Now this is how it started: THE ILX 1980s ALBUM POLL RESULTS!!

42. Hüsker Dü - New Day Rising [1985] (146 points, 14 votes)

http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/ciu/42/c9/6653228348a09b0db25e2110.L.jpg

Yes, Goddammit, where is the love for NEW DAY RISING. Spectacular from end to end, even errr... the less than spectacular parts. Title track is bliss.

― BlastsOfStatic (BlastsofStatic), 8. huhtikuuta 2005

I think New Day Rising is my favorite too but I like them all so who knows. Newest Industry and Chartered Trips are my favorite songs though. I remember getting Metal Circus in high school and being totally freaked out by Diane. The production on the later records bothers me way more than on the early stuff. In fact I don't notice it at all up through New Day Rising.

― dan. (dan.), 8. huhtikuuta 2005

The Living End, then Zen & Rising, broke my brain &, in essence, birthed my full-on indie wuv when I first heard them 10+ years ago (w/ Sugar serving as the womb). Then I went through a phase where I disowned Husker. Then I felt a little nostalgic (& glommed onto Everything Falls Apart, because it sounded fresh to me). Then I TOTALLY disowned them. Now, I think I'm ambivalent & nostalgically curious, tho I don't think I'll ever hear what I heard way back when now, which is to be expected, but still disappointing. Not that I really need to hear them ever again - I can probably bring up any song from those 2 records at any time in my noggin. Except for the cat skinning one (which I really like). And "59 Times The Pain" can go trip on a bear trap.

― David R. (popshots75`), 8. huhtikuuta 2005 17:56

I'm totally wearing a big eye-piercing orange New Day Rising shirt today

― Zack Richardson (teenagequiet), 8. huhtikuuta 2005 18:46

This Nation's Saving Grace is the one they tacked "Cruiser's Creek" too, right?

― EZ Snappin, Friday, November 27, 2009 1:46 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark

Yes, it was "Barmy" in the UK iirc. One of my two Fall LP votes. I also voted for EVOL.

ick, I really don't like NDR very much as a whole but that bodes well for Zen Arcade.

my 2nd top 5 pick...MP II wz #5, and EVOL wz #3

I hope Cosmic Thing (#4) makes it but I have my doubts...

41. The Cure - Pornography [1982] (148 points, 9 votes)

http://i357.photobucket.com/albums/oo12/RCSDVD_2008/pornography.jpg

All three (_Pornography_, _Disintegration_, _Bloodflowers_) are great. Since I spent most of yesterday listening to _Pornography_ on repeat, I have to give the nod to that one this week.

― Dan Perry, 7. toukokuuta 2002 3:00

This is tough, and strangely, it's the album I had on in the van while driving around all my xmas peeps last night.

For years, 100 Years was the no contest winner. More recently, I've been all about that one-two punch at the end of Cold and Pornography.

But now that lyric from the Figurehad "I will never be clean again" is echoing in my mind.

This is my favorite Cure record.

― Nate Carson, 26. joulukuuta 2008 0:08

This is one of the best records of the 80's all-time. It pretty much sparked me into being a music-lover. I don't see bleakness so much as unimaginable fantasy and arching wonder. It's a deeply, deeply psychedelic piece of music.

And I don't know what to vote for. Probably "The Figurehead" or "A Strange Day" but every track (except maybe "The Hanging Garden") has a fair shout.

― baby got bahn (country matters), 26. joulukuuta 2008 7:08

i'm going to have to think about this for a long, long time. is there an album that even sounds close to this one? truly one of the best albums ever made and looking forward to hearing it this week to make up my mind.

― Bee OK, 26. joulukuuta 2008 7:56

We're into the biggish hitters now and I'm having to admit that the things I voted for and hoped would turn up in the 60-100 range aren't going to happen now. Oh well...

yeah me too, looks like Nurse With Wound isn't gonna place...

100. Robyn Hitchcock - I Often Dream of Trains [1984] (75 points, 5 votes)
98. (tie) Scraping Foetus off the Wheel - Hole [1984] (76 points, 5 votes)
98. (tie) Spacemen 3 - The Perfect Prescription [1987] (76 points, 5 votes)
97. Big Black - Atomizer [1986] (77 points, 8 votes)
96. Associates - Sulk [1982] (79 points, 6 votes)
95. Jane's Addiction - Nothing's Shocking [1988] (79 points, 7 votes)
94. Def Leppard - Pyromania [1983] (80 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
93. Thomas Dolby - The Golden Age of Wireless [1982] (80 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
92. Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - Dazzle Ships [1983] (80 points, 9 votes)
91. Run-D.M.C. - Raising Hell [1986] (80 points, 10 votes)
90. Meat Puppets - Meat Puppets II [1984] (81 points, 9 votes)
89. Prince and the Revolution - Parade [1986] (83 points, 10 votes)
88. Bruce Springsteen - Tunnel of Love [1987] (86 points, 7 votes)
87. Pet Shop Boys - Actually [1987] (86 points, 8 votes)
86. Pet Shop Boys - Please [1986] (87 points, 8 votes)
84. (tie) Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine [1989] (87 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
84. (tie) Talking Heads - Speaking in Tongues [1983] (87 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
83. David Bowie - Scary Monsters [1980] (89 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
82. Scraping Foetus off the Wheel - Nail [1985] (91 points, 5 votes, 1 first place vote)
81. The Beat (aka The English Beat) - I Just Can't Stop It [1980] (91 points, 13 votes)
80. Various - The Indestructible Beat of Soweto [1985] (93 points, 6 votes, 1 first place vote)
79. The The - Soul Mining [1983] (93 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
78. The Pogues - Rum, Sodomy & the Lash [1985] (93 points, 16 votes)
77. Meat Puppets - Up on the Sun [1985] (94 points, 8 votes)
76. U2 - The Joshua Tree [1987] (95 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
75. Cyndi Lauper - She's So Unusual [1983] (95 points, 9 votes)
74. Galaxie 500 - On Fire [1989] (96 points, 10 votes)
73. X - Wild Gift [1981] (97 points, 9 votes)
72. The Chills - Kaleidoscope World [1986] (98 points, 7 votes, 1 first place vote)
71. Roxy Music - Avalon [1982] (99 points, 10 votes)
70. Laurie Anderson - Big Science [1982] (99 points, 11 votes)
69. Scritti Politti - Cupid & Psyche 85 [1985] (100 points, 7 votes)
68. New Order - Power, Corruption & Lies [1983] (100 points, 16 votes)
67. Violent Femmes - Violent Femmes [1983] (101 points, 12 votes)
66. Prefab Sprout - Steve McQueen [1985] (104 points, 10 votes, 1 first place vote)
65. Donald Fagen - The Nightfly [1982] (105 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
63. (tie) Tom Waits - Rain Dogs [1985] (106 points, 12 votes)
63. (tie) Cocteau Twins - Treasure [1984] (106 points, 12 votes)
62. Grace Jones - Nightclubbing [1981] (106 points, 12 votes, 1 first place vote)
61. Arthur Russell - World of Echo [1986] (108 points, 11 votes, 1 first place vote)
60. Eric B. & Rakim - Paid In Full [1987] (111 points, 8 votes, 1 first place vote)
59. Mekons - Fear and Whiskey [1985] (111 points, 8 votes, 2 first place votes)
58. The Cure - Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me [1987] (112 points, 7 votes, 2 first place votes)
57. Arvo Pärt - Tabula Rasa [1984] (112 points, 9 votes, 1 first place vote)
56. R.E.M. - Lifes Rich Pageant [1986] (112 points, 12 votes)
55. Dinosaur Jr. - You're Living All Over Me [1987] (115 points, 13 votes)
54. Bruce Springsteen - Born in the U.S.A. [1984] (118 points, 14 votes)
53. Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska [1982] (120 points, 14 votes)
52. Brian Eno / David Byrne - My Life in the Bush of Ghosts [1981] (120 points, 17 votes)
51. Leonard Cohen - I'm Your Man [1988] (121 points, 11 votes)
50. The Feelies - Crazy Rhythms [1980] (123 points, 13 votes)
49. The Go-Betweens - 16 Lovers Lane [1988] (125 points, 9 votes, 1 first place vote)
48. XTC - Skylarking [1986] (127 points, 16 votes)
47. Steely Dan - Gaucho [1980] (128 points, 9 votes)
46. R.E.M. - Reckoning [1984] (131 points, 14 votes)
45. Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band - Doc at the Radar Station [1980] (133 points, 11 votes)
44. The Fall - This Nation's Saving Grace [1985] (136 points, 13 votes)
43. Sonic Youth - EVOL [1986] (143 points, 12 votes, 1 first place vote)
42. Hüsker Dü - New Day Rising [1985] (146 points, 14 votes)
41. The Cure - Pornography [1982] (148 points, 9 votes)

Only one of my top ten has shown up JOY*! This means two of the remaining nine will surprise everyone with their GLORY! (seven being obv shoeins) when they inevitably place because of UNDENIABILITY! :-D

*) Nail.

I really thought Pornography would be close to the top ten. I had it at #2.

It was voted second to Disintegration in the Cure albums poll so I don't think we'll be seeing a rush of Cure records near the end of this.

wld sm much of this albums posted since last i stopped by. arvo part! first real left-field wtf surprise so far. put it in my top 5 hoping it'd at least straggle in somewhere at the bottom, but good on yr, mr part.

plus piles of my c.86 dorm rm boombox favorites: dino jr, evol, skylarking, husker du, bush gost, etc. now i just need some clove cigarettes and a hand-me-down pink floyd poster.

I woulda thought Crazy Rhythms woulda been top ten, same with Nation's Saving Grace. This list is getting weird. (Doc more popular than Skylarking?) In kind of a good way, I think.

Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart will be the record with one first-place vote and no other votes, right? It barely bumped Crazy Rhythms from my top spot; had I known it was Top Thirty great only in the province of my doodlebug imagination I might have been tempted to leave it off in favour of strategically bumping Crazy Rhythms up a few slots. Whatevs.

My big retro surprise of this year: finally being able to listen to Sonic Youth again. Haven't enjoyed a note since Dirty came out, but recently re-blasted by just how fucking good Sister is... when it's on, I know every note, every lyric, every switch-up. Had forgotten entirely; it's like going back in time and discovering your own face on an ancient statue. Will now have to pull out EVOL and find out the same thing.

ilm has steered me wrong regarding the cure. i bought 4 of their albums and none are very good.

ILM's Cure-love is one of its unfortunate quirks.

oh bah

strangely the "hits" here, Rockville & So. Central, are probably my LEAST favorite of the singles of this area.

I meant "era" obv.

Great list so far. I like that it's very difficult to imagine a single animating sensibility that could have produced it.

"Born in the USA" the only thing on here I'm familiar with and don't care for.

"Standing On The Beach" should easily be top 10, unless people didn't vote for it because it's a comp.

I really thought Pornography would be close to the top ten. I had it at #2.

i thought it would make the top 25. i had it at 10.

this is a very interesting list, i have much to learn thanks to ILM.

please please please let e2-e4 make this list

So far my #5, 7, 15, 17 and 23 have made it. Probably half of the rest won't make the list. The cool thing about this poll is that I still like almost everything on the list so far. I really felt like 84-87 was a nadir for good music, relatively. But there's always stuff I've forgotten about worth reconsidering.

40. Dexy’s Midnight Runners - Searching for the Young Soul Rebels [1980] (148 points, 11 votes, 1 first place vote)

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/61/172162576_64e4e5743b.jpg

despite EVERYTHING, the fashion mistakes, the grumpy lead singer, seeing aforesaid grumpy lead singer in a negligee having loo rolls thrown at him trying to sing "concrete and clay" while two women in bras chucked loo rolls back at the crowd at reading dexy's midnight runners DID NO WRONG! three superb and very different albums - the best to me is "don't stand me down" but "searching" nudges so close so often! passionate, raw and very very funny ("i've been searching for the young soul rebels/ but i can't find them/ where've you hidden them")

godlike

― commonswings, 7. kesäkuuta 2002 3:00

Classic for sure. "Searching for the Young Soul Rebels" is just about perfect. A pure vision, great songs, big ideas (and a great cover). "Too-Rye-Aye" is almost as good, a step forward from an artist not afraid to change, not scared to be different from the rest.

Why didn't it travel? Did they even try to crack the USA? Despite the familiar soul influences, I guess Rowland was/is just too cussed to try and change his behaviour in order to sell records. His control freak nature probably precluded a 150-date assualt on the small towns of America in the name of 'promotion', and it's doubtful if the band would have lasted that long anyway. Imagine being cooped up with Kev in a tour bus!

With the Soul/Stax/Northern Soul influences Dexys should be accessible to a US Audience, yet are somehow quintessentially British. Maybe someone from the US of A can explain better than me why they don't translate.

― Dr. C, 26. helmikuuta 2001 3:00

I`ve been a DMR fan since they bought out Searching for the Young Soul Rebels. It was so fresh and new it blew my mind. Of course I had to turn the volume down on some of the songs with cuss words in them, but on the whole I was very impressed. I was 16 when Geno came out, and everytime I listen to that song it takes be back to 1980 when there wasn`t all that much good music about. I remember I had a poster on my wall of DMR. Kevin Rowlands et al were on a running track and were posed getting ready to run. I don`t know what ever happened to that poster, but whenever I hear Geno it takes me back to my teens and having posters on my wall such as DMR, Squeeze, and Paul Weller! Tom...I don`t understand why DMR were only a one hit wonder in the US either. They obviously didn`t appreciate them as much as the UK did. Their loss! :-D

― Wendy B, 10. helmikuuta 2002 3:00

I love every bit of Searching for the Young Soul Rebels.

― Matt Helgeson (Matt Helgeson), 20. marraskuuta 2003

^^^ this is the second album of the list so far I haven't heard before. d/l'ing right now.

I woulda thought Crazy Rhythms woulda been top ten, same with Nation's Saving Grace.

Really? You thought the Feelies would genuinely be able to kick it with Public Enemy and Pixies and 7 other Prince records in the top ten? I know ilx is v. much "oh canon smh" at times but I don't think we are gonna radically depart from it for a record that rarely gets talked about. That said I listened to it for the first time yesterday and it is pretty cool.

Yeah, Crazy Rhythms is a fine record, but I figure there are only a very few people in the world who are obsessed with it.

THat one's a surprise for me, Dexy's have really dropped off my radar.

Listening now, liking it very much. Almost embarrassed to say the only Dexys song I knew before was "Eileen."

God I love This Nation's Saving Grace. From the moment the spectral dolor of Mansion starts up I know i'm going to have to listen to it all (as I am now).

It's just so much goddam fun as well - puts a big grin on my face. The spastic repetitive rhythms. The tales of expat power lunacy, the unposey but completely out there experimentation, the usual but still incredibly potent mix of mundane local detail and supernatural import, catch phrase and narrative, scorn, wit and bracing sympathy.

And Victorian time travel of course.

And those last words, which at times I have held closer to my heart than anything else - 'every day you gotta cry some, every day you gotta die some, wipe the tears from your eyes son, all the good times are past and gone'.

39. Manuel Göttsching - E2-E4 [1984] (154 points, 12 votes, 2 first place votes)

http://8106.tv/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/e2-e4.jpg

the japanese seem to be particularly e2-e4 crazy. last time i was there i saw all sorts of e2-e4 merchandise. the scarves were particularly popular.

― stirmonster, 15. toukokuuta 2007 20:15

i love the psychogeographic feel of e2-e4, that feeling of leaving the centre, an acidpsyche trip from bethnal green to chingford

― 696, 27. toukokuuta 2007 21:18

I've been a fan of the early stuff for years but am now listening to E2-E4 for the first time and it's amazing. I'm stunned by how good (and ahead of its time) this is.

― rw, 18. lokakuuta 2005 23:40

i saw harvey play a beach party here in hawaii just three days ago. a half hour before sunset he put on E2-E4. about 25 minutes in i went up to him and asked, "are you going to play this one all the way through?" he smiled huge and replied "of course, man!" it was dark by the time the song's 58th minute rolled around. the mixture of an epic sunset with an epic track orchestrated by such a master selector created something hard to describe. it will probably remain one of my top 5 musical moments for the rest of my life.

― grady (grady), 28. kesäkuuta 2006 23:18

^^^ never heard this one either.

what is e2-e4 and what does it sound like?

/tuomas

An early start today. The Dexy's one is probably the album I have read most about without ever being particularly curious to hear. Fantastic write-up for E2-E4 - now that's how to make desperate to check out a record!

via the P4K 80's list

"As the story is sometimes told, Göttsching stopped in the studio for a couple of hours in 1981 and invented techno. E2-E4 is the most compelling argument that techno came from Germany-- more so than any single Kraftwerk album, anyway. The sleeve credits the former Ash Ra Tempel leader with "guitar and electronics", but few could stretch that meager toolkit like Göttsching. Over a heavenly two-chord synth vamp and simple sequenced drum and bass, Göttsching's played his guitar like a percussion instrument, creating music that defines the word "hypnotic" over the sixty minutes of the single track. A key piece in the electronic music puzzle that's been name-checked, reworked and expanded upon countless times. --Mark Richardson"

Wikipedia says James Murphy based 45:33 on it too, so consider me curious.

"E2-E4" is a proto house/techno/trance album form 1984 with some prog guitar noodling. Personally, I can appreciate how it seems to have presaged a lot of the electronic music of the following 25 years, but compared to the stuff it inspired, I think it sounds a bit weak. The synths are kinda too high and shrill, the bass sounds very weak, and the guitar bits feel boring and out of place amidst the electronics.

i will def try it out later, being-on-spotify-pending

So glad to see Dexys in the list they were the only band to have two albums in my top ten. I'm not sure how much love there is for Don't Stand Me Down on here, I hope it makes an appearance.

Manuel Göttsching is yet another one I've not heard that I'm going to have to check out.

38. New Order - Substance [1987] (156 points, 16 votes)

http://en.academic.ru/pictures/enwiki/83/SubstanceCoverBig.jpg

I pretty much think of Substance as being the "proper versions"-- Temptation and Confusion are remade (but let's face it, the remake of Confusion's considerably better than the original), and otherwise it's the original 12" single version of everything but "True Faith." Which "awful club remixes" did you have in mind?

― Douglas, 3. joulukuuta 2001 3:00

If I had to save just one New Order album from the fire, then it would be Substance.

Despite the presence of Blue Monday and the tedious remixes of some of the later sinlges, there is just too much classic material to write it off completely.

Wish they'd waited for the full version of Touched By The Hand of God though - the last of the essential 12" versions.

― Zanny G, 4. joulukuuta 2001 3:00

I recently re-discovered Substance and have to say it's one of the finest compilation albums I've ever come across.

Forgot how marvellous 1963 was - beautiful record, perhaps an update is needed on this one.

And all the remixes are incredible. No question.

Lovely artwork, too.

― russ t, 7. maaliskuuta 2003 16:43

I'm not sure what it is -- I didn't really "grow up" w this record like some in these parts.

But as satisfying as Substance is on several levels, I'm still finding a lot of it hamstrung by its 80s production values -- drum machines that lack texture, sequences and programs that tend to plod rather than enervate.

Dan Selzer has said elsewhere on ILM that some of that can be attributed to NO's modernist tendencies -- the band's willfully crude use of sampling, etc. I respect his opinion and he knows a shit ton more than I do about New Order.

But while that definitely applies to records like Technique, I don't think it does to Substance, where there's really not much of a justification for it -- it's not like you're hearing the ex-Joy Division guys reveling in primitive synthesizer technology on, say, "Shellshock" or even "Perfect Kiss" (which on many levels I really love, btw). Often, you're hearing remixes done by other people and sounds (digital bongos, synth blasts) that went the way of the dodo for good reason. Regardless, in a lot of cases, they're simply not being deployed with much creativity or even a charming naivety.

Yes, a HUGE part of New Order's appeal is their willingness to embarrass themselves -- My I've arguedmore bands should do it today, because it creates a tension that modern production values (and their accessibility to anyone with a computer) tend to relieve. But I think there's a pretty good case to be made (on Substance anyway) it's not always occurring on purpose...and not always that appealing either.

― Naive Teen Idol, 14. marraskuuta 2007 20:51

Still hate the remixed versions on this (an old ILM argument, I know). I never ever listen to it, and I listen to a lot of New Order.

Substance is one of the first, if not the first, albums I ever bought. I played it to death. Looking at the track listing now, I can't remember that many of the songs. It's possible that's just down to the rubbish titles, but I don't think so.

Two other things I don't get: praise for the artwork; and why the downer on 'Confusion'? It's definitely my favourite thing they did (John Barnes rap apart).

The artwork is great in that it's all these vibrantly colored stills wrapped in the most basic black & white bookends.

I just crossed the 30:00 mark on the Manuel Göttsching album. I could see listening to this once a year or so, but it's definitely not an all the time kind of thing.

Glad to see Dexy's post so high. Didn't vote for it but I wavered about including it in my 30.

Last time I tried to listen to E2-E4 was with friends and they called it boring. Listening again now and it seems like a perfect late night alone record.

37. De La Soul - 3 Feet High and Rising [1989] (164 points, 23 votes)

http://www.blogseitb.net/eitbmusika/files/2009/09/3-feet-high-and-rising.jpg

3 Feet High oozes fun, so it wins.

― I Wish You Almanac (Autumn Almanac), 20. toukokuuta 2004 6:13

it seemed like there was a huge WTF-ness to it that no other hip-hop at the time possessed. the 'psychedelic' connotations stem more from the 'daisy age'/love vibe theme perhaps. the interludes like 'transmitting live from mars' just have that fantastic 'what the hell is going on' factor amongst the general wacky backdrop.

― Stevem....Has Dandruff (blueski), 15. helmikuuta 2005 13:11

De La Soul/Transmitting Live from Mars

proposed by gygax!

Spike Lee?s Do the Right Thing, subject and style, was the peak of 1989 as year of black rage: in the opening credits, Rosie Perez amazondances to Public Enemy?s Fight the Power, distillate of the entire film, ragged nerve-flare of (semi)informed and (quasi)politicised anger, at the tipping point between fully justified expression of stress and the slurch off into full loss of perspective. (What would YOU do?)

By significant (and demonstrably saleable) contrast: De La Soul?s made name that same year was quietness and quirkiness, other chosen ways to live out black American life on-screen. The distinction held them down in the end got trapped in stupid media-emptied words (such as "surreal" or "hippie")... There were others, though.

Almost always in rap, you?re listening to the rapper as an character in the drama s/he or they just wrote ? and part of the fun is the tension between what?s acting and what?s acting out. The soft French voice in ?Transmitting Live from Mars? asks "Quelle heure est-il?" ? is the knowledge what time it is the ur-hiphop gift? ? but a lot more present than the sense of listening *to* De La Soul as a rap act is the sense of listening, and listening with them, to the constituent parts of this song (the male and female voices on a French language tape, the gentle little string smear copped off a Turtles record). One minute forty of classico-pop art abstraction: hugely filling the speakers with its depthless reticence.

Give or take street language that can?t be everywhere comprehensible (it wd lose its cachet if it were) and all this often delivered in extremes of compactness, rap is upfront and in-yr-face about it concerns. Which means a rapsong *without* a rap is at the very least a kind of riddle (even if you?d prefer not to hear that it?s a metophor or an allegory, or any invocation of similar ticket-to-upscale-museum status).

So why "live" and what?s Martian about it? Who the aliens here, who the threatened? Which is home, and which is far? Yes, it might just that the ordered calm of a European language lesson is a universe away from black American life. But it might also be that the idea of black Americans finding value and pleasure in this same lesson is a universe away from the stereotypes ruling American life, or European life, or __________ Am I listening to De La Soul listening to a Transmission from Mars, or is Mars the sound of De La Soul listening? Science fiction, from War of the Worlds to Marvel Comics to Star Trek to whatever, is the prism that binds, the perfect cultural representative of a shared humanity, even as it straight away goes on to raises questions about distinctly unshared identification: who were the hunters here, who the display?

Thinking about 25th hour, which I saw last sunday with my sister, I wondered if there isn't something Spike Lee is really good at that doesn't get talked about - or maybe I just wasn't listening in the right places. In his films that I so far saw (which isn't all of them), there are often these moments ? never emphasised, just moved into then out of ? of vivid grace and tenderness, where people in their own space are for a time NOT required either to conform to or battle the pervasive cartoons structuring the world elsewhere, including its many self-appointed discontents. Lee does these moments superbly well, actually: but part of what's so powerful about them, in their unassuming way, is that they're surcease from all the stuff he seems so overknown for: "THIS IS A PICTURE OF US - GET USED TO IT!" That picture is often immense, in its urgent flamewarred way, but isn?t even the only thing he?s about, after all.

"THIS IS A PICTURE OF *YOU* - DIDN?T YOU KNOW THAT YET?" The Martians are ALWAYS us, whoever we are, however we behave. There is no "world away": it?s all here.

― mark s (mark s), 31. toukokuuta 2003 18:32

36. The Fall - Hex Enduction Hour [1982] (166 points, 14 votes, 1 first place vote)

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/58/154062438_0492f539b7.jpg

gotta give it to "The Classical". that song was like a Rosetta stone that opened up The Fall for me -- they may have other songs where the satire is more biting, MES is more caustic, or the music is more abrasive, but on "The Classical", all of those elements come together perfectly and create something that feels like a manifesto. or a mission statement, or a vision. yeah, vision is the right word; I would definitely call it visionary. if you were to draw a Venn diagram of Fall tracks, most of the others would be wholly contained within its circle. I dunno, I'm a little drunk right now.

― With a little bit of gold and a Peja (bernard snowy), 4. joulukuuta 2008

the drumming on this album fuking destroys imo

― Cam3ron C. (wilter), 5. joulukuuta 2008 0:46

1) i can see why spectre vs. rector would send most people running away & screaming, but not bcz of its length as much as it being the perfect soundtrack for sacrificing goats..

2) still it's awesome...the "and this day" comparisons are off though...def. "iceland" is hex's "S vs. R"

3) in another thread I had flippantly stated that Slates was better than Hex...the case has been made that I might have to reconsider mightily that position.

4) i voted for "jawbone and the air rifle" for three reasons:

a) an astonishing lyrical peak even for MES in the absolute zenith of his powers
b) great "be-nice-to-animals" subtext
c) it's a four minute song that holds its own in an album full of epics...and sounds almost as massive as "winter" or "hip priest"

4) I'm glad Gamaliel voted for "Winter 2"...it should have got more votes. It is very much equal to "The Classical", every bit the epic, and twice as wondrous...the only handicap is that it's only half the song, and is therefore somewhat reliant on its prequel, but still...

but I'm not bitching...I think we all knew that "The Classical" and "Hip Priest" were going to walk away with this...and they deserve to; isn't "The Classical" the one song that made Western Civilization stand up and think "Huh! Maybe having a band with two drummers is not a stupid idea after all"? But we need to take a good long listen to this album...This is just one album. Only half of a song in The Fall's peak period could devour entire bands from that same period. As I listen to HEH right now, I can only think one thing: it is time to stop kidding ourselves. Wire was not this good. Talking Heads were not this good. Elvis Costello was not this good.

Bowie was never this good.

― Hipster Loser-Loser (Drugs A. Money), 17. joulukuuta 2008 15:30

prole art threat

best fall record = hex enduction hour

― gygax!, 2. tammikuuta 2003 20:37

Prefer This Nation's Saving Grace for its focus and introversion but Hex Enduction is fine in its own way. This album is the climax and summation of Fall Era 2, I think.

Trying not to be hip-hop strawman but 37 is a travesty.

As in a travesty it's not higher? I had it at #10.

travesty its not higher yes. thought it might have been a lock for the top 10 but i'm starting to come around to the idea that it will be every prince record nominate + daydream nation.

Well, my ballot won't help that top 10 - no Prince or Daydream Nation for me.

Looks like most of my favourite albums are not going to make the Top 30!

... what I mean is, they've gone already