1986

Here's another killer year.  Why waste time talking about it on the whole?  These albums speak for themselves.

10.  Guided by Voices - Devil Between My Toes
For example, my favorite band ever finally makes an appearance with their debut LP.  As usual they are moving and growing from the more unified, but still surprisingly strong, EP Forever Since Breakfast with its generally folk-rock sound.  Though it is still a far cry from the finely-tuned lo-fi of their 90s work, this album has a very raw sound that benefits the still young Ohio group.  Their debt to R.E.M. is  most evident, but manages to Pollard's idols as he imitates Stipe on the childlike brother fantasy "Hey Hey, Spaceman" and the tribute to a deformed Appalachian guitar god "Hank's Little Fingers."  There is an unusual abundance of energetic little instrumentals like "Crux" and "Bread Alone," but the album has a darker tone than most of GbV's work with "Portrait Destroyed by Fire" and less directly on tracks like "Old Battery" and "Discussing Wallace Chambers."  It concludes with "Captains Dead," a heavy rocker with Byrds-y harmonies that is still beloved by official iron men  of all ages.

9.  The Butthole Surfers - Rembrandt Pussyhorse
The Texans slow down and further refine their distinct sound with a greater emphasis on the studio as an instrument and Paul Leary's on his own musicianship.  They are no longer a vulgar, psychedelic punk band, but their own sludgy vulgar psychedelic concoction on songs like "Whirling Hall of Knives" and the 7/4 shanty "Sea Ferring."  Humor is still a key part of their sound on the British accented diary of life on the road "Perry" and the thudding industrial cover of "American Woman."  Perhaps also on the somber organ dirge of "Strangers Die Every Day" and the book-ending paranoia of "(Creep) In The Cellar."  The Surfers go beyond gross-out jokes and into artistry by real people that woulkd influence some of the most popular acts of the following era.  It's pretty frightening and will only get more so.  You will scream again, again, again AAAAH!!!

8.  The Three O'Clock - Ever After
Because of the departure of Louis Gutierrez and the drastic change of sound the Three O'Clock's third album is too often overlooked.  While the loss of the guitarist is a major blow, keyboardist Mike Mariano really picks up the slack and the prominence of synthesizers on this album makes it sound more like an 80s album than any of the previous ones.  The songs, while less rocking than before are as strong as ever and Quercio's lyrics still retain all their weird charm on songs like "Suzie's on the Ball," "The Penny Girls," and the hero-worship of "Follow Him Around."  As the title might imply, there is more sentimentality here as heard in "Look Into Our Eyes" and "Songs And Gentle Words," though the latter's thick layers of synths keep the psychedelia around in a more timely fashion.  While it may be more pop, Quercio's bass is as heavy as ever and this underrated gem is a great place to start getting paisley for a synth pop fan.

7.  Camper Van Beethoven - II & III
The Santa Cruz group is best-known for their debut which unfortunately did not make the cut for the last year, but I am of the rare opinion that the follow-up is the equal of that fun and worldly album.  Being lucky enough to have heard this on vinyl first and not knowing which side (labeled II and B) was the "proper" beginning I first heard the smart-assed party-crasher anthem "(We're a) Bad Trip," one of the band's msot fun songs.  The "correct" opener "Abundance" sets the standard just as well for the many other psychedelic instrumentals and near-instrumentals like "Circles," the atmospheric "Dustpan," and perfectly-titled "ZZ Top Goes to Egypt."  Their humor is as strong as ever on the country miniature "Cowboys from Hollywood" and the teen-advising "Goleta," securing their spot as "Most Californian Band of All Time."  Their choice of covers gets less ironic, but no less fiendish and clever on Sonic Youth's "I Love Her All The Time," but with eighteen originals it's just another one of many great songs.

6.  Hüsker Dü - Candy Apple Grey
The group's first album for Warner Brothers is naturally the most accessible so far, but it is no surprising jump and the playing is as heavy and fast as you would expect had it been released on SST.  Unfortunately the production is not that much better either.  Seen as the writer of the potential hits, Grant Hart goes into darker, more emotional territory with "Sorry Somehow" and the band's best-known near-hit "Don't Wanna Know If You Are Lonely."  Mould may outdo him on darkness on twin tragedies "Hardly Getting Over It" and "Too Far Down," but his up-beat rockers "Eiffel Tower High" and "All This I've Done For You" - some of the group's catchiest songs.  This album captures that brief period when it seemed like the dudes could have really broken out before drugs, insanity, personal rivalries, and an AIDS-scare proved them, or at least some of them to be "Dead Set On Destruction."

5.  XTC - Skylarking
Following their move into full-blown classic UK psychedelia as the Dukes of the Stratosphear the Swindon drummer-less trio enters the studio with Todd Rundgren to create this beautiful tribute to the Earth and its seasons.  Best-known for the unfortunately corny, explicitly childish "Dear God," most songs are a brighter set of clean songs with thick arrangements like "Season Cycle" and "That's Really Super, Supergirl."  Andy Partridge apparently classed with Rundgren, but it is hard to hear flaust or evidence of tension on the bright and trippy "The Meeting Place," or the lounge-y jazz of "The Man Who Sailed Around His Soul."    Both of the group's songwriters are at their best and Rungdren's insistence on pulling them in every direction makes this album their most fascinating listen of all with almost any imaginable stylistic base covered.  Colin Moulding shines his brghtest on the last two tracks, the funeral folk of "Dying" and rebirth of "Sacrificial Bonfire," which concludes the album with all the rebirth of spring and the mysterious pagan quality that makes this album XTC's most distinct.

4.  The Feelies - The Good Earth
After six years the Feelies finally return to the studio with none other than Peter Buck at the board.  In the time since Crazy Rhythms Glenn Mercer and Bill Million had been involved with the greatest band of all time The Trypes (later Speed the Plough - more on that later...) and more than just a rhythm section from from John Baumgartner (who took the cover photo).  The masters of tension kick off the album with the piano-dominated "On the Roof," a song so loose it is hard to beleive it was written by a band from New Jersey.  This big and simple folk-rock sound that is equal parts Tom Petty and Lou Reed dominates this and their following albums, but an almost ten-year-old song "Slipping (Into Something)" takes them back to their early days of building and building and building.  This is their only album for 25 years to not include a cover, which is great as the new band had a lot to show off after all this time, it is just unfortunate for all those other songwriters who don't get to hear that unbelievable guitar sound on their work.  "Slow Down" and "The High Road" say it all, I suppose.

3.  The Smiths - The Queen is Dead
The Smiths surprise even their fans with this masterpiece.  The band's playing is unbelievably tight, in particular Andy Rourke's bass which provides the perfect counter-melody to Morrisey's vocals and Marr's chiming chords.  The best example is of course "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out," which finds Moz's humorously dramatic lyrics best fit in Marr's gorgeous arrangement, but the astute closer "Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others" comes close with the guitars creating the perfect Smiths swirling atmosphere.  The vocals are at their best on "The Boy With the Thorn in His Side" and the Earth-shattering title track.  Lyrically it is Morrisey's best as heard in "Cemetery Gates" in which his defensiveness is well-explained and thought-provoking rather than in the downward spiral of obnoxious and pretentious into which he is still falling.  It is a shame I have talked about the lead vocalist so much as this is truly a band effort and each member deserves as much credit as the other for making this one of the finest albums of its time.  Just a shame it did not continue.

2.  The Triffids - Born Sandy Devotional
This Perth sextet goes even further than the Smiths in terms of intensity and drama.  The album even opens up with the story of a man who, due to his failing marriage attempts suicide by inviting "The Seabirds" to feast on his live body in the ocean.  The birds knew better, apparently.  Life does not get much easier on "Tarrilup Bridge" with keyboardist Jill Birt's fragile lead or on the epic "Stolen Property" with its final rant that suggests Nick Cave may not have been all that one-of-a-kind.  The fare never gets lighter, just a little brighter on the down-under childhood memories of the "Estuary Bed" and the dark and puzzling "Chicken Killer."  Even the album's single "Wide Open Road" is a lonely tale of heartbreak that despite its certain hopeful quality never lets you forget that it comes from the most isolated Western city on the planet.  The music is big and distinct with prominence of organs, strings, vibes, and plenty of "Evil" Gram Lee's steel guitar up front.  Closer "Tender is the Night (The Long Fidelity)" is a quiet duet which despite its initial tragedy and concluding homesickness leaves the heavy-themed album on a relatively light note.  Keep away from children.

1.  The Chameleons - Strange Times
The Chameleon's final album of their original run has a lot of those same dark and nostalgic themes on this brooding piece of heavy psychedelia.  The record, as surreal (though of much higher quality) as its cover begins with the fast "Mad Jack," most similar to their earlier work, but longer, slower compositions take over soon after with "Soul in Isolation" and "Swamp Thing" being the best examples of this growing and slithering sound.  Guitar dynamics are still what the band does best, but they allow room for more synthesizers on songs like "In Answer" and the closing "I'll Remember."  Some of these songs veer further into heady philosophical territory like "Time/The End of Time," but just as successful are their most human tracks of all the nostalgic "Childhood" and the acoustic guitar-coated farewell of "Tears."  With not much time left the Chameleons make their finest work, a cohesive universe of sound that cannot be placed in any real material setting or time.  Not so much soul-crushing as much a heavy, initially painful soul massage.  The American and CD versions contain excellent bonus tracks such as an even better version of "Tears," "Ever After," and an extended, extra heavy cover of "Tomorrow Never Knows."