Wonderwall
Artist: Oasis
Community Score: 8.20
International Velvet
Artist: Catatonia
Community Score: 8.67

Prior to International Velvet, Catatonia offered modest, lovely pleasures -- pretty, ringing pop songs filled with sweet and sour melodies. Apparently, the band was concerned that they were a little too precious, a little too similar to late-'80s indie pop groups like the Primitives, so they beefed up their sound, turned up the guitars and... Read More

Head Trip in Every Key
Artist: Superdrag
Community Score: 7.25

Superdrag's second major-label album, Head Trip in Every Key, lacks anything as immediately grabbing as Regretfully Yours' knockout punch, "Sucked Out," but on the whole, the album is nearly as good as its predecessor. Sonically, the group's attack has tightened up considerably -- the guitars are punchier, the rhythms more visceral -- and the... Read More

The Chinese Album
Artist: Spacehog
Community Score: 5.00

"In the Meantime" was a huge hit, and Resident Alien went gold, but Spacehog's debut earned them no critical respect. At any other time, the group's glitzy revival of Bowie, Roxy and Mott the Hoople would have earned kudos, but it arrived at the height of Brit-pop, when other, more celebrated (and, frankly, better) bands were dominating the... Read More

Death Rides a Pale Cow: The Ultimate Collection
Artist: The Dead Milkmen
Community Score: 10.00

Death Rides a Pale Cow is an excellent, 22-track overview of the Dead Milkmen's career, containing all of their cult classics -- "Bitchin' Camaro," "Instant Club Hit (You'll Dance to Anything)," "Punk Rock Girl," "Smokin' Banana Peels" -- plus the previously unreleased "Labor Day" and "Milkmen Stomp," which was previously only available on a... Read More

It Means Everything
Artist: Save Ferris
Community Score: 7.80
The Inevitable
Artist: Squirrel Nut Zippers
Community Score: 5.00

The members of the band mostly just call it jazz, or "hot music," or, when they're feeling naughty, "race music" -- a term that dates back to the1920s and '30s, when major record labels released jump blues and hot jazz singles under special subsidiary imprints with names like Okeh and Sepiatone. It's music that doesn't really have a name... Read More

Spiders
Artist: Space
Community Score: 7.44

Quirky and often highly clever, Space had one of the most appealing alternative rock releases of 1996 in Spiders -- which grossed some listeners out with a cover depicting tarantulas. This eccentric, risk-taking band (not to be confused with the late-'70s disco group Space) doesn't take itself too seriously, and brings an enjoyably twisted sense... Read More

Hot
Artist: Squirrel Nut Zippers
Community Score: 7.00

Squirrel Nut Zippers' second album, Hot, was one of the most surprising success stories of 1997. Like the group's debut, The Inevitable, Hot is comprised entirely of good-natured, if slightly tongue-in-cheek, postmodern big-band music. The band has nailed the sound of jump blues and swinging jazz, and if the Zippers don't have the chops of real... Read More

John Peel Sessions 1992-1995
Artist: The Wedding Present

The songs on this CD come from a period in the Wedding Present's career that most fans' would admit to be less than inspirational. The frenzied jangle of their early days had slowed considerably and the frustrated growl and unrelenting mope of the classic Seamonsters LP had been replaced by a seemingly blasé attitude and even worse, a spot of... Read More