Fear and Whiskey

Utterly bizarre. Weird rambling speech over punky violins, mad subject matters. Sometimes you hear an album and you have no idea if it’s genius or madness. One star? Five? Who can tell?

Best Song: None. Worst Song: Chivalry. What in the 8-bit cowboy is that background instrumental? Overall: I will be surprised if there is a worse vocal performance on this list. This sounds like your milquetoast colleague who always wants to go to karaoke, so you assume they must be able to sing, but when they get on stage they just start loudly talking with the music. And it's interspersed with amateur theatre? Even better. This album is one of the 1001 ways to tell that you've actually already died and you were sent to the bad place.

I'd like to think that there are hundreds of subgenres of music, and with this list being only 1001 long, the best 1-10 albums of any subgenre are represented here. If this album isn't right at the bottom of this particular subgenre then god help the rest of the albums. Jesus Christ.

Occasionally threatens to be really good. But sadly never materialises. Most sounds like a band failing to be interesting but succeeding at being annoying

I was brought up on a diet of fear and whiskey. My old man used to beat me black and blue, then douse me in whiskey and set me alight. It was an exciting time to grow up and sculptured me into the well-rounded human I am today.

So you're telling me that a British band did in 1984 what Viagra Boys did on In Spite of Ourselves in 2021, for a whole album, with copious violin, and I didn't listen to any of it until today? Put this directly in my veins, stat. I don't care if it stops holding up eventually: This is exactly for me and there's an entire discography and several relistens ahead. Fine food for my imagination.

just not in to diddly dee punk. as soon as the fiddle turns up i lose interest. i used to play football for the bolton irish centre in the north of england celtic supporters tournament. after the football they would hire a function room and there would always be a fucking diddly dee band on and all these english people would sing along to these irish republican songs because they support a scottish football team that has something to do with ireland. all a bit weird and has probably put me off it even more. i'd like to thank buckfast for getting me through that nonsense. the americans seem to bum this kind of irish punk too. fucking history nonces.

Someone’s drunk uncle recorded an album of himself doing karaoke at the pub.

The info for this album said it was punk & country. Just because you suck at making music doesn’t make you a punk band. Really thought the bad fake American accents were a really great touch.

Oh ya, this is right up my alley. Like the Clash but with a fiddle. Very reminiscent of The Pogues, and a slight attitude of Johnny Cash. There are a couple more strange avant garde type songs that were misses for me. But overall, this is a very fun, well written and ahead-of-its-time punk folk album. 4/5 Favorites: Chivalry, Hard to Be Human Again, Last Dance, Lost Highway Least Favorites: Trouble Down South, Psycho Cupid,

One listen sufficient. There is a reason this didn't get released widely in 1985. Not shocking, but not good.

I think they just gave some microphones and instruments to a bunch of random people in the underground at 2 am and hit record. The "singers" might have some ideas about what notes are supposed to sound like, but I'm not entirely sure. At first I thought they opened with the worst song on the album, but somehow it just kept getting worse.

just because an album is weird, doesn't mean it should be on this list. all the elements are decent enough but they do not work together at all. the singer is especially terrible, no singing, just talking and raising or lowering his volume occasionally

A British group that decides to defy expectations by laying fiddles, harmonicas, and country guitar hooks onto a punk-rock foundation should be praised and applauded when it is done as spectacularly as this. Although the war-time themes of the songs would expect you to have a brooding, dark tone, the songs are actually really fun and catchy. I never thought I would hear an album like this, it's an underrated gem. Favorite Song: Country Least Favorite Song: Psycho Cupid

never heard of this act but really enjoyed this album. normally “british pub band” is a tough sell but it works

Not for me.

I honestly didn’t think I’d like this one, but I did! I guess the whole country punk thing is up my alley.

Haha, that was fun, but like in a really bad way

You have to be pretty into British New Wave to find this band, and it shows. Probably a good deep cut for someone into that scene, but not for the average listener.

Not at all what I was expecting. The Punk element is much less obvious, and the Country element more prominent, with fiddle and everything. There’s also a fair amount of dissonant noise at points. The song I found myself drawn to most was Last Dance, but I’m biased towards songs about looking for small pieces of meaning in random moments of life, especially those involving love and/or empty dancefloors. A teacher I had at uni once mentioned that I wrote almost exclusively about the ‘poignancy of the random moment,’ and I get the sense of that in Last Dance. I also love the detail of singing ‘You were waltzing’ in a song that isn’t a Waltz, especially when the band have proven that they could do a Waltz previously on Flitcraft. I’m enjoying it more on a second listen. The dissonant noise parts are less prominent than I had realised. I think they’re unusual enough that they take focus from the rest of the album which is, if anything pretty standard Country Rock fare, played with a Punky attitude rather than instrumentation. Now that I know what to expect, I like this a lot

Actually liked this. Will need to relisten to it sometime.

false

Really good album loved it lots.

really enjoyed this. great production on the album too

Yeah liked that. Four stars possibly just because it's new to me.

Sons diferentes, interessantes e muito bons

Medio punk así gracioso. Sin más.

Pretty good

Not bad at all actually

interesting, proboably should listen more before id give it a final rating

BOMB

A tale of 2 completely different sides to an album. The first side is decent (first song is great and Hard to be Human is very good), but the second side is quality alt-country cowpunk, and definitely worth the listen.

Je tenais à m'excuser pour la faute de syntaxe que j'ai commise en rédigeant ma critique de l'album de Gainsbourg. Ça n'arrivera plus.

Not a huge fan of this one. Bad singing, weird backing tracks. Just weird.

There is a long-running comedy panel game on BBC radio where one of the tasks is to sing the lyrics of one song to the tune of another. That sprung to mind listening to the first track. The second sounded like an out-take from Jeff Wayne's "War of the Worlds". The start of the third gave me Supertramp vibes then went punk. Then the album just got weirder. Not for me 1/5.

Woof. The vocals in this first song are atrocious. If the rest of the album follows suit, this is going to be a tough one to finish. "Hard to be Human Again" was a welcome change in the sound once it started playing. Not my favorite type of music, but seems like it's much more in this band's wheelhouse. The rest of the album had a couple of other spots that piqued my ears a bit, but it was overall a relief to finish the album and move on to something better - I think there's a very good reason that some of the songs had less than 7K plays on YouTube Music.

Kinda sounded like Fred Armisen doing an 80s uk punk band skit

Sounds like Morrissey, terrible.

I had never heard of Mekons and am glad that I have. I have a feeling they may start making the rotation in the up coming new year. An interesting mix with country influenced music in behind the music at the forefront. Happy new year!

Loved it. one of those albums you can't explain why :)

I really enjoyed this, it’s weird and I haven’t heard much like it, which makes me like it more! Adding punk influence to any other music genre makes an album sound like heaven to me. Fav songs: Psycho Cupid, Darkness and Doubt, Last Dance Least fav songs: I liked them all

I knew nothing of this album...or band...went in cold. And... I think I reaaaaaally like this. Added the whole album to my playlist. A weird mix of British Punk and folk/country meets a early David Lynch film? I don't know...but I liked it. saying 4.5 but giving it 5 stars.

im literally obsessed with this album, the clamor! the fiddle!! 10/10 i liked every song on the album 😔

This caught me by surprise. The singer is rarely on pitch and the drum machine is overbearing. Somehow it is post c&w and post punk at the same time. Yet there is a ton of charm here and I love it for its sheer creativity and effort.

It’s Cowpunk—what else could you want?

Really good album. Country elements are strong and not half-assed. Musicianship is top notch, and the lyrics were good but hard to follow. This album was a joy.

This album was sick. Take some folk/bluegrass/country and chop it up with a bunch of hypnotic drum lines, add some punk, then finish it off with some wild songwriting. Every song was so different. You go from Trouble Down South, which is a punky bluesy freaky number to Psycho Cupid, which is a totally futuristic desert cyberpunk trance. This is the exact weirdness that I like doing this list for

This had me reaching for so much other music as so many 80's & 70's elements (XTC, Police, even They might be giants, early Pulp). So thanks for the discovery, that's why I'm here!

Muss ich nochmal an einem ruhigen Abend mit Whiskey hören aber gehört definitiv schon zu meinen persönlichen Neuentdeckungen.

I need a pint after listening to this. At first I wasn't really feeling it but it definitely grew on me. Not the biggest fan of the spoken word ones though. Meh 3.

This was really neat. Completely unexpected and a very unique sound with the combination of fiddle and harmonica with the punk elements.

I enjoyed listening through this album though it may noy be ny everyday cup of tea. Strange combo of punk and country that works somehow. I liked it!

well that certainly was an album

I normally don't like this type of music, but this one is just sloppy enough to appeal to me. It's closer to Meat Puppets and The Waterboys than it is from The Pogues or whatever, which is a good thing.

Um, is this exercise making anyone else think maybe your taste in music is bad? If these are the best albums and I can't stand them....is that my fault or theirs? I think it's theirs.

I did not need to hear this before I die.

I could've used some whiskey listening to this. Not bad, but the country/punk blend wasn't doing it for me. Neither influence was very strong and the result was just not enjoyable. 2/5

1.5

not really sure why this was on a top 1,001 list. like, it was fine... but i didn't really see anything about this album that pushed the music genre/industry forward.

pretty meh

Very niche struggling students make a band and play at sketchy underground clubs with 15 people vibe. Few songs were catchy (last two) but non were memorable.

I don't know what to say. The mix/production just sounds so weak. Everything sounds so flimsy and the song writing isn't much better. I also have no idea why this was even included, it doesn't seem that popular or influential. Violent Femmes and Meat Puppets already did MUCH better cow punk years earlier and are already on this list. I don't want to make another "They are only on here because they are British" rant, but that is the only reason I can see why this was included. Mid 2.

This wasn't awful but I didn't really get anything out of it.

Awful. What a waste of time. Some of the music was okay but man… those vocals were some of the worst we’ve had on this list.

I don't know why this album is part of this list. It's not good, nothing special, and as far as I know, has not been a great influence on anyone.

This is more a bar band album than a top 1001 album.

The '80s country punk thing is almost cool, but the singer sounds shitfaced drunk

So I have never really explored the Mekons, but a band I loved in high school - Too Much Joy - had a song called "If I Was a Mekon" and it made me curious about them. What little I had heard before today didn't do much for me so I didn't go any farther. This will be a good opportunity for me to give them a proper chance. Listening now, and on paper this sounds like something I SHOULD really like - it has rock, country(ish), and punk(ish) elements, which is what features in a lot of the new music I like today. But I think it's the vocals that bother me. And the production sounds very 1985/flat/muted to me. I've read that this band was great live and I bet they were, but this particular studio work doesn't do it for me. I got all the way to track 9 ("Last Dance") before I thought, "OK, I like this one."

I like experimentation, but this felt messy, and that he style of singing, which was really popular back then, doesn't help. At least I could feel that they tried to do something different, but still feels a bit like every other british rock album from that period of time

Tried…..just couldn’t get into it

Wasn't for me :(

-nothing about this really stood out to me or spoke to me idk. it was not bad but it was not really “good”. the whole time I was listening to it I was sorta just thinking “yup that’s definitely music” -there are definitely worse albums, some even on this list, but I fear this one did not really leave much of an impression either way -Favorites are Chivalry and Darkness and Doubt

Camden, Fiddles, Guinness, are they even of Irish descent, I dunno. It's fine but I'll never listen to it again.

Not that into this one. Was pretty uninteresting. 2/5 Won’t listen again

It's actually remarkable how similar all of these post punk/new wave English bands of the 80s sound like. I will give it to these guys though, this is unusually bad. It's one of the shortest albums I recall listening to now 860+ deep and yet it still manages to find a way in being too long. Weird violin and "singing" all throughout. 3/10

Largely passed me by. Rather inoffensive, but no real reason to listen again. Darkness and Doubt was fine, I hated Psycho Cupid, but quite liked Trouble Down South.

not for me

Oh wow. I really could not keep up with all the directions this album was going The first song sounded like Morrissey’s tired uncle drunkenly trying to assemble a Casio in the back room of a saloon. The second song was like the soundtracks of three different Film 4 original cop movies were playing at the same time. The third song was… actually kind of normal, but then the fourth song was like drinking in a tiki bar in Eastern Europe where everything was inexplicably in slow motion. The second half of the album is a bit more of your standard 80s fare, and then the closer is a really fun country ballad (with a violin solo that sounds exactly like Sound of Silence) I’m fresh out of similes but long story short this was horrible yet also somehow endearing. Wouldn’t recommend, would listen again - could be a 1, could be a 4, giving this a confused 2

There were a couple brief moments where a song would start to trend towards being not completely awful. Or maybe it was when I just couldn't be bothered to pay attention

Punk but wasn't feeling it

I like the early stuff from the mekons more. I found this to be a bit of a chore even with the short runtime. Don't dig the folksier arrangements.

This shit sucks.

Adam Sweeting from The Guardian writes in his 2004 review of the Mekon’s Best Of album release: ‘Fear & Whiskey first appeared in 1985, its ragged folk-country sound drawing inspiration from America but informed by the horrors of the miners' strike. It earned the band the tag "the godfathers of alt-country"’ Godfathers of alt-country? Nuh-uh. Alternative country pre 1985 is more in the vein of the Jayhawks, Gram Parsons and Townes Van Zandt (from the late 1980’s onwards- Uncle Tupelo, Wilco and Lucinda Williams). Just because you add a fiddle, slide guitar and harmonica to your punk band doesn’t mean you transform into an alt country band! 🙄 There is a lack of cohesion on this album I can’t even begin to elaborate on. It made me irrationally angry. Overall: 1/10

DIE!!!!!!!

Not a fan

It’s like they realized they sucked as a punk band and decided to also suck as a country band. Like if Dexy’s Midnight Runners decided to be worse somehow.

You know it's bad when an album was only 35 minutes and it still felt like a massive waste of time.

'My sex drew back into itself - tight and dry - closed up' - thanks to the words in Psycho Cupid Danceband on the Edge of Time, summed up my feelings about this album perfectly.

It comes across like a novelty act, but without being funny. I couldn’t wait for it to be over.

I've really enjoyed this album. It is so good! And it has great songs on it. There's not much to say, it's a funny and very much enjoyable album, which is also great. Not all albums need to be very deep, varied or intense to be great. Sometimes albums like this one are such a great listening. And that's fine too.

Knowing that the Mekons are Jonathan Franzen's favorite band didn't put me in the right mood exactly, but just 30 seconds into Fear and Whiskey I realized they too were a band for me. In a sense, they're the Grateful Dead of punk rock: a collective more than a band that incorporates elements of country into the schematics of their original approach and emphasizes the live show. But they're also something else entirely: I'm assuming they do not have legions of fans but thousands in the know, and while the Dead are essentially a live band w/ album footnotes, the Mekons are real studio folk. Full of warmth, humor, modesty, they yet know they're onto something. 'I wanted to say fall in love w/ me / I wanted to say fall in love / It'll be alright.'

Not all that long ago, I went through a heavy Mekong phase, and not surprisingly this was one of the albums. Hey so maybe not a perfect record but that’s not what the Mekons are going for anyway.

Brilliant.

The more times I listened to this the more I fell in love. It’s like if Crass made Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, and it’s no wonder this is widely cited as an influence on the 90’s alt-country scene. The back half really kicks things up with the country influences and it’s hypnotic in making me want to come back for more. This is one I’ll be coming back to fairly often.

Holy shit, this album is the definition of getting better with each song. That is a MONSTER second half!!

Though some vocal jank, the album feels like bold statement melodies telling interesting stories

Na az ilyenek miatt kezd bele az ember ebbe projektbe. Hallgattam volna valaha country-punkot magamtól? Nem. Jobb zene ez mint az előzó album? Nem. Megérdemel egy ötöst, amiért ennyire bizarr és kreatív? Igeeeeennn.

Fookin' brilliant.

Man oh man. So back in the 90s, I used to listen to a band, Too Much Joy, with a song called "If I Were A Mekon." Back then, I didn't know what a Mekon was, and I knew I wasn't quite as cool as Too Much Joy. But now I have heard The Mekons. And I'm not a Mekon. So I can't say I'm cooler than TMJ. But I too wish I was a Mekon and so maybe I'm now on par.

Country and punky and gritty. Love it!