Pere Ubu - The Modern Dance (1978)

Artist - Pere Ubu
Album - The Modern Dance
Year - 1978
Country - US
Genre - Post-Punk

DC told me to rip my review from RYM. So:

A band of street musicians plays punk music with robots and angry hobos at a train station in a noisy and chaotic future city. They are interrupted and accompanied by the noises of the station; trains, passengers in conversation running off to unknown destinations, traffic, and the general noises of the city. As night falls and the station quiets down, their music takes a somber tone. Once alone, the group take part in an anarchic jam session and vandalize the station. As dawn approaches they play one last song, a fitting finale to their performance.

One of my favorite albums of all time... it just has such a wonderful energy to it, and it really builds an atmosphere. There's catchy shit, but at the same time it does stuff that would scare away anybody just looking for catchy shit. The album has a great flow, and I absolutely love some of the sounds the band gets out of the instruments. From the shrieking solo on the Modern Dance, to Thomas' at times psychotic sounding vocals, to the cacophony of noise that Sentimental Journey builds to, I just love this album.

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Bardo Pond - Bufo Alvarius, Amen 29:15 (1995)

I don't really know how to classify this album. Drone, shoegaze, noise rock, post rock, space rock, psychedelic rock, or is it some kind of Frankenstein monster made up of all of them? Fuzzy droning guitars build up layers of solid sound and then the band weaves melodies through the wailing wall of sound, whether they are some sort of cosmic blues, meditative chant, or some other remnant of whatever musical influences built this album.

The main portion of the album explores all of the possibilities contained within that collection of influences. The album ends on the collosal "Amen," and while I love the kind of sloppy noisy blues rock that makes up the rest of the album, Amen feels relaxing. It relieves the tension of the album. It is almost a peaceful song, despite the droning guitar. The bells and the female vocalist have a sort of beauty that is lacking in the rest of the album and is a fitting way to end it.

I figured this was the least likely album of my possible choices to have overlap with the group, so hopefully I will be giving some people a new listening experience. DemonCashew is pretty positive about it, so hopefully thats a good sign for the rest of your preferences. (Though he likes Lady Gaga and Animal Collective so I'm not sure if we can trust him.) He says I should mention the vocals, which I guess are kind of weird when they are actually trying to say something. I don't know what that guy is going on about.

the place of sending

post courtesy of Florpy.