Treble’s Best Albums of the ’80s: Part Two
1987
10. Big Black — Songs About Fucking (Touch and Go)
Songs About Fucking is loud, it’s abrasive, it’s unattractive in the extreme. It’s a collection of sordid tales and odder oddities, a parade of grotesques born from the minds of Chicago-area natives with ugly, wrinkly brains sloshing around in their misshapen noggins in a broth that is equal parts brilliance and bile. So really, it’s everything that made Big Black so great in the first place. – Hubert Vigilla
9. Guns `n Roses — Appetite for Destruction (Geffen)
With 1987’s Appetite for Destruction Guns N’ Roses took the sunset strip metal scene of LA by storm. The package of glam metal itself was wrapped in a look of big hair and neon spandex and delivered by stiletto heels snapping lipstick-stained bubble gum from the stage to the public. Bluntly, the scene was too pretty for its own good and the only chance at salvation would be to destroy and rebuild. And that’s exactly what GNR did. – Kevin Falahee
8. The Jesus and Mary Chain — Darklands (Blanco Y Negro)
Post-Gillespie, post-Psychocandy, Jim and William Reid reduced the sugar and fuzz, letting macabre stiffen the melody. Darklands is the densest beast in the JAMC discography. Completely automated drums and a preoccupation with the dismal side to life cast it in contrast to the debut’s hazing Wilson fuzz box, or Stoned and Dethroned‘s knowing tranquillity. Confinement imagery looms large, particularly that which life springs on the individual, rather than an angst of fashion or pre-determinism. The themes of rain, self-demolition and heartbreak in the most vindictive sense clutter the mindset of these songs. This time the girl is in league with the world against our protagonist, and the manic confusion that made all OK won’t push the buttons any more. The party is over. – Thomas Lee
7. Depeche Mode — Music for the Masses (Sire)
One thing that DM tried to change was the use of guitars. Known mainly as a band that used a variety of keyboards and synthesizers, songwriter Martin Gore tried to give the new album something different. The band described their new music as electronic metal, wore leather (always), sometimes with studs, and really played up the goth-metal imagery. But rather than wallow in misery, Depeche Mode became somewhat of a joyous band to its fans, and Music for the Masses would ironically become exactly what the title jokingly intended. – Terrance Terich
6. The Pixies — Come On Pilgrim (4AD)
Hands down, the best demo tape ever commercially released. I mean, I don’t know how many demo tapes were actually released. Maybe Nebraska counts, or any Guided by Voices album. Either way, The Pixies wins for not actually trying to make one of the greatest albums of the decade, and somehow pulling it off. Yeah, sure, their next two would be even more mind-blowing, but they had Albini and Gil Norton on their side. This was a damn demo. Didn’t I make that clear? – Jeff Terich
5. R.E.M. — Document (IRS)
Set aside the fact that R.E.M. shot rapidly downward in quality, and cast your mind back to a time when they wrote meaningful songs and Michael Stipe had just learnt to sing properly. Document is the other, shocking side of the 80s: Reagan, Nicaragua, the Contra scandal, Grenada …and MTV. – Chris Griffiths
4. Sonic Youth — Sister (SST)
Sister is Sonic Youth’s seventh album and some have considered it a transition album from the band’s early experimental indie label albums to Daydream Nation and Dirty, moving to a grander scale in terms of sound. Transitional shmansitional. Yeah, it differed from EVOL and Bad Moon Rising, but was Sonic Youth a band that ever went down a linear path? The charm of Sonic Youth was that their songs seemed to capture that spark of initial creativity, making everything sound fresh and new. – Jackie Im
3. The Smiths — Strangeways, Here We Come (Rough Trade – Sire)
In September of 1987, The Smiths were officially kaput. What the Britons left behind is a polished, some accuse over-produced, offering that boasts the well-crafted songwriting expected from such glum, pale fellows. Thus Strangeways comes brimming with melancholy tales of love gone, Marr’s musicianship and Morrissey’s swoony vocals. – Hubert Vigilla
2. Dinosaur Jr. — You’re Living All Over Me (Warner Bros.)
Boy, what a fucking mess. There’s distortion all over the place, sloppy guitar solos, lo-fi recording quality, some kind of screwed up cover of a Cure song. And that stoned warble, what is that? Oh, right, that’s You’re Living All Over Me, the first great indie record for guitar geeks. J. Mascis, Lou Barlow and Murph made a mighty racket on their sophomore release, and said racket was among the best of their career. It would take seven years before they finally got around to making that funny-as-hell golf video, but an album this rocking can get by without the rooftop putting. – Jeff Terich
1.U2 — The Joshua Tree (Island)
While past albums explored injustices with confidence, religious themes with absolute faith and love with sincerity, The Joshua Tree found Bono, the Edge, Larry Mullen and Adam Clayton tinged with doubt and insecurity. That’s not what most people tend to remember about the album, however, as so many of its songs became recognizable stadium anthems, but that’s what they’re about. “Where the Streets Have No Name,” with its haunted, rising organ lines and the Edge’s echoed arpeggio guitar seem to exude self-assurance, yet the lyrics belie that swagger. The opening lyrics say it all when Bono grits, “I want to run / I want to hide.” – Terrance Terich
Personal Best
Echo & The Bunnymen – Echo & The Bunnymen (Sire)
Echo purists will rain on the grey album’s parade due to its accessibility, but it remains a work finding the band at their creative peak. Oddly, it’s the third album I’ve reviewed from the year 1987 that featured photography from Anton Corbijn (the other two being U2’s The Joshua Tree and Depeche Mode’s Music for the Masses), proving he had great taste in music. Just as Echo would trot out a bunch of covers to find inspiration, so too did Coldplay on their tour in support of A Rush of Blood to the Head, as they covered “Lips Like Sugar.” Their tour posters were all done in the style of the cover photo of the grey album as well. “God’s one miracle, lost in circles,” indeed. – Terrance Terich
Robbie Robertson – Robbie Robertson (Geffen)
I previously wrote two reviews covering the first major production works from Daniel Lanois, and Robbie Robertson is somewhat the fourth in a quadrilogy of albums featuring his blend of arena rock meets world music. U2’s The Unforgettable Fire and The Joshua Tree, bookending Peter Gabriel’s So, were the initial trilogy, and each of those artists appear on Robertson’s album. Each of the four albums are steeped in a kind of sepia-toned grainy Americana, which is odd considering U2 is Irish, Gabriel British, and Robertson Canadian. But being that Robertson’s mother was Mohawk and he grew up in and around the culture, he seemingly had the most inside perspective. – Terrance Terich
The Silencers – A Letter From St. Paul (RCA)
I ended up buying the cassette at the Tower Records in San Diego across from the Sports Arena. It is one of the few albums I can remember exactly when and where I purchased it, that’s the effect this album had on me. The cover struck me first, all white with the band placed in the lower right in front of their gear, Jimmie holding his guitar and wearing a jaunty cap, the band’s name in huge gray letters at the top. In its simplicity, it still remains one of my favorite album covers of all time. I already knew the song “Painted Moon,” but other songs on the album would win me over on further listens. – Terrance Terich
