Hüsker Dü - Land Speed Record/Everything Falls Apart/Zen Arcade vs Descendents - Milo Goes To College/I Don't Want To Grow Up/Enjoy

Sorry all* but I just skipped through the first couple of Descendents albums on YT and this is the kind of party punk Hüsker Dü had to wipe out. Yes even Turn On The News. PS I have no sense of humour.

* see what I did there?

xp Milo Goes to College is 22 mins long. Bailed out after three tracks, why are we doing this poll lol

There is no comparison between these two bands but I’m just here to multi post about the Dü.
Never listened to Descendents and likely never ever will. Too male/juvenile.

Awful tiny sound, terrible singing, very male, juvenile and worse. Definitely a good decision to stay away.

juvenile

Definitely avoid the title track of Enjoy

There's something sonically off about 80s Midwest that is deeply white and alienating to me (Husker Du, Replacements, Prince[!!]) in a way that the Descendents don't even though their entire catalog is songs about being white and alienated!
It could just be a snare sound or guitar flange/chorus pedal or something but I could never put my finger on it. "From the Gut" doesn't skeeve me out nearly as much as anything from Zen Arcade, so it has to be something on the production end.

Prince?

Yeah even Prince doesn't escape Minnesota!

CONTROP:

Framing the Descendents as "pop-punk" is a fairly cursory and shallow take, esp compared to Husker DU!!!!

Some of their music is pretty avant and sophisto, even their earliest material had massive jazz and prog chops, eg:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s79JBBNYbB0

a wild journey through insane meter shifts and 32s-40s is some hard bop modalism.

I remember reading an interview with Milo & Bill about how nervous they were how MGTC (ie, a progressive unique sound) would be received by the punk crowd but Watt & Boon who originally released it on their vanity label convinced them that it would do well. After the New Alliance copies sold out quickly, SST picked them up and took over from there.

“From the Gut” doesn’t skeeve me out nearly as much as anything from Zen Arcade, so it has to be something on the production end.

Zen Arcade was recorded in Redondo Beach, so I’m not sure this hypothesis holds up.

After the New Alliance copies sold out quickly, SST picked them up and took over from there.

SST didn’t pick them up till a few years later; the only album they recorded for Ginn directly* was ALL. (*Yes I know New Alliance was marketed by SST before they took it over.)

re: redondo beach, you can take the band out of the midwest...
though yeah i do interpret the pet peeves i have with some descendents songs as being hair metal influenced rather than some sonic equivalent of tuna casserole.

Also, Spot (the producer) is black

SST didn’t pick them up till a few years later; the only album they recorded for Ginn directly* was ALL. (*Yes I know New Alliance was marketed by SST before they took it over.)

― wronger than 100 geir posts (MacDara), Tuesday, September 24, 2024 11:01 AM (forty-six minutes ago)

Hello my old friend! The 2nd pressing (1983) of MGTC was funded by SST, and then by the 3rd pressing (1984) the album had both NA and SST logos on the back cover.

Well you learn something new every day! I stand corrected! Weird that they didn’t just jump over directly, maybe there’s a story there.

I forget the exact order of events, but IIRC Bill Stevenson talks about it on that SST podcast if you want a deep dive

I didn't know that either xp

better poll would have been "land speed record" v "milo goes to college" instead of this hüsker hümiliation

Playing Descendants reminded I never listened to the very different US 80s group The Replacements, who I am also struggling with.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Even though I honestly listened to Milo way more than any other album on this list, this is still Huskers by a mile for me.

Wait, did I see that some people don't like "Turn On the News"!? What's up with that?

Related:

Playing Descendants reminded I never listened to the very different US 80s group The Replacements, who I am also struggling with.

Where's the struggle? Just good songwriting and performances.

serving dinner in my house often accompanied by a rendition of Hüsker Dü's "portion control"

struggling with The Replacements is crazy talk.

Yeah -- wow, didn't know this, Wiki says ZA and Double Nickels were released the same day, 7/3/84
― WmC,

Joe Carducci says that SST didn't have release dates - the records came out when SST got them. Many stores probably received their first copies of Zen Arcade and Double Nickels on the Dime on the same day, but it wasn't intentional on the labe's or bands part.

That makes no sense at all

I loved all of these bands when I was 14-15 but the Descendents is the only one that I listen to now and wonder what the hell I ever saw in them. Funnily enough, played MGTC and IDWTGU recently on a whim and sorry, those records are terrible, and not just because of the gross incel aspects (but that too)

like i mentioned above, it came out in july but it took me until october to find a copy. stores had to order copies of the german pressing to meet demand. stoner label says OOPS!

"While the band insisted sales would be strong for Zen Arcade, SST initially pressed only between 3,500 and 5,000 copies of the album. The album was out of stock for months afterward and the delay in further copies stifled sales."

its funny cuz i love the title Zen Arcade but it totally sounds like the name of a bad 80s indie rock band.

Yeah, SST distro was infamously fucked up. There are lots of tales of Husker Du hitting town in support of "Zen Arcade" only to find that stores were sold out. Not that the band wasn't notorious for playing sets packed with songs from the next album(s). Here's the setlist from an October 1984 Chicago show, just a few months after "Zen Arcade:"

Something I Learned Today
It's Not Funny Anymore
Everything Falls Apart
Girl Who Lives on Heaven Hill
I Apologize
If I Told You
Folk Lore
Terms of Psychic Warfare
Powerline
Books About UFOs
Broken Home, Broken Heart
Diane
Hate Paper Doll
Green Eyes
Divide and Conquer

Encore 1
Pink Turns to Blue
Eight Miles High

Encore 2
Reoccurring Dreams

Encore 3
Ticket to Ride
Bad Moon Rising
New Day Rising

Descendents since they reformed have been shite but I cant argue with the old stuff. I still enjoy it when I hear it, but Husker Du have been one of my fave bands since I discovered them very early 90s, so unsurprisingly I'm voting HD.

Getting excited to see the poll results, this one's gonna be close

no way!!

there is no way this will be close

God the Huskers were such prolific songwriters.

that setlist makes my head spin
i would have been a mess at that show (i also would have been a child but that's beside the point)

Maybe I should have added a retro-ironic 90s style "NOT!", Huskers vs Replacements would be the real contest.

xpost

i've reconciled my answer to that one too.
it's still Dü

Interesting that they ended the set with "New Day Rising" - in the first half of '85 they started their shows with that song more often than not (ofc the album was out by then)

I was more of an ALL fan than the Descendents, though some of those songs have gotten cringe over the years.

re: replacements, to add more beloved bands to my visceral unheimlich list -- hum and poster children, which is a bummer because rick & rose are the coolest.

I went back and listened to some Descendents songs I used to love and got really discouraged because like, Sour Grapes meant a LOT to me when I was a 15-year-old heartbroken teenager and it's obviously super-gross and misogynist. Same with Clean Sheets, Hope, Bikeage, Catalina, I'm Not a Loser... I think I can still get away with Myage, I'm Not a Punk, Tonyage, Parents, Suburban Home, Jean is Dead, Get the Time, Good Good Things, Silly Girl. The songs about farts and food are all probably safe, if not particularly good.

So I was like, "maybe these Husker Du fans actually have something. Maybe I need to grow up." So I went and tried listening to them for the fourth time in my life. And holy fuck, it continues to be the most boring shit I've ever heard in my life (other than the Replacements). I hope I never learn to like them because it will mean that everything fun in me has died. I'm so sorry for you all. SWA is superior to this monotonous buzzsaw garbage. Fuck Husker Du forever.

honestly sir
fp-ing you for that last sentence

I'll take any FPs thrown at me. I have to stand by my convictions. I have to let the people know.

well you got +1 from me for absolute slander and having a wrong musical opinion

:)

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

loooool

when you're right you're right

I went back and listened to some Descendents songs I used to love and got really discouraged because like, Sour Grapes meant a LOT to me when I was a 15-year-old heartbroken teenager and it's obviously super-gross and misogynist. Same with Clean Sheets, Hope, Bikeage, Catalina, I'm Not a Loser... I think I can still get away with Myage, I'm Not a Punk, Tonyage, Parents, Suburban Home, Jean is Dead, Get the Time, Good Good Things, Silly Girl. The songs about farts and food are all probably safe, if not particularly good.

So I was like, "maybe these Husker Du fans actually have something. Maybe I need to grow up." So I went and tried listening to them for the fourth time in my life. And holy fuck, it continues to be the most boring shit I've ever heard in my life (other than the Replacements). I hope I never learn to like them because it will mean that everything fun in me has died. I'm so sorry for you all. SWA is superior to this monotonous buzzsaw garbage. Fuck Husker Du forever.

― peace, man, Monday, September 30, 2024 4:21 PM

The correct answer: Level 42's World Machine

wow