Lots o' bug killing today, beginning with this The Modern Dance album by Pere Ubu.
This record has been on my radar to find for my own Bible (Mojo, August 1995) collection of albums for quite sometime where it sits at #72.
However, today I'm thinking it might also be prudent to actually listen to it as well.
The Modern Dance remains the essential Ubu purchase. For sure, Mercury had no idea what they had on their hands when they released this as part of their punk rock offshoot label Blank, but it remains a classic slice of art-punk.
It announces itself quite boldly: the first sound you hear is a painfully high-pitched whine of feedback, but then Tom Herman's postmodern Chuck Berry riffing kicks off the brilliant Non-Alignment Pact, and you soon realize that this is punk rock unlike any you've ever heard. David Thomas' caterwauling is funny and moving, Scott Krauss (drums) and Tony Maimone (bass) are one of the great unheralded rhythm sections in all of rock, and the "difficult" tracks like Street Waves, Chinese Radiation, and the terrifying Humor Me are revelatory, and way ahead of their time.
The Modern Dance is the signature sound of the avant-garage: art rock, punk rock, and garage rock mixing together joyously and fearlessly.
As for being on the Bible list?
I dunno.
I mean, I liked it ... but among the pantheon of greatest albums ever?
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