The Bears
Artist: The Bears

The debut album from the Bears is a solid slice of great guitar-driven pop tunes. Although Adrian Belew was seen nominally as the frontman, this was truly a band; four friends who had known each other for years, playing for pure joy. Songwriting duties were shared, with each member contributing at least one track, and they also wrote several... Read More

Fuck
Artist: The Leaving Trains

With a new lineup anchored by the band's sole returning member, singer/guitarist Falling James, the Trains begin to solidify around the atavistic paeans to dissipation and alienation that quickly are becoming James' stock-in-trade. The roaring guitars still rumble, but many of the last album's softer moments are lost in a preference for... Read More

Truth and Soul
Artist: Fishbone
Community Score: 8.25

By 1988, alternative/college rock was becoming a recognizable force in the mainstream. Several bands were big enough to play arenas, and many even earned gold and platinum albums. The tide was clearly changing for such previously misunderstood bands such as Fishbone. Their second full-length release Truth and Soul was issued that year, and... Read More

Witchdoctor
Artist: Sidewinders

Though it was released in the same year as Cuacha!, the Sidewinders' debut album, Witchdoctor, is a major advance. The band sounds more focused and powerful from the first note, which still has the Hüsker Dü guitar roar but a more pronounced western character. True, the title cut has a guitar lead straight from Bob Mould territory, but there are... Read More

Eponymous
Artist: R.E.M.
Community Score: 6.64
Document
Artist: R.E.M.
Community Score: 8.21
Huevos
Artist: Meat Puppets
Community Score: 6.60

Recorded and released just a few months after the experimental Mirage, 1987's Huevos was a return to the Meat Puppets' earlier, more straight-ahead direction. The band (guitarist/singer Curt Kirkwood in particular) had always voiced their admiration of ZZ Top, and Huevos contained Billy Gibbons & Co.'s influence more than any other Puppets... Read More

Rehab Doll/Dry As a Bone
Artist: Green River
Community Score: 4.50

Collecting Green River's second and third releases, plus three rare tracks, Dry As a Bone/Rehab Doll is a near-definitive look at the Seattle band that, along with the Melvins and Soundgarden, virtually invented grunge. Out of all the bands that branched out from the Green River family tree, the originals sound most like Mudhoney upon first... Read More

Bent by Nature
Artist: Glass Eye

Very edgy, angular pop. Deconstructed? Visionary! ~ Robert Gordon, All Music Guide Read More

Echo & the Bunnymen
Artist: Echo & the Bunnymen
Community Score: 7.70

This fine release (not to be confused with the self-titled 1983 EP) is the Bunnymen's best since their debut, Crocodiles. The album catches the group at a fortuitous career juncture; the clutch of songs here is among the hookiest and most memorable the band would ever write, while the arrangements are noticeably clean and punchy, mostly... Read More

Pop Said...
Artist: The Darling Buds

The Darling Buds' first studio LP is a potent mix of Blondie and Velocity Girl. Not as streetwise as the former but rougher than the latter, it's a solid collection of 12 straight-ahead pop-punk songs, some of which were re-worked and glossed up from earlier EPs released on the Native label. It's not earth shattering, and the relentlessly upbeat... Read More

Boylan Heights
Artist: The Connells

Their second album shows a great improvement over its predecessor. With help from producer Mitch Easter, the band effectively combines Southern rock's jangly guitars with Celtic influences. One of the more distinctive, though generally overlooked, college rock albums of the late '80s. ~ Chris Woodstra, All Music Guide Read More

George Best Plus
Artist: The Wedding Present

This huge collection summarizes the early portion of the Wedding Present's career, the C-86 era of jangly, revved-up indie-pop. The release compiles the band's first album and its first two singles ("Nobody's Twisting You Arm" and "Why Are You Being So Reasonable Now") -- 23 tracks worth of the hyper pop the band is known for. Apart from the... Read More