Melody Maker Albums of the Year 1988

Certainly one record in this list placed approximately 27 places too low...

Loads of fantastic albums here, maybe my favourite year for music ever. Being 16 at the time might've had something to do with it, though.

I'm looking, and I can't say there's anything I'd want to spend more time with.

Oh ennui.

Someone please to tell me about: AR Kane, Skinny Puppy, Jane Siberry, Mary Margaret O'Hara, Shiva Burlesque, Green On Red and Live Skull.

(Yes I know this is the internet so I can look them up, but I'd like someone who was, say, 16-18 in 1988 to give me a wholly subjective perspective)

count me in among the corny post-pastoral fuxx

Yep, Reynolds slagged off Nation Of Millions. Reliable fellow, eh?

oh and mark my office etc.

Did he? Silly boy. I have never understood why people (esp. Simey) made such a song and dance about AR Kane.

... I'll be along to join Grouty outside your office shortly

dunno what to make of a r kane -- they never live up to what grimey et al say about them, but they'd be a 100x better without the vocals. the guy is on some embrace-level shit.

Oh I voted for AR Kane here! Fantastic album - the Police meet AMM (try segueing the end of "Spanish Quay" into the beginning of Inexhaustible Document: it works!

Also wanna know where "A Little Man And A House And The Whole World Window" is. WAKE UP MELODY MAKER

Did the Cardiacs make it into any critics' EOY polls ever?

Mildly surprised at non-appearance of Viva Hate.

Did the Cardiacs make it into any critics' EOY polls ever?

Probably the end-of-term mag at some minor public school somewhere

The Cardiacs
A Little Man And A House And The Whole World Window (Alphabet)
NME 1988

Tired of getting pushed around? Can’t stick the pace of the late eighties? Hanker after the days when Houses were for the Holy? Well take a look through the square window at the Cardiacs but no puns please ‘cos this isn’t funny.
Just when you thought Marillion had taken us to the very limit along comes this schizo-progressive anachronism wherein the Cardiacs have telescoped the entire dreggs of the early seventies into one album so geriatric, by comparison that the next Blue Oyster Cult will sound as fresh as ‘Viva Hate’.
It is the Floyd, it is Genesis, it is King Crimson, does is matter? ‘A Little Man…’ is the very worst bits of ‘Tommy’ stretched out to an eternity; it’s Emerson Lake and Palmer; it’s "Brain Salad Burglary" as the NME of it’s day might have said. By way of variation ‘In A City Lining’ knocks off one of those Neil Young/Mission cryogenic guitar solos and to bewilder us completely there is a nutty body-stomp midway through ‘Is This The Life’ which resides about as comfortable as Ian Paisley in the Vatican. Cardiacs are the sound of both feet in the grave.

Jack O’Neil

^^^ with reviewing like this who needs music

world-famous music critic "Jack O'Neil"

just to balance it up, NME's '88 album of year was Nation Of Millions, but runner-up was Irish Heartbeat by Van Morrison & the Chieftains.

Mary Margaret O'Brien = perfect adult contemporary/jazz/folk/postpunk fusion. Bonkers vocals on Bodies In Trouble is a youtube must. Gets my vote.

Nos. 24, 28, 20 and 1 are all pretty classic for me. Certainly not an embarrassing list overall. I've never *heard* of Shiva Burlesque. It'd've been cool to see the Rapeman album in there, off the top of my head, but maybe they weren't a music press type band, I dunno

God that sounds dodgy in my description. Look just get this album you won't ever regret it ever!

The music press had a thing against Rapeman for reasons unclear (irony alert).

Shiva Burlesque went on to become Grant Lee Buffalo.

Not a particularly good year.

Voted Scritti Politti, but only because Prefab Sprout or Crowded House weren't in the list.

!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z14wPTz6PdY

"Spirit of Eden" probably. "Daydream Nation" and "Surfer Rosa", only albums by their respective bands that I am likely to listen to these days. Oh, didn't see "Isn't Anything".

Wow. Featuring the ever-prolific Talk Talk, Mary Margaret O Hara and My Bloody Valentine. Keep those tunes a-coming.

It took me a second to get that but wooh boy, when I did!! : )

Quality not quantity.

the list: a-fkn-bundance galore. im-bogglin-possible to choose.

From memory the critical breakdown would have been thusly:

1 - everyone's 8th or 9th choice
2, 6, 14 - Stickboy
3, 5, 7, 10, 13, 15, 24, 29 - Reynoldstubbs
4, 9, 18, 22, 25, 27 - Jonesey
8, 11, 12, 16, 17, 20, 21 - Chris Roberts
19 - Stud Bros
23 - Caroline Sullivan
26 - Carol Clerk
28-30 - ?

(i.e. I don't recall anyone in MM being especially opinionated one way or the other about the last three)

Tender Prey

I've only heard five albums on this list, but then my 1988 was almost entirely 12" singles-based, and mostly guitar-free. At the time, my top albums of the year were:

1. Lovesexy - Prince
2. Tracey Chapman - Tracey Chapman
3. Introspective - PSBs
4. Short Sharp Shocked - Michelle Shocked
5. The Forest Is Crying - Trio Bulgarka
6. Look What I Got - Betty Carter
7. Akwaba Beach - Mory Kante
8. Green - REM
9. Naked - Talking Heads
10. Gypsy Kings - Gypsy Kings

...with The Pogues If I Fall From Grace With God, Hal Wilner's Disney tribute Stay Awake and Leonard Cohen's I'm Your Man as runners up.

Most glaring omission: It Takes A Nation Of Millions, but I was DJ-ing a mixed alternative lesbian/gay club night and had BANNED! Public Enemy after Professor Griff's homophobic comments in the press. My Roxanne Shante-loving separatist lesbian contingent wouldn't have stood for it, for starters - and bearing in mind the climate of the times (Clause 28 etc), I wasn't standing for it either.

20 years on, and my vote from this lot has of COURSE to be for Public Enemy.

CharlieNo4: that AR Kane album sounds like really woozy dub reggae with lots of JAMC-style feedback thrown in the mix. It sort of lollops along sleepily and every now and again it'll crash into a big bucket of noise. The Live Skull is good too: quite a dark sound but with lots of white light shining through all the holes ripped in it. It's not a million miles away from the AR Kane actually - the same sort of lolloping bass with guitars slicing through the muzz, but definitely 1000x more rocking. They always got compared with Sonic Youth at the time and that overshadowed them a bit.

Er, Nation Of Millions is there but at number (Clause!) 28 WAS THIS A PLOT WE SHOULD BE TOLD

Pogues were verboten at MM and Stickboy was quite keen on Tracy Chapman but I guess in MM terms she failed to have significant swoon/bliss component necessary for the times.

To be honest this year would be better evaluated by a singles EOY list, being the year of Acieed crossover and all that...

Fisherman's Blues!

I still have a soft spot for that album.

Yes. (leaves Ding's office) (with an xpost)

The Pogues If I Fall From Grace With God

Now we're talkin.

BACK IN THE OFFICE RIGHT NOW MM WERE RIGHT WORST GROUP EVER

Er, Nation Of Millions is there but at number (Clause!) 28 WAS THIS A PLOT WE SHOULD BE TOLD

Heh... I meant that they were omitted from my own list, not MM's.

My 1988: Ten City, Inner City, Todd Terry in all his guises, Neneh Cherry, Rob Base, Sterling Void, Yazz, S-Express, Eric B & Rakim, early sightings of De La Soul & Soul II Soul, Stetsasonic, Young MC, Phase II, Ofra Haza, Blaze, Nightwriters, Kym Mazelle, CeCe Rogers, Brat Pack, Joyce Sims, JVC Force, Roxanne Shante, Yello, Womack & Womack...

The year I first started reading MM regularly. It's probably not unconnected, then, that 1-3-5-6-14-16-20-21 would be somewhere in my own personal top 200 of all-time. 28 seems terribly important and ground-breaking and that, but I didn't understand that stuff at the time and I don't think I've played it more than half a dozen times.

I really, really, really, really loathe The Pogues. Sorry everyone. They're the fucking worst. Trad-Oirish fakey dullard bollocks from some public-school dropout with disgusting, avoidable health issues and a bullshit mythology.

i don't think anyone disagrees.

If that AR Kane album really sounds as NickB describes it then I've been missing out!

My mum likes The Pogues. ;_;

If that AR Kane album really sounds as NickB describes it then I've been missing out!

I don't think it does, but then that's just my opinion. I don't like The Pogues either but any band with Terry Woods in them can hardly be descibed as fake Oirish.

If it helps people don't think they're fake Oirish in Oirland

Did the Cardiacs make it into any critics' EOY polls ever?

The people standing next to me at The Forum last night were having an animated conversation about Cardiacs.

Mind you, it was at a Gong concert...

It was probably my ex-brother-in-law

Things I have learnt today: 1. I can't read; 2. ctrl-F doesn't work very well when 70+ messages are being hidden.

'S a fair summary, though.

I couldn't really get behind Bug here cos I don't think it was as great a record as You're Living All Over Me. Not that it was a disappointment, but I would always reach for YLAOM first.

AR Kane as I know there's enough support for PE here. And I'm the only person here (guessing) who is missing Voice of the Beehive here (though the NME liked 'em a lot more)...

Caroline Sullivan was quite keen on them IIRC but they didn't fit the MM agenda of blissed out/fascination over meaning &c.

Unlike All About Eve.

Bummed is a bit of a glaring omission here isn't it?

Indeed.

for LJagger re: a.r.kane

A.R. Kane - Green Hazed Daze - on youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRz5YHPGDH4

AR Kane had their own label for a bit, didn't they? H.ark! Records. Butterfly Child, Papa Sprain and one other band I can't recall released a couple of EPs each in late '91/early '92. And there was a collaboration with Alison out of them Cranes for the Rough Trade Singles Club - In Rain?

I saw Papa Sprain play a 20min set of feedback supporting Pale Saints and Boo Radleys in Liverpool in '92. I think it may have been a nod to their mentors, whose own live shows were something similar, I believe.

I saw that tour in Hull. Thought Papa Sprain was complete shite at the time. Maybe I'd've got it now.

I was certainly in a minority in thinking it was ace.

This sounds pretty good!

I loved the queasiness of 69. i never did much for me - it seemed a little meeker and cleaner. It was one of the first CDs I ever bought and I often wondered if that had something to do with it (but let's not get into the supposed sterility of early CD).

i would like ar kane a lot better as an instrumental band, though the singing on 69 isn't as much of a stumbling block for me as "i". i've been listening to 69 and isn't anything back to back a lot in the last few days in the run up to the round house thing and they complement each other, ar kane really were much more of an obvious influence on the rank and file 'gazers than mbv weren't they, pale saints, early lush etc.

Amusing how low Daydream Nation is, considering how many UK bands started copying them and Dinosaur Jr. within the next few years.

I think this album holds up pretty well too:
Eleventh Dream Day - Prairie School Freakout

Also missing Camper Van Beethoven, Naked Raygun, Slayer, Ambitious Lovers, Souled American, Woodentops, Napalm Death, Kreator, Feelies, Mano Negra, For Against, and there were certainly plenty of other great hip hop albums in addition to PE:

N.W.A. - Straight Outta Compton
EPMD - Strictly Business
The Jungle Brothers - Straight Out The Jungle
Boogie Down Productions - By All Means Necessary
Ultramagnetic MCs - Critical Beatdown

Overall the list is a disgrace ;)

Would add the first Galaxie 500 to the list of absentees as well, not that we're short of indie here.

Ljagger: two a.r.kane 1988 tracks on myspace

http://www.myspace.com/arkane69

Baby Milk Snatcher
Sperm Whale Trip Over

I really, really, really, really loathe The Pogues. Sorry everyone. They're the fucking worst. Trad-Oirish fakey dullard bollocks from some public-school dropout with disgusting, avoidable health issues and a bullshit mythology.
What "mythology" are you talking about?

Hard-drinking fast-living Irish scallywags who sing the country's soul through the medium of folk

*vomits*

Oh.

I agree with the puzzlement expressed here regarding All About Eve. I quite liked them at the time, bought their first couple of 12"es...but I tried to play this stuff again more recently and was utterly baffled as to what was so wonderful about it. It was a nice Vaughan Oliver sleeve, though, on D for Desire.

Also it's kinda nice to see Wonder Stuff get a bit of a kicking...I loved "Never Loved Elvis" at the time, but yeah that first album was kinda annoying and they totally had no groove! I've never felt much of an urge to pull their stuff out, really. Can't remember a thing about whatever the album was after NLE.

I think I'll give A.R. Kane another try when I get home.

I still have a soft spot for House of Love, but I'll always maintain their first album is their weakest. Nick Cave's Tender Prey is a mighty force of nature. So is House Tornado, but I'll probably vote for Cocteaus.

Daydream Nation is one of my least fave SY albums. I really should give Live Skull a go one of these days. Back then I ignored bands like them, but considering I've come around to Sonic Youth a lot since then, maybe I would feel differently now.

It may be the boring, indie-canon choice - but Daydream Nation in a walk. Surfer Rosa in second. After that, there's not much I feel strongly about.

I do remember some of those other Nate Starkman label bands. I too had that Red Temple Spirits cassette! Don't remember liking it much. I liked Drowning Pool a lot, though especially when they lost their awful singer and put out the gorgeous, instrumental Aphonia album which I still play today. Then they got yet another awful singer and became the Mumbles!

Hmmm, at the time the answer would have been Bug or House Tornado.

In the 90's it would have been Surfer Rosa (dated a girl who liked the Pixies) or Isn't Anything.

Now it's Spirit of Eden.

I've said this in other threads, but that Live Skull album is near the top of my list of "albums that you wish you liked cause the band has a cool name and it has a cool cover, and theoretically it ought to be great." My picks for '88 in that vein would be Rat at Rat R's "Stainless Steel" EP and "Gutterlight" by Dustdevils.

'In Gut's House' by Ut and the first Band of Susans go together with that lot too, both great records.

Love that BoS album!

Other "Bug" from '88 worth mentioning is the Das Damen song from the very fine Marshmellow Conspiracy EP. That's another '88 vintage thing I still play occasionally.

I was thinking "how can Spacemen 3 not be on the list" but I see there was only a live album that year.

Yes, Band Of Susans - Hope Against Hope; what an album, what a title track!

The UK didn't get Straight Outta Compton until '89 but otherwise I totally agree with fastnbulbous' hip hop list except I would also add Follow The Leader by Eric B & Rakim.

And really To The Batmobile Let's Go by the Todd Terry Project should be VERY high up there somewhere (and the Royal House album).

And Spillane by John Zorn and Virgin Beauty by Ornette and...

There was a Royal House album? I just didn't get "Party People" at all when it came out, in much the same way that I didn't get "Adventures Of Grandmaster Flash On The Wheels Of Steel" - it was a couple of jumps ahead of me, but I had an underlying hunch that there was something worth perservering with. Then "Can You Feel It" - which was virtually a remix of "Party People" anyway - came out and just exploded. It was my biggest floor filler for two or three weeks, just after "Big Fun" and just before "Voodoo Ray". And then there was Swan Lake, Black Riot, Todd Terry Project... ah, Todd-mania, happy days...

Yep - the Royal House album was entitled Can You Party? Standout track: "A Better Way" with vocals by the splendidly-named Ian Star.

Wow, Hope Against Hope. There's an album I hadn't heard in nearly 20 years. I think I still have it on tape, which includes Love Agenda from the following year, and might even be better. Time is right for a reissue. Wired For Sound 1986-93 was issued in '95.

No Critical Beatdown
No Blood Fire Death
No Bananarama's greatest hits
No I Am Kurious Oranj
No I'm Your Man
No Reek of Putrefaction
No South of Heaven
No Great Adventures of Slick Rick
No Don't Be Cruel
No Lead Me On
No Straight Outta Compton
No ...And Justice For All, for the fucking love of Christ

this list wasn't even there in '88

MC covers Compton a couple of posts up

indeed, it made #21 the following year

Never thought I'd see a poll where my two favorite albums are by Public Fucking Enemy and Sonic Fucking Youth, but hey, there's a first time for everything (and they're both pretty good albums, obviously.)

I'm surprised Melody Maker panned It Takes a Nation of Millions... when it first came out. Is the review available online anywhere? I'd love to read it.

ISTR Reynolds opining that "Millions" was too self-referential and too concerned with PE's treatment at the hands of the media and that it was a distinct disappointment after "Bum Rush". I thought he was wrong then and I think he was even wronger now.

also there was insufficient bliss/ocean input unlike e.g. Strafe Fur Rebellion and Legendary Pink Dots.

At the end of 1988 I would have said Green. By 1991 I'd gone back and discovered Isn't Anything, Surfer Rosa, and Daydream Nation. I'm struggling to choose between those ones now.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

I have 13 of those and they're all great - or they were the last time i played them in about 1989.
Honourable mentions - pixies ,mbv yawn, amc, thin white spunk, muses, kane

Seeing as it's missing Rudimentary Peni and Napalm Death, it's gotta be Jane Siberry . Sounded like nothing else to me when I first heard it

Don't believe the Hype

No-one into Revolting Cocks? I'm sort of surprised by that.

Have still never heard any Jane Siberry. Anyone care to tell me about that record?

I couldn't decide whether to vote for RevCo or Skinny Puppy, and forgot to vote for either.

ugh someone voted the wonderstuff

Wow Marcello voted for AR Kane? I must adjust my assesment of him.

Sorry that sounds rude. I didnt have a bad assesment to begin with. But anyway.

I've had bad and good assessments of Marcello. I wouldn't be quick to pass judgement with that dude. To this day I have no idea how I stand about him. ILX might be a little more entertaining with his presence, though. He was noticeably silent on that Phil Spector thread. I somehow he'll return to ILX for awhile, if at all.

DOUBT