has never been shy about his love for the Grateful Dead). The verse-chorus-verse portion of the song is so well crafted and DGC

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wanted to salvage its giant hook and use it to attract potential Sonic Youth converts, so the band conceded to a six-minute edit for release as the album’s first single. Washing Machine’s second and final single was the angelic “Little Trouble Girl” (guest vocals by Kim Deal along with Memphis’ Lorette Velvette and Melissa Dunn). Sonic Youth headlined what was easily the best lineup of Lollapalooza (The Jesus Lizard and Pavement played to the big crowds while a rotating lineup of myriad great bands appeared on the second stage) in the months leading up to the album’s release that September. SORRY Imaginary Friend (1984, Radiobeat) Painfully overlooked, Imaginary Friend is the first and best of two releases by Boston’s Sorry between 1984 and 1986. After debuting on the Gerard Cosloy–curated Bands That Could Be God compilation, Sorry released this fantastic album of hardcore tempos infused with Mission of Burma, Minutemen, and U.K.-post punk influences. It opens with the electrifying minute-and-a-half blur of “My Word,” a Ping-Ponging melodic avant-hardcore anthem of anthems. Mission of Burma’s Roger Miller played keyboards on four of the eighteen tracks, including a cover of the Mekons’ “Where Were You?” Guitarist and vocalist David Kleiler went on to play in the Volcano Suns. SOUL ASYLUM Hang Time (1988, A&M) Soul Asylum traveled a middle ground between the Replacements and Hüsker Dü (two other Minneapolis bands to emerge to wider out of Minneapolis’ early-’80s punk and hardcore scene), insomuch as they didn’t leave a consistent discography, front to back. Posterboys for Midwest scrappiness, they did make their best left-field country music (sort of Meat Puppets–ish, but without the hallucinogenic qualities), straightforward, borderlineglam-metal bar rock, and fast-and-heavy hook-anchored Hüsker Dü–style proto-indie rock last an entire album with the major 1988 debut, Hang Time. Notables include 120 Minutes and college-rock fave “Sometime to Return” (possibly the band’s best song), the similar-ish “Cartoon,” the also-raging “Beggars

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and Choosers,” and a handful of other rockers that showcased the band at the height of their powers. The A-side ends with the thinking man’s power ballad, “Endless Farewell.” Soul Asylum’s career comprised a decade of baby-stepping progress in the American underground before grasping the brass ring of Grammy-winning, multiplatinum success with 1992’s Grave Dancer’s Union. Known as Loud Fast Rules in a very young, decidedly hardcore incarnation, the band switched to the Soul Asylum moniker, under which they released four full-length albums on Twin/Tone (one a collection of older outtakes and extras) beginning in 1984. The first three were produced by band mentor and Hüsker Dü cofounder Bob Mould, and the second through fourth all carried 1986 release dates (the latter, While You Were Out, was produced by Suicide Commandos founder and Bob Mould mentor, Chris Osgood). (All four Twin/Tone LPs contain moments of greatness and could have been cherry-picked to make one seminal, unforgettable masterwork to sit comfortably alongside Zen Arcade and Let It Be as a seminal title.) Soul Asylum toured extensively and was exposed to larger audiences when Hüsker Dü took them along on semi-legendary jaunts. A bit of trivia lost to history is that Soul Asylum was one of the earliest major-label signings from the proto-indie/posthardcore underground, following not far behind Hüsker Dü and the Replacements. SOUNDGARDEN Ultramega O.K. (1988, SST) Grunge folklore alleges that Soundgarden, having released two EPs and a debut 7-inch with Sub Pop, had already signed a development deal with A&M when the band’s A&R guy got the idea to license a single album to SST to increase its street cred. Ultramega O.K. does fall victim to the distinct “sonic disconnect” common to SST’s late-’80s releases, when the label went with whatever hack producer was the cheapest following the departure of studio quality-control handlers Spot and Joe Carducci. In the case of Soundgarden, however, this adds a ton of charm to this album, which stands up to or beats anything Sub Pop would release until Nirvana’s Bleach the following year (which Cobain said was influenced by Soundgarden). Tracks “665” and “667” poke fun at the media’s obsession with Satanism in hard rock and metal, and

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the closing track, “One Minute of Silence,” is a “cover” of John Lennon’s “Two Minutes of Silence,” minus the Yoko Ono part. THE(E) SPEAKING CANARIES Songs for the Terrestrially Challenged (1995, Scat) Don Caballero drummer Damon Che is the sole static member of the Speaking Canaries, and this double-length record was the band’s sophomore effort. Barring a 1992 debut misstep (The Joy of Wine) that didn’t at all prepare listeners for what would follow, there is not one song in the band’s discography (two full-lengths and two 12-inch EPs) in which Che is not at the absolute top of his game as a guitar virtuoso and quasi-savant songwriter of scary talent. But from 1995 to 2002, when the Speaking Canaries released all of its proper titles, critical attention and a decentsized fan base proved elusive; the world just wasn’t ready for this band’s unique, omnipotent, and seamless mixture of early Van Halen, experimental metallic sensibilities, golden-voiced singing, and irascibly catchy and extremely heavy indie rock. Songs for the Terrestrially Challenged is a double-length of just that and the sort of new discovery that begs the question, “Why doesn’t anyone know about this?” JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION Extra Width (1993, Matador) The garden-variety garage-rock and punk-revival band of the late ’80s and most of the ’90s could be counted on to deliver the following: an album cover of retro-assaultive imagery like topless females and hot rod–obsessed greaseballs on their way to swing some bicycle chains at a rumble in the park, band members who looked like the latter, and an inspirational dismissal of all rock-based music made after the mid-’70s first-wave punk rock that unfortunately lapsed into tedium under stylistic rules that made generic early-’80s hardcore seem complex by comparison. There was no more refreshing antidote than Jon Spencer Blues Explosion’s first two albums for Matador Records. Ex-Pussy Galore and Gibson Bros. and concurrent Boss Hog (with wife, Christina Martinez) guitarist and singer Jon Spencer might be the namesake here, but after a couple of full-lengths (Extra Width and followup Orange), the telepathically cohesive JSBX became one of the only certifiably mind-blowing power trios on stage in the early

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’90s, and one of the only punk-blues and garage-revival acts whose retro tendencies were outshined by wildly original and progressive imaginations. Thanks to Extra Width, JSBX smuggled funk and soul concerns into a book about some of the whitest rock music ever made. JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION Orange (1994, Matador) Listeners who recognized the crudely drawn theremin on the cover of Orange took it as a hint that this would be something different. And that it was. JSBX’s artistic arc reached its highpoint with Orange—from the Philly soul string arrangement (by Kurt Hoffman) accenting the single “Bellbottoms” to the Jerry Lee Lewis-versus-spazzed-out-noise rock of “Dang,” the slow power grooves of the title track, the primal carnal intent of “Full Grown,” and further deconstructions of blues, rockabilly, and other American roots forms like they’d never, ever been torn apart in the past. The album is all over the place and wins wherever it ventures. Orange is closer to what the live incarnation of the Beastie Boys was capable of at its best. In fact, the clavinetpowered funk workout “Flavor” features guest scats by Mike D. and Beck (JSBX would later tour with the Beasties). Orange is a musical history lesson that, as it has been said elsewhere, takes three steps into the future with each look to the past. Primal, sweaty, entertaining, diverse as hell, raging with rock-and-roll spirit—it’s an extremely special album. SQUIRREL BAIT S/T (1985, Homestead) This (very) young Louisville band was formed in 1983 and had one of the better historical pedigrees of the post-hardcore era. Most of its members would go on to form or join bands found elsewhere in this book, but as far as Squirrel Bait was concerned, the band plied a remarkably influential and solid melding of Hüsker Dü, Mission of Burma, Naked Raygun, and the Replacements. Hüsker Dü’s Bob Mould and the Lemonheads’ Evan Dando sang the praises of Squirrel Bait in the press, while members of Big Black and Naked Raygun suggested their label (Homestead) release something by the Kentucky quartet, which had opened for all of these bands on mini-tours around the eastern United States.

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This short eight-song LP was the result, marked by the blazing guitars of David Grubbs and Brian McMahan, the earthy and semi-rootsy vocals of Pete Searcy, and fifteen-year-old drummer Britt Walford, who was a powerhouse for his age. As with many other post-hardcore bands sprouting up around the country middecade, Squirrel Bait songs were sung or screamed melodically and checked in at mid- to hardcore tempos, but had a special power and spirit, taking what Hüsker Dü had honed over the previous two or three years to the next logical step. After Squirrel Bait dissolved in 1988, Grubbs founded Bastro and Gastr Del Sol, played with Codeine, Bitch Magnet, and Red Krayola, and had a prolific solo career. McMahon formed Slint, played in Will Oldham’s Palace Brothers as well as Kink Kong, and founded The for Carnation in the mid-’90s. Walford joined McMahon in Slint and formed the overlooked but great Evergreen, not to mention his stretch as drummer with the Breeders. Searcy would provide vocals on three Big Wheel albums before embarking on a career as a solo singer-songwriter. SQUIRREL BAIT Skag Heaven (1987, Homestead) Squirrel Bait’s second LP expands upon the band’s self-titled debut with the subtle ’70s hard-rock edge to opener “Kid Dynamite” and a fiery blur of “Kick the Cat,” “Virgil’s Return,” and “Too Close to the Fire.” At times, Britt Walford’s drumming is so intense it sounds as if it might become severed from the rest of the din and roll down a different path. Several songs start off at a restrained, mid-tempo pace, or even with left-field quasi-freejazz (“Choose Your Poison”), and then launch into a hyper-speed, all-cylinders surge a third of the way in. Skag Heaven does have a thread of traditionalism running through it, and it’s plain to see why Dave Grohl cited Squirrel Bait as such a powerful influence on his songwriting in the Foo Fighters. The quartet broke up shortly after this album was released (part of the band was already away at college), allegedly over creative differences based on (the venerable) “jocks against weirdoes” friction.

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ST. JOHNNY — SWIRLIES

ST. JOHNNY High as a Kite (1993, Rough Trade/Caroline) This straight-ahead but excellent Sonic Youth-meets-Pavementmeets-Dinosaur Jr indie mope-rock act excels with every song on this collection of early 7-inch and EP material. The track “High as a Kite” got a little bit of traction on 120 Minutes, but the AIDS-related tale “Go to Sleep” is the jewel. The New York– based band was one of two (the other being Cell) signed to DGC/ Geffen in 1993 by the label’s coolest and best-known A&R man, Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore, and based on the strength of the material collected on High as a Kite, it’s not hard to see why. The major label would go on to release the two proper albums St. Johnny had in it, including the near-excellent Speed Is Dreaming later that same year.

STARFISH Stellar Sonic Solutions (1995, Trance Syndicate) Those who would be enamored with the Foo Fighters’ debut, Sugar’s oeuvre, the first three Superchunk albums, or Arcwelder’s Pull if each had extra helpings of heaviness and aggro are strongly encouraged to seek out this Austin, Texas, trio’s debut full-length. Produced, appropriately enough, by Bob Mould, Stellar Sonic Solutions is one of those records built on an uncomplicated, established (if not formulaic) foundation, yet which achieves wallto-wall filler-free perfection. This really, really loud and heavy hook-hemorrhaging indie rock with the added bonus of semishoegaze female vox courtesy of Ronna Era. Guitarist Scott Marcus was previously in Austin stalwarts Glass Eye and played “Ultimate Loser,” one of the funnier characters in Richard Linklater’s cult film hit Slackers.

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STARFLYER 59 Silver (1994, Tooth and Nail) The Riverside, California, Starflyer 59 is basically Jason Martin and a revolving cast of backing help. The long-running, still-active “band” started out as America’s first Christian shoegaze outfit (or at least the first to get any attention from secular audiences), but Starflyer 59’s personal beliefs (or the novelty thereof) are not why the act is included here. Debut full-length Silver (for Christian altrock safehouse label Tooth and Nail) is a colossal, quiet-loud-quiet beast of thick and mean guitar riffs, crystalline vocals, and the teeth that the shoegaze style was rapidly abandoning at the time. STEEL POLE BATH TUB Tulip (1991, Boner) The strain of post hardcore that came to be known as the noise rock subgenre suffered from a particularly off-putting homogenization issue, a problem that tended to make the standouts, well, stand out all the more. Steel Pole Bath Tub began in Bozeman, Montana, as a Thinking Fellers Union Local 282–style out-pop combo with female vocals (no official releases from this era, though at least an album’s worth of demos is floating around and comes highly recommended). The band ended up in the Bay Area on Boner Records in the late ’80s, and this entry is their second proper full-length release. Featuring drummer Darren Morley (“Mor-X,” formerly of Mr. Epp and the Calculations with pre-Mudhoney Mark Arm and Steve Turner), this trio set itself apart with an inventive yet tasteful use of samples (via analog cassette tape decks controlled by foot pedals); dual vocalists and songwriters with different melodic and pop-craft senses that never followed the barking, testosterone-heavy styles that plagued the subgenre; a deft hand with the “noise” part of the “noise rock” equation; and a distinct understanding of how to make “heavy” work. With Tulip, the band began a three-album (plus one 10-inch EP) winning streak that would carry them until an absurdly negative experience with the majors caused disbandment in 1996. Tulip’s highlights—“Mercurochrome,” “Soul Cannon,” “Sister,” “One Thick Second,” and especially “The Scarlet”—announced a noise rock band that brought something new and worthwhile to the table.

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STEEL POLE BATH TUB The Miracle of Sound in Motion (1993, Boner) Aside from a slightly muddled sound (SPBT had too much going on in their songs and needed good dynamics), the third Steel Pole Bath Tub full-length sits alongside the band’s official studio output that followed as a document of this trio in its prime. From the Melvins-ish crawl of “Borstal” to the speedy assault of “Pseudoephedrine Hydrochloride” and “Bozeman,” and all the way to a respectful cover of the Pogues’ “Down All the Days,” The Miracle of Sound in Motion does well by the best of the noise rock bunch (Superconductor, Cherubs, Slug, Cows, and so on) as an excellent example of how the subgenre could be executed in a timeless fashion. Meaning, the record sounds as new and wild today as it did in 1993, without any of the trappings that would bog down the band on their future path. STEEL POLE BATH TUB Some Cocktail Suggestions from Steel Pole Bath Tub (1994, Boner) Before SPBT embarked on its brief dalliance with a major label, the band issued this six-song wallop as a stopgap farewell to a label that didn’t seem like the contractual type in the first place (and for some reason, critics dismissed these twenty-five-plus minutes of music as such). Barring the short, free-form noisefest of “Slip,” the balance here are bar-raisers for Steel Pole Bath Tub’s discography to date. It helps tremendously that Steve Albini engineered; his patented touch brings out the subtleties of SPBT’s singular strain of noise rock while accentuating the “rock” half of the subgenre. Why he wasn’t behind the board on every SPBT release is a mystery. Inspired, electrifying, and, for lack of a better term, pretty badass.

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STEEL POLE BATH TUB Scars from Falling Down (1995, Genius/Slash) The final chapter in the major labels’ indie rock feeding frenzy occurred from 1995 to 1997. Such was the Wild West nature of the period that the commercially challenging sounds of Steel Pole Bath Tub seemed like a good idea to someone at Warner-owned Slash (by way of the failed fake-indie imprint Genius). Then again, this could be said for any number of albums in this book. Scars from Falling Down was received as a “more commercial” work for SPBT, with many writers complaining that the band had toned things down. In truth, the Bay Area trio, like several other misguided major-label émigrés of the time, ended up releasing its strongest full-length under an evil corporate behemoth (written somewhat tongue-in-cheek). And to be fair, the album’s sole single (and video), “Twist,” could have ended up on alt-rock radio for a second in a universe not that far removed from our own. Otherwise, even with the sampling dialed way down for legal reasons, the album is the most consistent and rewarding work of the band’s career, one that was cut way too short when Slash rejected demos for a follow-up (eventually released years later as Unlistenable, a title inspired by one label exec’s response to the recordings). Curious readers should check out “The Conversation,” “Twist,” “Home Is a Rope,” “Four Barrels,” “3 of Cups”—or, hell, the entire album. STRAPPING FIELDHANDS Wattle and Daub (1996, Shangri-La) This Philadelphia-based enigma is irrevocably linked to the same early-to-mid-’90s lo-fi movement of which Guided by Voices was the unofficial flagship band. While there are similarities, Strapping Fieldhands’ musical references date to a time before the ’60s British Invasion and ’70s punk and power-pop stomping grounds favored by Guided by Voices’ Robert Pollard. The noticeably timeless feel to the lot of the band’s 7-inches, 10-inch EPs, and previous full-length debut, Discus, can be attributed to the Fieldhands’ enthusiasm for skiffle (a peculiarly British pre-1960s form of folk) combined with obscure late-’60s/early’70’s micro-styles of folk-rock. By the time of its superior second album, Wattle and Daub, the band had arrived at an original, and timelier, updating of these influences.

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SUGAR Copper Blue (1992, Rykodisc) Hüsker Dü’s Bob Mould had gotten the plaintive, lush collegerock impulses out of his system with the 1989 semi-successful Workbook, but the journey back to more rocking and darker areas that he attempted with 1990’s Black Sheets of Rain was brought down by trebly thin production and a backing band that eventually didn’t work out. This is a point worth considering if Sugar’s early-1992 formation seems opportunistic, occurring as it did amid the maelstrom sparked by Nirvana’s Nevermind. Besides, Nirvana and the basic musical tenets of the alt/grunge/indie explosion were mostly based on a formula pioneered by Hüsker Dü a few years earlier, thus granting Mould a gold-plated license to rock out wherever and whenever he damn well pleased. Sugar comprised Mould on guitar and vocals, David Barbe of Athens, Georgia (formerly of Mercyland and Bar-B-Que Killers, concurrently in Buzz Hungry), on bass, and Bostonian Malcolm Travis (ex–Human Sexual Response, Zulus, and No Man with Mission of Burma’s Roger Miller) on drums. The trio’s powerpop hooks encased in a loud and mountainous instrumental presentation is free of extremely rough edges and is the missing link between Hüsker Dü’s path-paving and the Foo Fighters’ mainstream-ready application of the form from 1995 onward, sort of skipping the societal and cultural hate-and-bait role filled by Nirvana (namely on third and final In Utero). Many critics chimed with the assumption that Copper Blue represented a fantasy extension of the Hüsker Dü catalog, had that band continued into the next decade, but this sort of future-telling trivializes the album in question. This is Bob Mould the Fan, one-stop shopping across what had transpired as a result of his first band’s influence, then applying his unmistakable aptitude at combining the dark with the light. Copper Blue is loaded with home runs. Opener “The Act We Act” is riff-rock over shoegazer layers, and “A Good Idea,” “Changes,” and “Helpless” were hits on MTV and the newly blossoming arena of alternative-rock programming on commercial radio (and on college radio, of course). “If I Can’t Change Your Mind” would have made Workbook a much better stab at an acoustic and electric balance, and “The Slim” makes for melancholic listening as it spins the tale of a friend’s gradual 310 GIMME INDIE ROCK

demise from AIDS. The world was . . . almost ready. Regardless, Copper Blue performed nicely in the U.K. (where it was released by Creation Records and awarded NME’s “Album of the Year”) and found respectable success on this side of the pond. Copper Blue almost went gold and (kind of ironically) is the most successful album of Bob Mould’s career (so far). SUGAR Beaster (1993, Rykodisc) As the ’80s passed their halfway mark, the running time required for an album to be considered a proper full-length increased—a far cry from the days when a “full-length” Minutemen title wrapped well under the twenty-minute mark. By the early ’90s the paradigm had reached near reversal with this six-song “EP,” which clocks in at more than a half-hour—and with not a second wasted. The second release by guitarist and singer Bob Mould with the first appropriate rhythm section he had enjoyed since Hüsker Dü, Beaster is a seamless song cycle recorded during the Copper Blue sessions that was obviously too heavy, dark, abrasive, and propulsive to fit into that album’s agenda. But these should not be considered mere outtakes. “Come Around” out-noise-pops the competition and “Tilted,” abetted by advanced technological studio possibilities of the early ’90s and the massive sound achieved by the producers (Mould and Lou Giordano), is of more relative ferocity than anything Mould created before or since. If Copper Blue is a little too accessible for one’s tastes, Beaster is the remedy. SUN CITY GIRLS Torch of the Mystics (1990, Majora/1993, Tupelo) Cited by Animal Collective as a big influence and heard in the sounds of a bevy of other underground bands of the last quartercentury or so, the Sun City Girls’ 1981–2007 body of work includes fifty full-lengths, twenty-three cassettes, twelve 7-inches, twelve soundtracks, twenty-five compilation appearances, and six feature-length videos. Brothers Richard and Alan Bishop formed SCG with drummer Charles Gocher in 1981 and as outsiders circumnavigating the Phoenix, Arizona, hardcore and punk scene, but they found like-minded and long-term colleagues in the Meat Puppets and JFA (Alan Bishop played bass with the latter

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for about a year). SCG’s sound is literally unclassifiable. In 2010, Pitchfork.com’s Marc Masters put it perfectly: “More than any other underground American rock band in the previous three decades, they used the entire world for artistic inspiration and sonic miscegenation. It’s no wonder the music sprawled, veering into fractured rock, twisted ragas, creepy ballads, surf-riding jams, tightly wound Asian-inflected pop, and blabbering poetry. When every sound made in every far corner of the earth is fair game, things can get messy.” Torch of the Mystics is the best place to start and the best single-album encapsulation of the band. Gocher lost his battle with cancer in 2007, ending the Sun City Girls (though the Bishop brothers toured in tribute to him as Brothers Unconnected). Alan and Richard Bishop (now Sir Richard Bishop) have built sizeable bodies of solo work in recent years. SUN CITY GIRLS Kaliflower (1993 Abduction) The first studio full-length by the band to appear on their own Abduction label after the band’s first decade of releases on JFA’s Placebo imprint and the Seattle label Majora, Kaliflower is a great document of both the outer reaches of the band’s sense of humor and stylistic arsenal. It begins a most entertaining take on the spoken word and poetry slam backed with a jazz combo and proceeds all the way to the tightest and heaviest power-trio spacerock blowouts. SUN CITY GIRLS Valentines from Matahari (1993, Majora) Sun City Girls in their most rocking of modes put their singular stamp on later-period Black Flack–style inversion of heavy hardcore,’70s hard rock, and wild acid rock. Throughout, the trio displays their Eastern-influenced transcendence and their generally mind-blowing walk down the invisible line between controlled fury and improvisational free-rock abandon.

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SUN CITY GIRLS Bright Lights Dark Beginnings (1993, Majora) This one will appeal to fans of Bardo Pond, No Neck Blues Band, the Grateful Dead, early Pink Floyd, and so on. The long, hypnotic workouts are anything but tedious or sleep-inducing. SUN CITY GIRLS 330,003 Crossdressers from Beyond the Rig Veda (1996, Abduction) This album is truly an epic achievement, a showcase for each of the innumerable styles, angles, performance incarnations, and agendas the band had been working on for its entire career. A listening experience wholly unlike any in this book. SUNNY DAY REAL ESTATE Diary (1994, Sub Pop) Sunny Day Real Estate is one reason the sentiment “when emo was awesome” appears every now and again. Like several other like-minded progenitors, this Seattle band offset the thickheaded dude-ness that had infiltrated the indie-alt-grunge under-andabove-ground of the early ’90s. With roots in the late-’80s and early-’90s hardcore scene (bassist Nate Mendel was in Christ on a Crutch and straightedge band Brotherhood) and enough guitar muscle to go up against the heavier bands from this moment in time, Sunny Day Real Estate added inward examination with its melodic, clear-headed, and smart lyrics and vocals. Diary is just what a sizeable indie/post-hardcore audience was looking for. The band got some attention via MTV and performed the song “Seven” on MTV’s Jon Stewart Show. Mendel and drummer William Goldsmith famously went on to become the rhythm section in the Foo Fighters, while singer/guitarist Jeremy Enigk launched a solo career to a decent degree of acclaim.

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SUPERCHUNK S/T (1990, Matador) This release is one of the musical instruction manuals for what came to be known as the sound and attitude of ’90s indie rock, Superchunk’s first album blasted by on a skillful mixture of ’80s post hardcore and classic first-gen pop-punk like the Buzzcocks, not to mention the fact that it was anchored by one of the great anthems of the era, the previously released single “Slack Motherfucker.” An exuberant snapshot of what a lot of the earlier releases in this book were leading up to. SUPERCHUNK No Pocky for Kitty (1991, Matador) On this Steve Albini–produced sophomore release, Superchunk sounded as if it had matured a lifetime, expanding the attack and teeth of their debut. By now a formidable live act with a good amount of touring under its belt, the band presented songs that realize the potential hinted at on its debut, and then some. But Superchunk’s masterpiece, amazingly, would be next up on the list. SUPERCHUNK Tossing Seeds: Singles 89–92 (1992, Merge) In the early to mid-’90s, a full-length collection of previously released 7-inch material or unreleased tracks could be a bumpy ride for those new to the band in question. Superchunk’s Tossing Seeds features one of the era’s most iconic (albeit misunderstood) singles, the 1990 “Slack Motherfucker,” but the band’s 1990–91 climb to the top of the indie rock heap is more instructive for how kind the passing years have been to “Fishing,” “Cool,” “The Breadman,” “Cast Iron,” and “Seed Toss,” along with the pair of Sebadoh covers “It’s So Hard to Fall in Love” and “Brand New Love.” For bands and artists, the 7-inch was an economical method for releasing music and often the glue holding together bands’ discographies, and for fans in the pre-Internet days, one of the cheapest ways to sample acts. The notion of the B-side as a dumping ground for phoned-in filler became antiquated as bands began to look at the 7-inch as a six- (at 45 rpm) or thirteenminute (at 33 rpm) window of opportunity.

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SUPERCHUNK On the Mouth (1993, Matador) Though it was the band’s contract-fulfilling release with Matador (Superchunk would spend the rest of the ’90s on its own label, Merge), On the Mouth fit in well with Matador’s 1992–93 succession of indie rock gold from Pavement, Liz Phair, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, and Yo La Tengo. Of course, Superchunk sounds nothing like those bands, but during that period each released an album that would go on to become a fan-multiplying fave that also earned the good graces of critics. On the Mouth is also the first Superchunk release to feature classic-lineup drummer Jon Wurster, whose powerful and rock-solid chops connected with the much better songwriting and multifaceted momentum in and around the band to create the greatest album of Superchunk Mk. I. “Precision Auto,” “The Question Is How Fast,” “For Tension,” and “I Guess I Remembered It Wrong” are the full realization of the band’s simple but proprietary indie and punkrock mix, while the longer riff-dirge “Swallow That” is a rare show of meaner intensity that helps give the album balance. SUPERCHUNK Foolish (1994, Merge) If On the Mouth was Superchunk’s entry into the upper echelon of indie rock of the early ’90s, Foolish was the band’s biggerpicture breakthrough in the Nirvana-fueled alternative cultural makeover. It’s also one of indie rock’s best-known breakup records, written and recorded during the unraveling of the relationship between guitarist, singer, and songwriter Mac McCaughan and bassist Laura Balance, also the co-operators and founders of Merge. But the show went on, and this was Superchunk’s first album since leaving Matador to become the Merge flagship band as the label experienced its own salad days (moving into an office and putting a third person on staff) with the releases of some early-’90s benchmarks of its own, including the Magnetic Fields’ The Charm of the Highway Strip, Polvo’s first two full-lengths, and Lambchop’s I Hope You’re Sitting Down. Musically, Superchunk had moved on from the wall-to-wall rush and youthful exuberance of their previous three full-lengths. Foolish is a product of adulthood, professional and personal responsibility, the turmoil going on behind the scenes,

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and extraneous forces like this being the first time traditional (stylistically, aesthetically, and culturally) indie rock had to face down internal stagnation brought about by an influx of second-wave mediocrity and the major label and mainstream co-opting rampant during those post-Nevermind times. Songs feature acoustic guitar, production clarity, and a variety of tempos and energy levels; it was by far the most commercially viable and accessible Superchunk had ever been. Foolish got the band on Late Night with Conan O’Brien and sold 40,000 copies within three months of release. It is widely considered one of indie rock’s crucial moves into a more accomplished and mature realm and away from the hairy abandon of its origins. It’s also the album that put Merge on a world-dominating course as a totally independent label of great success and cultural eminence. SUPERCONDUCTOR Hit Songs for Girls (1993, Boner) When this Canadian band’s name pops up, it’s usually because it happens to be the first outlet for future Zumpano and New Pornographers principal, Carl Newman. Boasting a publicitystuntish but real lineup that never dipped below four (often six) guitarists and two bassists, this noise rock behemoth avoided free-form messiness thanks to Newman’s now-known penchant for untouchable pop hooks and a tendency to have most of the guitarists acting in a layering capacity. Hit Songs for Girls, one of the many interesting and exciting noise rock titles to come from Boner’s late-’80s/early-’90s roster (the label was founded by Fang guitarist Tom Flynn), features Newman’s songwriting catchiness throughout (especially on “There Goes Helen” and “Come on Hotdog”) and closes with one of indie rock’s best collisions of chaos, pop, and rock-and-roll magic: “Feedbackin’.”

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SUPERCONDUCTOR Bastardsong (1996, Boner) The final release by Boner and Superconductor has both band and label bowing out in astonishing style. An ambitious doublelength epic that succeeds with the tricky kitchen-sink approach, Bastardsong veers from mastery of the many-guitar approach to plaintive acoustic balladry and analog synth experimentation (remember, these instruments were a ballsy touch at the time), all with a loose but continuous concept behind it (the album was billed as a “rock opera”). Moreover, Bastardsong packs the adventurousness nods to ’70s prog-rock also achieved by fellow decibel-and-discord sculptors A Minor Forest and Slug. Sadly, and like the latter band, these types of multifaceted sprawls usually came as finale works that couldn’t really be topped. The creative restlessness that made them great would also make the bands defunct. SUPERSUCKERS Smoke of Hell (1992, Sub Pop) This Seattle band’s (by way of Arizona) first proper full-length, and the band itself, had little to nothing in common with the rest of the Sub Pop roster at the time, save for the two albums the label had released by the Dwarves. Smoke of Hell, with its Daniel Clowes cover art, was fourteen stampeding punk and hardcoretempo riff-rockets over which bassist Eddie Spaghetti lays down his sneeringly antagonistic, cocksure vocals. The whole package is a catchy, balls-out Motörhead/AC/DC/Ramones–influenced ride with huge production by Jack Endino—one of the best guitar sounds by the proto-grunge/grunge go-to engineer to date. Too tight and heavy for the garage-rock and punk-revival crowd, too tastelessly rock and roll and metallic for the indie and grunge set, Smoke of Hell was overlooked at first but hindsight puts the album way ahead of its time, considering the similar overall approach taken by the later (and mostly Scandinavian) movement of heavy punk-and-roll bands like the Hives, the Hellacopters, Turbonegro, and Gluecifer.

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SUPREME DICKS The Unexamined Life (1993, Homestead) The Supreme Dicks’ original Amherst, Massachusetts/Hampshire College–based lineup of Daniel Oxenberg (guitar and vocals), Jon Shere (guitar and vocals), Steve Shavel (vocals, guitars, and theremin), Mark Hanson (drums and vocals), and Jim Spring (guitar and turntables) came together in 1982. The band settled into an existence as a performance entity, but one seemingly fixated on accumulating a small country’s worth of onstage guests. Dinosaur Jr’s and Sebadoh’s Lou Barlow was a return sideman, and Beck has also joined the band in performance (as has Ariel Pink in more recent years). The Supreme Dicks finally got around to debuting on record with a 7-inch in 1992, followed by this full debut. One minute into the opening song, “In a Sweet Song,” it becomes apparent that there will be absolutely zero outside musical reference points to come. The Unexamined Life is a collection of the delicately structured, gently psychedelic in a rural and almost accidental way, traditionally passed-down folk of an innocent urgency that somehow stumbled onto pop hooks and keeps wanting to sing those hooks with a heightened conviction but always shies away for fear that the entire song could crumble around them. The vocals are endearingly off-key, but might take a little getting used to for some listeners. Then again, thinking hard enough while this album plays does bring to mind distant musical cousins Devendra Banhardt, very early pre-T. Rex, and the Red Krayolas’ Mayo Thompson, but each only for a short time. At times surprisingly graceful and radiant, other times terrified of its own shadow. SWANS Cop (1984, K 422) Dig into the furthest extremes of death metal and grindcore, explore the harshest of free-form noise and the most depraved of early industrial music, nowhere will one find early albums that are darker, heavier, more brutal, more powerful, more influential, and more disturbing than early-to-mid-period titles by Michael Gira’s Swans. Beginning as a type of no-wave band during that movement’s final gestures, and springing from the same NYC scene as Sonic Youth and Glenn Branca, Swans released a self-titled mini-album in 1982 and the debut Filth in 1983, 318 GIMME INDIE ROCK

both anomalies of huge, unrelenting rhythmic noise-sludge. On sophomore effort Cop, improved production, tighter walls of guitar, and further sharpening of the band’s intent combine to make a crawling mammoth of immense low-end guitar and bass riffs of suffocating density and abusive distortion. Michael Gira’s vocal howls, yells, and spoke-sung proclamations take negativity and nihilism to an all-new level, and methodical, subtribal drumming hits so hard each beat is akin to being fifteen feet from a bad car crash. Most of the music in this book released from 1985 on that operates with at least a degree of heaviness (which is a lot of the music in this book) owes a stylistic debt to Cop. SWANS Young God EP (1984, K 422) Also known as “Raping a Slave,” the EP officially titled Young God is the musical nastiness of early Swans peaking over twentyfive minutes and four songs. The industrial and experimental tendencies are taken up a notch with the notorious chain-andmetal-table included as a percussive instrument. “I Crawled” and “Young God” employ the band’s earliest use of melodic vocals, in the first hint of a shift toward the more inclusive big-picture punishment and awe that was to come. All four songs last between five and a half and seven minutes, but each seems like an hour or more of sonic torture for those not in the mood or lacking a taste for visceral and meaner corners of music. Young God was reissued with Cop on one CD in 1992 and has since been packaged with more titles from this period in the band’s evolution. SWANS Greed (1986, K 422) Vocalist and keyboardist Jarboe begins her legendary tenure in the Swans, as does bassist Algis Kizys, who stayed on until the band’s original period of activity ended in 1996. After arriving at the ultimate expression of heavy, brutal, noisy, and negative with its two previous releases and performing at such torturously loud volumes that the police frequently shut down shows (not to mention Michael Gira’s stomping on the fingers or pulling the hair of audience members who sat on or slouched against the

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stage, and the actual full-on physical assault of anyone caught head-banging [his pet peeve]), Swans could move in only one fundamental artistic direction. The baby steps are heard in Jarboe’s haunting backing vocals; opener “Fool,” carried along not by towering industrial and sludge-metal riffs but by a grand piano, the synthesizer on “Money Is Flesh,” and a slight calming of the overall disposition and arrangements. In that regard, this might be the best place to start for some. SWANS Holy Money (1986, K 422) The sister album to the one it followed, Holy Money was recorded in the same sessions as Greed and continues the band’s slow amassment of an instrumental, stylistic, lyrical, and vocal arsenal of more diversity, experimentation, and appeal while retaining the high level of intensity so crucial to Swans’ sonic mission. Jarboe sings lead on “A Hanging” and “You Need Me,” and the acoustic eight-minute dirge of “Another You” is altogether new territory. Swans’ influence on the future of heavy music in all of its countless strains is undeniable, this album in particular has been cited as a major influence by principal members of Earth, Sunn O)), and Justin K. Broadrick (founder of Godflesh and Jesu). SWIRLIES What to Do about Them (1992, Taang!) Boston and the surrounding area offered several entries in the American shoegaze sweepstakes of the early ’90s. Unlike regional contemporaries Cold Water Flat and Drop Nineteens, the Swirlies did not stop at stylistic adeptness when it came to the band’s U.K. idols Ride, Chapterhouse, and My Bloody Valentine. The band’s 1992 debut for local institution Taang! was actually a collection of eight previously released 7-inches and unreleased songs from a 1991 demo. As a field recording of howling (presumably feral) dogs is joined by the snaking guitar lines of opener “Tall Ships” and the song lurches into the business of seasick riffs over sensual boy/girl vocals, it’s soon apparent that this is a band with a far more organic and scrappier (in the best sense) agenda than that of most coolly disconnected acts toeing the shoegaze and drone-noise pop line at the time. Without a moment of filler, the excellence of this mini-album is a clear nod to My Bloody

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Valentine’s first paradigm-shifting work, 1988’s Isn’t Anything. The smoky, extremely lo-fi spookiness of “Her Life of Artistic Freedom” is unlike anything associated with shoegaze, but could be a lost track from Thinking Fellers Union Local 282’s epic badand-good trip, Mother of All Saints. The furiously rocking “Didn’t Understand” and heavy, lumbering punch of “Upstairs” both hint at Sonic Youth circa Daydream Nation and local forebears Dinosaur Jr, but more so, each track is Swirlies to the core. For the Swirlies’ two-decades-and-counting existence, a revolving door of nearly twenty supporting musicians (including Kurt Vile, cartoonist Ron Rege, and someone credited as “The Ghost of Christmas Past”) has backed the static core of founder, guitarist, songwriter, and singer Damon Tutunjian and bassist Andy Bernick. SWIRLIES Blonder Tongue Audio Baton (1993, Taang!) The first of the Swirlies’ two majestic proper album tours de force is shoegaze at its core, but it’s also driven by the same spirit of rugged individuality that informed the best of the 1990s pioneers—both known and respected acts like Pavement, Sebadoh, and Royal Trux, as well as the overlooked Thinking Fellers Local Union 282, Fly Ashtray, Trumans Water, and Grifters. Several songs shift tempo, mood, and instrumental layers, giving a prog-rock feel to the band’s gifted hand at noise-pop. With “Jeremy Parker” and “Park the Car by the Side of the Road,” Damon Tutunjian and company pull out the big guns with, respectively, mammoth-sized, plundering dynamics of racing BPM’s and jagged, furious guitar. But this never devalues the sugary pop hooks or songwriting mostly helped along by the male-female vocal tradeoffs.

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SWIRLIES They Spent Their Wild Youthful Days in the Glittering World of the Salons (1996, Taang!) The Swirlies’ final hurrah of the ’90s is a multistyle ride through super-distorted electronic-pop, sludgy semi-metallic palmmuted riffing, and synth-anchored prog-rock anthems. It’s the culmination of the shoegaze/indie noise/lo-fi/outsider pop symmetry initiated on the Blonder Tongue Audio Baton. There is a strong case for this album being the best of the two and therefore the band’s definitive statement. Regardless, it is an excellent gateway to the rest of the band’s work.

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a focus on songwriting, and lacked the immediate payoff of their friends and common tour mates The Jesus Lizard. After two full-lengths, two 12-inch EP’s and a 7-inch on Amphetamine Reptile, Tar announced its arrival on Touch and Go Records in 1992 with the Teetering 12-inch EP and third full-length, Toast. With a smidge more melody and a crystallized attack, Toast is Tar’s best album, as well as both their heaviest (“Altoids, Anyone?” and “Quieter Fellow”) and most downbeat (“Satritis,” no doubt about the pitfalls of Nirvana-style hyperstardom). In 1994 the band decided to break up Big Black style (i.e., at the height of its game), and spent more than a year writing and recording the also-recommended but not quite as strong Over and Out (1995, Touch and Go). These two albums are among the period’s most solid examples of Steve Albini’s studio prowess. TEAM DRESCH Personal Best (1995, Chainsaw/Candy-Ass) The untouchable execution of this classic punk-rock, post hardcore, and hard-rock masterpiece will knock unprepared listeners against the wall with ferocious guitar work, air-moving heaviness, multiple-vocal harmonies, palpable conviction, and heart that’s rarely delivered with such urgency in any form of music. And the hooks—the songwriting acumen throughout this ten-track album is jaw-dropping. Team Dresch was deeply active in the queercore movement of the Pacific Northwest and came out of the same scene as Sleater-Kinney. Founder Donna Dresch had played with Dinosaur Jr and the Screaming Trees, among many others, and is a figurehead in the aforementioned scene, while guitarist Jody Bleyle was also the drummer for the fantastic Hazel. This album is essential for all lovers of great heavy and hard-rock-based music.

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THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS Lincoln (1988, Bar/None) The brainy, inventive, humorous, and deeply human guitarand-accordion duo John Flansburgh and John Linnell started They Might Be Giants in 1982. By the release of their second album, Lincoln, in 1988, they had already captured the hearts of America’s college-radio audience. Mostly this was through the genius “Dial-a-Song” service maintained with classified ads, a toll number, and their answering machine, an idea that was forced upon the duo when they lost recording equipment and other band-related items in a burgled apartment. Thanks to the five hundred–plus songs the band recorded onto the machine and the successive website that replaced it, They Might Be Giants are one of the most prolific rock bands in the history of music. Lincoln kicks off with They Might Be Giants’ catchiest song in the duo’s unceasing discography (seventeen albums to date), “Ana Ng,” a frantic pop song built on a repetitive, choppy (and distorted . . . for these guys) guitar riff and, like most TMBG songs, packed with lyrics and wordplay about a fictitious Vietnamese girl thinking about someone on the exact opposite side of the earth. Fans responded accordingly to the song and its decently rotated MTV video, making it the band’s first to chart. The album’s remaining seventeen songs follow the duo’s experimental alterna-pop treatment of a variety of styles, such as sea shanties, jazz-pop, and polka. Like each of TMBG’s first four albums released before 1994’s John Henry, Lincoln was recorded with synthetic backing bass and percussion. It would be They Might Be Giant’s final album for an independent label before a four-record stint on Elektra. THINKING FELLERS UNION LOCAL 282 Mother of All Saints (1992, Matador) Along with Trumans Water’s Spasm Smash double-length released the same year, Thinking Fellers’ Mother of All Saints is sort of like the Daydream Nation of the late-’80s and early-’90s experimental out-to-lunch quasi-movement of noise pop (very early Pavement, Fly Ashtray, Uncle Wiggly, Sun City Girls, etc.), at least in its scope of inspiration. (It was too weird to really shake things up à la Pavement’s Slanted and Enchanted or the band Guided by

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Voices.) Excepting the “Feller Filler” (minute-or-so noise interludes connecting the songs), this huge album bridges TFUL 282’s weirdest and most challenging types of pop confections and the completely twisted rock-ish work that filled their previous fulllength (1990’s Lovelyville) with a step toward the accessibility that they would introduce, albeit on their own terms, with their next few releases. Still, Mother of All Saints is an excellent showcase of just how innovative, individualistic, and unprecedented this corner of early-’90s indie rock could be. THINKING FELLERS UNION LOCAL 282 Admonishing the Bishops (1993, Matador) Four normal-length to longer tracks that have TFUL 282 growing along with its audience. “Hurricane” could be Polvo or Pavement as interpreted by this band. The three other songs are just as beautiful and inventive, each in its own way. Admonishing the Bishops makes a perfect companion to Strangers from the Universe, released the next year without any crossover content. THINKING FELLERS UNION LOCAL 282 The Funeral Pudding (1994, Ajax) Released the same year as the relative breakthrough Strangers from the Universe, this mini-album features plenty of classicera Fellers, especially opener “Waited Too Long,” the beautiful and delicate “Heavy Head,” and the prog-pop brilliance of “23 Kings Crossing.” THINKING FELLERS UNION LOCAL 282 Strangers from the Universe (1994, Matador) Between 1986 and 1992, the two double albums, two full-lengths, 10-inch EP, and a handful of 7-inches released by the Thinking Fellers maintained an entirely self-created sound and vision. Then TFUL 282 aggrandized said sound and vision with 1993’s Admonishing the Bishops and 1994’s Strangers from the Universe. TFUL 282 had changed into a slightly more accessible version of itself and Strangers from the Universe fit right in with other creative successes released during Matador’s first hot streak. And

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while it was no Orange or Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, by a long shot, Strangers from the Universe sold well for a TFUL album and, along with the band’s live shows that left converts everywhere they played, marks a certain apogee for the band. This album is the best place to start for those unfamiliar. THINKING FELLERS UNION LOCAL 282 I Hope It Lands (1996, Communion) The final album released during the San Francisco sextet’s 1994–96 period of unprecedented popularity, thanks to its most intensive touring to date (even opening an arena tour in spring 1995 as the support act for the band Live) and three previous releases that captured a unique creative vision, one that was among the most rewarding options for indie and underground devotees looking to expand their listening palettes. I Hope It Lands offers a swarm of enjoyably experimental and insane “Feller Filler” tying together a wealth of peerless left-field pop to which the band held exclusive proprietary claim. “Empty Cup,” “A Lamb’s Lullaby,” and “Triple X” were what happened when the Thinking Fellers kicked that stuff upstairs into the life-affirming category. Following the release of this album, the band decided to abandon the touring regimen of the previous three years and become a recording and studio entity, making albums when the members’ respective day jobs could be coordinated. THOMAS JEFFERSON SLAVE APARTMENTS Bait and Switch (1995, Onion/American Recordings) Part of the Columbus, Ohio, 1990s scene of bands that also included Gaunt, V-3, New Bomb Turks, and the Cheater Slicks, and which was influenced by alcohol, the greatest historical reference points in underground music history, and a vendetta against the rest of humankind, TJSA delighted in releasing purposefully hard-to-find 7-inches (fans had to write the band a letter giving a good reason why they deserved to have one before the band would send off a 7-inch). Fronted by former Great Plains singer Ron House, TJSA found itself on a major label when fan and tastemaker Johan Kugelberg was hired by Rick Rubin’s American Recordings to A&R bands through a new offshoot label, Onion.

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Bait and Switch was a new kind of lo-fi, pushing a four-track mixer set up to the limits of functionality. The album is a harsh rush of smart-ass chaotic punk with House’s easy-to-recognize hateful whine of a singing style and guitarist Bob Petric’s scuzzy shredding riff-bombs flying in all directions. THREE MILE PILOT Nà Vuccà Dò Lupà (1991, Headhunter/Cargo) Armistead Burwell Smith IV (a.k.a. Zach Smith), later of Pinback, on bass and vocals, and Thomas Zinser (also Pinback) on drums formed Three Mile Pilot in 1991. With cover art not unlike that of more subtle death metal albums, Nà Vuccà Dò Lupà came out of the rather productive early-’90s San Diego post-hardcore/ hardcore/indie rock scene with a sound unlike anything created by the band’s regional contemporaries (but the same could be said about the disparate Trumans Water, Drive Like Jehu, Heavy Vegetable, and the Gravity Records roster). With only vocals, a bass, and drums, the album is a somewhat dark mood piece that opens with “One Step Ladder,” a song that slowly increases in tension until Smith’s unmistakable voice and melodic singing style is pleading in desperation in front of aggressively strummed high-register bass chords and crashing drums. While a little unrefined at this point, the song and the album is a template for this band’s often beautiful, atmospherically downcast sound and innovative experimentation, all of which would gel soon enough and become a major influence on underground styles of the next two decades. THREE MILE PILOT Chief Assassin to the Sinister (1993, Headhunter/Cargo/1994, Negative/1995, Geffen) Adding guitarist Pall Jenkins on vocals and guitar, Three Mile Pilot was much fuller, noticeably darker, and all around superior band from the already excellent duo that recorded the debut. With longer songs, an uptick in the band’s distinct melodic sensibilities combined with a grimmer, almost fatalistic disposition, this is Three Mile Pilot’s ultimate work. Geffen took enough notice to sign the band and re-release Chief Assassin in 1995, but internal issues over the pressure and drawn-out writing and recording of its next album led to the band being dropped by the major. TMP

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continued on to release the highly recommended Another Desert, Another Sea album in 1997, but then broke up shortly thereafter, with members going on to more exposure and success with The Black Heart Procession (Jenkins) and Pinback (Smith and Zinser). THROWING MUSES S/T (1986, 4AD) Kristin Hersh and her stepsister Tanya Donnelly formed Throwing Muses in 1983 while both were still attending high school in Newport Beach, Rhode Island. Once drummer David Narcizo and bassist Leslie Langston became the first real rhythm section, the band self-released an EP and cassette of demos titled The Doghouse Cassette in 1984 on its own Blowing Fuses label. The cassette generated the band a surprise No. 1 college-rock hit (“Sinkhole”) and Fort Apache Studios’ manager Gary Smith was a big enough fan to bring the Muses to the attention of 4AD Records’ Ivo-Watts Russell, leading to the band becoming the first American act on the label. Hersh wrote all of the songs on the band’s self-titled debut and had yet to turn twenty at the time of its release. The album is one of the great debut records of college or original alternative rock, going well beyond the polite and quirky jangle so omnipresent in that world by 1986. Hersh is a storm of staggeringly original manic creativity throughout this ten-track trip through diverse but consistently off-kilter song construction, punklevel energy, personal confusion, and demon-exorcizing. Hersh suffered from bipolarity so severe that it caused hallucinations, and her uncontrollable real-life mood swings are openly translated through this album’s musical, vocal, and lyrical acrobatics. Drummer David Narcizo’s famous lack of cymbals and self-taught style is a vital part of this album’s distinct sound (he had never played a drum kit before joining the band and his experience was limited to time in the high school marching band). The album gained the band a great deal of attention on the college-rock circuit and led to the Throwing Muses signing with Sire for almost all of their albums that followed until the band’s hiatus in the mid-’90s. Donnelly, one of the musical unsung heroes on this album and in alternative and underground rock in general, moonlighted in the Breeders before defecting from the Muses in the early ’90s, taking Narcizo with her to form the briefly successful Belly.

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TIGER TRAP S/T (1993, K Records) A big faction of the American branch of the “twee pop” movement came out of, or navigated around, one town and one label: Olympia, Washington, and K Records. Despite having been founded in the early ’80s by Beat Happening’s Calvin Johnson, the label’s “International Pop Overthrow”—basically a twee-pop counterpoise to the burly testosterone grunge and alt metal that came blaring out of Olympia’s big brother to the north, Seattle— didn’t hit full steam until the very late ’80s and early ’90s. When it did, there was a lot of crossover with the riot grrrl movement screaming out of Olympia at approximately the same time. But Tiger Trap was from Sacramento, California, rocked tighter and somewhat lighter and cleaner than its cohorts, packed each song with at least one pop hook, and was responsible for this one front-to-back quintessential album in the band’s short lifespan. TOILING MIDGETS Sea of Unrest (1982, Instant Records/Rough Trade U.S.A.) The same year his bad behavior facilitated the demise of the Sleepers, vocalist Ricky Williams resurfaced in San Francisco’s Toiling Midgets, formed in 1979 by the Sleepers’ drummer Tim Mooney and former Negative Trend guitarist Craig Gray as an instrumental band. Sea of Unrest is the band’s only album with its first lineup, and it was the first release by the newly opened stateside branch of Rough Trade. The Toiling Midgets were Flipper’s unofficial local competition, more so live than on vinyl. Sea of Unrest is a stand-alone album of American experimental rock innovation of the period, with songs that vary greatly in force, tempo, and vibe, sometimes even arriving at a prescient avant underground metal chug-riff-plus-bass-anddrums presentation. Plus the Toiling Midgets were motivated by sonic exploration rather than just a retailiation against punk and hardcore audiences of the day. Williams’ vocals are much more mentally unstable than on the Sleepers’ Painless Nights, and the subject matter can be disturbing, but the album’s overruling aesthetic is one of intelligence and innovation. After Williams’ death from a heroin overdose in 1992, the Midgets’ original lineup regrouped with American Music Club’s Mark Eitzel on vocals, releasing that year’s Son album on Matador.

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TORTOISE S/T (1994, Thrill Jockey) A sonic anomaly upon its release in summer 1994, the selftitled debut by supergroup Tortoise defied easy classification but, in hindsight, makes nothing but total sense. The indie rock underground had begun to oppose its genre’s traditionalists (Superchunk, Sebadoh, etc.) by 1993 or so, and used the growing revivalist interests in ’70s forms like Krautrock, Brian Eno’s experiments in pop and ambient styles, space rock, dub reggae, prog, the rock and jazz fusion albums of Miles Davis and Ornette Coleman, and the 1980s explorations of bands like Talk Talk as it weaponry. This, along with the ground broken by albums like Slint’s Spiderland, gave birth to Tortoise and the subgenre known as post rock. Tortoise comprised the bassist of Eleventh Dream Day, the rhythm section of post-hardcore band Bastro, and Slint’s Dave Pajo, along with other known entities in the Chicago indie scene of the late-’80s. Its self-titled debut is an instrumental updating of practically every revisited style mentioned above. Memorable moods and hooks were crafted without vocals and the band’s multi-bass lineup that owed more to dub reggae and the work of U.K. luminaries like Adrian Sherwood than other influences. This melting pot made hearing the album for the first time in the context of that period a listening experience with few if any precedents. TORTOISE Millions Now Living Will Never Die (1996, Thrill Jockey) If Tortoise’s self-titled debut was largely without equal, its followup studio effort changed part of the underground rock landscape for the rest of the ’90s and earned the band, for better or worse, the label “godfathers of American post rock” for good reason. With much longer tracks and a marriage of rock and non-rock approaches of unparalleled aptitude, this album was quite the historical turning point for the underground scene that birthed it.

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TRANS AM S/T (1996, Thrill Jockey) Trans Am’s debut full-length had the benefit of being associated with Thrill Jockey’s largely spotless track record, which included the post-rock debut by Tortoise and the sunny jazz-fusion pop of the Sea and Cake. What had many furrowing their brows upon first listen, however, was the fact that, while some of this instrumental album does pay tribute to the same Krautrock, instrumental, and experimental electronic icons of the ’70s favored by Tortoise, the fusion at hand here is not that of rock and jazz, but of post-prog, ’70s AOR/hard rock (Boston, Styx, etc.), a clear affinity for Thin Lizzy, Hawkwind-style space rock, and prethrash power metal of the early ’80s. The album is a song-cycle of heavy, tightly played, and, for lack of a better term, badass hard rock instrumentals tailor-made for high volume and disregard of speed limits. Each is connected by short synthesizer and keyboard vignette that touch on Eno and disco, but more on the late-’70s soundtrack work of Tangerine Dream. Another striking quality is that, whether intended or not, the album was an antithetical middle finger aimed at the early-’90s lo-fi, pick-it-up, attempt-to-play, and release-it-DIY mindset that had made serious inroads. Trans Am was first thought to be a one-off, ironic joke by indie smartasses—a good indicator of how uncool ripping leads, anything related to real metal without some over-intellectualizing baggage, and performance and studio professionalism had become by 1995. But the D.C.-based band— Nathan Means, Phil Manley, and Sebastian Thomson—wasn’t an earnest, po-faced treatment of rock cliché, either. It hit a balance between knowing smirk and authentic love for the musical reference points. Because neither critics nor the band’s new fans really knew what to do with this band, Trans Am found itself with the “post rock” tag and crossed the country opening for Tortoise, proof of the uselessness of that term if there ever was one. Trans Am had the balls to stand by and push forward with guitar rock and its persistence made for a fun and triumphant album that sounds as great today as it did almost twenty years ago.

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TREEPEOPLE Guilt, Regret, Embarrassment (1991, Toxic Shock/K Records) As the 1990s folded into the new millennium’s first decade, Built to Spill shared a specific extra-sonic common denominator with similarly survival-minded artists like Modest Mouse, Beck, Wilco, Flaming Lips, My Morning Jacket, Ween, and Sonic Youth: the ability to amass a following that crossed over into demographics outside of indie rock, with the most prominent crossover pickups being fans of the jam band movement. Built to Spill has spent its post-Y2K years (barring a couple of brief periods of time off) packing theaters from Brooklyn to the most culturally bankrupt scorched-earth sprawl hellholes the country can offer, no to mention the real breadwinner—festivals! So why haven’t the reissue, remaster, and repackage gods smiled down on the discography of Doug Martsch’s pre–Built to Spill band, Treepeople? For those who only know Treepeople by name and association, there seems to be a misconception that this was “Doug Martsch’s hardcore band before Built to Spill.” But this misrepresents the band. Treepeople was formed by Martsch, brothers Pat Brown (bass) and Scott Schmaljohn (guitarist and singer), and Wayne Rhino Flower (drums), all three of whom were former members of Boise, Idaho, hardcore band State of Confusion, and released their first cassette and 7-inch in 1988. This was followed by a few more 7-inches and the Time Whore 12-inch EP in 1990. When debut full-length Guilt, Regret, Embarrassment was released in 1991, the chops and, for lack of a better term, balls, to make guitar soloing a central component of a band’s style was the domain of only a tiny handful of indie rock bands. (Martsch admitted J Mascis was a huge influence.) Built to Spill fans with a deep affinity for Martsch’s guitar wizardry but who have never heard a Treepeople album could be in for a rare listening experience with this album. There’s no guitar team in this book with the sonic dialogue shared by Martsch and Schmaljohn (though, the ladies in Team Dresch come close), including Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo. Note the cover of David Bowie’s “Andy Warhol” that bests Dinosaur Jr’s treatment of same.

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TREEPEOPLE Something Vicious for Tomorrow/Time Whore (1992, C/Z) This eight-song mini-album served to further develop Treepeople’s sound. It features a hair-raisingly great cover of the Smiths’ “Bigmouth Strikes Again,” plus the raging heavy pop of “Filter” and “Funnelhead” (the latter also released on a split with Archers of Loaf). TREEPEOPLE Just Kidding (1993, C/Z) The final Treepeople album with Doug Martsch in the ranks is the band’s finest moment and one of underground rock’s best uses of internal strife as a tension engine. The band’s two-song crest here can be credited to both Martsch and co-guitarist and songwriter Scott Schmaljohn, with the latter’s “In C” and the former’s “Neil’s Down” (a re-recorded version of a song from a 1991 split 7-inch with House of Large Sizes). What first got Seattle’s scene noticed in the late ’80s would go on to be its ruination by the time Just Kidding was released in 1993, and though the Treepeople had called the Pacific Northwest haven home for several years, the quartet never fit into an easily pegged hole and thus suffered commercially. Martsch would leave the Treepeople shortly after the release of Just Kidding, returning to Boise to form Built to Spill. TRULY Fast Stories . . . From Kid Coma (1995, Capitol) The story is a familiar one: great band, great sound, horrible timing. Truly was formed by Robert Roth, Hiro Yamamoto, and Mark Pickerel. Yamamoto was the original bass player for Soundgarden, playing on everything the band released up to 1990. Pickerel was the Screaming Trees’ original drummer on five full-lengths until hitting the road in 1992. Guitarist Robert Roth tried out for Nirvana in the late ’80s and led a band called the Storybook Krooks. Truly released a four-song EP on Sub Pop in 1991 then got snapped up by Capitol in 1993. By the time the band’s double-album opus, Fast Stories. . . was released, Seattle had become a much more complicated place, seemingly another planet compared to the hype-magnet it was just a few years earlier. Fast Stories . . . is a melodic, heavy guitar-rock epic

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with psychedelic flourishes, à la Built to Spill sister band Caustic Resin (sans the overt drug references), but the heart beating underneath everything is stellar songwriting. Like another Screaming Trees side project, Solomon Grundy, Truly has not found a friend in history. To say this album is worth seeking out is a gross understatement. TRUMANS WATER Spasm Smash XXXOXOX Ox & Ass (1993, Homestead) Trumans Water’s debut album, Of Thick Tum (1992), is a ridiculous mess that sounds as if some asshole frat boy bullies with no musical experience stole Polvo’s instruments and proceeded to play what they thought the band sounded like. John Peel loved the record so much that many plays on his show inspired the band to emerge from the scene-circumnavigating non-ghetto of experimental indie rock outfits like Fly Ashtray, Thinking Fellers Union Local 282, and Sun City Girls. So Trumans Water returned the following year with an arch-epic of musical sensibility that avoided the bigger-picture indie rock scene. The night-and-day difference between Of Thick Tum and the double-length Spasm Smash XXXOXOX Ox & Ass is indicative of Trumans Water’s ability to throw open its safety valve and flood the record bins with their abrasively detuned Sonic Youthish noise-pop, spazztic highregister but often melodic vocals, amid hardcore tempos that came together in a sound that was peerless for its day and way ahead of the curve. This album, and several after it, can be heard in many younger bands in more recent years, whether they were a conscious influence or not. Whatever the case, Trumans Water remains a neglected chapter in American indie individualism of the early ’90s. TRUMANS WATER Godspeed the Punchline (1994, Homestead) It’s doubtful that any band in rock history has followed up a double album with a quadruple album, but that’s essentially what Trumans Water did. After finding and perfecting its sound with the double-length Spasm Smash XXXOXOX Ox & Ass, the band issued its four Godspeed . . . releases across four different labels and around the same time in 1994. Godspeed the Punchline is the only studio-produced title in the series, which showcased the

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same sort of idiosyncratic, wildly exciting, and off-center spazzpop that made Spasm Smash . . . such an awesome oddity. The other three albums in this series feature self-recorded improvnoise experimentation—a lot of it. TSOL Dance with Me (1981, Frontier) The original TSOL was formed out of Orange County protohardcore band Vicious Circle in 1980 by Jack Grisham, drummer Todd Barnes, guitarist Ron Emery, and bassist Mike Roche. This incarnation of the band would follow a rapidly developing musical vision over the two full-lengths and two EPs (plus some compilation tracks) the band released between 1980 and 1983. After starting out with an EP of decent but unremarkable politico-punk and hardcore in 1980, TSOL returned with its groundbreaking full-length debut, Dance with Me. This album integrates the Damned’s Machine Gun Etiquette and The Black Album into the hardcore template and spits out a tense, wellwritten, and provocative sound that fans went bonkers over. The next TSOL album, Beneath the Shadows, was a solid set of full-on keyboard-saturated goth-wave that unburdened TSOL of its fan base overnight.

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ULTRA VIVID SCENE — YOUNG FRESH FELLOWS

ULTRA VIVID SCENE S/T (1988, 4AD) Prior to founding Ultra Vivid Scene, Kurt Ralske was the guitarist for the anglophile indie pop band Crash, which was formed in New York around 1985 but moved to the U.K. in search of an audience for its unremarkable interpretation of pre-showgaze dream-pop and C86 rush. The band broke up in 1987 and Ralske returned to NYC. 4AD released the self-titled debut that Ralske produced, performed, and wrote for his next project, Ultra Vivid Scene. The album displays a penchant for guitar fuzz, pop, and the emerging “baggy” or “Madchester” dance-rock rhythms that the U.K.’s Happy Mondays, Soup Dragons, and Inspiral Carpets were concurrently refining into their own movement, but also has an obvious proto-shoegaze feel to it. That being stated, the harsh noise of The Jesus and Mary Chain’s Psychocandy or My Bloody Valentine’s Isn’t Anything album and You Made Me Realize EP (released around the same time) is not Ralske’s main concern. The album hits the right spot with the single “Mercy Seat,” the infectious “A Kiss and a Slap,” and the pretty pop of “Nausea” and “This Isn’t Real,” both of which could be dead ringers for Yo La Tengo’s not-dissimilar work of the late ’80s and very early ’90s. Try not to pay too much mind to the lyrics, and this little curio pays off nicely. UNCLE TUPELO No Depression (1990, Rockville) The Belleville, Illinois, band Uncle Tupelo was certainly not the first underground band to collide the traditional country music of the Carter Family and Hank Williams with distorted guitars, quiet-to-loud duality, emotional rage, and punk and hardcore tempos, but it was the first and best when it came to creating the indie rock offshoot that would soon take on a life of its own (as opposed to merely existing beneath the umbrella of indie rock) as alternative country, or alt-country. It was no sly nod to an unknown or neglected work when the genre’s periodical bible (the long-running No Depression magazine) was named after Uncle Tupelo’s 1990 debut album, which itself was named after the 1936 Carter Family cover of James D. Vaughan’s “No Depression (In Heaven)” that is covered therein. Though it would take a few years for the world to catch up to the band’s innovations, 342 GIMME INDIE ROCK

alt-country soon blew up into a full-fledged movement that is still growing today (better known as the post-millennial variety of Americana that favors small acoustic instruments, twenty-plusmember ensembles, and mega-stardom). Uncle Tupelo’s impact would not fully deliver on its initial promise until the band was fracturing mid-decade. In 1990, No Depression was a ragged, convicted, and theretofore unheard melding of R.E.M., the Minutemen, Dinosaur Jr, and the aforementioned midcentury hillbilly/country music, the latter often pulled off so convincingly that it conjured the sounds of musicians of yore. The band of high school buddies, who had existed in various forms under different names since the 1980s, recorded this debut at Boston’s famed Fort Apache Studios, where it was produced by Sean Slade and Paul Q. Kolderie, so chosen because of their work on Dinosaur Jr’s Bug. (Fun fact: the Gibson SG played by J Mascis on Bug can be heard on this album.) And as many readers know, the band’s two principle figures, Jay Farrar and Jeff Tweedy, would go on to greater fame and critical acclaim in their respective post-Tupelo vehicles. With standout tracks like “Whiskey Bottle,” “Factory Belt,” “Graveyard Shift,” and “Before I Break,” No Depression is alt-country at its most transcendent. UNCLE TUPELO Still Feel Gone (1991, Rockville) It doesn’t take long for Still Feel Gone to announce the honed, more confident, and better beast that Uncle Tupelo had grown into after the release of its albums. On the Jeff Tweedy–penned opener “Gun,” the band’s own timeless indie rock invention, rural R.E.M.-style longing, and Hüsker Dü’s “Makes No Sense at All” all intersect in the ultimate Uncle Tupelo track. But by no means is there a quality-drop from there. A tribute to the fallen Minuteman, “D. Boon” packs an earnestness that stands arm hairs on end, while “Nothing,” “Postcard,” and “Punch Drunk” all do the same, if for different reasons. Compared to the spartan eight-track punch of its predecessor, Still Feel Gone is, as a whole, the band’s multi-instrument, multilayered utilization of everything a $6,000 recording budget and two weeks could milk out of the more professional Long View Farm studios in central Massachusetts (Slade and Kolderie of Fort Apache returning to record), but it succeeds on every level without becoming mired

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under pointless ambition. Uncle Tupelo would release one more album (the Peter Buck–produced, almost entirely acoustic, halfcovers, half-originals March 16–20, 1992) for Homestead Records and Dutch East India imprint Rockville (previously known as Giant Records) before leaving over nonpayment problems and releasing its final LP, Anodyne, on major label Sire in 1993. The band split the following year. Out of the acrimony came Wilco (Tweedy) and Son Volt (Farrar). UNCLE WIGGLY Across the Room and into Your Lap (1991, Shimmy Disc) In the late ’80s, WFMU DJ Wm. Berger named a thirty-minute segment of his radio show “Lo-Fi” to describe the home-recorded music that filled it each week, and it is from there that the term allegedly caught on and was handily applied to the full-fledged indie rock quasi-movement influenced by Sebadoh, Smog, and the cassette-only Shrimper label. Berger also formed the band Uncle Wiggly in 1988 with two members of NYC’s Fly Ashtray. Both bands traversed the ’90s and met the same outcome: they were overlooked. Like Fly Ashtray, Uncle Wiggly trucked in the highest quality indie psych/noise-pop and, as expected, both bands sound quite similar, with Fly Ashtray leaning toward a slightly noisier and experimental manner of songcraft. On Uncle Wiggly’s first Shimmy Disc outing, the trio sets off on a prolonged hypnotic Feelies-meets-Neu!-style instrumental workout that crests with loud and furious strumming. There are copious nods to the Minutemen and the Meat Puppets, as well as pop with sterling hooks that jump out of every corner. Thus, Uncle Wiggly poses the same conundrum as Fly Ashtray: Why wasn’t this band huge? And now that bands like Thee Oh-Sees are amassing relatively rabid cult followings with sounds eerily similar to these bands, where’s the retroactive love?

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UNCLE WIGGLY There Was an Elk (1992, Shimmy Disc) Like sister band Fly Astray, Uncle Wiggly’s second Shimmy Disc album is the band’s masterpiece. The trio puts scruffy, reverbhappy indie/noise-pop confections with hooks so massive it feels like the band must have lifted them from forgotten AM radio hits remembered from childhood rather than making music that sounds like any genre of the past. UNCLE WIGGLY Non-Stuff (1995, Hemiola) This short, eight-song album sees Uncle Wiggly enter somewhat experimental waters, creating its own patented sort of prog-rock and fuzz-pop that is both the most innovative in the band’s body of work and the catchiest. This, along with the preceding There Was an Elk, are the best places to begin with Uncle Wiggly, but the much poppier Jump Back, Baby (1996, Teenbeat) is also worth seeking out. UNREST Imperial F.F.R.R. (1991, Teenbeat) It took six years and a consistent stream of creatively restless titles (from cassettes to 7-inches to EPs to a couple of proper full-length LPs) for Unrest to stop visiting every subgenre under the banner of independent and underground rock (especially those originating across the pond) and blindside that same world with Imperial F.F.R.R.. Never had there been such a seamless union of beautiful minimalism, unprecedented innovation, experimentalism, and towering hooks so upfront and infectious that they felt stolen from some alternate dimension of mainstream pop.

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UNREST Perfect Teeth (1993, 4AD/Warner Bros.) Unrest’s final album was its first for a major label, released during the year that many above-ground music industry factions extended an olive branch to an authentic indie culture often viewed with a jaundiced eye. Unrest discovered how to make indie-bubblegum work for its postmodern purposes with 1991’s Imperial F.F.R.R., then polished (and rocked) it up a bit for an album that seems like it could have been successful, if only the industry didn’t have its sights on noisier or grungier fare. Not even the album’s most hook-laden numbers (“Cath Carroll,” “Make Out Club,” “So Sick,” “Six Layer Cake,” “Light Command,” and “West Coast Love Affair”) could liberate the airwaves and MTV from side-mouthed vocals and PG-rated guitar distortion. Perfect Teeth was actually too nuanced, and the label, along with the new alternative mainstream, had no idea what to do with it. UNSANE S/T (1991, Matador) In 1989, Unsane’s original lineup—guitarist and vocalist Chris Spencer, bassist Pete Shore, and drummer Charlie Ondras— released the “This Town” b/w “Urge to Kill” 7-inch on Treehouse Records. It would be the NYC trio’s first gift to the noise rock movement of the late ’80s and ’90s, and after two more singles, the band would make this explosive debut of barely contained musical and lyrical aggression, chaos, and sheer force. Spencer’s Fender Telecaster makes a brutal soundscape this instrument was never meant to transmit, and his unique vocal wail is at times akin to a fleeing flock of birds when it isn’t a believable impersonation of a man screaming for his life. Ondras, who passed away after the release of this album, hits his kit with such frenzy that concrete blocks are required to keep it from scooting across the floor. Genuinely disturbing yet an electrifying listening experience, Unsane carved its own niche in noise rock with this debut.

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UNSANE Singles 88–92 (1992, Matador) Unsane Mk 1 with Charlie Ondras on drums was best at issuing its noise rock cacophony through the 7-inch format. After Ondras’ death, Unsane began its gradual maturation into a different beast of a more metallic stripe, and aside from a forced hiatus of a couple of years (due to Chris Spencer’s time convalescing after being attacked in Austria) is still going strong and has amassed a long overdue cult of dedicated fans. The early Unsane singles compiled here (post-Ondras Unsane rarely releases on the format) come out of nowhere, one knockout blow at a time: the churning “Body Bomb,” the melodic (for this band) swarm of “My Right,” and the pinnacle of early Unsane singles, “Vandal-X.” This is the sound of urban decay and real problems put to music like never before. UNWOUND Fake Train (1993, Kill Rock Stars) Fake Train was the first proper Unwound album, recorded after the band’s special sonic heartbeat, drummer Sara Lund, joined (original drummer Brandt Sandeno played with the band for a year or so and appears on an unreleased demo album and an early 7-inch or two). Lund’s rolling, propulsive style was a hallmark of Unwound and might be the reason that the band’s best songs were usually midtempo (like this album’s “Honourosis,” “Feeling$ Real,” and opener “Dragnalius”). Fake Train was also the first music album released by the soon-to-be-influential Kill Rock Stars label, which began as an outlet for spoken-word releases. The Unwound uninitiated should check out writer Jason Heller’s exhaustive and excellent “Why Unwound Is the Best Band of the ’90s” piece written for The Onion A/V Club and published in September 2013.

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UNWOUND New Plastic Ideas (1994, Kill Rock Stars) Unwound’s ability to draw charming and infectious results from a noisy dirge-rock mix of Fugazi, Sonic Youth, Polvo, and aggro stompers like Hammerhead and Steel Pole Bath Tub reaches its creative apex on album number two. Structurally, this is most likely the band’s heaviest album, retaining some of the sloppy chug of Fake Train but pointing at the tighter, more direct manner explored to a greater degree on the next album and Repetition. New Plastic Ideas could also be the band’s best album, depending on how one favors Unwound, as the band did deviate within its own formula. UNWOUND The Future of What (1995, Kill Rock Stars) Alternately Unwound’s poppiest and angriest album, The Future of What begins the band’s campaign to sharpen itself into the angular force it would be on the next album, 1996’s Repetition. Opener “New Energy” is an aptly titled post-hardcore brick to the head that wouldn’t be out of place on any number of Amphetamine Reptile records by bands that were basically much scarier and more hateful than this more multi-mood trio. Then, as if to help lick the wounds, track two, “Demolished,” is a pure indie rock/heavy-pop winner, resembling Polvo’s hook-oriented gems from the same period. UNWOUND Repetition (1996, Kill Rock Stars) Following Repetition, the band’s fourth official full-length, Unwound shifted into a slightly different animal on the misunderstood Challenge for a Civilized Society (1998), then closed out its career with the grand and sprawling Leaves Turn Inside You (2002). With the big picture in place, Repetition is in many ways the focused peak Unwound had been climbing toward over their last three albums. Angular, spectacularly intense, and profoundly potent, the trio is unstoppable on the single “Corpse Pose” (complete with dark-wave-ish guitar and keyboard effects that recall Chrome or the Screamers), opener “Message Received,” and album highpoint “Unauthorized Autobiography.” And that’s just the first three songs. Experimentation in dub reggae, post-rock

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touches that mean business, and longer, prettier dirge-scapes (“For Your Entertainment” and “Next Exit”) all work to tremendous effect. This is Unwound’s finest moment and, hence, the best place to start for those new to the band. U.S. MAPLE Long Hair in Three Stages (1995, Skin Graft) Arriving in 1995 out of the ashes of noise rock band Shorty, U.S. Maple began when four members from two bands met on a Chicago street corner and began discussing how to “erase rock and roll from their collective minds.” Long Hair in Three Stages, produced by Jim O’Rourke, goes damn far toward deconstructing said musical style down to nothing, then rebuilding it into something with all the parts in the wrong places but miraculously maintaining its idiosyncratic self-made style as a form of underground and experimental rock. Imagine Captain Beefheart, John Cage, Sonic Youth, and comedian Jonathan Winters trying to operate together as a band confined to an eight-by-eight-foot detention cell at the equator. Then imagine the result being a fantastic and listenable type of new rock that’s not mired down by for-the-sake-of-it obtuseness or faux bizarre baggage. U.S. Maple moved over to Drag City, where they released even more engaging albums over the next decade or so. URGE OVERKILL The Supersonic Storybook (1991, Touch and Go) Though Urge Overkill made the bed in which it would have to retire, associating the band’s early discography only with its pompous squandering any original promise unjustly treats 1991’s The Supersonic Storybook and the mini-album that followed. Interpol and hordes of other bands after Y2K have made dressing to the nines part of their presentation, but in the late-’80s pofaced indie rock/post-hardcore/noise rock environment that birthed Urge Overkill (in Chicago, no less), it took serious balls to squeeze into fitted crushed-velvet suits and band-logo-embossed turtlenecks and then base your band’s mission on ’70s excess, especially before your songwriting was good enough to serve as a safety net. For the most part, that’s what happened until Urge Overkill unleashed its third full-length, The Supersonic Storybook, where the band gained an awesome drummer

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(Blackie Onassis) and finally realized its dream marrying harder ’70s rock and power-pop of the same era, contemporary altrock punch that had nothing to do with grunge, instrumental showmanship, and timeless hooks. “The Kids Are Insane,” “Bionic Revolution,” and “The Candidate” are rockers that actually come off like The Who, Cheap Trick, and Thin Lizzy thrown into a blender and updated for the times. And Hot Chocolate’s 1974 pre-disco hit “Emmaline” is seriously powerful stuff in the hands of Urge Overkill. URGE OVERKILL The Stull EP (1992, Touch and Go) Best known for featuring the cover of Neil Diamond’s “Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon” that made its way onto the Pulp Fiction soundtrack and put a brief dance with real fame in Urge Overkill’s future, the The Stull EP also boasts eighteen more minutes that go beyong The Supersonic Storybook’s achievements with some scene-directed attitude and stunning mood pieces like “Goodbye to Guyville” (a reference to fellow Chi-town indie star Liz Phair) along with the killer title track. Then there’s the burning cover of “Stitches,” originally by obscure Killed by Death–style punk band The Alan Milman Sect. Even with two of these six tracks seeing previous release through a Sub Pop Singles Club 7-inch, Stull managed to make sense of the band’s impending move to the majors. VERSUS Dead Leaves (1995, Teenbeat) Originating out of the short-lived late-’80s noise rock band Flower, NYC’s Versus was formed in 1990 by the core of bassist Fontaine Toups and the Filipino-born Baluyut brothers (Richard and Edward, guitar and drums, respectively). In 1992, the wave of guitar-bass-drums meat-and-potatoes American indie rock proper was riding its highest artistic wave, pushed along by a continued storm of top-shelf 7-inches like the first two by Versus, “Astronaut” b/w “Insomnia” and “Bright Light” b/w “Forest Fire.” Those four songs block out the first one-third of this chronologically sequenced odds-and-sods collection. Building from the venerable tri-pillared Sonic Youth, Mission of Burma, and Dinosaur Jr start-up plan many other bands used at the

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time, Versus eschewed sloppiness and compromised fidelity for a toothy dynamic precision, golden-voiced guy-girl vocal balance, and apparent access to the secret fountain of perfect hooks. Versus communicated an egalitarian sexual energy through lyric and mood without overdoing it —a feat in and of itself. VERSUS Secret Swingers (1996, Teenbeat) The exciting punch and perfect pop of each Versus 7-inch and compilation track released between 1992 and 1994 was not thoroughly transferred over to the band’s two longer format releases at the time: the 1993 twenty-seven-minute Let’s Electrify EP and the 1994 debut full-length The Stars Are Insane. But in 1996, with a third Baluyut brother (James) on second guitar, Versus emerged on second proper full-length Secret Swingers (and on that year’s five-song Deep Red EP) as a band matured to the extent allowed by the formula it created. The songcraft is foreboding, but infectiously so, and is propped up by dynamics more impressive than the band’s earlier quiet-loud-quiet approach, which was expanded to accommodate more guitar and longer songs. Try not to let the unfortunate cover art detract from the intake and enjoyment of the music. VERTICAL SLIT/ V-3 Under the Blood Red Lava Lamp (1986, Old Age) For the thirty-two years (1977–1999) that his music surfaced under the monikers of Vertical Slit, Ego Summit, V-3, Lacquer, and Phantom Limb (among others) or under his own name as solo releases, Jim Shepard of Columbus, Ohio, was America’s true rugged individualist of underground music. Shepard was an outsider’s outsider with one foot perpetually planted in the margins, though his final years of activity throughout most of the ’90s saw some degree of connectivity with a like-minded underground community and culminated with an album released through a major label (1995’s Photograph Burns—see next entry). He debuted as Vertical Slit in 1977 with the Slit and Pre-Slit LP, a home-recorded anomaly self-released in a one-time pressing of one hundred (it has been repressed in a couple of three-hundredcopy runs since 2011). This live document of a club gig in 1980 is also a Vertical Slit album, but it finds Shepard leading a power

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trio and creating a form of post punk progressive rock that’s like an eerily accurate crystal-ball vision of slightly more adventurous but certainly not uncommon ’90s indie rock concerns. A tight, hard-rocking Pere-Ubu-meets-Led Zeppelin-meets-Televisionmeets-the-future set that doesn’t suffer too greatly from the fidelity-allergic small-club technical realities of the day. Lifeaffirming six minutes: “Metal or Meat.” VERTICAL SLIT/ V-3 Photograph Burns (1995, Onion/American) Jim Shepard’s band V-3 was the vehicle for most of his ’90s work. Preceding this album was the Siltbreeze release Picking through the Wreckage With a Stick album and Evil Love Deeper on Thrill Jockey (both released in the early ’90s), plus the self-released albums Psychic Dance Hall (a collection of 7-inch releases) and Negotiate Nothing (1992). All are highly recommended. Then the most unlikely thing resulted: a major label album. Like Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments, V-3 found a temporary benefactor in Johan Kugelberg, who was adding some seriously highquality music of a subcultural nature to Rick Rubin’s American Recordings empire with his short-lived Onion imprint. Photograph Burns is V-3 at its most focused and traditionally rock; a fact that will be misinterpreted unless there’s some familiarity with other V-3 releases. Though V-3 bassist Leland Cain plays throughout the album, which was culled from multiple sessions, three drummers appear, including Columbus’ own Sam Brown, who played drums for New Bomb Turks and Gaunt and is now the musical foundation for indie rock supergroup Divine Fits (with Spoon’s Britt Daniel). To many listeners, the fidelity on this record (or lack thereof) makes most other recordings from the period sound like The Alan Parsons Project, but this is a distinctly atmospheric level of fidelity that does not subtract anything from what makes the album one of the truly special ’90s underground rock releases. Opener “American Face” is T. Rex or Bowie-meets-lo-fi semimetal. But Photograph Burns is such a powerful album because of its slower numbers like “Torch,” “Caucasian White,” “Bristol Girl,” and “Horsekick.” These songs use slightly experimental Crazy Horse–like arrangements as vehicles for Shepard’s nakedly honest baggage—the type of stuff that could be a lesson in life’s

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real problems for generations of underground and above-ground music supposedly delivered from the heart. Tragically, on the third weekend in October 1998, Jim Shepard took his own life at his home in Columbus, three years after the release of Photograph Burns, which went straight into the black hole of obscurity, where it would stay until the lo-fi resurgence of a decade later brought renewed interest in Shepard’s body of work—every bit of it deserved. VIOLENT FEMMES S/T (Slash, 1983) In one of indie rock’s great fairytale moments, Pretenders’ guitarist and keyboardist James Honeyman-Scott discovered this young Milwaukee, Wisconsin, trio busking on a street corner in front of the venue his band would be headlining that evening. The Femmes were invited (by Chrissie Hynde) to play a brief acoustic set in the sweet spot between the opening band and the Pretenders. Many of the songs recorded in mid-1982 for this nowquintessential piece of American alternative rock were written by singer and guitarist Gordon Gano when he was still in high school, though the young musician’s influences—Lou Reed and The Velvet Underground, the L.A. paisley underground, Jonathan Richman, and Talking Heads—suggested a precocious teenager, and Gano built a decidedly original sound out of it all (aside from the glaring Richman similarity). The often acoustic setup (the rhythm section comprised a standup bass and tiny snare-ruled kit in front of a standup drummer) didn’t diminish the punkish attack, even when things delved into postmodern rockabilly territory. The R-rated, lustful but confused lyrics were sung with a boyish snarl, and staples like “Blister in the Sun,” “Add It Up,” the Willie Dixon–appropriated “Gone Daddy Gone,” “Prove My Love,” “Kiss Off,” and blazing gem “Promise” made this album many teenagers’ obligatory introduction to college or “modern” rock throughout the ’80s. The album was certified gold by the end of 1987 and platinum by 1991, when it cracked the Billboard 200 at No. 171 (behind the popularity of “American Music,” a single from their fifth album Why Do Birds Sing?.

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VOID (see THE FAITH/VOID, page 102) VOLCANO SUNS The Bright Orange Years (1985, Homestead) Peter Prescott put together Volcano Suns shortly after the demise of the band for which he held the drumming position, Mission of Burma. Of course, there are obvious Burma touches here, but this is a more lighthearted, flat-out rocking and creatively restless outburst of songs tinged with garage-psych and beefed-up Feeliesstyle folk fury, plus a feel of all-around increased inclusivity when it came to whatever struck the trio during the recording process(es). By a tiny edge, this is the best of Volcano Suns’ two Homestead titles and a must for fans of Mission of Burma and Boston’s crazily fruitful ’80s underground rock scene. After the follow-up All Night Lotus Party (1986), Volcano Suns departed Homestead for SST. VOLCANO SUNS Thing of Beauty (1989, SST) Two albums into its relationship with SST (the noisier and spottier but fun Farced from 1987 was the band’s first with the label) and four albums into the larger game, Volcano Suns delivered a double-length set of songs with Thing of Beauty, the album that seemed to be the reason why the band was put on the earth. The accomplished songwriting that finally found harmony with band’s obvious jones for noisier arrangements makes for less of the unfocused and unneeded chaos of the previous two albums without sacrificing any of the energy, charm, manic drive, or punchy dynamics. That Thing of Beauty is the band’s best should be partially credited to guitarist David Kleiler (cofounder of Boston’s Sorry), who played some guitar on Farced, coming in as the full-time replacement for Chuck Hahn (himself the replacement for original guitarist Jon William) and the writer behind a decent chunk of the double album. Side four is all covers, with Volcano Suns’ treatments given to Brian Eno’s “Needles in the Camel’s Eye,” Devo’s “Red Eye Express,” and the MC5’s “Kick Out the Jams.”

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MIKE WATT Ball-Hog or Tugboat? (1994, Columbia) Ball-Hog or Tugboat is the first solo album by Minutemen and fIREHOSE cofounder, bassist, vocalist, and iconic down-to-earth thinking man of the American underground Mike Watt. It followed the breakup of both fIREHOSE and Watt’s seven-year marriage to former Black Flag bassist Kira Roessler, though the couple continued a creative partnership with Roessler contributing artwork to this album and the pair’s long-running dual-bass duo, Dos, is active to this day. For Ball-Hog or Tugboat?, Watt elected to assume an interesting position somewhere between man behind the curtain and the obvious creative driver, surrounding himself with a dream team of collaborators and friends, including Henry Rollins, Sonic Youth, Eddie Vedder, Dave Grohl, and Krist Novoselic (their first time playing together since the death of Kurt Cobain), Flea, Soul Asylum’s Dave Pirner, Germs and Nirvana guitarist Pat Smear, Pixies’ Frank Black, Evan Dando, Mark Lanegan of Screaming Trees, That Dog’s Haden sisters, Mike D. and Ad-Rock, Dinosaur Jr’s J Mascis, Curt and Cris Kirkwood of the Meat Puppets, former SST house-producer Spot, Saccharine Trust guitarist Joe Biaza, and Parliament/Funkadelic/James Brown organist Bernie Worrell. Watt sings just two of the tracks here, but the Eddie Vedder–sung “Against the ’70s” went to No. 21 on Billboard’s Modern Rock Tracks chart, and the J Mascis–as–Eddie Hazel cover of Funkadelic’s “Maggot Brain” is further proof that Dinosaur Jr’s creative engine is one hell of a guitar player (as if any more proof was needed). A cover of Sonic Youth’s “Tuff Gnarl” is another of the many highlights. A strange amalgam of the many subcurrents running through the ’90s underground, this album remains Watt’s best-selling title after the Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime. WEEN God Ween Satan: The Oneness (1989, Twin/Tone) New Hope, Pennsylvania’s Aaron Freeman (Gene Ween) and Mickey Melchiondo (Dean Ween) formed Ween in 1984 after striking up a musical dialogue during their eighth-grade typing class. It makes one wonder if anyone has issued proper credit to the teacher behind the seating assignment. The pair immediately set about making music and recording every second of it with any available miked electronic device. The next five years saw the

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duo self-releasing six albums on cassette and one solo title (same format) by Gene. Minneapolis’ best-known independent, Twin/ Tone Records, signed the band as Gene and Deen were saying farewell to high school (1989). The following year, the label gave the world what is most certainly one of the albums to most deftly combine complete mind-fuckery and genuine listener enjoyment. And it’s a twenty-nine-track double-album opus, to boot. The artistic and critical success of God Ween Satan: The Oneness should be credited to “the third Ween,” producer Andrew Weiss, whose long membership in the Ween inner circle began when his sixteen-track home studio was used in the making of this album. The band’s amazing sense of humor based on the members’ expert grasp of the stupid and genius dichotomy, an enigmatic balancing act in regard to novelty versus rock history reverence, eclectic style palette, and songwriting prowess were already in place on God Ween Satan, albeit in an abrasive, visceral manner compared to later albums. WEEN The Pod (1991, Shimmy Disc) Historical revisionists have labeled this album Ween’s “most difficult” work. The Pod was a notorious and much-loved underground phenomenon in 1991. Of course, an amazingly effective handful of calculated myths surrounding Ween’s second officially released album helped to fuel much of the notoriety. Like the liner note claims, the contraption on the cover (itself a rendering of Leonard Cohen’s The Best of Leonard Cohen) is a “Scotchgard bong” and the entire album was recorded while the duo was very high on the household laundry room’s biggest killer of brain cells. The duo later came clean and stated that these claims were, “the most slime-bag thing we could think of.” The duo had changed labels to Shimmy Disc, where Ween’s organic and authentic outsider aesthetic found perfect label mates in Bongwater, Boredoms, GWAR, King Missile, and the work of label owner and producer Kramer. Unlike many Shimmy Disc releases, however, this one did not feature the trademark production touch of Kramer, but a production touch it surely had. The murky submerged quality to this recording was often critically reviled at the time, but the irony here is that more than a decade later Ariel Pink would either knowingly or unconsciously

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use a similar sound on records that mesmerized the musical landscape during one of two “lo-fi” movements over the course of the next decade (they can’t be called “revivals,” as many of the principals were unaware of lo-fi’s rich late-’80s/early-’90s history in America). The Pod was named after the apartment where Deen and Gene allegedly laid down the 3,600 hours of four-track recordings that ultimately produced these twenty-three tracks. The album shows a graduation to greatness in songwriting and less harsh nihilism (in sound and lyrical themes) when compared to God Ween Satan. The blatant takes (somewhere between a “rip” and a “nod,” but totally respectable nonetheless) on ’70s hard and psych rock, folk music bards, metal, Bowie, and the absurdist fucking around in between offer the uninitiated a remarkably wide pastiche of styles. In fact, The Pod is its own little rock history lesson as consumed through Ween’s singularly bent worldview. WEEN Pure Guava (1992, Elektra) Literally an extension of The Pod (it was culled from the same pile of home recordings), Pure Guava is one of the strangest albums to ever carry the logo of a major label, and the second time in rock history (behind Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska) that the big boys released a full-length recorded entirely on analog four-track. Even stranger is that the gamble paid off with a minor hit in “Push th’ Little Daisies” (due in part to its inclusion in an episode of Beavis and Butthead). The song itself, a Barnes and Barnes/ Dr. Demento–style romp with helium-pitched vocals, is one of the oddest three minutes of music to reach a wide audience, but elsewhere on Pure Guava, the genre-jumping duo turn in their best to date when they want, and their most fucked-up when the mood strikes, as with “Reggaejunkiejew,” “Flies on My Dick,” “Hey Fat Boy (Asshole),” and “Big Jilm,” to name a few of the more entertaining room-clearers spread throughout. But when Deen and Gene want to reach into their bag of chops, as they do with “Tender Situation,” “Sarah,” and “Springtheme,” fans are reminded of Ween’s ability to write their own idea of Brill Building–quality pop songs. At the time, the prediction that Pure Guava could be followed by almost a decade of releases for Elektra and another ten years of more concentrated activity and

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output, plus a huge and intensely dedicated following, would have gotten a resounding, “Shut the front door!” Just think about one of the comments made by Beavis (or was it Butthead?) as they watched the video for the aforementioned hit: “These guys got no future.” WEEN Chocolate and Cheese (1994, Elektra) Wean returned twenty-two months after the release of Pure Guava with the expectation-shattering Chocolate and Cheese, recorded from fall 1993 to spring 1994, used a professional studio and skilled side players. While this method is a far cry from the fourtrack home recordings that made up 1991’s The Pod and 1992’s Pure Guava, the resulting album wouldn’t be mistaken for one by any other band than Ween. Tracks like “Spinal Meningitis (Got Me Down),” “Can’t Put My Finger On It,” “Mister, Won’t You Please Help My Pony,” and “Candi” are as hilariously and disturbingly fucked-up as anything in the band’s enormous body of work. The professional production doesn’t detract from this. On the other, more foreshadowing side of things, “A Tear for Eddie,” “Roses are Free” (made popular on the jam-band circuit by Phish’s cover of the song), “Drifter in the Dark,” “Joppa Road,” “I Can’t Put My Finger on It,” and “Freedom of ’76,” by unapologetically lifting various popular forms of music from the past, might be pretty weird, but the execution is flawless. Mention should be made of “Baby Bitch,” an Elliot Smith–like beauty that is hands down the most heart-shattering and brutal breakup song in the band’s universe of songs. WIPERS Youth of America (1981, Park Ave.) As far as what would become indie rock and more specific styles like garage punk and post hardcore are concerned, Wipers’ second full-length was years ahead of its time. The number of later bands, too numerous to list here, with this album in their sonic DNA is flat-out astonishing. An early and notable part of the Portland, Oregon, late-’70s punk scene, Wipers formed in 1977 as the brainchild of Greg Sage, a musical figure who started earning a reputation as a savant genius at an early age. His father worked in the broadcasting industry, and the family owned a record-

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pressing lathe machine, which the young Sage obsessed over and learned to master while in junior high school, sowing the seeds of Sage’s lifelong dedication to a total DIY ethic. Wipers’ original concept was a band that released ten albums in fifteen years without ever playing live or participating in any form of press or promotion, thus forcing listeners to immerse themselves in the music itself. But some form of reality intervened, and Wipers built a reputation as a great live act around Portland before releasing 1980’s Is This Real? LP, which gained a cult following and is now rightfully considered one of America’s greatest punk and post punk albums. Even so, it’s neither as prescient nor beautifully moody or excitingly experimental as Youth of America. Two of the six tracks here pass the six-minute mark, a deliberate reaction to the type of punk and hardcore emerging in America at the time, and these anchors (“When It’s Over” and the untouchable tenminute title track that closes the album) let Sage’s compositional brilliance shine. For a few reference points that only tell part of the story, imagine Hawkwind, the Feelies (circa Crazy Rhythms), Mission of Burma, Chrome, Television, early R.E.M., and The Embarrassment all losing a battle-of-the-bands contest to a powertrio that piecemealed each band’s best attributes as accessories to its own unique style. Existing in a cultural vacuum was the secret catalyst in the greatness of many pre-Internet bands, but Wipers’ second and third full-length albums might be the best result of this phenomenon. WIPERS Over the Edge (1983, Trap/Restless) Brevity returns to Greg Sage’s agenda, but that’s about the only thing this album has in common with Wipers’ 1980 debut, Is This Real? The major developments of Over the Edge are increased guitar distortion and heavier dynamics and the consummation of Sage’s skill as a pop craftsman. As with Youth of America, there is a rather dark and ominous tension at the heart of Wipers’ peerless sound, and here it found eleven more succinct and urgent vessels in which to arrive. Thanks to some good ears in college radio programming and better distribution, the track “Romeo” (previously released as a 7-inch in 1981) became an underground hit of sorts.

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WORLD OF POOH The Land of Thirst (1990, Nuf Sed) San Francisco’s World of Pooh was singer-songwriter and former 28th Day member Barbara Manning, Caroliner member and Thinking Fellers Union Local 282 collaborator Brandon Kearney, and Jay Paget (soon to be a member of TFUL 282). World of Pooh released one full-length, The Land of Thirst, which takes the influence of New Zealand indie pop bands like the Bats, The Clean, the Chills, and the Verlaines (plus other hook-heaving bands on or associated with that country’s now-legendary and influential Flying Nun label) and spits it back out with songwriting, energy, tension, and lyrical subjects that any of those bands would have killed for. That’s right—the greatest album of Flying Nun–style indie pop didn’t even come from New Zealand. Manning would go on to join Magnetic Fields’ Stephin Merrit in The 6ths, and release albums for Matador as a solo artist and with her band, S.F. Seals. X Wild Gift (1981, Slash) New York City set things in motion in the 1970s with proto-punk and punk rock. L.A.’s contribution is what would soon attain the blanket term of “hardcore.” However, underneath this convenient tag, as many know, were countless bands that were associated with hardcore but swiftly branched out or just never abided by the form’s strict stylistic guidelines to begin with. X was one of these bands. Older than most other circa-1980 upstarts, they opted for a more rock-and-roll route to antisocial themes and other nonconformist attributes. X released two straight-up seminal barn-burners, L.A. (1980) and this sophomore LP in 1981, before giving in to the Americana, rockabilly, and traditional rock interests that the punk rock and hardcore of these first two albums overpowered and kept in check. The guy-girl tradeoff vocals of guitarist John Doe and bassist Exene Cervenka are unmistakably X, and the professional skills of lead guitarist D. J. Bonebrake put the band in a different league than sloppy and more destructive contemporaries like the Germs.

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YO LA TENGO May I Sing with Me (1992, Alias) Not to short the clutch of Yo La Tengo full-lengths that preceded 1992’s May I Sing with Me, but the band’s first with the nowclassic lineup of Ira Kaplan, Georgia Hubley, and newly arrived permanent bassist James McNew (after years of semi-legendary turnover in that particular spot) is also its first consistently confident, top-drawer collision of Feelies jangle-storm, organic effects–driven noise pop, and all of the other stuff that makes the Yo La Tengo recipe so special. May I Sing with Me was the first of four full-lengths that found the band on an ascending arc of quality leading up to the unimpeachable I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One in 1997. This album features YLT gems “UpsideDown” and “Always Something,” as well as asskickers like “Out the Window” and the drone-to-freak-out exercises “Sleeping Pill” and “Mushroom Cloud of Hiss.” YO LA TENGO Painful (1993, Matador) Yo La Tengo christened its move from troublesome indie label Alias to powerhouse Matador by releasing its ultimate love letter to two concurrent subgenres that heavily influenced the band: U.K. shoegaze and New Zealand indie pop. By far the band’s most atmospheric album to date, Painful starts off with the seven-minute “Big Day Coming,” featuring YLT’s patented delicate sing-songy balladry behind swells of feedback—before kicking into noise-pop gear with “From a Motel 6,” a song that seems like what the band had been moving toward during its previous nine-year journey. Note the cover of the Only Ones’ “The Whole of the Law.” Painful can easily be counted among the slew of classic indie rock albums issued by Matador in the early ’90s.

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YOUNG FRESH FELLOWS The Men Who Loved Music (1987, Frontier) This Pacific Northwest–based, perpetually out of place, and still-active college-rock institution was formed by static member/ singer/guitarist Scott McCaughey (also of The Minus 5 and essentially the fifth member of R.E.M. from 1994 to 2011) in 1981 and to date has released over fifteen albums. With a prominent sense of humor (from lighthearted to caustic) and its own formula of college rock, power-pop, pub rock, and singer-songwriter folk that recalls, and even influenced, mid- to late-period Replacements (YFF were the band at Paul Westerberg’s first wedding), Young Fresh Fellows’ great album is their third, 1987’s The Men Who Loved Music, which generated a college-radio hit with the song “Amy Grant.”

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APPENDICES

PERIODICALS WERE PARAMOUNT: ’ZINES & MAGAZINES 1981–1996 More important than college radio, word-of-mouth, 120 Minutes, or any other source of new music or information about new music. Before the information torch was passed to the Internet, ’zines and magazines were how one followed the developments in underground music, formed personal taste in such, and established a frame of reference. Additionally, ’zines and publications of low to moderate exposure (i.e., not glossy magazines that could be purchased in grocery stores) were where the Lester Bangs/Richard Meltzer/Nick Tosches blueprint of exceptional rock criticism was expanded upon to a great degree. The secret history of the best music writing of the last thirty-five years is spread among the publications listed below. As of this writing, Bazillion Points has published book collections of Touch and Go and We Got the Power!, and SUB POP U.S.A.: The Subterraneanan Pop Music Anthology, 1980–1988 is now in production. Some of these ’zines went online and have extensive archives, and several morphed into record labels or were edited by folks who went on to achieve greater exposure. Too many remain lost to obscurity and historical neglect. I recommend the Tumblr site Fuckin’ Record Reviews (fuckinrecordreviews.tumblr.com) for tons of scans of ’80s and ’90s zines up to 1996. It would be next to impossible to make a comprehensive list of ’80s and ’90s ’zines, and any exclusions are based entirely on a lack of personal experience with the titles, an unreliable memory, or current need for a thorough go-to database, though the ZineWiki site is commendable.

18 Wheeler

The Bob

Chickfactor

Alternative Press (original late-’80s–mid-’90s run)

Bomb

Chunklet

Book Your Own Fuckin’ Life

CLE

Badaboom Gramophone

Bravear

Conflict

Bananafish

Breakfast without Meat

Cool Beans

Beer Frame

Bronx Cheer

Crank

Ben Is Dead

Bunnyhop

Cut

The Big Takeover

Bust

Dagger

Bikini Kill

Butt Rag

Decibel

Bitch

Cake

Disaster

Black to Comm

Carbon 14

Dunwich Dreams

Blue Persuasion

Chemical Imbalance

Duplex Planet

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Factsheet Five

No Idea

Subterranean Pop/Sub Pop

Feminist Baseball

Non-Stop Banter

Suburban Voice

File 13

Op Magazine/Option

Superdope

Flipside

Outpunk

Tape Op

Forced Exposure

Pop Culture Press

Teenage Gang Debs

Grace and Dignity

Pop Smear

Throat Culture

Genetic Disorder

Profane Existence

TK Offense/The Offense

HeartattaCk

Puncture

Touch and Go

Hermenaut

Punk Planet

Trouser Press

Hit It or Quit It

Rebel Grrrl

Tuba Frenzy

Hit List

riot grrrl

Ugly American

Ink Disease

Rockmag

Ugly Things

Kicks

Rocktober

We Got Power

Lowlife

Rollerderby

What Goes On

Lumpen Times

Scat Records Quarterly

Whump

Magnet

Scram

Wind-Up Buttercow

Matter

Search and Destroy

Wingnut

MaximumRockNRoll

Seconds

Wipeout!

Monk Mink Pink Punk

Siltbreeze

The Wire

Motorbooty

Slander

Yak’uz’a

Muckraker

Smiling Disease

Yet Another Fanzine

Murder Can Be Fun

Snipehunt

Your Flesh

Negative Capability

Speed Kills

Zero Gravity

A Nest of Ninnies

SPIN

New Red Archives

Stay Free!

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BETWEEN THE COVERS After first obviating the need for record guides in book form, the Internet created a need for new books that would help readers navigate the oceans of choices and the problem of historical revisionism that hinders an accurate big picture of the past. The following bibliography comprises books are both out of and in print, hard and easy to find, but all are essential for further research and/or were (and remain to be) deeply inspirational to the writer behind the one you are now holding. Andersen, Mark, and Jenkins, Mark. Dance of

Carducci, Joe, and Lightbourne, David. Wyoming

Days: Two Decades of Punk in the Nation’s

Stories: Yeung Girl, the Winter Hand, Homo

Capital.

Vampyrus.

Azerrad, Michael. Our Band Could Be Your Life: Scenes from the American Indie Underground 1981–1991. Baumgarten, Mark. Love Rock Revolution: K Records and the Rise of Independent Music. Ballance, Laura; Cook, John; and McCaughan, Mac. Our Noise: The Story of Merge Records, the Indie Label That Got Big and Stayed Small. Blush, Stephen, and Petros, George. American Hardcore: A Tribal History, Second Edition. Boulware, Jack, and Tudor, Silke. Gimme

Carver, Lisa. Rollerderby: The Book. Cavanagh, David. The Creation Records Story: My Magpie Eyes Are Hungry for the Prize. Cheslow, Sharon; Connolly, Cynthia; and Clague, Leslie. Banned in DC: Photos and Anecdotes from the DC Punk Underground (79–85) . Chick, Stevie. Spray Paint the Walls: The Story of Black Flag. Christgau, Robert. Christgau’s Consumer Guide: Albums of the ’90s. ————. Christgau’s Record Guide: The ’80s.

Something Better: The Profound, Progressive, and Occasionally Pointless History of Bay Area Punk from Dead Kennedys to Green Day. Brannon, Norman. The Anti-Matter Anthology: A 1990s Post-Punk & Hardcore Reader. Cameron, Keith. Mudhoney: The Sound and the Fury from Seattle. Carducci, Joe. Enter Naomi: SST, L.A. and All That . . . ————. Life against Dementia: Essays, Reviews, Interviews 1975–2011. ————. Rock and the Pop Narcotic: Testament for the Electric Church.

Cross, Charles R., et al. Nirvana: The Illustrated History. Davidson, Eric. We Never Learn: The Gunk Punk Undergut 1988–2001. DeRogatis, Jim. Milk It!: Collected Musings on the Alternative Music Explosion of the ’90s. Dinosaur Jr Dinosaur Jr Ensminger, David. Left of the Dial: Conversations with Punk Icons. Frank, Thomas, and Weiland, Matt. Commodify Your Dissent: Salvos from The Baffler. Frank, Thomas. Boob Jubilee: The Cultural Politics of the New Economy.

368 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Gentry, Brandon. Capitol Contingency: Post-Punk, Indie Rock, and Noise Pop in Washington, D.C., 1991–1999. Goldberg, Ben. Bands Not In the Trouser Press Record Guide Guide. Grubbs, Eric. POST: A Look at the Influence of Post-Hardcore 1985–2007. Harrington, Joe S. Sonic Cool: The Life & Death of Rock ’N’ Roll. Hurchalla, George. Going Underground: American Punk 1979–1992. Jaerisc, Burkhard. Flex! U.S. Hardcore Discography: Book #3. Jarnow. Jesse. Big Day Coming: Yo La Tengo and the Rise of Indie Rock. The Jesus Lizard. The Jesus Lizard Book. Jovanovic, Rob. Perfect Sound Forever: The Story of Pavement. Kot, Greg. Wilco: Learning How to Die. Marcus, Sara. Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution. Markey, David, and Schwartz, Jordan. Party with Me Punker: Early 80s Southern California Hardcore Scene. ————. We Got Power! Hardcore Punk Scenes from 1980s Southern California. Nedorostek, Nathan, and Pappalardo, Anthony. Radio Silence: A Selected Visual History of American Hardcore Music. Pavitt, Bruce. Experiencing Nirvana: Grunge in Europe, 1989. Reynolds, Simon. Bring the Noise: 20 Years of

————. Rip It Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978–1984 (U.K. edition). Robbins, Ira A. The Trouser Press Record Guide, Third Edition. ————. The Trouser Press Guide to ’90s Rock: The All-New Fifth Edition of the Trouser Press Record Guide. Rollins, Henry. Get in the Van. Scaruffi, Piero. A History of Rock Music 1951–2008. ————. A History of Rock and Dance Music, 1990–2008, Vol. 2. Sinker, Daniel. We Owe You Nothing, Expanded Edition. Strong, Martin C. The Great Indie Discography. Todd, David. Feeding Back: Conversations with Alternative Guitarists from Proto-Punk to Post-Rock. Tow, Stephen. The Strangest Tribe: How a Group of Seattle Rock Bands Invented Grunge. True, Everett. Nirvana: The Biography. Vee, Tesco, and Stimson, David. Touch and Go: The Complete Hardcore Punk Zine ’79–’83 . Walsh, Jim, and Pernu, Dennis. The Replacements: Waxed-Up Hair and Painted Shoes: The Photographic History. Watt, Mike. Spiels of a Minuteman. Willard Nodine, Steven. The Cease Is Increase: An Oral History of the Milwaukee Punk & Alternative Music Scene. Yarm, Mark. Everybody Loves Our Town: An Oral History of Grunge.

Writing about Hip Rock and Hip Hop. ————. Retromania: Pop Culture’s Addiction to Its Own Past. APPENDICES 369

In addition, several titles in Continuum’s 33 1/3 series are worth checking out, namely the overviews of R.E.M’s Murmur, Slint’s Spiderland, Dinosaur Jr’s You’re Living All over Me, Ween’s Chocolate and Cheese, Pixies’ Doolittle, Guided by Voices’ Bee Thousand, Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime, and Sonic Youth’s Daydream Nation.

ROCK DOCS Many of the bands featured in these pages have been the subjects of feature-length documentaries. While some of docs cannot be wholeheartedly recommended due to the general problems that plague the rock-doc format (or because I simply have not seen them), the following come highly recommended. Please note: aside from 1991: The Year Punk Broke, these are not “tour docs,” though many of those exist as well. 1991: The Year Punk Broke

First Avenue Hayday (Minneapolis nightclub)

Another State of Mind (1982 hardcore; Social

Fugazi: Instrument

Distortion, Youth Brigade, Minor Threat) Athens, GA: Inside/Out

Guided By Voices: Watch Me Jumpstart Half Japanese: The Band That Would Be King

The Color of Noise: The Amphetamine Reptile Records Story

Hype! (Seattle scene documentary made in 1996)

Couldn’t You Wait: The Story of Silkworm The Decline of Western Civilization (1980s L.A.

Not a Photograph: The Mission of Burma Story Sonic Outlaws (Negativland & friends)

punk) Such Hawks Such Hounds: The American Hard The Devil and Daniel Johnston

Rock Underground

Don’t Need You: The Herstory of Riot Grrrl! The Fearless Freaks (the Flaming Lips)

Tad: Busted Circuits and Ringing Ears We Jam Econo: The Story of the Minutemen

Filmage: The Story of the Descendents

MAJOR-LABELS AND THEIR SUBSIDIARIES OR IMPRINTS THAT RELEASED ALBUMS IN THIS BOOK A&M

East/West

RCA

Atlantic

Elektra

Reprise

Capitol

Epic

Sire

Columbia

Interscope

Slash

Def American/American

Mercury

Warner Bros.

DGC/Geffen

Priority

370 GIMME INDIE ROCK

MOST OF THE LABELS IN THIS BOOK, AND THEN SOME 4AD

Grass

Rough Trade

99 Records

Harriet

Ruby/Slash

Abduction

Hemiola

Rykodisc

Ajax

Homestead

Scat

Alias

In the Red

Shangri-La

Alternative Tentacles

Independent Project

Shimmy-Disc

Amphetamine Reptile

I.R.S.

Shrimper

Anyway

K Records

Siltbreeze

Bar/None

Kill Rock Stars

Simple Machines

Big Time

Kranky

Skin Graft

Beggars Banquet

Lookout!

Sky

Blast First!

Majora

Slumberland

Boner

Mammoth

Smells Like Records

BYO

Matador

Sonic Bubblegum

Cargo/Headhunter/Fistpuppet

Merge

Southern

Caroline

My Pal God

Spinart

Chainsaw/Candy-Ass

New Alliance

SST

Communion

No Core

Sub Pop

Coyote

Nuf Said

Subterranean

Crypt

Onion (American Records

Taang!!!

C/Z

offshoot)

Teenbeat

Desoto

PCP Entertainment

Thrill Jockey

Dischord

Placebo

Tooth and Nail

Drag City

Pop Narcotic

Touch and Go

Drunken Fish

Posh Boy

Toxic Shock

Ecstatic Peace

PVC

Trance Syndicate

Enigma

Quarterstick

Tupelo

Epitaph

Radiobeat

Twin/Tone

Forced Exposure

Reflex

Twisted Village

Frontier

Restless

Up!

Fundamental

Revelation

Vermiform

Giant

Rockville

Vernon Yard

Glitterhouse

ROIR

APPENDICES 371

THIRTY ESSENTIAL AMERICAN UNDERGROUND ROCK ALBUMS RELEASED IN 1997 Not only could I easily compile a second volume of 500 more essential albums released from 1981 through 1996, but there are more than enough releases to justify a hypothetical sequel subtitled 1,000 Essential American Underground Rock Albums 1997–2012 (to my editor: ahem, hint . . . hint . . .). So at the risk of making this book more of an argument-starter and messageboard fodder than it already is, if the latter book were to materialize at some point in the future (with my name on the front of it), here’s a thirty-album sneak preview:

Bardo Pond Lapsed

Monorchid Let Them Eat. . .

Bassholes Deaf Mix Vol. 3

Jim O’Rourke Bad Timing

Built to Spill Perfect from Now On

Palace Music Lost Blues and Other Songs

C4AM95 (né the Fucking Champs) III

Panel Donor Surprise Bath

Bobby Conn S/T

Paris 1942 S/T

Dinosaur Jr Hand It Over

Party of Helicopters Abracadaver

Ego Summit The Room Isn’t Big Enough

Sea and Cake The Fawn

Fat Day Burrega

Silkworm Developer

Flaming Lips Zaireeka

Space Needle The Moray Eel Eats the Space

The Great Unraveling S/T

Needle

Harvey Milk The Pleaser

Three Mile Pilot Another Desert, Another Sea

Hovercraft Akathisia

Tina, Age 13 Good Feelings

Karp Self-Titled

Today Is the Day Temple of the Morning Star

Kyuss/Queens of the Stone Age S/T split EP

The VSS Nervous Circuits

Meringue Music from the Mint Green Nest

Yo La Tengo I Can Hear the Heart Beating As One

Modest Mouse The Lonesome Crowded West

372 GIMME INDIE ROCK

IMPORTANT 7-INCH RELEASES WITH NON-ALBUM SONGS The album format may be the recorded backbone of underground musical movements, but the American and European DIY scenes of the ’80s and ’90s exhumed the 7-inch single/EP format and made it its lifeblood. Here’s a quick thirty American 7-inch singles/EP’s that kill and feature exclusive non-album songs (and lean toward the latter part of the ’81–’96 period):

Brainiac “Go Freaks Go” / “Silver Iodine” (a.k.a. Internationale EP)

Sebadoh Gimme Indie Rock! 5-song 7-inch EP Shellac The Rude Gesture (A Pictorial History)

Cherubs “Carjack Fairy” / “Daisy Poser” 7-inch

3-song 7-inch EP

Coral “Filling a Hole” + 2 7-inch EP

Silkworm The Marco Collins Sessions 4-song EP

Deep Wound S/T 9-song 7-inch EP (Lou Barlow

Slant 6 “What Kind of Monster Are You?” + 2

and J Mascis’ pre–Dinosaur Jr hardcore band)

7-inch EP (post-Autoclave trio)

Die Kreuzen Cows and Beer 6-song 7-inch EP

Steel Pole Bath Tub “Arizona Garbage Truck” /

Drive Like Jehu “Bullet Train to Vegas” / “Hand

“Voodoo Chile”

Over Fist” 7-inch

Sun City Girls “Eye Mohini” + 3 7-inch EP

Fire in the Kitchen “Simple English” +1 7-inch

Superchunk “Mower” / “On the Mouth” 7-inch

Fly Ashtray Soap/Bip/Feather 3-song 7-inch EP

Swirlies “Didn’t Understand” + 2 7-inch EP

The Frogs “Adam & Steve” / “Now You Know

Team Dresch “Hand Grenade” + 2 7-inch EP

You’re Black” 7-inch

Thinking Fellers Union Local 282 The Natural

Fugazi 3 Songs EP

Finger 4-song 7-inch EP

The Grifters “Corolla Hoist” / “Thumbnail

V-3 “American Face” / “Son of Sam Donaldson”

Sketch”

7-inch

Hüsker Dü “Eight Miles High” / “Masochism

V/A Dope-Guns-’N-Fucking in the Streets Vol. 8

World” 7-inch

7-inch EP (w/ Superchunk, Guzzard, Jawbox,

The Jesus Lizard Lash 6-song 3x7-inch EP

and godheadSilo)

Meat Puppets In a Car 5-song 7-inch EP

V/A Dope-Guns-’N-Fucking in the Streets Vol. 9 2x7-inch EP (w/ Boredoms, Supernova,

Palace Music “Horses” / “Stable Will” 7-inch

Chokebore, Bailter Space, and Love 666)

Polvo “Vibracobra” / “Can I Ride” 7-inch Royal Trux “Back to School” / “Cleveland” 7-inch

APPENDICES 373

IMPORTANT AUDIO ENGINEERS, PRODUCERS, AND STUDIOS When the American DIY movement began to come together around various regional scenes at turn of the ’80s, there were virtually no studio engineers or producers who knew what to do with this new music, so these communities had to make their own. What follows is an incomplete list of important engineers, producers, and studios of the era. The accompanying information mostly applies to the 1981–1996 time frame, or to bands originating from it, unless otherwise noted.

Steve Albini Arguably the most influential

notes, leading to recordings by Pavement, the

figure on this list regarding engineering

Oblivians, Sonic Youth, Guided by Voices, Wilco,

innovation and work. Albini is almost

Silver Jews, Young Fresh Fellows, Lydia Lunch

singlehandedly responsible for establishing the

& Rowland S. Howard, Cat Power, The Jon

modern-day sound and essence of “heaviness”

Spencer Blues Explosion, and Come. Post-1996,

on record. Albini engineered albums by

the studio gained even more exposure as the

Slint, Pixies, Pussy Galore, the Breeders,

birthplace of albums like Jeff Buckley’s Sketches

Boss Hog, Flour, TAD, Pigface, Hum, Didjits,

for My Sweetheart, Modest Mouse’s Good News

Poster Children, Volcano Suns, Mule, Failure,

for People Who Love Bad News, and the White

Crain, Engine Kid, Don Caballero, PJ Harvey,

Stripes’ White Blood Cells. A fire destroyed the

Jawbreaker, Nirvana, Dazzling Killmen, The

studio in 2005, but Easley McCain Recording

Jesus Lizard, Six Finger Satellite, Breadwinner,

reopened in a new location and has been

Gaunt, Superchunk, Gastr del Sol, Tar, Low,

operating since.

Palace Music, Silkworm, A Minor Forest, Brainiac, Low, Scrawl, Guided by Voices, and Killdozer, among many others. Owns and operates Chicago’s Electrical Audio Studios, which he designed and opened 1997 after a decade of using the studio in his home. Iain Burgess Established the sound of Midwest punk, post hardcore/noise rock (sometimes called “the Chicago Sound”) in the ’80s and mentored Steve Albini. Recorded Naked Raygun, Big Black, the Didjits, Effigies, Rifle Sport, Bhopal Stiffs, Bloodsport, Cerebral Fix, Poster Children, Tar, Pegboy, Jawbox, and Cows. Burgess succumbed to cancer in 2010.

Mitch Easter / Drive-In Studios Member of the Sneakers and Let’s Active. Recorded R.E.M.’s classic 1981–1984 run of releases, as well as albums by Pylon, Helium, Pavement, Suzanne Vega, Game Theory, The Loud Family, Marshall Crenshaw, the Connells, and Velvet Crush. Jack Endino / Reciprocal Recording The unwitting “Godfather of Grunge” (as named in the 1996 documentary Hype!) co-founded Reciprocal Recording in 1986 and went freelance in 1991. Besides recording Nirvana’s Bleach, Endino made records by Soundgarden, Green River, Mudhoney, TAD, Screaming Trees, Skin Yard (his band), Afghan Whigs, Babes in

Doug Easley & Davis McCain / Easley McCain

Toyland, Dwarves, Treepeople, The Accused,

Recording Alex Chilton recorded the Gories at

L7, Love Battery, Seaweed, Coffin Break,

this Memphis studio, and the Grifters printed

Supersuckers, Hazel, Fitz of Depression, and

the studio’s phone number in their liner

Gas Huffer, among others.

374 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Steve Fisk Washington State–based member

Calvin Johnson / Dub Narcotic Studio Records

of Pell Mell, Pigeonhed, and the Halo Benders.

to come out of this studio include recordings

Production and engineering credits are vast

by Girl Trouble, Some Velvet Sidewalk, Lois

and legendary: Unwound, Screaming Trees, the

Maffeo, Tiger Trap, Unrest, Lync, Mirah, the

Halo Benders, Negativland, Beat Happening, 3

Microphones, Modest Mouse, and Karp.

Mile Pilot, Treepeople, the Gits, Soundgarden,

Mark Kramer / Noise New York Studios

Low, the Posies, and Nirvana, among others.

Former member of Shockabilly, New York

Steve Fjelstad / Blackberry Way Studios

Gong, the Fugs, and Butthole Surfers. Opened

This unassuming residential bungalow in the

Noise New Jersey Studios in 1985 and then

Dinkytown neighborhood of Minneapolis is

soon founded Bongwater and the Shimmy

where the first two Hüsker Dü 7-inches were

Disc label. Better known simply as Kramer,

recorded, plus many early- to mid-’80s Twin/

he recorded Galaxie 500, Low, Half Japanese,

Tone Records titles. Associated producer/

GG Allin, Daniel Johnston, White Zombie,

engineer and Twin/Tone go-to man Steve

King Missile, Ween, Urge Overkill, GWAR,

Fjelstad recorded the Replacements’ Sorry

Alice Donut, Paleface, The Jon Spencer Blues

Ma . . ., Stink, and Let It Be albums, plus titles

Explosion, Will Oldham, Boredoms, Luna,

by Man Sized Action, Rifle Sport, Articles of

Damon & Naomi, Lotion, and Fly Ashtray.

Faith, Ground Zero, and 7 Seconds.

Bob Mould Guitarist, singer, songwriter,

Fort Apache Studios (Various Producers)

founding member of Hüsker Dü, Sugar, and

Boston’s Fort Apache Studios (now located in

successful solo artist (ten full-lengths between

Vermont) was started in 1985. Sean Slade, Lou

1989 and 2012). Produced fine albums by

Giordano, Paul Q. Kolderie, Gary Smith, and

Man Sized Action, the Tar Babies, Articles of

Tim O’Heir are the most notable producers

Faith, Soul Asylum, the Zulus, Magnapop, and

associated with the studio. Albums by Throwing

Starfish. Recorded the last four Hüsker Dü

Muses, Pixies, Dinosaur Jr, Uncle Tupelo,

studio albums out of the studio/band office

Buffalo Tom, the Lemonheads, Volcano Suns,

on Nicollet Avenue in Minneapolis that is

Come, Sebadoh, Blake Babies, Yo La Tengo,

immortalized in Grant Hart’s song “2541.”

Elliot Smith, Juliana Hatfield, Tanya Donelly, and Belly were recorded there.

Pachyderm Studios This studio began operations in 1988 and is located about 40

Dave Fridmann Fridmann is a founding

miles south of Minneapolis/St. Paul in an old-

member of Mercury Rev (appears on the band’s

growth forest and features the same Neve 8068

first two full-lengths) and has produced every

recording console used in Jimi Hendrix’s Electric

release by that band and the Flaming Lips

Lady Studios. Aside from Steve Albini’s recording

(except Transmissions from the Satellite Heart),

of Nirvana’s In Utero, albums to come out of

as well as Weezer’s Pinkerton. More recently

Pachyderm include releases by Babes in Toyland,

known for producing MGMT, Tame Impala,

Superchunk, Palace/Will Oldham, U.S. Maple,

Royal Bangs, and Neon Indian.

the Breeders, and They Might Be Giants.

APPENDICES 375

Brian Paulson Paulson started off as the

Bob Weston Weston is the former bass player

second guitarist in Minneapolis’ Man Sized

for Volcano Suns but is better known for

Action, then launched his career as a producer

holding the same position in Shellac since that

by recording Slint’s Spiderland album. He went

band’s formation, plus he is the live-sound

on to record Superchunk, Beck, Archers of Loaf,

architect for the reformed Mission of Burma.

Dinosaur Jr, Polvo, Royal Trux, and U.S. Maple,

He worked under Steve Albini, mixing and

among many others.

assistant engineering several records, including

Spot (Glen Lockett) / Total Access Studios /

Nirvana’s In Utero, then recorded albums by

Media Art Studio / Unicorn Studios In-house

Polvo, Sebadoh, Six Finger Satellite, Arcwelder,

producer and engineer for SST, 1979–1985.

Velocity Girl, Thinking Fellers Union Local

Hüsker Dü, Black Flag, Minutemen, Meat

282, Tar, Archers of Loaf, Rachel’s, June of 44,

Puppets, the Dicks, Saint Vitus, Descendents,

Eric’s Trip, Shiner, Chavez, A Minor Forest, and

Minor Threat, Misfits, Big Boys, and Saccharine

Boy’s Life. Opened Chicago Mastering Services

Trust, among others.

in 2007.

Wharton Tiers / Fun City Studios Drummer

Brad Wood / Idful Music Brad Wood built

in Glenn Branca’s late-’70s no-wave band,

the Idful Music Corporation (Studios) in the

Theoretical Girls, among other acts. Founded

Wicker Park neighborhood of Chicago in

New York City’s Fun City Studios in 1982 and

1988. It was there that he recorded Liz Phair’s

recorded Sonic Youth, Swans, Glenn Branca’s

Exile in Guyville, the first two Sunny Day Real

Symphony albums, Cop Shoot Cop, Das Damen,

Estate albums, and titles by Seam, Tar, Hum,

Pussy Galore, Dinosaur Jr, Unrest, Royal Trux,

Trenchmouth, The Sea and Cake, Red Red Meat,

Unsane, Born Against, Further, Eggs, Quicksand,

Eleventh Dream Day, Veruca Salt, Jale, and

and Helmet.

Ben Lee.

Butch Vig / Smart Studios Cofounded Smart

Don Zientara / Inner Ear Studios Arlington,

Studios in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1984 and

Virginia. Founded Inner Ear Studios in the late-

recorded Killdozer, Laughing Hyenas, Die

’70s and recorded the great majority of classic

Kreuzen, Tad, The Fluid, and Urge Overkill.

full-lengths released by Dischord Records,

Best known for two 1991 albums he recorded:

including those by Minor Threat, Government

Smashing Pumpkins’ Gish and Nirvana’s

Issue, the Void/Faith split, Scream, The Faith,

Nevermind (mostly done at Sound City Studios

Marginal Man, Rites of Spring, Embrace, Reptile

in California). Also produced Sonic Youth’s Dirty

House, Dag Nasty, Shudder to Think, Jawbox,

and Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star,

Nation of Ulysses, Circus Lupus, Lungfish, Gray

among others. Founded the band Garbage with

Matter, Slant 6, Ignition, the Warmers, and

Scottish singer Shirley Mansion in 1994.

Fugazi (with Ted Nicely).

376 GIMME INDIE ROCK

A VERY CURSORY LIST OF 25 ESSENTIAL VARIOUS ARTIST COMPILATIONS Compilations and soundtracks didn’t fit into the format of this book’s main section; they are inconsistent by design, and there were just too damn many of them released in the American underground from 1981 to 1996. Here, however, are twenty-five with which you can’t go wrong.

The 20th Anniversary of the Summer of

intense pre–Dinosaur Jr hardcore band of Lou

Love 1987–1967 (1987, Shimmy Disc) Mark

Barlow and J Mascis), Moving Targets, Sorry,

Kramer—Shockabilly member, former Butthole

Christmas, Busted Statues, the Outpatients,

Surfers bassist, and future underground

Beanbag, the Flies, and Salem 66.

mogul, as well as producer/engineer of many important works—started his legendary Shimmy Disc label with this facetiously titled compilation featuring Half Japanese, Sharky’s Machine, the Workdogs, George Cartwright, Men and Volts, Missing Foundation, Artless, Fish and Roses, No Safety, Fred Frith, the Shaved Pigs, The Moon, Krackhouse, Tuli Kupferberg, Kramer/Hild/Carney, Samm and

The Blasting Concept (SST, 1983) The first of a whopping 12 V/A compilations/soundtracks SST would release over the next nine years. While many were compiled around themes, this was a roster sampler of the label’s first four years, with previously released songs by the Minutemen, Meat Puppets, Saccharine Trust, Black Flag, (L.A.’s) Overkill, Stains, Wurm, and Hüsker Dü.

Dave, The Spongehead Experience, Scott Williams, Otto Kentrol, Laraaji, Allen Ginsberg & Steve Taylor, and the debut of the label’s flagship band, Bongwater.

The Bridge: A Tribute to Neil Young (1989, Caroline) Predating Young’s coronation as “The Godfather of Grunge” by a couple of years, this comp features Neil classics and deeper

Athens, GA: Inside/Out Original Soundtrack (1987, I.R.S.) This film and its accompanying music documented the vibrant Southern college-town scene of Athens, Georgia, featuring early-to-mid-’80s live and studio

cuts interpreted by Soul Asylum, Victoria Williams, the Flaming Lips, Nikki Sudden, Loop, Nick Cave, Pixies, Sonic Youth, Psychic TV, Bongwater, B.A.L.L., Dinosaur Jr, and Henry Kaiser.

material from R.E.M., Love Tractor, Flat Duo Jets, the Squalls, Kilkenny Cats, Time Toy, Pylon, Bar-B-Q Killers, and Dreams So Real.

Chunks (1981, New Alliance) An important piece of early-’80s L.A. hardcore featuring the pre–Milo Goes to College Descendents song

Bands That Could Be God: The Conflict Compilation (1984, Conflict/Radiobeat) Conflict editor/publisher, Homestead Records manager, future Matador Records co-founder, and all-around best-ear-of-the-last-threedecades Gerard Cosloy compiled this comp that

“Global Probing,” the early Minutemen track “Clocks,” and Pagonicons-era Saccharine Trust. But it really pays off with tracks by the more obscure (and now serious collector fodder) Chiefs, Peer Group, Vox Pop, and the shredding proto-crossover punk-metal of the Stains.

featured the legendary Deep Wound (especially

APPENDICES 377

Day in the Park . . . A Compilation of Now

Boss Hog, Vertigo, Melvins, Dwarves, Casus

Sounds (1994, The Now Sound) Indie rock

Belli, Hammerhead, Cosmic Psychos, and

compilations were notoriously spotty affairs,

Fetish 69.

but for whatever reason, this omnipresent (at the time) little comp had some of the best songs to date by Versus, Grifters, Archers of Loaf, the Dambuilders, Unwound, Further, Small 23, Crayon, Butterglory, Spatala, Nothing Painted Blue, Diskothi-Q, Blaise Pascal, Portastatic, and Refrigerator.

Dü Hüskers: The Twin Cities Replay Zen Arcade (1993, Synapse) Just like the record it honors, this comp is an amazing feat, as twenty-three Twin Cities bands cover local heroes. Showstoppers are Hammerhead’s “Something I Learned Today,” Muskellunge’s “Chartered Trips,” Walt Mink’s “Somewhere,”

Deep Six (1986, C/Z) Predating Sub Pop’s

Arcwelder’s “Whatever,” Janitor Joe’s “What’s

first full-length release, the Sub Pop 100

Going On?,” and Flour’s “One Step at a Time.”

compilation, by several months, C/Z’s Deep Six featured very early, and in some cases the first officially released material by Green River, Melvins, Malfunkshun, Skin Yard, Soundgarden, and the U-Men. This compilation and the debut album by Green River are widely considered the first grunge releases.

Flex Your Head (1982, Dischord) This compilation’s role in American hardcore’s salad days was unparalleled, exposing the Dischord/ D.C. hardcore scene to the outside world and helping to further establish American hardcore in general. Features Ian MacKaye’s Teen Idles and Minor Threat, plus Henry Rollins’ pre-Black

Dope-Guns-’N-Fucking in the Streets Volume

Flag S.O.A., along with Untouchables (Ian’s

1–3 (1989, Amphetamine Reptile) This comp

brother Alec’s pre-Faith band), Government

collects the first three 7-inch splits or four-

Issue, Youth Brigade, Iron Cross, and the

way comps the still nascent Amphetamine

mighty Void.

Reptile released under this attention-getting, stupid/genius title copped from the MC5. This excellent progress report on America’s noise rock subgenre features tracks by U-Men, the Thrown Ups, Lonely Moans, Helios Creed, Surgery, Cows, Halo of Flies, Mudhoney, Tar, God Bullies, Tad, and King Snake Roost.

Guitarrorists = Player + Instruments (1991, No. 6/Glitterhouse) A collection of instrumental solo guitar pieces by the cream of the underground, circa 1991: Sonic Boom, Kurt Ralske, Kathy Korniloff, Jeffrey Evans, Wayne Coyne, J Mascis, Dean Wareham, Mark E. Robinson, Marc Gentry, Dave Rick, Kat

Dope-Guns-’N-Fucking in the Streets Volume

Bjelland, Thurston Moore, Helios Creed, Tom

4-7 (1992, Amphetamine Reptile) Compiles

Hazelmeyer, Paul Leary, Nick Salomon, Don

the next four volumes of 7-inch titles in the

Fleming, Kim Gordon, Nikki Sudden, Kramer,

series of the same name (released in 1990 and

Neil Hagerty, Wayne Rogers, Rick McCollum,

’91) and steps outside the AmRep roster (and

Marcy Mays, Lee Ranaldo, and Steve Albini.

noise rock subgenre) a bit, featuring Lubricated Goat, Thee Mighty Caesars, Helmet, Gas Huffer, Jonestown, Crows, The Jesus Lizard, Unsane,

378 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Half-Cocked Original Soundtrack (1995, Matador) This film is a fictionalized narrative with real bands and musicians—sort of the

Singles of indie rock but somehow worse.

Fisk. There’s a surprising amount of guitar

The soundtrack, however, is great. It features

experimentation from Fred Frith, Henry Kaiser,

some of the best works by Unwound, Slant

and Elliot Sharp. And, yes, the band No Age is

6, Rodan, Smog, Two Dollar Guitar, Kicking

named after this record.

Giant, Sleepyhead, Ruby Falls, Versus, Polvo, Freakwater, Crain, Helium, and Grifters.

Not So Quiet on the Western Front (1982, Alternative Tentacles) A forty-seven-band

Human Music (1988, Homestead) Possibly

double-length comp released during American

the genesis of America’s first wave of kiwi-

hardcore’s glory year of 1982 featuring Social

pop obsession, Homestead’s follow-up to

Unrest, Fang, Crucifix, Code of Honor, 7

The Wailing Ultimate is notable for featuring

Seconds, Dead Kennedys, Rebel Truth, MDC,

the New Zealand “big four of pop” whom

Angst, Flipper, Vicious Circle, Whipping Boy,

Homestead licensed from the Flying Nun

5th Column, Los Olvidados, and dozens more.

label: The Clean, the Chills, the Verlaines, and

Alternative Tentacles’ Let Them Eat Jellybeans

Tall Dwarfs. Comp also features tracks by Big

compilation that appeared in 1981 was also

Dipper, Live Skull, Honor Role, My Dad Is Dead,

of great importance, exposing Flipper, Black

Great Plains, Antietam, the Membranes, Happy

Flag, the Feederz, Circle Jerks, Subhumans, Bad

Flowers, Yo La Tengo, The Embarrassment,

Brains, and Half Japanese (among others) to a

Death of Samantha, Volcano Suns, Phantom

wider audience.

Tollbooth, Bastro, Nice Strong Arm, the Pastels, American Music Club, Salen 66, Half Japanese, and . . . G. G. Allin.

The Smitten Love Song Compilation (1994, Karate Brand) No real story behind this compilation other than it leans a little toward

Kill Rock Stars (1991, Kill Rock Stars) The

the noise rock and heavier stuff . . . and

first full-length released by this label was

features one of Jawbreaker’s best songs (the

also the recorded debut of Elliot Smith and

non-album “Housesitter”). Also represented are

one of the last times Nirvana appeared on

Slug, Engine Kid, godheadSilo, Lifelikeweeds,

an independent label. Others featured are

Johnboy, Cherubs, Steel Pole Bath Tub, Grifters,

Bratmobile, Some Velvet Sidewalk, Beat

Unwound, Beekeeper, and the Trumans Water

Happening, Courtney Love (Lois Maffio’s band),

lo-fi gospel offshoot Soul-Junk.

Nation of Ulysses, Unwound, Mecca Mormal, Bikini Kill, Witchy Poo, Melvins, Infamous Menagerie, Kicking Giant, Fitz of Depression, and Half Japanese’s Jad Fair.

Sub Pop 100 (1986, Sub Pop) Sub Pop’s first-ever full-length release has a wider nonproto-grunge variety than C/Z’s Deep Six and is an important snapshot of mid-decade post

No Age: A Compilation of Instrumental SST

hardcore and more experimental concerns.

Music (1987, SST) Several artists appear more

Features Scratch Acid, Wipers, Sonic Youth,

than once on this double-length. Of special

Naked Raygun, U-Men, Steve Fisk, Boy Dirt Car,

interest: Black Flag, Blind Idiot God, Greg Ginn’s

Lupe Diaz, Savage Republic, Shonen Knife, and,

power-metal/improv trio Gone, Sonic Youth’s

oddly enough, Skinny Puppy.

Lee Ranaldo, Pell Mell, Lawndale, and Steve

APPENDICES 379

Sub Pop 200 (1988, Sub Pop) Sub Pop

We’re All Normal and We Want Our Freedom:

founders Jonathan Poneman and Bruce Pavitt

A Tribute to Arthur Lee and Love (1994, Alias)

quit their day jobs in 1988, raised some cash,

Released as a three-gatefold triple 10-inch on

and focused 100 percent on the label, closing

colored vinyl and predating the Love/Arthur Lee

that year with a triple-album compilation (on

resurgence by a bit, this comp features covers

vinyl) featuring tracks by Mudhoney, Nirvana,

by Fly Ashtray, Eggs, Uncle Wiggly, Urge Overkill,

Soundgarden, Green River, Screaming Trees,

The Mad Scene, Love Battery, and Television

Tad, Beat Happening (the only non–Sub

Personalities. Note: Teenage Fanclub’s

Pop band here), The Fluid, the Walkabouts,

experimental interpretation of “Between Clark

Fastbacks, Blood Circus, Steve Fisk, the

& Hilldale” is a must-hear!

Thrown Ups, spoken-word enigma Steven Jesse Bernstein, Terry Lee Hale, Swallow, Chemistry Set, Girl Trouble, the Nights and Days, and Cat Butt.

Why Do You Think They Call It Pop? The Pop Narcotic Compilation (1994, Pop Narcotic) Ditto for this compilation, released only as a double 10-inch and featuring a good gathering

Surprise Your Pig: A Tribute to R.E.M. (1992,

of bands dropping pop hooks into all manner

Staplegun) Jawbreaker’s “Pretty Persuasion,”

of sub-styles, including Small Factory, Wingtip

J Church’s “(Don’t Go Back to) Rockville,” Band

Sloat, Sleepyhead, Kudgel, Monsterland, Polvo,

of Susans’ “1,000,000,” Jawbox’s “Low,” and the

Versus, Helium, the Dambuilders, and Grifters.

gloriously weird and beautiful deconstruction of “We Walk” by Steel Pole Bath Tub stand out, along with contributions from Mr. T Experience, Vic Chesnutt, King Missile, and Phleg Camp. The Wailing Ultimate (1987, Homestead) While SST was confusing its public with a swarm of dubiously motivated releases (it was releasing more albums per year than some major labels at this point), the Craig Marks– and Gerard Cosloy–run Homestead Records was offering a roster of sterling post hardcore, as shown here by contributions from Big Black, Dinosaur, Volcano Suns, Phantom Tollbooth, Squirrel Bait, Breaking Circus, Salem 66, Death of Samantha, Antietam, Live Skull, Naked Raygun, the Reactions, Big Dipper, and Great Plains.

380 GIMME INDIE ROCK

LOOSE ENDS 120 Minutes Following the mid-’80s run of MTV’s The Cutting Edge (the network’s first attempt to document an underground), the network debuted 120 Minutes on Sunday, March 10, 1986. It lasted for seventeen seasons and went through a number of hosts who made their VJ names with the show. Aside from VHS “video magazines” and promo video compilations released by labels and other entities, the occasional tour film, and the venue-only subscription channels between band sets at the local shithole, this was the only way for rabid fans to get a visual and audio take on their favorites or to get turned on to new acts. Many future heads of my vintage made it a ritual to tape each two-hour episode and trade or horde these tapes until they’d been played into an underwater fidelity, and everyone seems to have their own little nostalgic narrative of life-changing musical discovery by way of this show. Mine would be that 120 Minutes is responsible for my first exposure to Dinosaur Jr, so it could be said that a long, zig-zagging, and somewhat tenuous thread connects the show with the writing of this book. And everyone has their favorite host(s), with mine being both Brit Dave Kendall and precursor Kevin Seals, who together covered 1987–1992. The former was the show’s first permanent host, and the latter its creator. In 1992, as indie and alternative (rock, each in its own manner) became a rapidly consuming priority for the music industry, MTV launched the wildly inferior, more mainstream-focused show Alternative Nation, a shorter (video and interview format) weeknight program that lasted until 1997. The original run of 120 Minutes was cancelled without announcement in 2003. The subsequent attempts at resuscitating the program have all been 120 Minutes in name alone. Beavis and Butt-head That’s right. It took some hindsight on the part of pop culture at large, but this show’s initial four-and-a-half-year run is finally gaining some respect for, among many other things, its brilliant nuance-of-no-nuance approach and subtle but incredibly clever social/music criticisms. And some of the minds behind programming the show’s video segments had great taste. Several bands in this book got a backhanded boost, as the best tag team in rock criticism offered their observations from the couch. Those bands included: Helmet, Hum, Helium, Hole, Mike Watt, Built to Spill, Chavez, Circle Jerks, Foo Fighters, Juliana Hatfield, the Flaming Lips, Pavement, Hazel, Ween, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Soundgarden, Melvins, Shudder to Think, Supersuckers, R.E.M., Butthole Surfers, The Jesus Lizard, Dinosaur Jr, the Replacements, King Missile, Smashing Pumpkins, Babes in Toyland, Archers of Loaf, Beck, the Didjits, Violent Femmes, Sonic Youth, Jawbox, Superchunk, and, of course, Nirvana. Gerard Cosloy He being neither a producer/engineer nor the name of a book or ’zine, it is nevertheless prudent to mention the man who, be it in the most indirect or most involved of manners, had a hand in an astonishing number of the albums featured here. As a teenager and throughout most of the ’80s, he wrote and published Conflict, the absolute best example of caustic, hilarious, and dead-on underground rock criticism. And when it comes to what were called “record men” or “golden ears” in old music biz parlance, he’s this particular era’s preeminent example. Taking over Homestead Records during his first year of college and eventually picking up the ball dropped by SST a couple of years later, then partnering with longtime friends Chris Lombardi and Patrick Amory in 1990 to run Matador Records, Cosloy either discovered or shepherded to greatness a great number of bands featured herein. He still co-runs Matador along with his own label, 12XU, and remains as active and vital as ever. APPENDICES 381

ALSO BY

ANDREW EARLES

Books (author) Hüsker Dü: The Story of the Noise-Pop Pioneers Who Launched Modern Rock, Voyageur Press, 2010.

Books (contributor) AC/DC: High-Voltage Rock ’n’ Roll: An Illustrated History, Voyageur Press, 2010. Lost in the Grooves, Routledge, 2004. Metallica: The Complete Illustrated History, Voyageur Press, 2013. Mock Stars: Indie Comedy & the Dangerously Funny, Speck Press, 2008. Nirvana: The Complete Illustrated History, Voyageur Press, 2013. The Overrated Book, Last Gasp, 2006. Queen: The Ultimate Illustrated History of the Crown Kings of Rock, Voyageur Press. The Rock Bible, Quirk, 2008. Rush: The Illustrated History, Voyageur Press, 2013. Vice Guide to Festivals, Vice, 2009. Whole Lotta Led Zeppelin: The Illustrated History of the Heaviest Band of All Time, Voyageur Press, 2008.

382 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Periodicals (print and online)

Spin /Spin.com

Baltimore City Paper

Scion A/V Metal

Chunklet

Still Single

Decibel

Verse Chorus Verse

Devil in the Woods (DIW) / Self-Titled Magazine

Vice

Dusted

While You Were Sleeping

Econoculture.com

Washington City Paper

Harp

WFMU’s Beware of the Blog

Knoxville Voice

WFMU’s LCD Magazine

Magnet

. . . and the Cimarron Weekend (created/

McSweeneys.net

founded, co-edited/co-published, seven issues, 1996–2000)

The Memphis Flyer Memphis Magazine Recordings Onion A/V Club Earles and Jensen Present: Just Farr a Paste

Laugh. . . Vols. 1 & 2 (2CD/26-page booklet)

Perfect Sound Forever

Matador, 2008.

Philadelphia City Paper

Earles and Jensen Present: Just Farr the Record

Philadelphia Independent

(LP only) Matador, 2009.

Philadelphia Weekly

Best of the Best of the Best of the Best of the

Pitchfork

Best Show on WFMU (CD compilation) Tom Scharpling, 2004.

Scram Sound Collector

APPENDICES 383

INDEX

2 (Don Caballero), 89 3 Man Themes (Slug), 290 13th Floor Elevators, 140 28th Day, 360 30 Seconds Over D.C. (Bad Brains), 23 ’68 Comeback, 128 100 Flowers, 10 100 Years of Pulchritude (100 Flowers), 10 154 (100 Flowers), 10 330,003 Crossdressers from Beyond the Rig Veda (Sun City Girls), 313 A.M. (Wilco), 185 the Accused, 83 Acosta, Armando, 268 Across the Room and into Your Lap (Uncle Wiggly), 344 Adams, Mark, 268 Adickdid, 11 Adickdid (Adickdid), 11 Adkins, Hasil, 110 Admonishing the Bishops (Thinking Fellers), 329 Adolescents, 11–12, 13, 66, 293 Adolescents (Adolescents), 11–12 Ad-Rock, 355 Adverts, 35 Afghan Whigs, 12–13 Against the Stars (the Dambuilders), 75 Agent Orange, 11, 13–14, 166, 293 aggro rock, 33, 35, 125, 226, 281, 326, 348 Agnew, Frank, 11–12, 293 Agnew, Rikk, 11–12, 66, 293 The Alan Parsons Project, 352 Albini, Steve, 29, 32, 33–34, 50, 51, 88, 161, 163–165, 224, 232, 239, 246, 252, 273, 281–283, 290, 308, 314, 327 Album (Flipper), 111–112 Alice Cooper Band, 132, 141 Alice Donut, 14 Alien I.D. (Kicking Giant), 169–170 Alien Lanes (Guided by Voices), 136 All (Descendents), 81–82 Allin, G. G., 14 All Night Lotus Party (Volcano Suns), 354 All Rise (Naked Raygun), 214–215 All the Nations Airports (Archers of Loaf), 18, 185 All Through a Life (Rites of Spring), 261 Aloha Wednesday, 63 alt-country, 47, 127, 162, 257, 264 alt-indie, 32 alt-rock, 12, 50, 106, 136, 159, 177, 291, 310, 313

386 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Alternative TV, 10 Alvarez, Karl, 81 Alvin, Dave, 110 Amanita (Bardo Pond), 29 Amazing Disgrace (Posies), 245–246 Ament, Jeff, 132 America, 98 Americana, 230 American Music Club, 14–15, 253, 334 American Revolution (Love 666), 177 A Minor Forest, 10, 317 A Minute to Pray, a Second to Die (the Flesh Eaters), 110–111 An Angel Moves Too Fast to See: Selected Works 1971–1989 (Rhys Chatham), 63 Anastasia Screamed, 15–16 Anderson, Billy, 160 Anderson, Greg, 100 . . . And Justice for All (Metallica), 89 Angel Wings (Engine Kid), 100 Animal Collective, 311 Anodyne (Uncle Tupelo), 185, 344 Another Desert, Another Sea (Three Mile Pilot), 332 Anthology: SST Years (Screaming Trees), 274 Antona, Tomas, 14 AOR, 52, 53, 152, 335 Archers of Loaf, 16–18, 85, 160, 237, 242 Arcwelder, 18–19 arena rock, 13, 52, 335 Arm, Mark, 132 Articles of Faith, 185 The Ascension (Glenn Branca), 49 At Action Park (Shellac), 281 Atomizer (Big Black), 33 At the Drive-In, 49 Auer, Jon, 245–246 Aukerman, Milo, 80–81 Autoclave, 19, 144 Autoclave (Autoclave), 19 Avengers, 35, 289 Ayers, Scott, 230 Babes in Toyland, 22–23, 145 Back to the Known (Bad Religion), 25 Bad Brains, 23–25, 188, 196, 273 Bad Religion, 11, 25 Bailter Space, 26–27 Bait and Switch (Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments), 330–331 Bakamono, 27 Baker, Brian, 74, 83, 196 Baker, David, 194–195 Bakesale (Sebadoh), 280 Balance, Laura, 315

Ball-Hog or Tugboat? (Mike Watt), 355 Baluyut brothers, 351 A Band Called Bud, 133 Band of Susans, 27–28, 49, 63, 145, 158 Banhardt, Devendra, 318 Barbe, David, 310 Barbero, Lori, 22 Bardo Pond, 28–29, 313 Bardot, Bill, 158 Barely Real (Codeine), 68 Barlow, Lou, 83–86, 277–278, 280, 318 Barnes, Todd, 339 Barocas, Zachary, 159 the Bassholes, 90 Bastardsong (Superconductor), 317 Bastro, 29–30, 125–126, 303, 334 Bats, 360 Battles, 50 Bauhaus, 66 Beach Boys, 140 Beachwood Sparks, 120 Bean, Janet, 98 Bear Catching Fish (Engine Kid), 100 Beaster (Sugar), 311 Beastie Boys, 302 Beat (Bowery Electric), 47 Beat Happening, 30–31, 141, 178, 333 the Beatles, 135 Beaujon, Andrew, 97 Beck, 31–32, 48, 63, 90, 116, 302, 318, 336 Bedhead, 32, 124 Bedheaded (Bedhead), 32 Bedtime for Democracy (Dead Kennedys), 78 Beet (Eleventh Dream Day), 98 Bee Thousand (Guided by Voices), 136 Belly, 333 Beneath the Shadows (TSOL), 339 Berger, William, 344 Bergeron, Dave, 45 Berman, David, 284 Bernick, Andy, 321 Berry, Bill, 256 Berry, Chuck, 140 Berserker (Scratch Acid), 272 Bert, Bob, 248 Bertram, James, 31 Better Can’t Make Your Life Better (Lilys), 176 Betty (Helmet), 145 The Bevis Frond, 194 Biafra, Jello, 77–78, 216, 225, 226 Biaza, Joe, 200–201, 268, 355 Big Black, 33–34, 45, 252, 281, 302 Big Boys, 34, 82

Big Business, 169 Big Dipper, 16, 99 The Big Sellout (Bongwater), 45 The Big Shot Chronicles (Game Theory), 125 Big Star, 133, 245 Big Top Halloween (Afghan Whigs), 12 Big Wheel, 303 Bikini Kill, 35, 169, 288 Billote, Christina, 19 Birdbrain (Buffalo Tom), 52 The Birthday Party, 66, 272 Bishop, Alan, 166, 311–312 Bishop, Richard, 311–312 Bitch Magnet, 30, 35–36, 64, 275, 303 Bivouac (Jawbreaker), 159–161 Bjelland, Kat, 22, 145 Bjork, Brant, 172 Bjorkland, Chris, 45 Bjorkland, Steve, 45 Black, Frank, 355. See also Black Francis Black, Lori, 192 Black Flag, 40–43, 67, 77, 80, 81, 197, 255, 355 Black Francis, 50, 51, 206, 238–239, 241–242. See also Black, Frank Black Heart Procession, 332 Black Sabbath, 14, 132, 268 Black Sheets of Rain (Bob Mould), 310 Blake Babies, 43–44 Bleach (Nirvana), 221–222, 300 Bleyle, Jody, 144, 327 Blonde Redhead, 44, 62 Blonder Tongue Audio Baton (Swirlies), 321 Blondie Fan Club, 137 Blood, Bliss, 230 Blood/Candy (Posies), 246 Blood Guts & Pussy (Dwarves), 82, 93 Blood Music (Green Magnet School), 131 Bloodsport, 45 Blowin’ Chunks (Flipper), 112 Blue Cheer, 201 Blue Corpse (Jandek), 158 Blue Earth (Jayhawks), 162 bluegrass, 230 Blues Explosion, 128 Blues For the Red Sun (Kyuss), 172 Blush, Steven, 24–25 Boces (Mercury Rev), 195 Bo Diddley, 140 Body Love/Body Hate (Caustic Resin), 62 Bonebrake, D. J., 110, 360 Boner, Freda, 43

Bongwater, 45–46, 124, 170, 171 Bonsai Superstar (Brainiac), 48 Boon, Dennis “D.,” 83, 104, 200–201 the Boo Radleys, 26, 189 Boredoms, 27, 356 Born Innocent (Red Kross), 255 Born Too Late (Saint Vitus), 269 Bossanova (Pixies), 242 Boss Hog, 301 Bostrom, Derrick, 188 Bottle Rockets, 46–47 Bottle Rockets (Bottle Rockets), 46–47 Bowery Electric, 47, 173 Bowery Electric (Bowery Electric), 47 Bowie, Ash, 144, 243–244 Bozulich, Carla, 127 Bradford, Brett, 272 Brady, Pat, 207 Brainiac, 48–49, 131 Branca, Glenn, 49, 63, 145 Brannon, John, 173–174, 215–216 Breadwinner, 50, 148 Breaking Circus, 51 the Breeders, 48, 50–51, 148, 242, 303, 332 Brewer, Jack, 268 Brick Factory (Crayon), 70 Brick Layer Cake, 51 Bridge (Red House Painters), 254–255 A Brief History of Amazing Letdowns (Lilys), 176 Bright Lights Dark Beginnings (Sun City Girls), 313 The Bright Orange Years (Volcano Suns), 354 Brise-Glace, 126 Broadrick, Justin K., 320 Brock, Isaac, 205–206 Brokaw, Chris, 68, 69 Broomfield, Nick, 97 Brown, Bundy K., 30, 125 Brown, Pat, 336 Brown, Sam, 352 Brown Reason to Live (Butthole Surfers), 54–55 Brownstein, Carrie, 288–289 Brylawski, Dave, 243 Bubble and Scrape (Sebadoh), 280 Buck, Peter, 103, 246, 256–257 Buckley, Jeff, 281 Budd (Rapeman), 252 Buffalo Tom, 44, 52, 85 Buffalo Tom (Buffalo Tom), 52 Bufo Alvarius, Amen (Bardo Pond), 28–29 Bug (Dinosaur Jr), 85, 277 Built to Spill, 52–53, 62, 141, 336 Bullet Lavolta, 64

Bullhead/Eggnog (Melvins), 192 The Bumper Crop (Pell Mell), 235 The Bunkhouse Tapes (the Jayhawks), 162 Burgess, Iain, 70 Burl (Killdozer), 171 Burner (Breadwinner), 50 Burning in Water (Moving Targets), 207 Burning Kingdom (Smog), 292 Burning Witch, 100 Burritos, Inspiration Point, Fork Balloon Sports . . . (Cap’n Jazz), 61 Bush Tetras, 54 Butch (the Geraldine Fibbers), 127 Butterglove, 50, 148 Butthole Surfers, 54–56, 63, 107, 230 Buzzcocks, 160, 314 Buzz or Howl under the Influence of Heat (Minutemen), 200, 201 Byrds, 98, 162 Cabaret Voltaire, 66, 271 Cadena, Ton, 11 Cafritz, Julia, 248 Cage, John, 143, 162, 349 Cain, Leland, 352 Calculated (Heavens to Betsy), 144 California (American Music Club), 14 Callahan, Bill, 292–293 Call the Doctor (Sleater-Kinney), 288–289 Camofleur (Gastr del Sol), 126 Camper Van Beethoven, 60–61, 76, 104 Can, 291 Canary, Kelly, 96 Candlemass, 191 Candy Apple Grey (Hüsker Dü), 153 Can I Say (Dag Nasty), 74 Canty, Brandan, 261 Cap’n Jazz, 61, 101 Captain Beefheart, 349 Carducci, Joe, 151, 300 Carlson, Dylan, 96–97 Carns, Rachel, 169–170 Carter Family, 342 Cartwright, Greg, 227 Catherine Wheel, 204 Cat Power, 62, 293 Cats and Dogs (Royal Trux), 263 Caustic Resin, 62 Cavallo, Rob, 131 Celebrate the New Dark Age (Polvo), 244 Ceremonial (Savage Republic), 271 A Certain Ratio, 92 Cervenka, Exene, 360

INDEX 387

Chairs Missing (Wire), 186 Challenge for a Civilized Society (Unwound), 348 Chambers, Kenny, 207 Chandler, Dave, 268 Chandler, Lawrence, 47 Chapterhouse, 189–190, 320 Charles Brown Superstar, 63 Chatham, Rhys, 49, 63–64 Chavez, 64 Che, Damon, 53, 89, 301 Cheap Trick, 246 Chearno, Justin, 237 Cheater Slicks, 65, 227, 330 Cherubs, 66, 70 Chicken Truck, 46 Chief Assassin to the Sinister (Three Mile Pilot), 331–332 Chills, 360 Chocolate and Cheese (Ween), 358 The Choir, 63 Chris D., 110, 137 Christgau, Robert, 17, 295 Christian Death, 66 Chrome, 48 Chronic Town (R.E.M.), 255–256 Chuck D, 297 Circle Jerks, 67, 255 Clairvoyance (Screaming Trees), 274 Claridge, Eric, 275 classic rock, 135 Claustrophobia (Man Sized Action), 185 The Clean, 360 Cline, Nels, 127 Clumps Takes a Ride (Fly Ashtray), 113, 114 Cobain, Kurt, 50, 96, 114, 145, 171, 193, 209, 221, 223, 326 Coctails, 275 Codeine, 30, 35, 67–68, 124, 260, 303 Cohen, Andy, 282–283 Cohen, Leonard, 143 Cold Water Flat, 320 Cole, Fred, 78–79 Cole, Toody, 78–79 Coley, Bryon, 111 college rock, 200, 209, 257, 273, 291 Colletta, Kim, 158 Come, 69 Come on Pilgrim (Pixies), 238–239 Confessor, 50 Congregation (Afghan Whigs), 12, 13 Conheim, Peter, 216 Conley, Clint, 203 Conner, Gary Lee, 294 Conner, Van, 294 Conolly, Jeff “Monoman,” 181 Conrad, Tony, 63

388 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Continued Story (Daniel Johnston), 167 Cooper, Ray, 80 Cop (Swans), 318–319 Copeland, Miles, 256 Copper Blue (Sugar), 310 Coral, 69, 148 Cor-Crane Secret (Polvo), 242–243 Corgan, Billy, 291 Corin Tucker Band, 289 Corrosion of Conformity, 83, 147 Cosloy, Gerard, 83, 116, 207, 270, 299 Coultas, Kevin, 262 country, 188, 189, 230, 342–343 country-rock, 231 Courtesy and Goodwill toward Men (Harvey Milk), 143 cow-punk, 98 Cows, 70 Coxson, Graham, 204 Coyne, Wayne, 107–108 Cracker, 61 Crack in the System (Dead Moon), 78–79 the Cramps, 110, 137 Crappin’ You Negative (Grifters), 134 Crash, 342 Crash Worship, 90 Crawford, Ed, 104–105 Crayon, 70 Crazy Horse, 47 Crazy Rhythms (the Feelies), 103, 104 Creator (Lemonheads), 174 Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain (Pavement), 234 Crookt, Crackt, or Fly (Gastr del Sol), 126 Crover, Dale, 191–192 The Crownhate Ruin, 148 The Cry of the Turkish Fig Peddler (Bakamono), 27 Crystalized Movements, 53 Crystallized Movements, 194 culture-jamming, 216 Cunning Stunts (Cows), 70 Cure, 100 The Curtain Hits the Cast (Low), 179 Curve, 190 D.I. (Drug Ideology), 13 D.R.I., 83 Dag Nasty, 74 Dahlquist, Michael, 282–283 Daisy Chain Reaction (Poster Children), 246–247 Dall, Cynthia, 292 Damaged (Black Flag), 40, 41, 43 the Dambuilders, 74–75 the Damned, 130

Damon and Naomi, 124 Dance with Me (TSOL), 339 Dando, Evan, 174–175, 302, 355 Danzig, Glenn, 202–203 Das Damen, 75 Davidson, Eric, 65, 220 Davis, Dan, 264 Davis, Tamra, 298 Daydream Nation (Sonic Youth), 296 Days in the Wake (Palace Brothers), 230–231 Days of Our Drive/Sweet Piece of Ass (Charles Brown Superstar), 63 The Days of Wine and Roses (Dream Syndicate), 91, 203 Dazzling Killmen, 126 DBL Live (Butthole Surfers), 56 the dB’s, 76 Dead Kennedys, 12, 76–78, 202 Dead Leaves (Versus), 350 Dead Moon, 78–79 Deal, Kim, 50–51, 238–239, 241– 242, 299 Dear 23 (Posies), 245–246 Dear Sir (Cat Power), 62 Dear You (Jawbreaker), 161 Death Cab for Cutie, 49 Death Travels West (The Embarrassment), 98 Deceit (This Heat), 126 Deep Wound, 83 Deilly, Ben, 174–175 the Del Fuegos, 99 Demeski, Stan, 103 Demolition Plot J-7 (Pavement), 233 Denison, Duane, 163 DePace, Steve, 111 Descendents, 11, 14, 79–82, 176, 188 Deserter’s Songs (Mercury Rev), 195 desert rock, 172 !!Destroy-Oh-Boy!! (New Bomb Turks), 220 Devo, 48, 216 Diablo Guapo (Bastro), 29 Dial M for Motherfucker (Pussy Galore), 248 Diary (Sunny Day Real Estate), 313 Dickinson, Jim, 110 Dickless, 96 the Dicks, 34, 82 Didjits, 82, 220 Die Kreuzen, 83 Die Kreuzen (Die Kreuzen), 83 DiNizio, Pat, 291 Dinosaur (Dinosaur), 83–84, 177 Dinosaur Jr, 16, 26, 44, 52, 83–88, 106, 120, 174, 186, 189, 277– 278, 326, 327, 336, 343, 350 dirge-rock, 348

The Dirt of Luck (Helium), 144 Dis-*, 88–89 Discus (Strapping Fieldhands), 309 D Is for Dumptruck (Dumptruck), 92–93 Divine Fits, 352 Dixon, Don, 257 DMZ, 181 DNA, 44 Doc Dart’s Crucifucks, 107 Document (R.E.M.), 257–258 Doe, John, 110, 360 Doghouse Cassette (Throwing Muses), 332 Donahue, Jonathan, 107–109, 194, 196 Don Caballero, 89, 301 Donnelly, Tanya, 50, 332–333 Don’t Like You (Cheater Slicks), 65 Dookie (Green Day), 131, 159 Doolittle (Pixies), 240–241 doom-metal, 41, 96, 191, 193, 268–269 Doo Rag, 90 Dos, 355 Double Bummer/Breaking No New Ground (Bongwater), 45–46 Double Nickels on the Dime (Minutemen), 150, 202, 260, 296 Down (The Jesus Lizard), 165 Down Colorful Hill (Red House Painters), 253 Downward Is Heavenward (Hum), 148 Doyle, Tad, 326 A Dozen Dead Roses (No Trend), 226 Dr. Know (Bad Brains), 102 Drag City, 293 dream-pop, 187, 190, 342 Dream Syndicate, 16, 91, 124, 227 Dream Syndicate (Dream Syndicate), 91 Dreamy (Beat Happening), 30 Dresch, Donna, 327 Drive Like Jehu, 41, 91–92, 238, 261 Drive Like Jehu (Drive Like Jehu), 91 drone-rock, 28, 96, 124, 162, 194 Drop Nineteens, 320 Drunks with Guns, 107 Dry as A Bone (Green River), 132 Dub Narcotic Sound System, 31 dub-reggae, 119, 141, 177, 334 dub reggae, 349 Dulli, Greg, 114 Dumptruck, 76, 92–93 Dunn, Melissa, 299 DuPree, Bubba, 83, 102 Durango, Santiago, 33–34, 214 Durutti Column, 209

Dust Brothers, 32 Dwarves, 93, 220 Dylan, Bob, 140 Dynamic Truths, 69 Earth, 41, 96–97, 320 Earth 2: Special Low Frequency Version (Earth), 96 Earth A.D. (Misfits), 203 East Coast hardcore, 23 Easter, Mitch, 257 Eccsame the Photon Band (Lilys), 176 Edwards, Mark, 209 Effigies, 214 Egeness, Brian, 83 Egerton, Steven, 81 Egg Hunt, 117 Eggs, 97–98 Ego Summit, 351 8-Way Santa (TAD), 326 Eight-Foot Worm Makes Own Food, 54 Ein Heit, 282 Einstürzende Neubauten, 248, 271 Eitzel, Mark, 14–15, 253, 334 Electroshock for President (Brainiacs), 49 Eleven:Eleven (Come), 69 Eleventh Dream Day, 98, 106, 334 Ellison, Jim, 187 El Moodio (Eleventh Dream Day), 98 The Embarrassment, 76, 98–99 The Embarrassment LP (The Embarrassment), 99 Embrace, 74, 99–100, 117, 261 Embrace (Embrace), 99–100 Emery, Jill, 145 Emery, Ron, 339 emo, 61, 89, 100, 149, 215, 261, 276 emocore, 100 Encendedor (the Dambuilders), 75 Endino, Jack, 132 End on End (Rites of Spring), 261 Engine Kid, 100 Engle, John, 68 Enigk, Jeremy, 313 Enjoy! (Descendents), 81 Eno, Brian, 96, 173, 334, 335 Entropy (Arcwelder), 19 Era, Ronna, 306 Erlandson, Eric, 145 Erskine, Fred, 148 Escape from Noise (Negativland), 216–217 Especially for You (Smithereens), 291–292 Ethyl Meatplow, 127 Eucalyptus (Pitchfork), 238 Evans, Doug, 82

Evans, “Monsieur Jeffrey,” 128 Everclear (American Music Club), 14–15 Evergreen (Evergreen), 101–102 Evergreen (from California), 101 Evergreen (from Kentucky), 101– 102, 290, 303 Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge (Mudhoney), 208 Every Kind of Light (Posies), 246 Everyone Must Touch the Stove (Lorelei), 176–177 EVOL (Sonic Youth), 294–295 Excuse 17, 288 Exile in Guyville (Liz Phair), 236–237 Exile on Main St. (Rolling Stones), 237, 248 Ex-Necros, 174 exotica, 32 experimental, 140, 173, 216, 319, 335 Experimental Jet Set, Trash, and No Star (Sonic Youth), 206 Exploded Drawing (Polvo), 244 Exploder (Eggs), 97–98, 120 Extra-Capsular Extraction (Earth), 96 Extra Width (Jon Spencer Blues Explosion), 301–302 Fables of the Reconstruction (R.E.M.), 257 Factor X (Rhys Chatham), 63–64 Fair, David, 140 Fair, Jad, 140, 167 Fair Use: The Story of the Letter U and the Numeral 2 (Negativland), 218–219 The Faith, 99, 102 Faith No More, 145 The Faith/Void Split LP (The Faith/ Void), 102 Fake Train (Unwound), 347 Falconi, Ted, 111 The Fall, 233–234 Fallow, Chris, 31 Family Man (Black Flag), 42 Fang, 41, 102–103 Farced (Volcano Suns), 354 Farrar, Jay, 343–344 Farrell, Perry, 195 Fast Stories . . . From Kid Coma (Truly), 337–338 Fat (Descendents), 79 Fay, Bob, 280 Feederz, 166 the Feelies, 76, 98, 103–104, 124, 270 Felt, 209 Fender, Leo, 28 Fennell, Kevin, 136 Fight Songs (The For Carnation), 115

INDEX 389

Filth (Swans), 318 Fire Engines, 185 fIREHOSE, 104–106, 355 Fire of Love (The Gun Club), 137, 203 Fire Party, 104, 270 Fire Party (Fire Party), 104 Firewater (Silkworm), 283 Fisher, Terry, 264 Fisk, Steve, 216, 235 Five Story Garage (Man Sized Action), 185–186 F**King Champs, 215 the Flaming Lips, 106, 107–110, 148, 194, 336 Flansburgh, John, 328 Flat Duo Jets, 90, 110 Flea, 355 Fleming, Don, 245 Flemion, Dennis, 115–116 Flemion, Jimmy, 115 Flemish Altruism (A Minor Forest), 10 the Flesh Eaters, 110–111 Flesheaters, 137 Flipper, 41, 103, 111–112, 225, 289, 333 Flip Your Wig (Hüsker Dü), 152–153, 153 Flow (Pell Mell), 235–236 Flower, 350 Flower, Wayne Rhino, 336 Floyd, Gary, 82 Fly Ashtray, 113–114, 321, 338, 344–345 Flying Burrito Brothers, 162 Flyin’ the Flannel (fIREHOSE), 106 Fly Me To the Moon (Caustic Resin), 62 Flynn, Sean, 262 Folijahn, Tim, 62, 206 folk, 32, 230 folk-blues, 32, 128 folk-rock, 142, 309 Fontanelle (Babes in Toyland), 23 Foo Fighters, 114–115, 303, 306, 310, 313 Foo Fighters (Foo Fighters), 114–115 Foolish (Superchunk), 315–316 The For Carnation, 101, 115, 290, 303 Forget (Mission of Burma), 205 For Respect (Don Caballero), 89 For Your Own Special Sweetheart (Jawbox), 159 Fossils (Dinosaur Jr), 86–87 Foxcore movement, 273 Frankenchrist (Dead Kennedys), 77–78 Frayed Knots (Luxurious Bags), 180–181

390 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Freak*on*ica (Girls Against Boys), 129 The Freed Man (Sebadoh), 278 Free Kitten, 248 Freeman, Aaron, 355 free-rock, 28 Frenching the Bully (the Gits), 129 Frenzy (Mojo Nixon and Skid Roper), 224–225 Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables (Dead Kennedys), 12 Fridmann, Dave, 109, 194, 196 Friedl, Eric, 227 Frightwig, 270 Frigid Stars (Codeine), 67–68 Fripp, Robert, 235 Frith, Fred, 216 Froberg, Rick, 91–92, 238, 261 the Frogs, 107, 115–117 From Heaven to My Head (Luxurious Bags), 180 fROMOHIO (fIREHOSE), 105–106 Frosting on the Beater (Posies), 245 Fucked-Up, 204 Fugazi, 16, 19, 23, 100, 117–119, 148, 158, 237, 261, 348 Fuller, Chris, 89 Fun, Fun, Fun (Big Boys), 34 The Funeral Pudding (Thinking Fellers), 329 funk, 24 Further, 120 The Future of What (Unwound), 348 fuzz-pop, 345 G.I. (Germs), 202 Gaffney, Eric, 277–278, 280 Galaxie 500, 124, 194 Gallimore, Stan, 133 Game Theory, 76, 125 Gang of Four, 92, 147 Gano, Gordon, 353 garage-psych, 354 garage punk, 79, 93, 101, 127, 128, 137, 220, 227, 294 garage rock, 22, 65, 69, 128, 181, 220, 249 Garcia, Jerry, 216 Garcia, John, 172 Gastr del Sol, 30, 125–126, 143, 303 Gates, Chris, 34 Gaunt, 82, 127, 220, 236, 330, 352 Generic (Flipper), 111–112, 191 Gentlemen (Afghan Whigs), 12, 13 Gerald, Michael, 171 the Geraldine Fibbers, 127 Germs, 360 Get Your Goat (Shudder to Think), 281 Giant Sand, 16 Gibson Bros., 90, 128, 301

Giessmann, Brent, 99 Ginn, Greg, 40–43, 83, 102, 200 Ginsberg, Allen, 43 Gira, Michael, 318–319 Girls Against Boys, 128–129 Gish (Smashing Pumpkins), 291 the Gits, 129 Glass Eye, 306 Gluey Porch Treatments (Melvins), 191 Goat (The Jesus Lizard), 163, 164, 272 Goatsnake, 100 Gocher, Charles, 311–312 God Don’t Make No Junk (Halo Benders), 141 godheadSilo, 129–130 God Help Us (The Embarrassment), 99 Godspeed the Punchline (Trumans Water), 338–339 God Ween Satan: The Oneness (Ween), 355–356 Goffrier, Bill, 99 Go Go Harlem Baby (Flat Duo Jets), 110 Golden Shower of Hits (Circle Jerks), 67 Goldsmith, William, 313 Gone Fishin’ (Flipper), 112 Goner Records, 227 Goo (Sonic Youth), 22, 296–298 The Good Earth (the Feelies), 103 Gordon, Kim, 145, 295, 298 the Gordons, 26 gospel, 128 Gossard, Stone, 132 Government Issue, 130, 158 Government Issue (Government Issue), 130 Gramercy Arms, 75 Graning, Chick, 16 Grasshopper, 194, 196 Grateful Dead, 216, 313 Grave Dancer’s Union (Soul Asylum), 300 Gray, Craig, 333 Gray, Darin, 126 The Greatest Gift (Scratch Acid), 272 Greed (Swans), 319–320 Green, Jeremiah, 205 Green, Tim, 215 Green Cat Island (Run Westy Run), 264 Green Day, 131, 160 Green Magnet School, 131 Green Mind (Dinosaur Jr), 86, 88 Green River, 132 Green Thoughts (Smithereens), 292 Greer, Jim, 136 Grifters, 133–134, 321

grindcore, 77 Grippe (Jawbox), 158 Griptape L.P. (Further), 120 Grisham, Jack, 339 Grohl, Dave, 114, 303, 355 Ground Zero, 185 Group Sex (Circle Jerks), 67 Grubbs, David, 29–30, 125–126, 303 grunge, 70, 132, 177, 221, 274, 282, 291, 310, 313, 317 Guided by Voices, 75, 113, 135– 136, 220, 309 Guilt, Regret, Embarrassment, (Treepeople), 336 The Guilt Trip (Kramer), 120, 171–172 guitar rock, 144 The Gun Club, 127, 137 Haden sisters, 355 Haggerty, Joe, 45 Haggerty, John, 214–215, 236 Haggerty, Neil, 248, 263 Hahn, Chuck, 354 Hairway to Steven (Butthole Surfers), 56 1/2 Gentlemen/Not Beasts (Half Japanese), 140 Half Japanese, 140, 178 Hall, John S., 170 Halliburton, Kelly, 79 Hallowed Victim (Saint Vitus), 269 Hallraker! (Descendents), 82 Halo Benders, 31, 141 Halo of Flies, 141–142 Halvorsen, John, 26 Hamilton, Page, 27, 49, 145 Hammerhead, 130, 142, 348 Hampson, Robert, 173 Hang Time (Soul Asylum), 299–300 Hanna, Kathleen, 35 Hansgen, Steve, 196 Hanson, Mark, 318 Happy Flowers, 107 Happy Hour (King Missile), 170 Happy Mondays, 342 Happy Nightmare Baby (Opal), 227 hardcore, 12, 13, 16, 24, 25, 34, 40, 43, 45, 54, 66, 67, 74, 76–77, 79, 81, 82, 91, 93, 100, 102–103, 111, 117, 130, 137, 147, 149, 166, 174, 184, 188, 197, 200, 202, 207, 225, 226, 238, 255, 273, 339, 360 hard rock, 62 Hard Times (Laughing Hyenas), 173–174 Harshe, Sue, 273 Hart, Grant, 142–143, 149–154 Harvey, Curtis, 260

Harvey Milk, 143 Harwell, Dave, 96 Hasil Adkins, 90 Hatfield, Juliana, 43, 44, 175 Hawkwind, 27 Haynes, Gibson “Gibby,” 54–55 Hazel, 144, 327 Hazelmyer, Tom, 141 Head (The Jesus Lizard), 163–164 Headsparks (Seam), 275 Heart, Rick, 181 Heasley, Kurt, 175–176 Heavens to Betsy, 144, 288 heavy-indie rock, 102 heavy metal, 143 Hecksher, Bobby, 63 Helium, 19, 144, 244 Heller, Jason, 347 Helmet, 27, 49, 145, 148, 159 Helter Stupid (Negativland), 218 Henneman, Brian, 46 Here Comes Success (Band of Susans), 28 Heroine Sheiks, 70 Heroinman (Cherubs), 66 Herrema, Jennifer, 263 Herring, Dennis, 60 Hersh, Kristin, 332 Hetson, Greg, 67, 255 Hey Babe (Juliana Hatfield), 44 Heyday: 1979–83 (The Embarrassment), 99 Higgs, Daniel, 179–180 High Anxiety (Das Damen), 75 High as a Kite (St. Johnny), 306 hip-hop, 32, 216 His Absence Is a Blessing (Silkworm), 282 Hissing Prigs in Static Couture (Brainiac), 48–49 The Historically Troubled Third Album (Dis-*), 88–89 Hit Songs for Girls (Superconductor), 316 Hit to the Death in the Future Head (the Flaming Lips), 108–109 Hole, 22, 146 Holsapple, Peter, 76 Holy Money (Swans), 320 Homme, Josh, 172 Honeyman-Scott, James, 353 Honor Role, 50, 69, 147–148 Hootenanny (the Replacements), 259 Hoover, 148 Hornet Piñata (Didjits), 82 The Horrible Truth about Burma (Mission of Burma), 204–205 Hosler, Mark, 216 Hot Snakes, 92 Houdini (Melvins), 193

Housden, Janet, 255 House, Ron, 330–331 How Could Hell Be Any Worse? (Bad Religion), 11, 25 Howland, Don, 128 Hubley, Georgia, 361 Hudson, Earl, 23 Hudson, Paul “H. R.,” 23, 24 Hum, 148–149 Hurley, George, 105, 200 Husick, Anne, 28 Hüsker Dü, 18, 79, 83, 84, 98, 114, 130, 142, 149–155, 174, 185, 189, 207, 214, 246, 264, 299–300, 302, 310 I Against I (Bad Brains), 24–25 I Am the Game (Bloodsport), 45 Ibold, Mark, 232 I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One (Yo La Tengo), 361 Iceburn, 100 Icky Mettle (Archers of Loaf), 16–17 I Could Live in Hope (Low), 177–179 I Don’t Want To Grow Up (Descendents), 80–81 If’n (fIREHOSE), 105 Iha, James, 247 I Hope It Lands (Thinking Fellers), 330 Imaginary Friend (Sorry), 299 Immerwahr, Steven, 68 Imperial F.F.R.R. (Unrest), 345–346 I’m Really Fucked Now (Prisonshake), 247 In a Car (Meat Puppets), 188 In a Priest-Driven Ambulance (with Silver Sunshine Stares) (the Flaming Lips), 107–108 In Camera, 209 Incesticide (Nirvana), 223 Indeterminate Activity of Resultant Masses (Glenn Branca), 49 indie bubblegum, 346 indie noise, 322 indie pop, 168, 342, 346, 360 indie rock, 18, 19, 30, 43, 44, 67– 68, 69, 84, 91, 104, 120, 125, 129, 135–136, 144, 276, 350 industrial, 33 industrial music, 130, 271, 319 industrial noise, 248 Industry Standard (Big Boys), 34 Infrared Riding Hood (TAD), 326 In God We Trust (Dead Kennedys), 76 Inhaler (TAD), 326 Inindependence (A Minor Forest), 10 In My Eyes (Minor Threat), 196–197 In My Head (Black Flag), 42, 43 In on the Killtaker (Fugazi), 119

INDEX 391

In Prism (Polvo), 244 Insomniac (Green Day), 131 Inspiral Carpets, 342 instrumental, 235, 335 intellectual-pop, 76 Intellectuals Are the Shoeshine Boys of the Ruling Elite (Killdozer), 171 International Pop Overthrow (Material Issue), 186–187 Interstate (Pell Mell), 236 In the Aeroplane Over the Sea (Neutral Milk Hotel), 219 In the Presence of Nothing (Lilys), 175–176 In the West (Silkworm), 282 Intolerance (Grant Hart), 142–143 Into the Unknown (Bad Religion), 25 Into the Vortex (Hammerhead), 142 In Utero (Nirvana), 224 Invisible Lantern (Screaming Trees), 294 Islington Porn Tapes (the Dambuilders), 74, 75 Isn’t Anything (My Bloody Valentine), 175 Is This Real? (Wipers), 359 It’s a Shame about Ray (Lemonheads), 175 It’s Only Right and Natural (the Frogs), 115–116 Jamboree (Beat Happening), 30 James, Ethan, 201 Jandek, 158 Jarboe, 319 Jawbox, 158–159 Jawbreaker, 159–161 Jayhawks, 162 The Jayhawks (the Jayhawks), 162 jazz-pop, 275 Jenifer, Darryl, 23 Jenkins, Pall, 331–332 Jernigan, Scott, 168–169 Jesperson, Peter, 258 Jessamine, 162–163, 173 Jessamine (Jessamine), 162–163 The Jesus Lizard, 65, 70, 163–165, 272, 281 JFA (“Jodie Foster’sArmy”), 166 Joan as Policewoman, 75 John Henry (They Might Be Giants), 328 Johnny Thunders, 247 Johnson, Calvin, 30, 31, 31–32, 141, 168, 333 Johnson, Clarke, 29 Johnson, Kirk, 264 Johnson, Kraig, 264 Johnson, Kyle, 264 Johnston, Daniel, 166–167

392 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Jones, Chip, 69 Joy, Tonie, 207 Joyce, Don, 216 Joy Division, 92, 209 Judy, Eric, 205 Julius Caesar (Smog), 292 Jump Back, Baby (Uncle Wiggly), 345 June of 44, 148, 262 Jupiter Eye (Das Damen), 75 Just Keep Eating (Scratch Acid), 272 Just Kidding (Treepeople), 53, 337 Kaiser, Henry, 216 Kaliflower (Sun City Girls), 312 Kane, A. R., 189 Kannberg, Scott, 233 Kant, Immanuel, 184 Kaplan, Ira, 361 Karen O., 166 Karp, 168–169 Kasem, Casey, 218–219 Kates, Mark, 161 Kawamoto, Elso, Jr., 27 Kennedy, Laura, 54 Kennedy, Mike, 92 Kernel (Seam), 276 Kerplunk! (Green Day), 131 Kerr, Andy, 226 Kerr, Tim, 34 Key Lime Pie (Camper Van Beethoven), 61 Kezdy, Pete, 45 Kezdy, Pierre, 214 Kicking Giant, 169–170 Kill Atom Smasher (Pitchblende), 237 Killdozer, 171 Kill from the Heart (the Dicks), 82 Killing Joke, 66 Kilslug, 107 Kimball, Jim, 173 King Coffee, 230 King Missile, 170 Kink Kong, 303 Kinsella, Mike, 61 Kinsella, Tim, 61 Kirkwood, Cris, 188, 355 Kirkwood, Curt, 188, 355 Kizys, Algis, 319 Kleiler, David, 299, 354 Kolderie, Paul Q., 343 Kovalcik, John, 69 Kozelek, Mark, 253–255 Kramer, 45, 114, 120, 167, 170, 171–172 Kramer, Mark, 45, 114, 124, 167, 170, 171–172 Krautrock, 27, 28–29, 47, 162, 291, 334, 335 Krukowski, Damon, 124

Kugelberg, Johan, 330, 352 Kyuss, 41, 172 L.A. (X), 360 Labradford, 173 Lacquer, 351 Lagwagon, 246 L’ajre (Silkworm), 282 Lamb of God, 50 La Mia Vita Violenta (Blonde Redhead), 44 Lampkins, Tripp, 133 The Land of Thirst (World of Pooh), 360 Landshark (Fang), 102 Lanegan, Mark, 355 Laner, Brad, 190 Langston, Leslie, 332 Lapsed (Bardo Pond), 29 Last Splash (the Breeders), 51 Laughing Down the Limehouse (Anastasia Screamed), 15–16 Laughing Hyenas, 173–174, 216 Leary, Paul, 54 Leaves Turn Inside You (Unwound), 348 Lehrer, Lucky, 67 Lemonheads, 44, 174–175 Leon, Michelle, 22 Leonard, Pat, 207 Leonard, Tom, 180–181 Lesson No. 1 (Glenn Branca), 49 Let It Be (the Replacements), 260 Let Me Come Over (Buffalo Tom), 52 Let’s Electrify (Versus), 351 Let’s Have Some Crate (Fly Ashtray), 113 Let There Be Burma (Mission of Burma), 205 Lewis, Heather, 30 Liar (The Jesus Lizard), 165 Libertine (Silkworm), 283 Licher, Bruce, 271 Licht, David, 46 Lick (Lemonheads), 174–175 Life of Crime (Laughing Hyenas), 174 Life’s Rich Pageant (R.E.M.), 257 Lilys, 175–176 Lincoln (They Might Be Giants), 328 Linnell, John, 328 Litt, Scott, 224 Little Baby Buntin’ (Killdozer), 171 Live ’84 (Black Flag), 42 Liveage! (Descendents), 82 Live At Raul’s Club (the Dicks), 82 Live Skull, 28, 69 Living in Darkness (Agent Orange), 11, 13–14 Lo, Matt, 64

Locust Abortion Technician (Butthole Surfers), 55 lo-fi, 180, 259, 277–278, 284, 292, 309, 322, 344, 353 Log, Bob, III, 90 Loincloth, 50 Lolita Nation (Game Theory), 125 Lollipop Shoppe, 78 Lombardo, Tony, 80 Lonegran, Mark, 28 The Long Arm of Coincidence (Jessamine), 163 Long Division (Low), 178–179 Long Hair in Three Stages (U.S. Maple), 349 Loomis, Andrew, 78 Loop, 173, 189 Loose, Bruce, 111 Loose Nut (Black Flag), 43 Lorelei, 176–177 Lost Cause (Jandek), 158 Lost Somewhere Between the Earth and My Home (the Geraldine Fibbers), 127 Loud Family, 125 Louvin Brothers, 232 Love, Courtney, 22, 97, 145 Love 666, 177 Love Agenda (1989), 27 Loveless (My Bloody Valentine), 189–190 love-rock, 168 Low, 124, 177–179 Lowenstein, Jason, 231, 278, 280 Lowering, David, 238–239 Lowery, David, 61 Luna, 124 Lund, Sara, 347 Lungfish, 179–180 Lunsford, Bret, 30 The Lurid Traversal of Route 7 (Hoover), 148 Luxurious Bags, 180–181 Lyburnum Wits End Liberation Fly (Moss Icon), 207 Lyons, Richard, 216 Lyres, 181 Lysol (Melvins), 192–193 MacDonald, Scott, 18 Macfarlane, Lora, 288 MacKaye, Alec, 99, 102 MacKaye, Ian, 23, 99–100, 117, 196 MacLoed, Brian, 289 MacLoed, Ron, 289 Magnuson, Ann, 45, 171 Main, 96, 173 The Make-Up, 215 Makino, Kazu, 44 Malignus Youth, 184 Malkmus, Stephen, 233, 234, 284

Maller, Thermos, 90 Mangum, Jeff, 219 Manley, Phil, 335 Man Sized Action, 185–186 The Man Who Loved Couch Dancing (Gibson Bros.), 128 Marcus, Scott, 306 Margin Walker (Fugazi), 117 Marley, Bob, 23 Mars, Chris, 258 Marshak, Tracy, 255 Marshall, Chan, 62 Marshall, Dana, 273 Marshall, Scott, 64 Marshall Tucker Band, 47 Marshmallows (The for Carnation), 115 Mars Volta, 49 Martin, Jason, 307 Martinez, Christina, 301 Martin + Me (J Mascis), 186 Martsch, Doug, 31, 52, 53, 62, 141, 336–337 Mascis, J, 52, 53, 83–87, 106, 174, 186, 278, 355 Masters, Marc, 312 Material Issue, 186–187 math rock, 10, 50, 88, 243, 262 May I Sing with Me (Yo La Tengo), 361 Mays, Marcie, 273 Mazer, Elliot, 257 Mazzy Star, 124, 187, 227 MC5, 98, 140, 177 McBride, Sam “Sammytown,” 103 McCaughan, Mac, 275–276, 315 McCaughey, Scott, 246, 362 McCloud, Scott, 128 McCombs, Doug, 98 McDonald, Jeff, 255 McDonald, Steve, 255 McEntire, John, 29, 30, 125, 275 McLachian, Brent, 26 McMahon, Brian, 115, 290, 303 McNeilly, Mac, 163 McNew, James, 361 Meadows, Sean, 180 Means, Nathan, 335 Meantime (Helmet), 145 Meat Puppets, 106, 166, 188–189, 344 Meat Puppets (Meat Puppets), 188 Meat Puppets II (Meat Puppets), 150, 189, 260 Medicine, 189–190 Mekons, 10, 185 Melchiondo, Mickey, 355 Mellow Gold (Beck), 31 melodic hardcore, 207 Meltzer, Richard, 201

Melvins, 41, 63, 67, 70, 130, 143, 168–169, 177, 191–193 Memphis Sol Today! (Gibson Bros.), 128 Mendel, Nate, 313 Mentges, Jeff, 225 The Men Who Loved Music (Young Fresh Fellows), 362 Mercer, Glenn, 103 Mercury (American Music Club), 15 Mercury Rev, 108, 194–196 Merrit, Stephin, 360 metal, 24, 50, 81, 96, 191 Metal Circus (Hüsker Dü), 149, 153 Metallica, 89, 131 metal-punk, 103 Middle Class, 13 Midgett, Tim, 282 Mike D., 302, 355 Miller, Gary “Dr. Know,” 23 Miller, Roger, 203, 299 Miller, Scott, 125 Million, Bill, 103 Millions Now Living Will Never Die (Tortoise), 334 Mills, Mike, 256 Milo Goes to College (Descendents), 11, 14, 79–80 Minor Threat, 23, 74, 77, 99, 117, 196–197 Minor Threat (Minor Threat), 197 Minus 5, 246 Minutemen, 104–105, 113, 185, 188, 200–202, 205, 299, 343, 344, 355 The Miracle of Sound in Motion (Steel Pole Bath Tub), 308 Misfits, 79, 202–203 Mission of Burma, 15, 44, 64, 98, 108, 130, 174, 181, 203–205, 270, 299, 302, 350, 354 Mission of Burma (Mission of Burma), 205 Mitchell, Lexi, 275 Mitchell, Mitch, 136 Moby, 196, 204 Modern Lovers, 140 Modest Mouse, 205–206, 336 mod-pop, 186 Mommy’s Little Monster (Social Distortion), 293 Monkeywrench, 34 Monks of Doom, 61 Mooney, Tim, 333 Moore, Thurston, 206, 298, 306, 336 More to It (Malignus Youth), 184 Morley, Darren, 307 Morris, Keith, 67 Moss Icon, 207

INDEX 393

Mother of All Saints (Thinking Fellers), 120, 321, 328–329 Mothersbaugh, Mark, 216 Mould, Bob, 83, 114, 143, 149–154, 300, 302, 306, 310–311 Mousetrap (Das Damen), 75 Moving Targets, 207 Mr. Machinery Operator (fIREHOSE), 106 Mudhoney, 41, 132, 145, 208–209 Mueller, Jeff, 262 Mullin, Reed, 147 Murmur (R.E.M.), 256 Murph, 83, 85–86 Murphy, Rian, 293 Muse, 49 Music for Insect Minds (Halo of Flies), 141–142 Mustaches Wild (Karp), 168 My Bloody Valentine, 63, 98, 177, 189, 320 My Brother the Cow (Mudhoney), 209 My Dad Is Dead, 209–210 My Daughter, the Broad (the Frogs), 116–117 My Little Bastard Soul (New Radiant Storm King), 220 My Love Is Higher Than Your Assessment of What My Love Could Be (Harvey Milk), 143 My Morning Jacket, 53, 336 Myra Lee (Cat Power), 62 Mystical Shit (King Missile), 170 My War (Black Flag), 41, 42 My Way (Black Flag), 191 Naked Raygun, 45, 214–215, 236, 302 Narcizo, David, 332–333 Nassau (Sea and Cake), 275 Nastonovich, Bob, 232, 284 Nation of Ulysses, 215 Navetta, Frank, 80 Nà Vuccà Dò Lupà (Three Mile Pilot), 331 Necklace of Heads (Lungfish), 180 Necros, 216 The Need, 288 Negative Approach, 173, 215–216 Negative Capability . . . Check It Out!, 10 Negative Trend, 111, 289, 333 Negativland, 216–219 Neilson, Alex, 158 Neilson, Rick, 246 Nelsh Bailter Space, 26 Nelson, Jeff, 196 Nervous Breakdown (Black Flag), 67 Netson, Brett, 62 Neutral Milk Hotel, 219–220

394 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Nevermind (Nirvana), 86, 106, 171, 208, 222–223 New Bomb Turks, 82, 127, 220, 236, 330, 352 New Day Rising (Hüsker Dü), 151, 152 Newman, Carl, 316 New Order, 100 New Plastic Ideas (Unwound), 348 New Pornographers, 316 New Radiant Storm King, 220–221 new wave, 200 Nicely, Ted, 128 Nice Strong Arm, 221 Nichols, John, 178 Nine Inch Nails, 49 1990 (Daniel Johnston), 167 Nirvana, 14, 41, 50, 86, 131, 153, 160, 189, 208, 221–224, 337 Nixon, Mojo, 224–225 Noble, Jason, 262 No Depression (Uncle Tupelo), 342–343 noise-drone, 28 noise pop, 28, 108, 162, 174, 190, 221, 280, 345, 361 noise rock, 10, 18, 22, 27, 29, 30, 32, 33, 35, 41, 44, 46, 51, 64, 65, 70, 77, 91, 106, 108, 125–126, 141–142, 145, 158, 163, 215, 230, 249, 262, 272, 281, 290, 307, 347 NoMeansNo, 226 No Neck Blues Band, 313 Non-Stuff (Uncle Wiggly), 345 No Pocky for Kitty (Superchunk), 314 Norton, Gil, 240 Norton, Greg, 153 No Trend, 103, 225–226 Novelty (Jawbox), 158–159 Novoselic, Krist, 355 no-wave, 49, 54, 318 Obits, 92 Oblivians, 65, 133, 227 the Obsessed, 269 Ocasek, Ric, 24 Odelay (Beck), 32 Of Thick Tum (Trumans Water), 338 Oh My Gawd!!! . . . The Flaming Lips (the Flaming Lips), 107 Oldham, Will, 230–231, 260 Oliveri, Nick, 172 On Avery Island (Neutral Milk Hotel), 219–220 Ondras, Charlie, 93, 346–347 One Foot in the Grave (Beck), 31–32 O’Neill, Tara Jane, 262 One Sock Missing (Grifters), 133–134 On Fire (Galaxie 500), 124

On Fyre (Lyres), 181 Only Life (the Feelies), 104 Only Ones, 247 Only Theater of Pain (Christian Death), 66 On the Mouth (Superchunk), 315 Opal, 187, 227 Orange (Jon Spencer Blues Explosion), 302 O’Rourke, Jim, 126, 349 Ortmann, Mark, 46 Osborne, Buzz, 191 Oswald, John, 216 Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart (Camper Van Beethoven), 60 Outlaws, 47 Out of Step (Minor Threat), 74, 196–197 Out of Vogue (Middle Class), 13 outsider rock, 140 The Out Sound (Slug), 290 Over and Out (Tar), 327 Over the Edge (Wipers), 359 Owings, Henry, 143 Oxenberg, Daniel, 318 Ozma (Melvins), 191–192 Pace, Amedeo, 44 Pace, Simone, 44 Paganicons (Saccharine Trust), 268 Painful (Yo La Tengo), 361 Painless Nights (the Sleepers), 289, 333 Paint as Fragrance (Rocket from the Crypt), 261–262 Pain Teens, 230 Pajo, David, 290, 334 Palace Brothers, 230–231, 303 Palace Music, 231–232 Palm, Mike, 13 Panther Burns, 133 Panthers, 237 Papa M, 290 Paranoid Time (Minutemen), 200 Park, Sooyoung, 275–276 Parker, Alister, 26 Parker, Mimi, 178 Parsons, Gram, 162 Pass and Stow (Lungfish), 179–180 The Pastels, 166 Paul’s Boutique (Beastie Boys), 32 Paulson, Brian, 29, 185 Pavement, 113, 148, 220, 232–235, 284, 321, 329 Pearl Jam, 132, 281 Peel, John, 338 Pegboy, 45, 204, 214, 236 Pell Mell, 235–236 Pentastar: In the Style of Demons (Earth), 96, 97

Perfect Disaster, 50 Perfect from Now On (Built to Spill), 53 Perfect Sound Forever (Pavement), 233 Perfect Teeth (Unrest), 346 Pernice Brothers, 221 Personal Best (Team Dresch and the Butchies), 273, 327 Petric, Bob, 331 Pettibon, Raymond, 297 Pezzati, Jeff, 214 Phair, Liz, 236–237 Phantom Limb, 351 Phelps, Joel R. L., 282–283 Photograph Burns (Vertical Slit/V-3), 352–353 Picciotto, Guy, 117, 261 Pickerel, Mark, 337 Picking Through the Wreckage With a Stick (Siltbreeze), 352 Piece of Cake (Mudhoney), 209 Pierce, Jeffrey Lee, 82, 137 Pierced Arrows, 79 Pigpile (Big Black), 34 Pillowtalk (Coral), 69 Pinback, 331, 332 Pink, Ariel, 318 Pinkerton, Peyton, 221 Pink Flag (Wire), 186 Pink Floyd, 98, 313 Pink Moon (Nick Drake), 279 Pirner, Dave, 355 Pitchblende, 237 Pitchfork, 91, 238, 261 Pixies, 15, 50–51, 74, 206, 238–242 Place, Pat, 54 Plastic Surgery Disasters (Dead Kennedys), 76–77 Plouf, Scott, 31 The Pod (Ween), 356–357 Poison 13, 34 politico-punk, 339 Pollard, Robert, 135–136, 309 Polvo, 16, 144, 221, 237, 242–244, 329, 348 pop, 136, 142, 149, 275, 344 The Pop Group, 66, 271 pop-punk, 45, 159–160 Posa, Dylan, 126 Posies, 245–246 Positively Dumptruck (Dumptruck), 93 Poss, Robert, 27–28, 29 Poster Children, 246–247 post hardcore, 10, 11, 16, 19, 29, 30, 33, 45, 47, 64, 66, 70, 88, 91, 100, 104, 107, 125, 130, 132, 135, 145, 168, 186, 191–192, 214, 215, 221, 226, 236, 238, 247, 252, 262, 272, 273, 281, 326

post–no wave, 28 post prog, 335 post punk, 10, 26, 48, 49, 54, 66, 92, 131, 140, 147, 200, 221, 238, 271, 299 post rock, 30, 47, 275, 334, 348–349 The Power of Pussy, (Bongwater), 46 power pop, 79–80, 187, 200, 291, 294, 309 Powers, Kid Congo, 137 power-sludge, 269 power-violence, 77 Prazision LP (Labradford), 173 Prekop, Sam, 275 pre-pop, 230 Prescott, Peter, 203, 354 Presidents of the United States of America, 31 Preslar, Lyle, 196 Preston, Joe, 96 Pretenders, 353 Pretty on the Inside (Hole), 127, 146 Pretty Plays for Baby (Nation of Ulysses), 215 The Pretty Song (Honor Role), 147 Prewitt, Archer, 275 Price, Frank, 225 Prisonshake, 247 The Problem with Me (Seam), 276 prog-rock, 27, 53, 89, 91, 135–136, 226, 271, 345 Promise Ring, 61 Propeller (Guided by Voices), 135 proto-grunge, 30, 70, 317 proto–indie rock, 149, 273 proto-metal, 62, 132 proto–noise rock, 171 proto-punk, 132, 360 psychedelia, 77, 112, 136, 227 psychedelic rock, 46, 93, 130 psych-garage rock, 181 Psychic Hearts (Thurston Moore), 206 Psychic Powerless Another Man’s Sac (Butthole Surfers), 55 psych-metal, 75, 132 psychobilly, 224 psych-pop, 125, 219, 291 psych-punk, 132, 270 Public Flipper Limited (Flipper), 112 Public Image Limited, 112, 225 Pull (Arcwelder), 18, 306 The Punch Line (Minutemen), 200 punk-blues, 70, 137 punk-metal, 129 punk rock, 11, 13, 23, 25, 35, 45, 47, 66, 76–77, 78, 81, 93, 103, 127, 136, 137, 140, 163, 181, 189, 200, 202, 214, 225, 226, 236, 248, 255, 261, 360

Pure (The Jesus Lizard), 163 Pure Guava (Ween), 357–358 The Purple Tape (Pixies), 238–239 Pussy Galore, 128, 248, 301 Pussy Whipped (Bikini Kill), 35 Queen, 98 Queens of the Stone Age, 172 Quercio, Michael, 270 R.E.M., 76, 98, 246, 255–258, 343 Rachel’s, 262 Racially Yours (the Frogs), 116 Rademaker, Brent, 120 Rademaker, Darren, 120 Ragin’, Full On (fIREHOSE), 104–105 Rain Parade, 227 Ralske, Kurt, 342 Ramones, 23, 63, 79, 160, 202 Ranaldo, Lee, 23, 49, 298 Rapeman, 163, 252, 281 the Rats, 78–79 Raygun . . . Naked Raygun (Naked Raygun), 215 R&B/soul, 12 Reagers, Scott, 268–269 Reality Bath (Nice Strong Arm), 221 Reatard, Jay, 133 Reckoning (R.E.M.), 257 Red Cross, 67 Red House Painters, 14, 253–255, 260 Red House Painters [I] (Red House Painters), 254 Red House Painters [II] (Red House Painters), 254–255 Red Krayola, 303 Red Kross, 255 Red Medicine (Fugazi), 119 Reed, Lou, 353 reggae, 23–24 Rehab Doll (Green River), 132 Reigning Sound, 227 Reis, John, 91–92, 238, 261 Reject All American (Bikini Kill), 35 Rembrandt Pussyhorse (Butthole Surfers), 55 Renaldo, Lee, 167, 297, 336 Repeater (Fugazi), 118 Repercussion (the dB’s), 76 Repetition (Unwound), 348–349 the Replacements, 78, 161, 247, 258–260, 264, 299, 302, 362 Repulse Kava, 247 Residents, 216, 235 Retrospective (The Embarrassment), 99 Retsin, 262 Revenge Fantasies of the Impotent (Alice Donut), 14 Rex, 124, 260–261

INDEX 395

Rex (Rex), 260–261 Reyes, Ron, 255 Reynolds, Simon, 47 Reznor, Trent, 49 Rice, Casey, 61, 236 Richman, Jonathan, 353 Rick, Dave, 46, 170 Rictus (Honor Role), 147–148 Ride, 320 Ride the Fader (Chavez), 64 Rifle Sport, 51, 185 riot grrrl, 11, 35, 144, 237, 273, 288, 333 A Ripping Spin (Salem 66), 270 Rising, Bob, 247, 276 Rites of Spring, 74, 99–100, 117, 261 Rites of Spring (Rites of Spring), 261 Rival Time (New Radiant Storm King), 220–221 The Roaring Third (Prisonshake), 247 Roback, David, 187, 227 Robbins, J., 158 Roberts, Nathan, 107 Roberts, Rick, 245 Robo, 40, 203 Robot World (Bailter Space), 26 Roche, Mike, 339 rock-and-roll, 25, 29 Rocket from the Crypt, 91, 92, 238, 261–262 Rock for Light (Bad Brains), 23–24 Rocking the Forest (Sebadoh), 279 Rodan, 64, 262 Rode Hard and Put Up Wet (Bastro), 29 Roessler, Kira, 42, 355 Rogers, Bennett, 63 Rogers, Wayne, 53 Rogerson, Roger, 67 Rollercoaster (Red House Painters), 254 Rollings, Pen, 50, 69, 147–148 Rolling Stones, 140, 248, 263 Rollins, Henry, 24, 40–42, 355 Romweber, Dexter, 110 roots-rock, 137, 189, 224 Roper, Skid, 224–225 Ropers, 175 Roth, Robert, 337 Royal Trux, 248, 263, 321 Royal Trux (Royal Trux), 263 Royer, Casey, 12 Ruby Red (the Dambuilders), 75 Rue, Caroline, 145 Run Westy Run, 264 Rusk, Corey, 216 Rusty (Rodan), 262 Rutmanis, Kevin, 70 Ruts, 293

396 GIMME INDIE ROCK

S.F. Seals, 360 Saccharine Trust, 200–201, 268 sadcore, 177, 254 Safari (the Breeders), 51 Sage, Greg, 358–359 Saint Germain, Ron, 297 Saint Vitus, 41, 191, 268–269 Saint Vitus (Saint Vitus), 268 Sakowski, Ron, 174 Salem 66, 270 Sally, Zak, 179 The Salvation Army, 270 The Salvation Army (The Salvation Army), 270 Sandoval, Hope, 187, 227 Sansano, Nick, 297 Santiago, Joey, 238–239 Saturation (Urge Overkill), 52 Saturn Outhouse (Pitchfork), 238 Sauter, Brenda, 103 Savage Republic, 271 Scars from Falling Down (Steel Pole Bath Tub), 309 Schick, Bob, 69, 147–148 Schmaljohn, Scott, 336–337 Schmersal, John, 48 Schwendener, Martha, 47 The Scientific Supercake LP (godheadSilo), 129–130 Scratch Acid, 163, 252, 272 Scrawl, 270, 273 Scream, 104, 273 Screamers, 48 Screaming Trees, 75, 106, 274, 294, 327, 337 screamo, 101, 215 Sea and Cake, 275, 335 Seam, 64, 124, 275–276 Sea of Unrest (Toiling Midgets), 333 Searcy, Pete, 303 Sebadoh, 113, 231, 277–280, 321 Sebadoh III (Sebadoh), 278–279 Sebadoh vs. Helmet (Sebadoh), 279 Secret Swingers (Versus), 351 See You on the Other Side (Mercury Rev), 195–196 Selberg, Shannon, 70 The Serpentine Similar (Gastr del Sol), 125–126 Seven Songs (Evergreen), 101 Sexy Pee Story (Cows), 70 Shadowland, 120 Shapes (Polvo), 244 Share the Fantasy (godheadSilo), 130 Sharp, Elizabeth, 220 Shatter, Will, 111 Shavel, Steve, 318 She Hangs Brightly (Mazzy Star), 187, 227 Shellac, 51, 281

Shelley, Steve, 44, 62, 167, 206, 295 Shepard, Jim, 351–353 Shere, Jon, 318 Sherwood, Adrian, 334 Shipping News, 262 shoegaze, 44, 47, 124, 148, 162, 175–176, 177, 187, 189–190, 194, 227, 307, 320, 322, 342, 361 Shore, Pete, 346 Short of Popular (Cherubs), 66 Shorty, 349 Shot Forth Self Living (Medicine), 189–190 Shouse, Dave, 133 Shrimp Boat, 275 Shudder to Think, 159, 281 Siberia (Polvo), 244 Signals, Calls, and Marches (Mission of Burma), 203–204 Silkworm, 100, 282–283 Silver (Starflyer 59), 307 Silver Apples, 162 Silver Jews, 221, 284 Sims, Brad, 82 Sims, David W., 163, 252, 272 Sims, Rick, 82 Singles 88–92 (the Unsane), 347 Sing the Troubled Beast (Bastro), 30 Sister (Sonic Youth), 295 Six Finger Satellite, 131, 221 the 6ths, 360 Skag Heaven (Squirrel Bait), 303 skiffle, 309 Skullflower, 96 Skunk, 64 Skyward with Triumph (godheadSILO), 130 Slade, Sean, 343 Slant 6, 19 Slanted and Enchanted (Pavement), 232–233, 279 Slay Tracks (1933–1969) (Pavement), 233 Sleater-Kinney, 35, 144, 169, 288–289, 327 Sleater-Kinney (Sleater-Kinney), 288 Sleep, 41 Sleepers, 111 the Sleepers, 289 Sleepers, 333 Sley, Cynthia, 54 Slint, 10, 27, 50, 64, 100, 101, 115, 290, 303, 334 Slip It In (Black Flag), 42 Slits, 35 slowcore, 14, 68, 115, 124, 177 sludge metal, 41, 145, 193 sludge rock, 62 Slug, 290–291, 317 Smalley, Dave, 81

Small Parts Isolated and Destroyed (NoMeansNo), 226 Smash (Offspring), 159 Smashing Pumpkins, 291 Smash Your Head on the Punk Rock (Sebadoh), 279 Smear, Pat, 355 Smith, Armistead Burwell, IV, 331–332 Smith, Chris, 168–169 Smith, Chris “Crow,” 110 Smith, Kendra, 187, 227 Smith, Mark E., 233 Smith, Zach, 331–332 Smithereens, 291–292 Smog, 292–293 Smoke of Hell (Supersuckers), 317 Snake Boy (Killdozer), 171 Snaketrain, 247 So, Were They in Some Sort of Fight? (A Minor Forest), 10 Social Distortion, 11, 13, 293 So Happy Together (Grifters), 133 Solomon Grundy, 294, 338 Solomon Grundy (Solomon Grundy), 294 Some Cocktail Suggestions from Steel Pole Bath Tub (Steel Pole Bath Tub), 308 Somery (Descendents), 82 Sometimes Chimes (Further), 120 aab13 Songs (Fugazi), 117 Songs about Fucking (Big Black), 33 Songs for the Terrestrially Challenged (Speaking Canaries), 301 Sonic Youth, 16, 22, 26–28, 44, 49, 87, 105–106, 145, 154, 159, 189, 222, 237, 248, 294–299, 336, 348, 349, 350, 355 Sonora Pine, 262 Son Volt, 344 Soo Young Park, 36 Sorry, 299 Sorry Ma, Forgot to Take Out the Trash to Take Out the Trash (the Replacements), 25, 258–259 Soto, Steve, 11 So Tonight that I Might See (Mazzy Star), 187 soul, 24 Soul Asylum, 98, 264, 299–300 Soul Food (Oblivians), 227 Soulside, 128 sound-collage, 216 Soundgarden, 300–301, 337 Sound in Time (Lungfish), 180 Soup Dragons, 342 Spacemen 3, 124 space-rock, 27, 47, 334 Spaghetti, Eddie, 317

Spanking Machine (Babes in Toyland), 22 Sparhawk, Alan, 177–178 Spasm Smash XXXOXOX Ox & Ass (Trumans Water), 328, 338 Speaking Canaries, 53, 89, 301 Spencer, Chris, 346 Spencer, Jon, 65, 128, 248, 301–302 Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, 90, 301–302 Spheeris, Penelope, 67 Spicer, Eric, 214 Spiderland (Slint), 100, 115, 185, 231, 252, 262, 290, 334 Spitzer, Ron, 28 Spot, 201, 203, 268, 300, 355 Spring, Jim, 318 Sprout, Tobin, 136 Squirrel Bait, 16, 29, 84, 98, 101, 290, 302–303 Squirrel Bait (Squirrel Bait), 302–303 St. Germain, Ron, 24 St. Johnny, 180, 306 Stabb, John, 130 Stag (Melvins), 193 Stamey, Chris, 76 Stands For Decibels (the dB’s), 76, 92 Star Booty (Bitch Magnet), 35 Star City (Pell Mell), 236 Starfish, 306 Starflyer 59, 307 Starlite Walker (Silver Jews), 284 The Stars Are Insane (Versus), 351 Stars Kill Rock, 11 State of Confusion, 336 The Static, 49 Steady Diet of Nothing (Fugazi), 118 Steel Pole Bath Tub, 70, 160, 307–309, 348 Steely Dan, 277 Stein, Seymour, 181 Stellar Sonic Solutions (Starfish), 306 Stenger, Susan, 28 Stereolab, 63 Stereopathic Soul Manure (Beck), 63 Stevenson, Bill, 42, 80–81 Stiff Little Fingers, 293 Still Feel Gone (Uncle Tupelo), 343–344 Still Screaming (Scream), 273 Stimulation Festival (Pain Teens), 230 Stink (the Replacements), 259 Stipe, Michael, 256 stoner metal, 29, 172, 269, 274 stoner rock, 172 Stoner Witch (Melvins), 193 Stooges, 98, 132, 140 Storybook Krooks, 337

Strangers from the Universe (Thinking Fellers), 329–330 Strangers of the Universe (Thinking Fellers), 329 Strangulated Beatoffs, 107 Strapping Fieldhands, 309 Strickland, Larissa, 173–174 Strike Under, 45 Stringfellow, Ken, 245–246 Strohm, John, 43 Strong Reaction (Pegboy), 236 The Stull (Urge Overkill), 350 Subotnik, Morton, 162 Success (Posies), 246 Suddenly Tammy!, 175 Suffer (Bad Religion), 25 Sugar, 18, 114, 306, 310–311 Sugarfix (Dwarves), 93 Suicidal Tendencies, 83 Suicide, 48 Sunburn (Blake Babies), 43–44 Sun City Girls, 311–313, 338 Sun Kil Moon, 253, 255 Sunn O))), 96, 100, 320 Sunny Day Real Estate, 313 Superchunk, 16, 85, 160, 275, 306, 314–316 Superchunk, (Superchunk), 314 Superconductor, 316–317 Superfuzz Bigmuff Plus Early Singles (Mudhoney), 208 The Supersonic Storybook (Urge Overkill), 349–350 Supersuckers, 82, 220, 317 Suplex (Karp), 169 Supreme Dicks, 318 Surfer Rosa (Pixies), 239–240 surf rock, 13, 77, 79, 235 Svenonius, Ian, 215 Swalla, Todd, 174 Swan, Kirk, 92 Swans, 28, 49, 248, 318–320 Sweeney, Matt, 64 Sweet Oblivion (Screaming Trees), 274 Swell Maps, 233 Swirlies, 320–322 Swiz, 99–100 Symphony No. 6 (Devil Choirs at the Gates of Heaven) (Glenn Branca), 49 synth-pop, 142 synth-punk, 48 T. Rex, 98, 227 T.S.O.L., 13 TAD, 326 Takahashi, Maki, 44 Talking Heads, 256, 353 Talk Talk, 334

INDEX 397

The Taller You Are, the Shorter You Get (My Dad Is Dead), 209–210 Tangerine Dream, 335 Tar, 27, 158, 326–327 Tarver, Clay, 64 Taylor, Scott, 133 Taylor, Tim, 48–49 Team Dresch and the Butchies, 11, 35, 144, 169, 273, 288, 327 Teen Angels, 96 Teen Idles, 196 Teetering (Tar), 327 Telepathic Surgery (the Flaming Lips), 107, 109 Telephone Free Landslide Victory (Camper Van Beethoven), 60 Television, 16, 91, 124, 235 Tennessee Tearjerkers, 227 Texas hardcore, 34 Texas Instruments, 167 Thee Oh-Sees, 344 Theoretical Girls, 49 The Pod (the Breeders), 50 There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You (Will Oldham/Palace Brothers), 231 There’s Nothing Wrong with Love (Built to Spill), 53, 62 There Was an Elk (Uncle Wiggly), 345 Thermos (Bailter Space), 26 These People (The Dicks), 82 They Might Be Giants, 328 They Spent Their Wild Youthful Days in the Glittering World of the Salons (Swirlies), 322 Thing of Beauty (Volcano Suns), 354 Thinking Fellers Union Local 282, 307, 321, 328–330, 338 Thin White Rope, 16 This Heat, 271 This Is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About (Modest Mouse), 205–206 This Mortal Coil, 209 This Side Up (Scream), 273 This Sounds Like Goodbye (Ken Stringfellow), 246 Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments, 127, 330–331, 352 Thompson, Beth, 190 Thompson, Charles, IV. See Black Francis Thompson, Mayo, 318 Thomson, Sebastian, 335 Thorpe, Suzanne, 194 Three Mile Pilot, 331–332 The Three O’Clock, 270 Throbbing Gristle, 248, 271 Throb Throb (Naked Raygun), 214

398 GIMME INDIE ROCK

Throwing Muses, 50, 332–333 Throwing Muses (Throwing Muses), 332–333 Tied Down (Negative Approach), 215–216 Tiger Trap, 333 Tiger Trap (Tiger Trap), 333 Tilt-A-Whirl, 18 Time Whore (Treepeople), 336 Timony, Mary, 19, 144, 244 Tiven, Seth, 92 Toast (Tar), 326–327 Today’s Active Lifestyles (Polvo), 243 Toiling Midgets, 289, 333–334 Tone Sensations of the Wonder-Men (Fly Ashtray), 114 Too Many Humans (No Trend), 225–226 Torch of the Mystics (Sun City Girls), 311–312 Toreador of Love (Hazel), 144 Torres, Elaina, 262 Tortoise, 30, 98, 275, 334, 335 Tortoise (Tortoise), 334 Tossing Seeds: Singles 89–92 (Superchunk), 314 Tough Guy Problem (the Dambuilders), 74, 75 Trace (Son Volt), 185 Tragedy Tragedy (Brick Layer Cake), 51 Tragic Figures (Savage Republic), 271 Trainer, Todd, 51, 281 Transaction de Novo (Bedhead), 32 Trans Am, 335 Trans Am (Trans Am), 335 Transmissions from the Satellite Heart (the Flaming Lips), 109–110 Trash (Mats), 25 trash rock, 69 Travis, Malcolm, 310 Treepeople, 52, 53, 62, 64, 141, 336–337 Triskaidekaphobe (Das Damen), 75 Tritoniam Nash: Vegas Polyester Complex (No Trend), 226 Trombino, Mark, 92 Trouble, 191, 269 Trudge (Savage Republic), 271 True, Everett, 208 Truly, 337–338 Trumans Water, 237, 321, 338–339 TSOL, 339 Tucker, Corin, 144, 288–289 Tulip (Steel Pole Bath Tub), 307 Tunney, Stephen “Dogbowl,” 170 Turing Machine, 237 Turner, Randy “Biscuit,” 34 Turner, Steve, 132

Tutunjian, Damon, 321 Twee (Slint), 290 Tweedy, Jeff, 343–344 twee pop, 168, 333 Twelve Point Buck (Killdozer), 171 24 Hour Revenge Therapy (Jawbreaker), 161 Twin Infinitives (Royal Trux), 263 Two Nuns and a Pack Mule (Rapeman), 252 The Tyde, 120 U.S. Maple, 349 U2 (Negativland), 218 Ultimate Alternative Wavers (Built to Spill), 52 Ultramega O.K. (Soundgarden), 300–301 Ultra Vivid Scene, 342 Ultra Vivid Scene (Ultra Vivid Scene), 342 Umber (Bitch Magnet), 35–36 Uncle Anesthesia (Screaming Trees), 274 Uncle Tupelo, 16, 46, 52, 342–344 Uncle Wiggly, 344–345 underground indie, 11 underground metal, 67, 100 underground rock, 92 Under the Blood Red Lava Lamp (Vertical Slit/V-3), 351–352 The Unexamined Life (Supreme Dicks), 318 Unfun (Jawbreaker), 160 United Kingdom (American Music Club), 14 Unknown Pleasures (Joy Division), 186 Unrest, 345–346 the Unsane, 28, 41, 346–347 Unsane (the Unsane), 346 The Untidy Suicides of Your Degenerate Children (Alice Donut), 14 Untitled (JFA), 166 Unwound, 44, 169, 221, 347–349 Up in It (Afghan Whigs), 12 urban psychedelia, 108 Urge Overkill, 52, 349–350 the Urinals, 10 Uzi, 69 V-3, 330, 351–353 Valentin, Rick, 247 Valentines from Matahari (Sun City Girls), 312 Vampire On Titus (Guided by Voices), 135 Van Halen, 102 Vedder, Eddie, 355 Vee, Tesco, 216

Vee Vee (Archers of Loaf), 17, 18 Velocity Girl, 175 Velvet Hammer (Scrawl), 273 Velvette, Lorette, 299 The Velvet Underground, 91, 104, 124, 140, 172, 187, 227, 353 Venus Luxure No. 1 Baby (Girls Against Boys), 128–129 Verlaines, 360 Versus, 350–351 Vertical Slit, 351–353 Vicious Circle, 339 Vig, Butch, 171, 222, 326 Violent Femmes, 353 Violent Femmes (Violent Femmes), 353 Viva Last Blues (Will Oldham/ Palace), 231 Void, 41, 83, 102 Volcano Suns, 16, 281, 299, 354 Voluntary Lifelong Quarantine (Luxurious Bags), 180–181 von Bolhen, Davey, 61 Vortura (Bailter Space), 26 Vs. (Mission of Burma), 204 The VSS, 131 Wade, Adam, 158–159 Waits, Tom, 143, 166 Walford, Britt, 50, 101, 290, 303 Walk Among Us (Misfits), 202–203 Walker, Scott, 143 Wallace, Andy, 222 Wammo (Bailter Space), 26–27 Warehouse: Songs and Stories (Hüsker Dü), 154–155 Warham, Dean, 124 Warlocks, 63 Warren, Jared, 168 Washam, Rey, 163, 252 Washing Machine (Sonic Youth), 234, 298–299 Wasser, Joan, 75 Watt, Mike, 104–105, 200–201, 355 Wattle and Daub (Strapping Fieldhands), 309 The Way to Salvation (King Missile), 170 The Wedding Present, 98 Weed Forestin’ (Sebadoh), 277 Weeds, 78 Ween, 90, 336, 355–358 Ween, Dean. See Melchiondo, Mickey Ween, Gene. See Freeman, Aaron Weinberg, Howie, 223 Weinrich, Scott “Wino,” 269 Weir, Bob, 216 Weiss, Andrew, 356 Weiss, Janet, 289 Welcome to Sky Valley (Kyuss), 172

Weldon, Craig, 281 Westerberg, Paul, 258–259, 362 Westing (Pavement), 233 Weston, Bob, 281 Whatchamacallit (Brick Layer Cake), 51 Whatever’s Cool with Me (Dinosaur Jr), 87–88, 223 What Makes a Man Start Fires? (Minutemen), 200–201 What To Do about Them (Swirlies), 320–321 What We Do (Doo Rag), 90 What Would the Community Think? (Cat Power), 62 When In Vanitas (Brise-Glace), 126 Where’s My Towel (Big Boys), 34 Where the Wild Things Are (Fang), 102–103 Where You Been (Dinosaur Jr), 88 Whiskey (Cheater Slicks), 65 White, Craig, 276 White, Jack, 110 White, Mike, 289 The White Birch (Codeine), 68 White Flag, 11 White Stripes, 110 Why Do Birds Sing? (Violent Femmes), 353 Wick, Jerry, 127 Wider, 64 Wiggs, Josephine, 50 Wilco, 336, 344 Wild Flag, 19, 289 Wild Gift (X), 360 Wild In the Streets (Circle Jerks), 67 Wild Love (smog), 293 Wild Things (Bush Tetras), 54 Williams, Hank, 342 Williams, Ian, 89 Williams, Ricky, 289, 333–334 Williams, Rozz, 66 Willis, Cody, 169 Wills, David, 216 Wilson, Kaia, 11 Wipers, 358–359 Wire, 147 Without a Sound (Dinosaur Jr), 88 Wood, Brad, 236, 276 Woods, Tom, 45 The Word and the Flesh (Band of Susans), 27–28 Workbook (Bob Mould), 142, 310 World Music style, 61 World of Pooh, 360 Worrell, Bernie, 355 Wowee Zowee (Pavement), 234–235 Wright, John, 226 Wright, Rob, 226 Wrong (NoMeansNo), 226 Wynn, Steve, 91

X, 360 Xerxes (Arcwelder), 19 X-Ray Spex, 35 XTC, 98 Yamamoto, Hiro, 337 Yang, Naomi, 124 Yank Crime (Drive Like Jehu), 92 Yarber, Jack, 227 Yeah, Me Too (Gaunt), 127 Yerself Is Steam/Lego My Ego (Mercury Rev), 194 Yip/Jump Music (Daniel Johnston), 166 Yo La Tengo, 76, 103, 166, 342, 361 You Can’t Fight What You Can’t See (Girls Against Boys), 129 You Can’t Pray A Lie (Laughing Hyenas), 173–174 You’d Prefer an Astronaut (Hum), 148–149 You in Reverse (Built to Spill), 53 Young, Gary, 232 Young, LaMonte, 63 Young Fresh Fellows, 246, 362 Young God (Swans), 319 Youngs, Richard, 158 You’re Living All Over Me (Dinosaur Jr), 84–85, 87, 277, 296 Youth of America (Wipers), 358–359 You Turn Me On (Beat Happening), 30, 31 Yow, David, 163, 272 Yu, Tae Won, 169 Zander, Robin, 246 Zapata, Mia, 129 Zedek, Thalia, 69 Zen Arcade (Hüsker Dü), 83, 150, 153, 202, 260, 296 Zen Identity, 177 Zinser, Thomas, 331–332 Zumpano, 316 ZZ Top, 189

INDEX 399

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I

spent upwards of an hour going over the last six months, making sure I was indeed about to start writing an acknowledgments section that acknowledges six people, but it’s the truth, and it’s a source of pride. Paramount among them

is Dennis Pernu, my longtime editor at Voyageur Press/Quarto Group. I have now

written two books as well as album essays in seven coffee-table illustrated histories for Dennis since December of 2007. And from December of 2012 until June of 2013, Dennis worked with me on three different book proposals before a fourth grew legs and here we are, because although it’s the sort of thing that remains unspoken in these kinds of professional relationships, I know he really went to bat for this one, and I know he continued to do so until the book was written and edited in May of 2014. He did something that seems to be more uncommon as the years go by: he played the true and traditional role of an editor. Other thanks need to go out to my colleague and friend Doug Mosurock, Jon Solomon of ComedyMinusOne Records, and my friends Dale McNeil and Ryan Brown. And finally, something much bigger than “thanks” goes out to my better half and life-love, Elizabeth Murphy, who (regardless of how cliché it may read) is the real force behind this book’s completion.

Contact andrewearles.com [email protected] Twitter: @GimmeIndie500

400 GIMME INDIE ROCK