Psychedelic Jungle
Artist: The Cramps
Community Score: 9.00

Here, Kid Congo Powers and Ivy form just as fine a team as she and Gregory did on earlier releases, and if things aren't always as flat-out fried as on Gravest Hits and Songs, the same atmosphere of swampy, trashy, rockabilly-into-voodoo ramalama reigns supreme. The song titles alone show the band hasn't really changed its sights any: the... Read More

New Gold Dream (81-82-83-84)
Artist: Simple Minds
Community Score: 7.60

One of Scotland's finest imports, Simple Minds deliver a strong synth-reared release on New Gold Dream. This album harks the darker side of the band's musicianship, and such material alludes to their forthcoming pop-stadium sound which hurled them into rock mainstream during the latter part of the '80s. They were still honing their artistic... Read More

Volume, Contrast, Brilliance... Sessions & Singles, Vol. 1
Artist: The Monochrome Set

This is another compilation, but back in 1983 this hugely rewarding record acted as a roundup of the group's career to date and was of immeasurable value to fans. It's aged well, too, and worth hunting down for some (quite radically different) radio versions of songs, oddities, and jocular moments, including John Peel introducing "Fat Fun" and... Read More

Love Zombies
Artist: The Monochrome Set

The group's second album (and last for Virgin subsidiary Dindisc), Love Zombies features more accomplished songwriting from main man Bid -- especially the title track and the playful "The Man With the Black Moustache." Fans -- BBC Radio DJ John Peel among them -- had long since recognized the Monochrome Set's supreme compositional agility. This... Read More

White Feathers
Artist: Kajagoogoo

"Too Shy" was one of the flimsiest singles of the new wave era, a cloying and catchy bubblegum tune disguised as synth-pop. Kajagoogoo never quite matched those heights again -- in fact, they rarely even came close. Their debut album White Feathers is filled with similarly lightweight synth-pop like "Magician Man," "Ooh to Be Ah," "Eronomics,"... Read More

Los Angeles
Artist: X
Community Score: 9.14

By the late '70s, punk rock and hardcore were infiltrating the Los Angeles music scene. Such bands as Black Flag, the Germs, and, especially, X were the leaders of the pack, prompting an avalanche of copycat bands and eventually signing record contracts themselves. X's debut, Los Angeles, is considered by many to be one of punk's all-time finest... Read More

Youth of America
Artist: Wipers

A grizzly, furious beast of a 30-minute record, Youth of America saw Greg Sage and his Wipers lengthening some of their material to very unfashionable lengths; many a hardcore punk band of the time could tuck a dozen songs about Reagan and fisticuffs inside the title track alone. Opposed to the compromised Is This Real?, Youth of America was... Read More

Violent Femmes
Artist: Violent Femmes
Community Score: 8.39

One of the most distinctive records of the early alternative movement and an enduring cult classic, Violent Femmes weds the geeky, child-man persona of Jonathan Richman and the tense, jittery, hyperactive feel of new wave in an unlikely context: raw, amateurish acoustic folk-rock. The music also owes something to the Modern Lovers' minimalism,... Read More

Underwater Moonlight
Artist: The Soft Boys

After recording the material that would later comprise the bulk of Invisible Hits, the Soft Boys recorded their masterpiece, the shimmering neo-psychedelic Underwater Moonlight. Essentially, the band didn't change their style for the record -- they merely perfected it. The Soft Boys don't hide their influences -- whether its the ringing guitars... Read More

Second Edition
Artist: Public Image Ltd.
Community Score: 10.00

PiL managed to avoid boundaries for the first four years of their existence, and Metal Box is undoubtedly the apex. It's a hallmark of uncompromising, challenging post-punk, hardly sounding like anything of the past, present, or future. Sure, there were touchstones that got their imaginations running -- the bizarreness of Captain Beefheart, the... Read More

Killing Joke
Artist: Killing Joke
Community Score: 6.50

Since 1980, there have been a hundred bands who sound like this; but before Steve Albini and Al Jourgensen made it hip, the cold metallic throb of Killing Joke was exciting and fresh. The harshly sung vocals riding over the pulsating synth lines of the opener "Requiem" have a vigor and passion that few imitators have managed to match. The... Read More

Invisible Hits
Artist: The Soft Boys

A collection of lost recordings and previously unreleased tracks, a number of this album's cuts remain Soft Boys classics, like "Rock 'n' Roll Toilet," "Wey Wey Hep Uh Hole," "Have a Heart Betty (I'm Not Fireproof)," and "He's a Reptile." Most of the songs were recorded in 1978-79 during the sessions prior to A Can of Bees and Underwater... Read More