Best Album on My Favourite Albums of......1983!!

i heard blister in the sun in a pub in glasgow last time i was home in september.

I suppose one of the genuinely good things about the internet is that it's allowed the music of the likes of The Go-Betweens to reach ears that it otherwise wouldn't have done. I mean, we can comfortably say now that they should have been on the same level career-wise as The Smiths in the UK in the '80s, but it would be inaccurate to say that they actually were at the time. The first Violent Femmes album is regularly touted on the internet as a classic, and I guess in a way its visibility has only increased over time outside of American music geek circles (appearances in 1,000 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die etc., a regular staple on "best albums of the '80s" lists, Gordon Gano allowing 'Blister in the Sun' to advertise all kinds of stuff), while not quite getting critical blowjobs on the same level as the Go-Betweens.

Perverted by Language
Mark Stewart + the Maffia - Learning to Cope with Cowardice
Confusion is Sex
Good Name
100 Flowers s/t haha
The Raincoats - Moving
Circle X - Prehistory
Emergency Third Rail Power Trip
Lost in Space
Yellowman - Guzungguzungguguzungguzeng
Nona Hendryx - Nona
She's So Unusual
Three O'Clock - Sixteen Tambourines
Come Away with ESG
Neil Young - Trans
B-52s - Whammy

I don't know the 0 votes get ordered, but the right album ended up at the bottom of the list.

You have to give them kudos for making their guitars sound like bagpipes!

OK they're in no way cool, but I have a lot of affection for their slightly ludicrous but very effective rousing bloodboiler anthems

I should go on a Big Country binge. They were Glenn McDonald's alltime favorite band back in the 90s when he was writing The War Against Silence (which I used to read as a teenager)

There's nothing wrong at all with The Crossing. Of course, I thought Adamson was better with The Skids, but I'm proud to say that Big Country album is a favourite of mine. 'Inwards' in particular really gets me going... love the guitar interplay on that, and the whole album. It's a shame that Steeltown and the follow-ups weren't as good.

I used to read Glenn McDonalds blog too. It was odd reading praise heaped on stuff like Big Country and Marllion at the time.

"Steeltown" is his favourite album of all time iirc. Tbh none of their albums after "The crossing" did much for me either.

they had some great singles but albumswise the 1st one is all you need plus the best of comp

^ Yeah, absolutely. Even if the albums after The Crossing weren't as good, they still had the occasional decent single. 'Look Away', for example.

Hello to the three other people who voted for Philip Glass! Maybe we can all gather one day on someone's couch and watch Koyaanisqatsi together.

I knew I should have voted for Big Country. I actually like the first three albums pretty well, but definitely The Crossing is the best. Steeltown has some good songs but the Lillywhite production half-buries it. There's a point where reverb just becomes murk.The Seer has Look Away and a nice Kate Bush duet. And now Big Country always makes me think of Bimble (R.I.P.), the Big Country threads were where I bonded with him. He would be righteously appalled by the zero votes.

steeltown kinda falls off after the first two songs, but man those first two songs are awesome.

I agree about the production on Steeltown. It's weird, because Lillywhite did such a great job on The Crossing.

Could be the band wanted a change in sound?

Yeah, it could well have been - and plausible - that the band wanted to make a different kind of record. I just don't think Steeltown sounds all that great - unusual for Lillywhite in that era.

1. R.E.M.: Murmur
2. OMD: Dazzle Ships
3. The Three O’Clock: Sixteen Tambourines
4. The Fun Boy Three: Waiting
5. The The: Soul Mining
6. XTC: Mummer
7. White Door: Windows
8. Republika: Nowe sytuacje
9. Tears for Fears: The Hurting
10. Captain Sensible: The Power of Love
11. Dolly Mixture: The Demonstration Tapes
12. Serious Drinking: The Revolution Starts at Closing Time
13. The Gist: Embrace the Herd
14. A Flock of Seagulls: Listen
15. Nits: Omsk
16. Eddie & Sunshine: Perfect Strangers
17. Soft Cell: The Art of Falling Apart
18. New Order: Power, Corruption and Lies
19. Eurythmics: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)
20. Heaven 17: The Luxury Gap
21. Madonna: Madonna
22. Aviador Dro: Sintesis
23. The Church: Seance
24. Glamour: Guarda tus lágrimas
25. Nacht und Nebel: Beats of Love
26. Andreas Dorau: Die Doraus und die Marinas geben offenherzige Antworten auf brennende Fragen
27. ESG: Come Away With the ESG
28. Bauhaus: Burning From the Inside
29. Cocteau Twins: Head Over Heels
30. Violent Femmes: Violent Femmes