Apparently, I'm back to hating black people.
My vote is
Other - Professionals - I Didn't See It Coming. Better than the Sex Pistols by a country mile.
Omissions:
Martha and the Muffins * This Is The Ice Age (Dindisc/Virgin) 81
The Raincoats * Ody Shape (Rough Trade)
David Byrne/Brian Eno * My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts (Sire)
The Sound * From The Lions Mouth (Korova/Renascent)
Bad Brains * Attitude (ROIR/In-Effect)
Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark * Architecture & Morality (Virgin)
Talking Heads * The Name Of The Band Is Talking Heads (Sire)
Yellow Magic Orchestra * Technodelic (EMI/Alfa)
The Blue Orchids * The Greatest Hit (Money Mountain) (Rough Trade/Ltm)
Art Bears * The World As It Is Today (Recommended)
Lizzy Mercier Descloux * Mambo Nassau (Ze)
Comsat Angels * Sleep No More (Polydor)
David Byrne * The Catherine Wheel (Sire)
King Crimson * Discipline (WB)
Echo & the Bunnymen * Heaven Up Here (Sire)
Dome * Dome 3 (Dome/Grey Area)
Ryuichi Sakamoto * Left Handed Dream (MIDI)
Jerry Harrison * The Red And The Black (Sire)
Rip Rig + Panic * God (Virgin)
Chrome * Blood On The Moon (Siren/Dossier)
Tuxedomoon * Desire (Ralph)
Adam & The Ants * Prince Charming (Do It/Columbia)
Public Image Ltd. * The Flowers Of Romance (WB)
The English Beat * Wha'ppen? (Sire)
Stiff Little Fingers * Peel Sessions (Strange Fruit)
Psychedelic Furs * Talk Talk Talk (Columbia)
The Replacements * Sorry Ma, Forgot TTOTT (Twin/Tone)
Gun Club * Fire of Love (Ruby)
The Fall * Slates EP (Castle/Sanctuary)
Fela Kuti * Black President (Capitol)
The Durutti Column * LC (Factory)
The Passage * For All And None (Virgin)
T.S.O.L. * Dance With Me (Frontier)
Crass * Penis Envy (Crass)
Minutemen * The Punch Line (SST)
New Age Steppers * Action Battlefield (On-U Sound/Statik)
Rip, Rig + Panic * God (Virgin)
Iron Maiden * Killers (Capitol)
Squeeze * East Side Story (A&M)
Heaven 17 * Penthouse and Pavement (Virgin)
B.E.F. * Music For Listening To (Virgin)
Raven * Rock Till You Drop (Roadrunner)
The Scientists (Cherry Red/SFTRI)
Chrome * Inworlds (Siren)
Cabaret Voltaire * Red Mecca (Mute)
Material * Memory Serves (Celluloid)
Wall Of Voodoo * Dark Continent (IRS)
Fingerprintz * Beat Noir (Virgin)
The dB's * Stands for deciBels (EMI)
Gang Of Four * Peel Sessions (Strange Fruit)
New Order * Movement (Factory)
Stiff Little Fingers * Go For It (Chrysalis)
Killing Joke * What's THIS for . . . ! (Virgin)
Siouxsie & the Banshees * Juju (Geffen)
The Stranglers * La Folie (EMI)
Associates * Fourth Drawer Down (V2)
Yello * Claro Que Si (Ralph/Mercury)
Bauhaus * Mask (Beggars Banquet)
The The * Burning Blue Soul (Epic)
Agent Orange * Living In Darkness (Posh Boy)
John Foxx * The Garden (Virgin)
Colin Newman * Provisionally Entitled The Singing Fish (4AD)
AC/DC * Highway To Hell (Atco)
The Church * Of Skins And Hearts (Arista)
Tygers Of Pan Tang * Spellbound (MCA)
Riot * Fire Down Under (Fire Sign/Metal Bldade)
Black Uhuru * Red (Mango)
Tom Tom Club (Sire)
The Go-Betweens * Send Me A Lullaby (Beggars Banquet)
Clock DVA * Thirst (Contempo)
Ozzy Osbourne * Diary Of A Madman (Jet)
Girlschool * Hit & Run (Stiff/Sanctuary)
B.E.F. (British Electric Foundation) * Music For Listening To (Virgin)
Trouble Funk * Early Singles (Infinite Zero)
Plimsouls * The Plimsouls (Planet)
Ludus * The Seduction (New Hormones)
The Suburbs * Credit In Heaven (Twin/Tone)
8 Eyed Spy (Fetish)
The Teardrop Explodes * Wilder (Mercury)
The Homosexuals * The Homosexuals' Record 1978-1981 (ReR)
Wah! * Nah=Poo - The Art Of Bluff (Castle)
Soft Cell * Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret (Phonogram)
The Jam * The Gift (Polydor)
Tom Verlaine * Dreamtime (WB)
The Cure * Faith (Elektra)
The Human League * Dare (Virgin)
Samson * Shock Tactics (Grand Slamm)
Modern English * Mesh & Lace (4AD)
Simple Minds * Sons And Fascination/Sister Feelings Call (Virgin)
Altered Images * Happy Birthday (Epic)
Ludus * Pickpocket EP (New Hormones/LTD)
Van Halen * Women And Children First (WB)
The Undertones * Positive Touch (Sire/Rykodisc)
Josef K * The Only Fun In Town (LTD)
The Slits * Return Of The Giant Slits (Epic)
Heavy Load * Metal Conquest (Thunderload)
Joe Jackson * Jumpin' Jive (A&M)
Grace Jones * Nightclubbing (Island)
Adolescents * Adolescents (Frontier)
Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers * Hard Promises (MCA)
The Professionals * I Didn't See It Coming (EMI)
New Musik * Anywhere (Epic)
Kid Creole & the Coconuts * Fresh Fruit In Foreign Places (Ze/Universal/Island)
Bow Wow Wow * See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang Yeah! City All Over, Go Ape Crazy! (One Way)
Anderson/Burroughs/Giorno * You're the Guy I Want to Share My Life With (Rough Trade)
The Undertones * Peel Sessions (Strange Fruit)
Pretenders * Pretenders II (Sire)
Big Boys * Where's My Towel (WastedTalent/Touch&Go)
Felt * Crumbling The Antiseptic Beauty (Cherry Red)
Yellow Magic Orchestra * BGM (Sony)
Dexys Midnight Runners * Too Rye Ay (Mercury)
Funkadelic * The Electric Spanking Of War Babies (WB/Charly Groove)
Prince * Controversy (WB)
Motorhead * No Sleep 'Til Hammersmith (Bronze)
Rush * Moving Pictures (Polygram)
The Cramps * Psychedelic Jungle (I.R.S.)
Ramones * Pleasant Dreams (Sire)
Iggy Pop * Party (Arista)
Neil Young * Re-ac-tor (Reprise)
Exploited * Punks Not Dead (Exploited)
The Wipers * Youth Of America (Restless)
Fred Frith * Speechless (ESD)
Fist * Fleet Street (A&M)
MX-80 * Crowd Control (Ralph)
The Vapors * Magnets (Liberty/EMI)
The Police * Ghost In The Machine (A&M)
AC/DC * For Those About To Rock... (Atco)
The Stranglers * The Men In Black (EMI)
Generation X * Kiss Me Deadly (Chrysalis)
Black Sabbath * Mob Rules (WB)
Accept * Breaker (Universal/Brain)
Y&T * Earthshaker (A&M)
Section 25 * Always Now (Factory)
The Cars * Shake It Up (Elektra)
The Saints * The Monkey Puzzle (Mushroom)
Mars * 78+ (Atavistic)
Motley Crue * Too Fast For Love (Beyond)
Robyn Hitchcock * Black Snake Diamond Role (Rhino)
Neville Brothers * Fiyo On The Bayou (A&M)
U2 * October (Island)
Electric Light Orchestra * Time (Jet)
Venom * Welcome To Hell (Neat/Combat)
Saxon * Denim And Leather (Carrere)
Motley Crue * Too Fast For Love (Beyond)
Depeche Mode * Speak & Spell (Sire)
Def Leppard * High 'N' Dry (Polydor)
Telex * Sex (Sire)
Madness * 7 (Sire)
Ultravox * Rage In Eden (Chrysalis)
The Fall * A Part Of America Herein, 1981 (Rough Trade)
Devo * New Traditionalists (WB)
The B-52's * Party Mix (WB)
Rick James * Street Songs (Motown)
Dictators * Fuck 'Em If They Can't TAJ (ROIR)
Husker Du * Land Speed Record (SST)
Judas Priest * Point Of Entry (Columbia)
Elvis Costello & the Attractions * Almost Blue (Columbia)
ZZ Top * El Loco (WB)
Tygers Of Pan Tang * Crazy Nights (MCA)
Parliament * Trombipulation (Casablanca)
Go-Go's * Beauty & the Beat (IRS)
The Birthday Party - Prayers On Fire
Quote:
It should come as no surprise that there is an album in Nick Cave's oeuvre called Prayers on Fire; a fascination with the dark, (self-)destructive side of religion is more than evident in his later work with the Bad Seeds. While there might not be any of the explicit Biblical imagery on Prayers on Fire that Cave would later ejaculate, the title of the album is apt, and its aptness is revealed almost immediately. Over the tribal thud of floor toms, shards of trebly guitar, the throb of an organ, and even a creepily out-of-place trumpet come the possessed, chant-like vocals — not an incantation to any god, but to "Zoo-Music Girl." It's the religion of depraved sexuality, bestial urges, and sadomasochism. "We spend our lives in a box full of dirt/I murder her dress till it hurts/I murder her dress and she loves it," howls Cave, echoing Leonard Cohen and finally concluding with the berserk plea, "Oh! God! Please let me die beneath her fists." Meanwhile, Cave sounds like he's actually being assaulted by the music, emitting horrific gasps and primitive grunts. And this is only the first track. On the next two tracks, language itself is violated and found inadequate. Words collapse upon themselves in "Cry," with Cave tossing out self-annihilating binaries like "space/no space," "fish/no fish," "clothes/no clothes," and "flesh/no flesh." On "Capers," penned by Genevieve McGuckin, semantics are made into sausage — words are chewed up and regurgitated as warped neologisms: "gloomloom," "clocklock," "paperparrent," "diehood." The lyrics for "Figure of Fun" aren't even printed in the booklet; instead, merely "obsessive, deadpan, moribund, seasick, etc." And perhaps that best sums up Prayers on Fire's graveyard poetry. The rest of the album is a subterranean labyrinth full of "sand and soot and dust and dirt," peopled by bizarre characters like Nick the Stripper and King Ink, and replete with images of murder, decay, blood, and Kafka-esque insects. Then, of course, there's Cave himself, the literate ghoul with an impressive vocal range who just stepped out of a B horror flick, trying to parry the intensity of the music like an Iggy Pop wasted on goth pills. But be careful not to overlook his subtle sense of humor and his awareness of the camp — there are also chickens to be counted, nuns inside his head, and Fats Domino on the radio. With Mick Harvey being the only future Bad Seed on hand (Anita Lane also contributed one set of lyrics), the music here foreshadows Cave's later work without quite resembling it (with the exception of his first album). The Birthday Party are closer to Joy Division (only more theatrical), the Pop Group (only spookier), or Pere Ubu (only more percussive). Though present on most of the tracks, the moody piano that would dominate much of Cave's solo work is never really prominent here. Instead it's the squiggles of Rowland Howard's guitar dodging the blows of the furious rhythm section that distinguishes the Birthday Party. Oppressive and unrelenting, Prayers on Fire is highly recommended for those aspiring to advanced states of dementia.
Black Flag - DamagedQuote:
Perhaps the best album to emerge from the quagmire that was early-'80s California hardcore punk, the visceral, intensely physical presence of Damaged has yet to be equaled, although many bands have tried. Although Black Flag had been recording for three years prior to this release, the fact that Henry Rollins was now their lead singer made all the difference. His furious bellow and barely contained ferocity was the missing piece the band needed to become great. Also, guitarist/mastermind Greg Ginn wrote a slew of great songs for this record that, while suffused with the usual punk conceits (alienation, boredom, disenfranchisement), were capable of making one laugh out loud, especially the protoslacker satire "TV Party." Extremely controversial when it was released, Damaged endured the slings and arrows of outrageous criticism (some reacted as though this record alone would cause the fall of America's youth) to become and remain an important document of its time.
Gang of Four - Solid GoldQuote:
Gang of Four's existence had as much to do with Slave and Chic as it did the Sex Pistols and the Stooges, which is something Solid Gold demonstrates more than Entertainment! Any smartypants can point out the irony of a band on Warner Bros. railing against systematic tools of control disguised as entertainment media, but Gang of Four were more observational than condescending. True, Jon King and Andy Gill might have been hooting and hollering in a semiviolent and discordant fashion, but they were saying "think about it" more than "you lot are a bunch of mindless puppets." Abrasiveness was a means to grab the listener, and it worked. Reciting Solid Gold's lyrics on a local neighborhood corner might get a couple interested souls to pay attention. It isn't poetry, and it's no fun; most within earshot would just continue power-walking or tune out while buffing the SUV. Solid Gold has that unholy racket going on beneath the lyrics, an unlikely mutation of catchiness and atonality that made ears perk and (oddly) posteriors shake. With its slightly ironic title, Solid Gold is more rhythmically grounded than the fractured nature of Entertainment!, a politically charged, more Teutonic take on funk. It's a form of release for paranoid accountants. Financial concerns form the basis of the subject matter; the hilarious but realistic "Cheeseburger" is a highlight with its thinly veiled snipe at America: "No classes in the U.S.A./Improve yourself, the choice is yours/Work at your job and make good pay/Make friends, great/Buy them a beer!" This is a nickel less spectacular than the debut, but owning one and not the other would be criminal.
X - Wild GiftQuote:
For X's second release, 1981's Wild Gift, the quartet followed the same path they had taken a year earlier on their debut, Los Angeles, creating another batch of timeless compositions that merged the energy of punk rock with other musical styles. Former Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek reprised his role as producer on what would turn out to be X's last independent release before signing to Elektra. Included are such eventual punk standards as "We're Desperate," the melodic hookfest "White Girl" (sampled years later by the Red Hot Chili Peppers in their song "Good Time Boys"), and "Beyond and Back" (which would serve as a title for their 1997 two-CD anthology). Other highlights include the '50s-prom feel of "Adult Books," the punk-pop composition "In This House That I Call Home," and the rapid "Back 2 the Base." While it may be a shade less exceptional than its predecessor, Wild Gift is nonetheless a classic effort.
This Heat - DeceitQuote:
Out of all the boundary breaking that occurred during the fertile era of post-punk, This Heat's Deceit is one of the most expansive, imaginative, and remarkably wild records to have been produced during the time — and very possibly the last three decades. It's an impressive procession of tangential shards that encompass tape collages, Middle Eastern motifs, barbaric vocal clamoring, and occasional pointy-jagged-atonal guitar passages that alternate between hypnotizing and shooting clean through your spine. The typical structures of jazz, world music, and rock & roll are heaved into a blender, cooking up a post-punk paella that's about as relaxing as a crosstown walk through a hail storm. It ends up hardly resembling anything it takes cues from. As with a good number of the album's ten tracks, random peeks into "Paper Hats" at the minute markers will hardly sound like the same song. And that song hardly resembles any of the others on the record; yet, it encapsulates what makes the whole thing so exciting. The song in question trots along arrhythmically with some bass, drum, and spindly guitar interplay until sputtering into a wreck of those instruments and who knows what else — this 20-second interruption, which resembles the Junkyard Gang's idea of warming up, abruptly gives way to a march down a Twilight Zone-themed corridor of snaky guitar, pulsing high hats, and creeped-out atmospherics. If you can make out any of the lyrics (the ones in "Independence" should ring a bell, though), you'll realize the mushroom clouds and political figures depicted in the sleeve aren't the only evidence that the record is about war and nukes. Know this — if you really want to be thrown around a room, there's hardly a better source. No greater record has been made in an abandoned meat locker.
The Au Pairs - Playing with a Different SexQuote:
Opening with the tongue-in-cheek "We're So Cool," the Au Pairs' debut record is a stunner, from Lesley Woods' scratchy guitar and declamatory vocals to lead guitarist Paul Foad's brittle soloing. This is an uncompromising, defiant record that asks no quarter; gender roles are turned upside down, hetero- and homosexual relationships put under a microscope, and theories about sex and sexuality turned upside down. Similarly, the tense political situation in Northern Ireland is harrowingly addressed in "Armagh," which details Tory-sanctioned torture and sexual abuse of wrongly imprisoned Irish women. An unfliching look at the world, Playing with a Different Sex is one of the great, and perhaps forgotten, post-punk records. The CD reissue on RPM adds eight significant bonus cuts from 1979-81 singles, which include different versions of tracks from the album and some songs which didn't make it onto the LP in any form.
Japan - Tin DrumQuote:
Partially growing out of their success in the country they were named after, as well as growing friendship and affiliation with such bands as Yellow Magic Orchestra, Japan, on Tin Drum, made its most unique, challenging, and striking album. It was also the final full studio effort from the group, and what a way to bow out — there was practically no resemblance to the trash glam flailers on Adolescent Sex anymore. Rather than repeat the sheer restraint on Gentlemen Take Polaroids, Tin Drum is an album of energy, Sylvian's singing still the decadently joyful thing it is, but the arrangements and performances tight, full, and active. The fusion of exquisite funk courtesy of Karn and Jansen's joined-at-the-hip rhythm section and a range of Asian music influences, from instrumentation to subject matter, combined with an even wider use of technological approaches to create the dramatic, sly songs on offer. Only the Talking Heads showed the same attempt at reach and variety at the time, at least in the Western rock world, but Japan arguably outstripped the New York band with its sheer sense of theatrical style. To top it all off, the band was more popular than ever, with "Ghosts," an appropriately haunting ballad notable for its utterly minimal arrangement, almost entirely eschewing beats for Barbieri's textures and Jansen's work on marimba, becoming a Top Ten hit in the U.K. The wound-up dancefloor art grooves of "The Art of Parties" and especially "Visions of China," the latter featuring what has to be Karnand Jansen's eternal highlight performance (check out Jansen's jaw-dropping drum break) were also notable efforts. Meanwhile, the evocation of Chinese culture in general continued with such songs as "Canton," a slightly martial, stately march with clear inspiration from the country's classical music tradition, and the concluding "Cantonese Boy."
Elvis Costello and the Attractions - TrustQuote:
Following the frenzied pop-soul of Get Happy!!, Elvis Costello & the Attractions quickly returned to the studio and recorded Trust, their most ambitious and eclectic album to date. As if he was proving his stylistic diversity, and his sophistication after the concentrated genre experiment of Get Happy!!, Costello assembled Trust as a stylistic tour de force, packing the record with a wild array of material. "Clubland" has jazzy flourishes, "Lovers' Walk" rolls to a Bo Diddley beat, "Luxembourg" is rockabilly-redux, "Watch Your Step" is soul-pop, "From a Whisper to a Scream" rocks as hard as anything since This Year's Model, "Shot With His Own Gun" is Tin Pan Alley pop, "Different Finger" is the first country song he put on an official album. And that's not even counting highlights like "New Lace Sleeves" and "White Knuckles," which essentially stick to Costello's signature pop, but offer more complex arrangements and musicianship than before. In fact, both "complexity" and "sophistication" are keywords to the success of Trust — without delving into the minutely textured arrangements that would dominate his next pop album, Imperial Bedroom — Costello & the Attractions demonstrate their musical skill and savvy by essentially sticking to the direct sound of their four-piece band. In the process, they recorded, arguably, their most impressive album; one that demonstrates all sides of Costello's songwriting and performing personality without succumbing to pretentiousness.
