500 ESSENTIAL A M E R I C A N U N D E R G R O U N D 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. 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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 A 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. 4 GIMMEINDIE ROCK 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 INTRODUCTION 5 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 avant- pop, and other styles that would soon drive guitars deeper into the metal- and hardcore- based 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, straight- up record guides were made obsolete once the sounds of yesterday and today could be 6 GIMMEINDIE ROCK 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 INTRODUCTION 7