Album/Compact Disc/Cassette
Artist: Public Image Ltd.
Community Score: 9.00

Hot guitars and 4/4 time signatures make this sound more like a hard-rock album than anything Lydon's done since The Sex Pistols. And the hit single "Rise" is actually a catchy number, believe it or not. ~ William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide Read More

A Can of Bees
Artist: The Soft Boys

One of the band's earliest recordings, featuring their signature tune "Give It to the Soft Boys," A Can of Bees includes a lot of the zaniness principal member Robyn Hitchcock would become known for in his later work, but the band had not yet jelled and found them still in search of their ultimate sound, an amalgam of new wave and psychedelia.... Read More

Spilt Milk
Artist: Jellyfish
Community Score: 8.33

For their second album, Jellyfish replaced the departed Jason Falkner with Tim Smith on bass. Jon Brion also came aboard with Lyle Workman to add to lead singer Andy Sturmer's guitar work. With Sturmer and keyboard player Roger Manning in place, however, Jellyfish managed to outdo their impressive debut with 1993's Spilt Milk. Spilt Milk expands... Read More

Ekstasis
Artist: Nicky Skopelitis

Guitarist Skopelitis' dustpan approach to world music sweeps various ethnic instrumental grit and grime into the whirling blades of co-producer Bill Laswell's shop-vac. Contributing to the unholy mess are Foday Musa Suso on kora, oudist/violinist Simon Shaheen, gospel organist Amina Claudine Myers, percussionists Zakir Hussain, Aiyb Dieng and... Read More

The Full Custom Gospel Sounds
Artist: Reverend Horton Heat
Community Score: 10.00

With fellow Texas maniac Gibby Haynes on production, Heat and his trusty sidemen go at it again on The Full Custom Gospel Sounds and do so with all the style and sass one could want. Kicking off with "Wiggle Stick," a perfectly lubricious number that ended up scoring the band some airplay with Beavis and Butthead, the good Reverend serves notice... Read More

Altered Beast
Artist: Matthew Sweet
Community Score: 7.00

Compared to the concise songwriting of Girlfriend, Altered Beast is all over the place, both emotionally and musically. Ranging from piercing guitar rave-ups ("Dinosaur Act") to gorgeous country-rock ("Time Capsule"), the album not only covers all sides of Matthew Sweet's musical personality, but pastes them together haphazardly. Consequently,... Read More

I Love Mekons
Artist: The Mekons

A series of rancorous disagreements with the high and mighty at Warner Bros. subsidiary Loud forced the Mekons into an unanticipated two years of silence that nearly scuttled this record and ended the band's career. Eventually, Warner relented (they had maintained the record was not good enough to release), and the increasingly restless Mekons... Read More

1976-1981
Artist: The Soft Boys

Although their five-year career reaped little in terms of commercial reward, the Soft Boys ultimately emerged among the most influential and best-loved of all the early "alternative" acts, as that genre thrust its way out of the twin wombs of punk and new wave. A convoluted back catalog -- as tricky and twisted in its own way as the very best of... Read More

Floored Genius 2: The Best of the BBC Sessions 1983-1991
Artist: Julian Cope

Released some months after the first Floored Genius and sharing its basic artwork and design concept -- even though it was released on a completely different label -- Floored Genius 2 is a wonderful collection of recordings Cope did for the BBC in between his earliest solo days in 1983 and Peggy Suicide's release in 1991. Mick Houghton, who did... Read More