Throwing Muses

Didn’t do much for me I’m afraid

This album didn't really impress me although I like powerful female voices. Maybe the album had some potential. But overall, it just sounded very flat. 2/5

On va la faire vite. C'est une sorte de groupe un peu punk. C'était plutôt cool, mais sans plus.

4.5

unfortunately the debut doesn’t seem to be on my streaming service so i tracked down what i could elsewhere. and i listed to what was linked as well. i think the music is pretty good, and poetry interesting, but the vocals are hit or miss. it’ll be humming along pretty well and then the vocals will throw me for a loop that isn’t really doing it for me. maybe on a different day.

A step above the recent run of abrasive guitar records that ended in twos — Kristin Hersh’s angular intensity and Tanya Donelly’s melodic counterweight give the record enough genuine variety to land above the “fuzz for fuzz’s sake” verdict that sank Mudhoney and the Velvet Underground. The jagged rhythms and Hersh’s slightly unhinged vocal delivery are doing real work rather than simply making noise. The honest ceiling is that none of it generates any pull toward return visits. A record that’s better than the alternatives isn’t the same as a record worth reaching for, and this one sits comfortably in the respect-without-love tier that the three exists to capture. Tanya Donelly’s presence is the distinguishing factor — her melodic sensibility gives the record moments of relative warmth that Hersh alone probably wouldn’t have allowed. A three delivered without ambiguity. Better than its neighbors in the recent listening run, not good enough to matter beyond that.

Somewhat difficult album to listen to depending on the region you live in but I eventually found it. 80's punk with a squeaky stilted female vocal performance. The instruments are doing more for me to enjoy but it never crossed the threshold where I wanted to dive in for more.

I prefer their later stuff

This one kinda surprised me in how much I enjoyed it. Idk if it was just the day or my mood, but I walked away impressed overall. I'll need another listen to fully come to a conclusion, but good overall. No idea why this wasn't on Spotify though.

4/5

I had to listen to the "In A Doghouse" version because that's all I could find on Spotify so hopefully it's similar enough. I liked the vibe of this album, I'm a sucker for some femme-punk even if I usually like it a bit angrier. The musicianship is great, probably even a bit ahead of its time seeing as this was released in the mid 80s. However I just couldn't gel with the vocals, I don't know if it was just her voice or the effects they were using on the mix but I found it really let the album down which was a shame. 3*

A pure core installment of 80’s girl punk. Wild and intense drawing on rage that I could feel.

I listened to the 1986 version of this from youtube. I'm going with a 3 here, it was alright.

I like it, good noughties rock

I really, REALLY wanted to like this. I’ve had Throwing Muses thrown at me before, though not this album, but my reaction was similar then. All the elements were there for love, but I just didn’t have the feeling. Like sitting on a date with someone you SHOULD like, all the indications are that you two would get on swimmingly, but there just isn’t any chemistry. And now you can’t wait to get out of there. 3 Boolean: true? Not too sure actually

Greatly underappreciated post-punk album, which certainly paved the way for the sound of the 1990s and even beyond in some ways. Throwing Muses is exactly why I carry on with this challenge in the first place despite the fact that I know there's inevitably going to be more stinkers than winners, as it's introduced me to a band I can absolutely see myself diving into very soon. The riffs are addictive, the lyrics are cryptic, and there isn't a single bad track here. Why has the world hidden this from me for so long?

If Gwen Stefani sang in an alt rock band

Not too bad. I liked the changes in time signature

Что за пресная шляпа

75/100. Cool debut album. I didn't know of this band beforehand and went in blind. Really interesting writing and the sound is great. Something interesting about Throwing Muses is that they were the first american band to release an album on the British label 4AD. A year later pixies would release their debut EP with them as well. A really cool record and a real bridging point for alt music.

🎧”The missing link between Siouxsie And The Banshees and P.J. Harvey” indeed.

Hard to find as the link for Spotify directs you to another later album. I can hear the B52's comparisons and I don't like the B52's but this was better. This didn't really move me anyway. Another time and situation I might have liked it better.

favs: "Speed and Sleep" and "Half Blast"

wait das cover gehört aber zu nem anderen album oder nicht...?

Did not really listen.

Divorce albums are the BOMB

I liked this album despite the fact that nothing really stood out. Still the music was enjoyable and the Courtney Love -esque voice was a nice match.

Proper mediocre

It's alright! 1001albumsgenerator.com has been magnanimious lately with bestowing rock albums and not some sheit

Sounded very much like Siouxie early in the album, but they clearly show their own sound with some genre mixes later on. I've liked most things I've heard by Throwing Muses, including this, but I like more of their other stuff.

Hard to have a true reflection of how the album flows when I’ve had to listen on YouTube and got adverts after every track. One of the main bug bares of doing this list. Anyway I couldn’t help but think of an album I previously listened to on this list and hearing the similarities. That band being ‘Hole’ however Hole felt far superior from memory and this just didn’t feel edgy enough as an album, yes female grundgy punk vocals were nice, yes the riffs were nice but it just lacked something- maybe I can blame the YouTube quality for that missing feature. Anyway- not as good as Hole so for that score a point less than Hole got. 7/10 Fave track- ‘soul solidier’ Worst track- ‘rabbits dying’

Throwing Muses The music of step-sisters that really does sound like the music of step-sisters. One second the guitar lines and vocals entwine together in harmony, the next they are antagonistic and spikey while the bass and, particularly, drums find a common thread - almost playing quiet mediators as time signatures and song structure bounce all over the place. It's notable that the most 'normal' track, Green, is the only one written by Tanya. I think Kristen would have been the scary sister to know 😂 Best Track - America (She Can't Say No) gave me the best balance between quirkyness and folk punk attitude. Call Me, Stand Up and Soul Soldier all good though too. Worst Track - Vickys Box Could have been massive, IMO, if they could have got on 😂 7.5/10

Not bad. I can see why they're on the list even if I wasn't super pumped about them while listening. They currently have a rating of 3 on this site, which I think is perfectly rated.

Tää levy oli vähän sillisalaatti, muttei huono sellainen. Kauheasti en ehtinyt keskittyä, mutta töissä oli ihan menevää toimintamusiikkia. Välillä meno muistutti Heartia, välillä laulajan ääni kiekui todella Kate Bush -vibaisesti. Tämä tarvitsee ehkä toisenkin kuuntelukerran.

Nyt ei jääny kyllä mitään käteen. Jotenki se levyjen vaihtojen sekoilu pisti pakan sekasin. Ei ihmeempää sanottavaa.

Tää oli oikein maukasta indiekolinaa! Vähän meni taustamusan puolelle, mut ainakin siihen erittäin passeli.

Aivan hyvvää post-punk rymistelyä 🙏🏼

Aivan jepa räimettä ja kova vokalisti. Vähän vaatis lisäkuuntelua. Reissaaminen verottanut levyihin paneutumista, mut jos aikoo arvostella 1000+ levyä niin ehkä jokaista ei voi aivan karrelle kuunnella ja niin pieteetillä paneutua, jotta tää proggis ois sustainable.

Listened to both the 1986 and 2006 (spotify linked) albums.

5/10 Punky but fairly forgettable. Just not enough musicality being it all, I guess.

Solid 3 - good album

Why would you throw a muse? What's the story behind that... 💭Great genre and cool-looking band, but it just did nothing for me. Maybe I'll give it another chance someday. Thanks😘

Wasn’t 100% into this. Appreciated the rawness of it though

Could only find 6 of the 10 individual songs on YouTube.

Angular guitar riffs, changing time signatures and the singer reminded me of Lena Lovich. It’s a bit shouty and dissonant for me my taste. I liked the opening track.

Good record

this was AWESOME! Iloved

Had to listen to this on YouTube, for some reason this one isn’t on apple music but their other albums are. I’ve listened to some of their other stuff and enjoyed it but never gave a full album a go before. After listening to this one I’ll definitely need to give their other stuff a deeper listen. Women led indie/post punk deserves more love

Originally listened to the wrong album. It's here (first 10 tracks): https://open.spotify.com/album/6NDHvXHJTWPMhUqiuwosH9?si=5HU8yJFwTYSytUJhskN3Ew Seems more historically significant than enjoyable. 2.5/5. Raising to 3.

It was honestly just ok, plenty more records of this genre that deserve to be ahead of this tho

i feel like there's a lot of riot grrrl spirit here, but that might just be because of how much indie rock is in both of them. idk. i liked this a good bit, but it loses steam when it goes more post-punk. loses me proportionally to how long it goes on for. i really did enjoy Hate My Way though. deserves to be one of the 1001? ehh idk. leaning no. i'd rather have a Breeders album on here

ok

A fun find ... there is still surprise left in this list.

Like if a garage band tried to imitate 90's alternative/grunge but didn't know how to write an interesting song

Not too bad - hadn't heard of thsi group before

I enjoyed this! It was fun

In the continuum of girlboss indie rock this is kinda halfway between Patti Smith and riot grrrl with a lot of wider late 80s college rock indie thrown in. Which is to say that I think it is good!

MUSE? Jk I FELL BEHIND AGAIN 😭 OHH???OH????? IT HAD ME THE MOMENT I REALIZED IT WAS A GIRLIE SINGING VERY 2000s SOLID 3

Every song sounds the same, just a bit boring

Make sure you listen to the right album! The Spotify link takes you to their 8th album of the same name (which is still decent). Find their compilation album "In the doghouse". The first 10 tracks are the right one. Great album and one that makes doing this list worthwhile. I particularly like the use of cowbell on Rabbits Dying.

ehh

Very forgettable and mid.

Wow! That was quite ahead of its time wasn’t it!? This is apparently what one of leads from the Breeders was up to in the 80s. Explains why it’s so good, why aren’t the Breeders on the list? For what it’s worth, this seems to be the same album as the YouTube link in Apple Music (US store): https://music.apple.com/us/album/throwing-muses/1025460656 For some reason Apple puts it in 2003, but it’s the same track list

Found this quite hard work. Vocals pretty annoying. One song where the volume fades up/down gave me a headache

not for me but its not bad

Really good!!! Not sure if album cover is right here but whatever album linked here I enjoyed a lot. 4-5/5

very meh

Even for a ~38-minute album, this felt like it dragged. The shaky singing that the lead singer used throughout the album was very annoying.

Really enjoyed this, an 80's/90's indie band I missed the first time around but will be sure to explore more.

this was really good better than pixies

Album 242. Throwing Muses (https://open.spotify.com/album/3rIziXSp46zL1jmweXITHy?si=0eo8pMuLTyKehNAobJo2og) — Throwing Muses (1986) Shit totale 1/5 No liked songs

Nothing too crazy about this album. I don’t think I’ll remember it when I finish this journey

hard to find

I really loved Bright Yellow Gun from their later stuff. This, not so much. 1/5

Seems more modern than its 1986 making. Good energy, great voice. Accidentally listened to some of their other work before finding the right album to listen to and wasn't upset about it.

# Album Name: Merriweather Post Pavilion # Artist: Animal Collective # Rating: 2/5 # Comments: Honestly, literally one good song and thats it. Did not enjoy this album. # Top Tunes: My girls # Would I listen to it again? Just my girls

great energy, however, the musicianship is lacking.

This album was hard to find (confusingly, the Spotify link is actually to a different album with the same name by the same band, but with a totally different group of songs). I was able to find the right album on YouTube. As for the music, there's a ton of variety and great lyrics. One of the more well-put together post-punk albums on this list. 4.0/5.0: Great

decent post punk

I found this a difficult one as I feel like it just blended into the category of “quite good but not particularly memorable rock music” of which there is lots on 1001. I had to give it 2 attempts just to see if I wasn’t giving it a fair go but that didn’t yield much more. It was fine, surprised to see it’s from 2003 as it feels a bit older than that. A benefit of the doubt 3 as I thought it was decent but don’t think I’d give it a third go.

Not sure what to make of this.  At times it's like a weird country folk album infused with a soft punk edge.  That's just the sound then you add in the vocals, and it gets even more bizarre as things go on. At times the screech down the mic is strained and sounds a bit witchy but not necessarily always a bad thing.  I'm just saying it's unique that's all and no direct easy comparison exists!   In the end enjoyed the wicked witch of the west!  The main caveat is the length of the album and the varied quality of the songs. It's an interesting package, just a shame it couldn't be consolidated but can see why it might have taken a lead in inspiring, better things to come.

Another pretty good band but an album that never seems to get beyond pretty good. Its a pretty raw sound that I can imagine enjoying in a grimy rock bar, but probably more likely one in the mid nineties than in 2003. I can't find anything too much to get excited about in this. It's fine but sounds like the sort of thing I've heard a hundred times before.

My attention glanced off this album a half dozen times before I gave up on trying to listen to it. I don’t know why, but it just doesn’t connect with me on any level. I know this band is well regarded. I feel like I have enjoyed a song or two of theirs in the past, but I’m unable to remember what those songs were nor are they in evidence here. One star bump because in my heart I feel like it’s me who’s failing them.

Totally forgettable,

Singer needs to take a chill pill

Definitely the best album I've had to listen to on YouTube. Riot girl wow. Like Sonic Youth and Blondie combined. Hooked me right away

New band for me, and I really dig the melodic post-punk sound.

Kristin Hersh and Tanya Donelly are royalty, and much of what makes them great is here from the start. To say I prefer the first post-Donelly album (University) and the first Belly album (Star) isn't a knock on their self-titled debut. In fact, The Real Ramona might be the best of their whole catalog, so they clearly had something special together. I just came to them separately and didn't go backward until I was an adult.

This was surprisingly good. Her voice is fantastic, and the songs traverse a wide range of emotions. I’m liking the riot girl sound more and more. A 4.

*PSA: The Spotify link is to the wrong album. They made another self titled album in 2003. You may be able to find it on the first ten tracks of 1998’s In the Doghouse, but If can’t find it on streaming, find it on YouTube. It’s worth it* What a revelation this album is. I’m more than 100 in, and this is my favorite discovery of the challenge so far. Both melodic and discordant, with songs that careen off the rails into new directions at any moments and then find their way back again. Lyrics that feel like someone’s confessing something to you in plain language but you can’t quite grasp what they’re telling you. Better each time I spin it.

Rock pauleira, muito bom. Essa aqui eu tenho que escutar mais!

The music was decent, but I wasn’t a huge fan of the vocals. She has a unique voice, but I don’t think it’s for me. 3/5

Average post puck

This is the reason I signed up. To hear a band I’ve heard of but never listened to. Love this one.

Meh

a tad boring, but i appreciate it

Good stuff. I'll be checking out some more of their discography.

pretty cool! haven’t heard this before but i like this era and genre

Not my thing but was good for it's genre.

Opens with a decidedly 120 Minutes song, "Call Me" - vocals and music sound very much like a Siouxsie and the Banshee song, mysterious and nervous, before suddenly changing tempo and becoming more pastoral. "Green" demonstrates an inspired and eclectic vocal, lots of octave jumps. "Vicky's Box" has more Sonic Youth flavor, noisy with provocative story lyrics redolent of Velvet Underground. Their influences seem pretty eclectic - "Rabbits Dying" breaks out into a rockabilly beat after a slow haunting intro and then reverts back for the finale. "Fear" is a disjointed, noisy song with vocals that remind me a lot of Tori Amos. The music on this album is produced with a warm sound but also with a treble emphasis, a 80s/90s alternative trend if there ever was one. It's very soothing, but also adventurous, unique, confident. Signed by iconic label 4AD, they share a lot of sensibilities with many of the label's other bands including the Pixies and Lush. Tanya Donelly would later go on to work with Kim Deal in the Breeders and then front her own band, Belly.

Self titled isn’t available on Apple Music so checked out House Tornado instead. I like it, cranberries-esque with vocals and good musicality, but more punk themes which I dig. 4.

Didn't really hear anything special. Not bad, just boring (part 2). Probably a 2.5 :)

This album is probably better than I think. For 1986, it seems slightly ahead of its time - even with its post punk vibe. It is refreshing to have the strong female vocalists and her tortured lyrics, but I struggled to really get into the groove with the music. I will have to return to this one. It just feels like it should resonate more.

This album was really great. Exciting vocals and great production. Great find.

This was good but for some reason they fell back to honky tonk sounds every now and then? Really jarring. I would say the "Call Me" is the best track but I think it's just that individually picked guitar sound that I liked more than the song itself. Thankfully it comes through in a lot of their songs. The instrumentation in general and it's ahead of the time I think. Like 80's punk meets 90's indie. I liked it; I'd listen to more of them if it came on.

Yeah man. Female lead pop-punk. This is what your "edgy" friend would put on the tape player when you're hanging out having a Circle K slushie during the summer. Also, started listening to the 2003 album first and ended up scrolling the review comments and realized this was a tricky find to get the 1986. Props to the person posting the youtube link so I am bumping that link again: https://youtu.be/E1Xd2jY3zWQ?si=dxhSZ3oEdj5K2rFA

I could see liking one song. But they didn't differentiate themselves enough for me to want to listen to a whole album of this.

Eh… I really don’t know what else to say. I like hole more than this band. Hard pass. 1.8

Listened to about half of the 2003 album of the same name before I realized it wasn’t the correct album. Found the correct one on YouTube. I’m not sure how to feel about the 1986 album. It’s not quite like anything I’ve listened to. But it’s surprisingly compelling. I like it more than a lot of punk I’ve listened to. 7/10 Quite Likeable

picks: portia, pretty or not

I have heard better No Doubt cover bands

Ca se ressemble trop

3.5

un 3

1. mercury - 1 2. pretty - 1 3. civil - 1 4. boz - 1 5. quo - 1 6. zpeed - 1 7.portia - 1 8. zolar - 1 9. epiphany - 1 10. flamingoz - 1 11. blazt - 2 12. flying - 1

Loved this one and went down a woman led punk rabbit hole.

This album is cool. It’s got cool rock and a good vocalist. Doesn’t overstay its welcome too

I'm not really a massive fan of this album's sound; the raw indie sound doesn't work for my ears. The vocalist does well in her role, but yeah, nah

I’m torn. It was different and interesting, and there were some enjoyable moments. But I can’t say that overall it was a great experience for me.

Very average alternative band, not much to offer but songs that are kinda similar to each other. I didn’t receive much from the messages in the songs too. Definitely won’t be listening to it again. Overall Score: Decent 4

Started off and I was like ehhhhh but really found the groove by the middle of the album.

One of those bands I've always been familiar with but never listened to beyond what got played on college radio or MTV 120 Minutes. Solid album and it plan on checking out more from their catalog.

Throwing Muses' untitled album from 1986, sometimes referred to as Throwing Muses and often confused with the 2003 album (unhelpfully) titled Throwing Muses, can be found on the collection "in a doghouse" if you can find it. So yeah, don't trust your streaming link. Go spelunking and searching for it, you'll find it with a different cover. The scattered availability, the unpredictable appearances, all amidst ambiguous rights issues never clarified with no idea what was on the horizon in an ever changing landscape of formats is something that plagues lesser bands frequently and it's a shame to see it playing out with these indie legends. Who has the will and the wherewithal to pursue this for Kristin Hersh? She's doing other things right now and frankly, may not have the archivist's desire to go back and collect all the things to make them more accessible for new audiences...and yet, and yet, this is an important debut record by an incredibly talented songwriter. Throwing Muses were a vital part of the college radio landscape and they serve as connective tissue to many scenes through this, House Tornado and The Real Ramona. Listening to the album now it's as urgent and alive as it ever was. Hersh's unique delivery and idiosyncratic approach to song forms backed by a skilled band resists sequestering the material in the past, somehow she manages a line of flight to escape sounding completely like just another time capsule of mid-to-late 80s American indie aspirations.

I couldn't say that I hated it, but I really could not say I enjoyed it. I liked the idea of the album but all the songs seemed to mesh into one and the singer's voice was not really for me. Another point was that any guitar solos usually fell quite flat for me which made it even worse. It is a shame since they are an interesting British band but I won't be listening to the album again unfortunately.

Foreshadows better things to come.

Surprised I hadn't heard this band before. You can tell they've influenced a lot of other music.

Decent; reminds me a bit of PJ Harvey at times.

I do not have strong feelings about this. While I appreciate a woman-fronted rock group, this album itself was not a stand out one for me

I enjoyed this - even if I had to use YouTube to listen to it. Not sure I love it though but I liked it.

Very angsty energetc punk/post-punk/alt-rock. Love the guitar work early in Call Me. Vocal delivery is reminding me of later alt rock (SOAD). Interesting rythyms. Ooh Fear has a crazy moody 80s feel, like from a Terminator film. I really like Call Me, and I love the style, but the rest of the album does sound a bit samey Best track - Call Me, Fear 3 stars

FYI the album on Spotify is from 2003! A bit confusing, since it shares the same name as their debut 1986 album (AKA this one) although technically the band considers the debut album to be untitled (sure lol). Had to go down the Youtube rabbit hole to find the proper recordings. Glad I made the effort to actually do so, as there is a distinct level of scruffy grit across the 1986 album that can truly only exist on the debut record for a female-fronted, 80s alt/punk band. Kristin Hersh's vocals give these songs a supercharged life of their own, and I'm here for it \m/ Throwing Muses walked so Pixies could run, but the Muses still had a hell of a walk.

Enjoyed that. Started strong, drifted a little, but finished strong. Will listen again (probably).

Few songs on here that I really liked.

Syncopated

I enjoyed it, 3.5 rounded down due to YouTube adverts

Gonna rate this based on the incorrectly linked Spotify album and hopefully come back cone day and piece together the real thing

very strange & unusual. pretty good? probably very fun live, or when paying attention to the lyrics. wouldn't listen to it casually though

Her voice is hard for me. Some songs I like her sound, others it was nails on a chalkboard. A 3 star since I couldn’t find consistency

Why would you have 2 albums with the same name? Here’s the link to their debut: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLcsIlynY0iwtbZfnfnXYr536aYAzEXn_8&si=xNl25KPyiHz8_Pgp Likes: Green; Stand Up

I can hear the influence on PJ Harvey and Hole. I can also hear the influence on 4 Non Blondes and Counting Crows. So you win some, you lose some. It's all a bit bright and manic for me. I think I'm more of a shoegazer. I wanna feel it in my gut not buzzing around my head.

So you’d think after finishing 559 albums that I would’ve learnt to double check that the link has taken me to the correct album before I start. Alas I was halfway through the wrong one before I realised. Luckily I really liked what I heard so was happy enough to for more. It’s just missing something to make me go for all five stars. Top Track - Vicky’s Box

Didn't like

Jangly and kind of dorky. Her voice kind of reminds me of a British Gwen Stefani (learned later that this is an American band signed to 4AD.. would've never guessed had I not looked into them more!). This isn't like a lot of other 4AD releases that I've heard before, but that doesn't mean it wouldn't be something I'd like to revisit frequently. Just a shame it's not anywhere conveniently located. (I had to use YouTube to play the album.. nowhere on any streaming. Shame..) I really like a lot of the progressions they do in the songs, and the dnb throughout the whole thing really clicks and is a solid unit. Really enjoyed this so far.

I like some of the guitar work and the vocalist is very good.

Really great debut by this band that I wasn't familiar with at all. A very cold, sinister gothic post-punk record with some killer vocals (courtesy of Kristen Hersh) and genuinely engaging writing. The opening track immediately hooked me with these uneasy, shaky vocals, the sinister arpeggios, and that sobering jangle-pop-esque switch-up in the final part. 'Green' was another favorite; the falsetto part in the chorus was very Kate Bush, and so was this groove in general, given it had this classic folksy feel to it. And the lyrics are devastatingly haunting in their depiction of obsession and fantasies that never manifested. 'Hate My Way' has a "The Cure" vibe, especially when it warms up in the middle, and the bass becomes more defined. And it's another song where the writing is superb, just super evocative. Not entirely smart enough to pick apart its meaning fully, but it seems to me that it's about the protagonist's inability to do anything in the face of some grand injustice, or feeling like they're somehow a part of the problem itself. 'Vicky's Box' is an all-around banger, with incredible bass and guitar work, and these raw guttural vocals. 'Rabbits Dying' sounded very much like an early '90s PJ Harvey song, in both of its very different sections, with more disturbing imagery on this one. Super underrated band and album, with lyrics, vocals, and riffs that would put many of their contemporaries to shame. Sucks that I hadn't heard of this band sooner, but that's what this list is for.

Every time it’s a massive pain in the ass to find one of the albums I wonder how the fuck anyone was supposed to do this before streaming. Anyway. Throwing Muses. This is excellent, and once again I have to ask why the fuck can’t I stream this anywhere sensible

Not a fan and surprised to see this on here. They play well together, but their sound and songs are not particularly interesting to me.

I'd heard of Throwing Muses for a long time, but never really even knew what kind of music they played, let alone (knowingly) any songs by them. The album is definitely better than I expected/feared, but also seems like an odd choice for a cult-favorite band whose best days were ahead of this album. The highlights for me are probably "Green", "Hate my way" and "Rabbits dying", although all of the tracks are solid (and solidly alt-rock), and also off-kilter in a sort-of appealing, sort-of unsettling way, with bizarre gonzo lyrics throughout.

Cool name, some quirky lyrics, but more of a band you like conceptually as opposed to actually enjoying the music.

Never heard of them before and this rips

Cool vibe, not super memorable, but overall, a joy to listen to and it makes me want to listen more of them.

Not a fan of the vocals, album cover is cool

6/10

What a bore

I like the lead vocalist but the whole affair was just so so

Can see why some people wouldn’t like it, but I did. Like Cranberries meets Pixies. Would have been better with rawer production I think!

4 out of 5. Only listened to the original release but this was another fun listen.

2/5

2 at best

No private session used for Spotify. I was listening to this album and I thought "how unremarkable". I seem to be in the doldrums of this list where I am hearing a stretch of unremarkable albums so I wasn't that surprised. Digging into it I realize I was listening to the 2003 album, not the 1986 album. Some helpful reviewer had a youtube playlist for the correct album, so I listened to that(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1Xd2jY3zWQ). These songs were more interesting, but I didn't care for the singer's voice and the mediocre musicians weren't doing enough to carry her or cover up for her caterwauling. It's a sad state of affairs when a band wants to be punk but they can't even pull that off, stay in the doghouse.

This is fine. Appropriately decent new wave rock music and I can hear how it influenced a bunch of bands in the 90s and 00s. Also quite generic, a bit like an 80s version of landfill indie.

frickin rocked in 1986 and frickin rocked again when the same title was used in 2003 music: appreciated. (⌐■_■)

Brand new to me and very good. Some real neat guitar stuff, and really isn’t that the most important thing?

This was such a cool album and a genuine surprise having never heard of Throwing Muses. It has a really enjoyable post-punk tone to it, with engaging instrumental hooks and haunting, impactful vocals. There are elements of it that remind me of Kate Bush meets PJ Harvey, maybe with a bit of Placebo in there for good measure. Call Me, Green & Hate My Way are brilliant openers and they set the tone brilliant for the album. I’m not sure I would have ever come across this record without the 1001 albums project, but I’m glad I did.

I haven't found this album thrilling at all. Instead, what I've found is a pretty post punk-indie scene album. And, to be honest, I've found it very boring at many moments. It has not much to talk about, and the songs feel very insipid and uninspired. Also, uninteresting. The indie influence here is exactly that, a kind of bland music that does not transmit anything. This is also found on the vocals, which are very lazy and make the listening a very slow and weary one. Added to the fact that the songs do not have any kind of interesting instrumental parts. They accompany the vocals, and that is remarkable in the moments in which there is no voice at all... they feel very bland and tedious to listen to. I understand the background of those kinds of albums, but they are not very interesting musically talking. They all sound the same. And, if it were the first album that I had ever heard like that, well, then I may have been at least impressed, at least for a bit, but it's not the case, and I can't say I've enjoyed listening to it at all.

Hey. Go easy on my beloved Muse. Although it looks like this predates Muse by a decade or so. Unfortunately, the music is extremely obscure (judging by streaming numbers): a surefire element for a trajectory towards an easy 1-star rating. The 1000 most important albums of all time can never justifiably include a record whose most popular track sits at a cool 87k streams. Let me guess: the "professional" critics love this record while continuing to slander better artists like Steely Dan and Queen. These ratings reach the likes of Graceland, Master of Puppets, The Queen Is Dead, and Slippery When Wet – which are all fantastic (or at least iconic) albums also released in 1986. But Throwing Muses? Perfect ratings by AllMusic, Sounds, and Spin Alternative Record Guide? I'm stumped. The opener, Mercury, is (to be frank) almost unlistenably bad. Luckily, though, it's completely unrepresentative of what follows. Pretty or Not is significantly better – those two interacting guitars, distorted to different levels but constantly harmonised, add a controlled chaos to the sound that I can't help but enjoy. Civil Disobedience follows. It's solid. Fairly typical punk, although the musicianship is better than most of what the punk genre has to offer. The song peaks at the end with the harmonised vocals. And then Pandora's Box comes in: the third surprisingly enjoyable track in a row. Did Mercury start us off on completely the wrong foot? For sure. Rough for the first track of a debut album. Compare that to something like the flawless band-introductory track Good Times Bad Times, the song that launched Led Zeppelin into the stratosphere. I love Speed and Sleep's quasi-psychedelic guitar sound, particularly its main riff in the intro. Great interaction between guitar and bass here. The singing isn't great, but I can ignore it. The grunge and shoegaze genres definitely took inspiration from this ultra-distorted noise. Portia continues the album with a surprisingly radio-friendly sound. Again the vocals are bad – I suspect they're mixed blurrily because Hersh is a poor singer and knows it. But for the majority of the album, everything else is surprisingly strong. Post-punk is a shaky genre, but Throwing Muses navigates it decently. 3/5 Key tracks: Pretty or Not, Speed and Sleep, Portia

Seems ahead of its time but as I'm new to this I can't appreciate it as much as I would have back when it was released. But I was too small in 1986 to appreciate this anyway.

What a damn hard album to find. Ended up needing a YouTube video of the whole album to listen. And I’m extremely glad I took the effort because I really enjoyed this. A woman lead punk band is always a treat, and this didn’t disappoint. Great lyrics, unique vocals, excellent musically, with some odd choices here and there. But really something special.

It was fine.

2003. Throwing Muses reunites, Tanya Donnelly and all, releases perfection. How was I not aware of this? 5

this is like siouxsie’s american counterpart; i salute you creepy eccentric ladies 4.5 stars

Fairly uninspired meandering rock 2*

I'm surprised I haven't heard of Throwing Muses before. I love these kinds of alt rock, post punk girl bands from the 80's and 90's, so this was a treat discovering a new (to me) one.

I was somewhat interested at the start of the album but it lost me pretty quick. Not a huge fan of some of the mixing choices.

멀느끼지

3.5 rounded up. Gave me Letters from Cleo vibes.

I like Kristin Hersh’s solo work better than this band’s output but this was still pretty decent.

Ok

Why was this included?

Yet another proof that post-punk is not my thing. It’s like a low effort punk without the energy, but with annoying choises in melody and singing. It could have been so much better with a few different choices. Btw: They have better songs/albums than this one…

I loved this, punky, b52s kinda early puck vibes, this was a hidden gem.

Seems like a good band, nothing to exciting for me

Bastante bien, algunas canciones me gustaron mucho pero un lse ni me gustaron. 6/10

Strong start. But all downhill from there mostly. The pairing of the music and the vocals just doesn’t work for me on every track except the first.

Not bad. Dare I say good? Not quite.

#348/1001. I was listening to the album thinking "nice, but not that great?" and reading about the band, until it dawned on me that I was listening to their 2003 self titled album instead of the 1986 one (this is where the Spotify link took me). As I couldn't find it (well I found out later that, yes, it is there, just with a different title) I turned to YT, with commercials breaking the vibe between the songs... But nevertheless what was uncovered was a gem which I probably would have missed without this list. I hope it would happen more often. One more missing link to the musical map I never knew I was missing. Post punk vibes ( yay for bo symbals), groove bass lines and interesting guitar riffs, mood, tempo, chord changes and kick ass vocals. Definitely worth coming back to!

I have no idea if I'm listening to it at the proper quality or not - all I could find was an incomplete YouTube playlist. It's fine. Nothing particularly grips me, nothing particularly bothers me.

happy that i know them now!

Je connais pas le groupe Je ressors aucun son, globalement je me suis fait iech Half blast est pas mal Après c’est pas cata non plus, c’est jamais désagréable à écouter

Okayy

Nothing much to write about, this was a cool project but nothing special.

bueno, pero tampoco muy bueno

Maybe this was a you had to be there kind of album. I was around in 86 but missed this one. I'm also not a fan of post punk so that might have something to do with it. The album comes across as warbling and boring. It was a chore to listen to. I wouldn't suggest it unless someone told me they want to annoy their neighbors.

Interesting listening. Novel approach to punk and pre-grunge. Really enjoyed the energy of the music. Great vocals. I slowly grew on me as I listened. Ah, the surprises.

Chicks who rock

I really enjoyed this. Instrumentals were tight and the vocals didn’t make me want to blow my brains out. It gave me B52 vibes but more hardcore. 9/10

alright

Meh

Little weird.

This was a hard album to track down since it's out of print, but I managed to cobble together a playlist thanks to YouTube. Basically collected early material then late 90s versions of the same songs. I personally think Throwing Muses has far better work in their discography, but this does show a young band helping to kick start the alt-rock movement that would overtake the 90s.

Throwing hands with anyone who likes this album

this is pretty cool, actually! the opening track is nice and powerful. the rest of the album flows pretty well together. unfortunately i think if all i can say is that i enjoyed my time with this album, the highest i can reasonably give it is a 3.

I couldn’t find an angle into this one. Everything seemed disjointed, I didn't care for it sonically or lyrically, overall just not for me. 1.5 as there wasn’t anything egregious.

Making sure that Aaron Botts doesn’t punch me

hit so hard idec

This was OK. I’ve always found Throwing Muses a bit hit and miss. A whole album is a lot.

It’s was ok

Out of tune rubbish

I can see the appeal but definitely need to be in the mood

Sounds ahead of its time, I thought this was released in 1998 not 1986. Though that doesn't mean it is good! 2/5

Len Houmous once threw a muse. 4.2 6/12 Speed & Sleep

Like almost everyone else I listened to the 2003 album first. It was fine but a bit bland. Then I went back and listened to the 1980s one on the list. I preferred it. Vocals were punchier. Songs better. Vickys Box and America stood out. But can't quite bring myself to give it a 4. Future 4. High 3.

i enjoyed this a lot

I had relatively high hopes for this and when it started it felt like it was in a genre I enjoy and had a sound I liked... But I kindof just didn't really do much for me. None of it was bad, but none of it was that memorable. None of the lyrics or tunes jumped out. The odd guitar riff or drum part caught my attention briefly, but it didn't really do enough to hold it.

Alt rock, friends of pixies Call me Hate my way

This is awesome

I had heard of them, but not sure I actually heard anything before this. This was great! A nice post punk alt sound here.

Did I love the whole album no...but I loved the difference of the music, I loved the harder rock voice from a woman and the emotions in the music.

I wanted to like this more than I did because I can get down with some female angst. There was something that felt kind of suffocating about this though, and I just wanted it to be over.

Very cool - I vaguely knew them from the pixies belly breeders axis. They sound a bit like Sleater Kinney a decade earlier. Solid stuff.

Nervy, angular post-punk that reminded me at times of Kate Bush and B-52’s. The lead vocals get pretty wild. She’s got a playful spirit. I bet she’s awesome live. This was a nice introduction to a band I’ve heard of but never got into before. I’d be curious to hear more.

Cool edgy alternative rock album. The singer is pretty forward in the mix on this album, which I like. She has a cool quavery vocal timbre and it should be front and center. Sometimes the band drones on a bit too much for my liking, but I think the overall sound definitely aims for that. Probably a good live band as well! Note for other reviewers: apparently there are two different self-titled albums for this band? Make sure you check out the right one!

I had a hard time finding this album, but once I did, I liked it.

Na dertig seconden wist ik al dat dit een lange zit ging worden. Geen zang, maar gekrijs van een of andere aanstellerina. Echt afschuwelijk, het gemekker van een zwangere geit in doodsangst. Verder het vertrouwde gejengel van expres ernaast spelende jarentachtig-irriteerbands. En dan komen deze troela's potdomme straks nog een keer langs. Jeuj.

Ik klik op de link en voor een plaat uit de '80s klinkt het wel heel erg '90s. Echt blij word ik er niet van. Dus maar eens naar wiki om te lezen waarom dit zo goed is. Maar goed ook, dat ik even surf. Want ik stuit gelijk op de waarschuwing. Verwar dit album niet met het album Throwing Muses van Throwing Muses. Huh? Jeetje, hebben ze gewoon twee verschillende albums met dezelfde naam uitgebracht. Wat irritant. Dat is vissen naar minpunten. Doe je alleen als je heel erg punk of heel erg artsy fartsy wilt zijn. Ahoewel? 'Of'? Dit album heeft toch wel een flinke tegenstelling in zich. Het lijkt én punk én artsy fartsy uit te stralen. Luister voor de punk bijvoorbeeld delen van het eerste nummer en luister daarna het tweede nummer, een soort Kate Bush track. Het is toch wel toch wel knap en uniek dat het zo samengaat op één schijf. Echt blij word ik er zelf niet van, helemaal niet door het veelvuldig gebruik van die trillende stem. Het lijkt soms wel Jim Carrey's versie van Somebody to Love... Maar toch wel een toevoeging aan de lijst. 2,5 ster

De snobs zouden de snobs niet zijn als ze weer eens een debuut willen pluggen. Tien jaar laten scoorde Throwing Muses een zeer bescheiden hitje met Bright Yellow Gun, maar de snobs willen even laten weten dat ze het debuut ook al op de kop hadden getikt, als een van de weinigen. Als ik zeg punk uit de 80s, gezongen door een vrouw, dan weet je eigenlijk al genoeg. Want zo klinkt het. Het had ook uit Engeland kunnen komen. Ik vind het niet megavervelend verder, maar het is zeker niet iets dat ik uit mezelf op zou zetten. En bovendien ben ik het dus niet eens met de keuze. Want Bright Yellow Gun is veel meer gepolijst, zonder de eigen sound te verliezen. Misschien dat ik een ander album een 3 zou kunnen geven, of misschien zelfs hoger, maar dit iets te rauwe jaren 80 album is voor mij maximaal 2 sterren waard. Voor de proef op de som zet ik University op, het album van Bright Yellow Gun. De rest van dat album laat ook wel een rauwe sound horen, maar dan meer op de 90s gestoeld. Rauwe grunge. Ik vind dat gelijk een stuk gaver, maar dat is ook omdat ik met die 90s muziek op ben gegroeid natuurlijk. Het schurkt gelijk tegen 4 sterren aan. Laat ik het eindcijfer dan middelen en toch op de licht vergeetbare 3 drukken.

I don't know why I can't seem to find a whole lot of words to describe why I like this album, but I just do. This flavor of post-punky alt rock just hits for me I guess? 8/10.

It's just okay. Pretty grungy rock sound that doesn't change much track to track

8.5/10 I really like that this album didn't stick with just one sound and kept changing

Post-punk discombobulation that may well have had an influence on the rior-grrrls that came a bit later. My musical knowledge has been suitably expanded whilst unlikely to be one I'll be making a bee-line for again.

3.5 or something

Aye great

Heard the new album but hadn't heard much old stuff, pretty good

Class, this should have far more listens on Spotify

Never heard of these guys before but that was great fun

I don’t mind this. The only other song I know by then was A FEEEEEEEELING…it was on a sire record compilation cd back in the day.

Entirely forgettable.

Yeah, this is not for me.

Some good melodies in here, and nice harmonies with the voices.

un álbum muy complicado de escuchar, muchos cambios en medio de las canciones, sonidos poco convencionales en momentos que siento inoportunos que te quitan todo el felling del tema, rescato 2 o 3 canciones nomas

Above average

4.5. The real tamona should be bext, too

This band and album cover are vaguely familiar, though I'm not sure why. This looks like your archetypal 90s alt rock album, which is especially strange considering that it released in '86. In any case, I'm locking in alt rock for my prediction. Here goes. On the money with my prediction, though I wasn't expecting a female vocalist. This was solid. Like many 80s alt rock albums, the identity and artistry of the genre isn't all there yet, but this is way, way more competent than that of its contemporaries. I view this music as comparable to that of grunge, which is a surprise considering that I've always had a hard time getting into that genre. The guitars have that same apathetic ring to them, yet there's more nuance here. For one, the guitars are more distinguished from the backing instruments, and there's a good level of emotion and energy behind them. Decent vocals, too. The falsetto can be a mixed bag on occasion, but it generally complements the way that these songs build and intensify. Book time. "...the missing link between Siouxsie and the Banshees and P.J. Harvey." Throwing Muses is commonly associated with Pixies due to them being signed to the same label and having toured extensively with the band. "The spiky sound and psychotic lyrics were far from user-friendly, but they conjured beauty from chaos." "Not an easy listen, but a compelling one. Think of it as a key to a magical kingdom". Wikipedia says this album released before the debut of Pixies, which is a surprise. It was also well-received by a handful of critics, but that's about it. This band certainly got in on the ground floor of 90s rock, and for that reason I think the album has earned its spot on the list. I cosign this inclusion.

Never listened. Expectations: None - Verdict: Good - *** I initially listened to the wrong album. Who has two self -titled records!? *** Well this is definitely more energetic and immediate than the later eponymous album that I listened to by mistake. I like the sudden shifts in tempo. Vicky's Box is good, as is Rabbits Dying. Overall this is a good album, but it's nothing too crazy.

Could not get into it at all. I think there is some punk style and ambitious songwriting that I admire, but I found this mostly just frustrating. Instead of feeling as expressive as I imagine it should do (and must do to many) to me it just felt rough around the edges

Hadn't heard before. Very nice.

There are hundreds of bands that sound like this. Why is this special?

Not really notable in any way.

Punk-Rock aus den 80ern. Wild, aber noch melodisch. Kann man sich anhören. 3/5

fav song: green chaotic, fragmented 30/100

I couldn't even figure out what was the right album to listen to. If it's that obscure, it isn't going to be worth it. I listened to a few songs from them and they sounded unoriginal.

Thankfully I quickly realized that I was listening to the wrong album titled Throwing Muses by the band Throwing Muses because when I found the correct album titled Throwing Muses by the band Throwing Muses, I found it much more enjoyable than the incorrect album titled Throwing Muses by the band Throwing Muses.

How are there two albums of Throwing Muses, Throwing Muses in completely different decades?

Couldn't really hear it all but what I heard said is fine

Super interesting, like a pre-cursor to Hole or Nirvana. A bunch of songs just take a weird left turn halfway thru (Call Me, Rabbits Dying) that I like. Pretty rad alt rack for 1986 - I like it!

Struggling to find a single nice thing to say about this. It’s not like there’s a lot of horrible things to say, there just isn’t much good either.

This feels like stepping into someone’s restless, brilliant subconscious. Kristin Hersh’s voice is the real hook here – tense, elastic, and emotionally jagged in a way that keeps you leaning in even when the songs themselves don’t fully lodge in your memory. The songwriting is quirky and off‑kilter enough to stay interesting, but nothing truly leaps out as a standout moment. It’s one of those albums where the vibe and the vocal delivery hit harder than any individual track. A solid, intriguing listen, even if it doesn’t quite leave a lasting mark.

Throwing Muses from my little research of them is cut from a similar cloth to the Pixies, I can for sure hear it. If you like the Pixies this one should come easy, it has the jangley guitars, prominent bassline, manic vocals, macabre lyrics, punk mentality etc. Another thing that is noticeable major thing that stands to me is the lead vocalists shaky, unstable voice that sounds like it's gonna break at any moment, but most of the time manages to keep composure. She manages to sound quite a lot like John Lydon/Johnny Rotten especially during early Public Image Ltd.. Or alternatively she sounds like a widow who's really preparing curses and a dish of revenge after a group killed her husband. Straight evil witch stuff. Highlight Song/s: "Green" and "Hate My Way"

Energetic female indierock? Post punk? Middle of the road. Don't remember anything from it after the weekend

Need to pick this up. YouTube is a terrible way to listen to music. Fond memories of high school and college and cool music.

I listened without the benefit of lyrics and, from what I subsequently read, that’ll have meant I missed the emotional heft of these songs. As piece of music, it’s intense, quite punky in places, and with its guitar driven tempo shifts either formed part of the early development of grunge or anticipated it (not sure of the timelines). For me, in fact, the most satisfying bit of this musically is the guitar sound when it’s providing the pre-explosion texture in the songs: it has a kind of unfiltered, unpolished quality that makes it sound really cool.

A bit too punkish for me in some senses, e.g. overdriven guitars and repetitive percussion started to give me a headache. Vocals didn't redeem it much either.

finding the real version of this album was a nightmare. worth it tho, loved it omg why isnt this on spotify. every saying the spotify link is the right one is lying btw, go on youtube and find it there. this album so damn good, its so dynamic and crazy the vocalist is good i loved it

Wasn't super into this at first. Some tracks are more spirited than others, and I will admit that Kristin Hersh is a pretty unique vocalist. This isn't as abrasive as some would expect with an early post-punk record, in fact it's pretty melodic. Grew on me a little bit as things went along.

Hard with the YT quality but was rough. You could feel the start of something but not ready yet..still feels like an amateur pub band or college battle of the band. Hate My Way is the prime example of why this got it's rating.

Meh

Kinda grew on me, but given the era. I’m surprised I didn’t enjoy it more.

Seemed like an okay punk album, but ultimately it wasn't for me.

Not normally my jam, but there was some big emotion and energy in this. Particular favorites are Green, Hate My Way, and Fear.

Didn’t mind the music itself, very college rock (not surprising for a 4AD release). But the vocals were NOT pleasant at all. Really annoying from the start - I had to skip around and nothing made it better.

This was pretty good, I knew of the band before now but had never really listened to them. I probably won't throw this into rotation on my own but wouldn't mind if it came on the "radio".

I love girl angst bands; reminds me of Sleater-Kinney?

I have never heard of Throwing Muses before, but they seem to be somewhat of an influential band on the author of the 1001 albums to hear before you die list as they are included not once, but twice on the list. This band's discography for the most part is very easy to find with the exception of their self titled debut album which I had to do some digging for, but once it was uncovered again I was pleasantly surprised with what it had to offer in full. I found their Folk Punk sound a bit strange and not always hitting for me as hard as I would have liked, much like Violent Femmes, but it was once again a very eye opening and interesting take on a genre I adore so much. Kristin Hersh's vocals are also a very cool touch as not many Punk bands, especially back in the 80s, had a female vocalist. As much as I wanted to love Kristin's vocals, they did become a bit much for myself during the whole runtime as her shakiness really was throwing me off quite a bit towards the back end of the album. I just don't think this project was very much up my alley but I think if this is your kind of music then you will definitely find it a staple of the genre. I just can't seem to get down with Throwing Muses' debut album, but maybe their other pick for this list will be more my style.

Liked it. Strong vocal performance. Band was good enough. 3/5 Might listen again

I kinda want to drone on about how great the Rhode Island scene was back in the day, but I don't want to be that boring old guy.

I accidentally listened to two of their albums and it was absolutely worth it. Love this sound.

This was okay, I have to give it another listen. I feel kike there was another album of theirs that I liked marginally better but even then it was a couple standout tracks. I might just not be a super fan but I like the overall sound

3.5 (37:36, 10 tracks, debut, 1986) Post-punk, alternative rock (American on British label) Not to be confused with Throwing Muses (2003 album). I like this album, listened to it many times. I like both Belly and The Breeders. I ended up giving it a 3 as I don't see me revisiting much but in retrospect in 1986 this was a hell of an album. Sort of an early Hole album. Singles from Throwing Muses "Soul Soldier" Throwing Muses is the 1986 debut album of the band Throwing Muses, released on British independent label 4AD. This was the first album by an American band to be released on 4AD, which had concentrated primarily on British-based acts up to this point. The release marked a shift in the label's direction; a year later 4AD would sign Pixies based in part on the band's connection to Throwing Muses, and by the mid-1990s much of the label's roster was made up of American bands. Rhode Island band relocated to Boston. All the songs on the album were written by Kristin Hersh, with the exception of "Green", written by Tanya Donelly. Tanya and Kristin are step sisters, Kristin’s parents divorced and her mom ended up marring her best friend Tanya’s dad. They formed “The Muses” when they were 14. Tanya went on to form The Breeders (w/ Kim Deal of The Pixies) and went on to form her own band Belly. Kristin formed 50FootWave. The album was produced by Gil Norton, who went on to produce albums for Pixies. The band considers the album to be untitled, with Throwing Muses the name they give to another album released in 2003. Around the early 1990s, the album went out of print, as plans were made by the band's American label, Sire Records to issue the album for the first time in the US, along with 1987's Chains Changed EP, which had also never seen American release. After Throwing Muses were dropped by Sire following the disappointing sales for 1995's critical favorite University, plans for the re-issue were dropped. The band later resurrected the re-issue project, issuing the 2-CD compilation In a Doghouse in 1998 on 4AD (DAD607CD) in the UK, and on Rykodisc in the USA. This compilation not only contained the debut LP and EP as originally planned, but also (on the second CD) the demo tape that convinced 4AD president Ivo Watts-Russell to sign the band; newly recorded versions of songs originally written in the band's early years; and the band's award-winning 1987 video for the song "Fish". AllMusic a "powerful debut" whose "startling collision of punk energy, folky melodicism, and Kristin Hersh's mercurial voice and lyrics...puts the work of most self-consciously 'tortured' artists to shame." "fluid, effortless emotional shifts"—also described as "violent, vibrant mood swings". Spin called it, "a record of dense textures, guitar splatter and belljar lyrics. The fragmented sound of Throwing Muses, a college girl's dining hall conversation set to antagonistic electric screeching, was painful, self-loathing, man-love-hating, ". 1) "Call Me" The band's primary songwriter, Kristin Hersh, often writes surreal and fragmented lyrics, the song is generally interpreted as a reflection of her experience with mental health struggles—specifically the dissociative disorder she was navigating at the time. The central demand of "Call me" is often seen as a desperate plea for attention or a tether to reality. In the context of Hersh’s memoir Rat Girl, it can represent the internal dialogue between her conscious self and the musical persona (which she called "Rat Girl") that seemed to take over during periods of intense creativity and dissociation. One of the most specific lyrical moments describes a character named Peter calling the narrator "Moonshine." The narrator responds with, "I just said, 'You let him call you that? This is your name!'"—suggesting a conflict over identity and how others perceive or label her versus who she actually is. The lyrics explore themes of being "dug five feet deep" and feeling as though others are looking in a mirror but seeing the narrator instead of themselves, highlighting a sense of isolation and misperception. The song’s meaning is also conveyed through its erratic structure. It begins with a tense, abrasive post-punk throb and "yelpy" vocals, but unexpectedly shifts into a "pretty waltz-time" section with sleigh bells. Critics and Hersh herself have described her early performances as sounding "psychotic" or like an "exorcism," reflecting the chaos of her mental state as she used music to process internal trauma and noise. In essence, "Call Me" serves as an introduction to the "exquisitely human struggle" of Kristin Hersh—a raw, visceral attempt to communicate through the "circus" in her head. 2) “Green" written and sung by Tanya Donelly, the song is often interpreted as a haunting exploration of childhood innocence, loss, and the surreal nature of memory. The recurring line, "There's one boy / In one house / In one place / At all times / And green eyes," anchors the song in a specific, fixed memory. The "green eyes" serve as a striking visual focal point, representing a person or a moment that remains unchanging and "haunting" in the narrator's mind. Unlike the more aggressive and abrasive tracks on the album written by Kristin Hersh, Donelly's "Green" is described as ethereal and haunting. It deals with themes of displacement and vulnerability, using imagery like a "phoenix burning my bed" and "kneeling in my ashes". The lyrics ask repeated, fragmented questions—"Who are you for? What is this?"—suggesting a search for identity or a struggle to understand a relationship that has become unrecognizable or "burned inside out". Because only about 2% of the global population has green eyes, they are frequently associated with creativity, intelligence, and an enigmatic personality in popular psychology. 3) "Hate My Way" is one of the most prominent tracks, while it is often felt as a raw anthem of teenage angst and frustration, Kristin Hersh has explained that the lyrics are a "conglomeration of ideas" rather than a singular personal confession. The opening lines—"I could be a smack freak / And hate society / I could hate God / And blame Dad"—are not autobiographical. Hersh revealed in her memoir, Rat Girl, that they paraphrase a conversation she had with a student on campus who was handing out pamphlets about "killing God" and rising above the church. The song was also influenced by a 1984 shooting at a McDonald's in San Diego. This adds to the song's darker themes of "encroaching awareness of evil" and societal violence. Like much of the band's early work, the song was written during a period when Hersh was experiencing undiagnosed dissociative disorder. She has described these early songs as "screaming themselves" at her, often feeling like they were written by another personality she called "Rat Girl". The title phrase, "I hate my way," suggests a rejection of one's own current state or path. Critics interpret it as a struggle with the "horror" and trauma of youth, expressed through erratic shifts in tempo and Hersh's "sugar-and-vinegar" vocal delivery. The song is filled with surreal and unsettling imagery that reinforces a sense of being trapped. References to a "screaming" kitchen, pillow, and shoes suggest that the narrator's distress is pervasive and inescapable. Phrases like "a gun in my head" and "I'm invisible" highlight the psychological weight and isolation Hersh felt while navigating mental health challenges. Mr. Huberty (James Huberty) was the 41-year-old perpetrator who entered a McDonald's in San Diego and killed 21 people before being stopped by a police sniper. The lyric "Mr. Huberty had a gun in his head" refers to his mental state and his eventual death by a single shot to the head or chest from a SWAT marksman. Gerry Ann (Gerry Ann Gallegos) was one of the victims of the massacre. In the song, the line "Gerry Ann was confused" likely reflects the sudden, senseless chaos of the attack where patrons were ordered to the floor before being indiscriminately shot. The "boy tangled in his bike forever" (referring to 11-year-old Joshua Coleman or his friends who were shot while riding their bikes in the parking lot). 4) "Vicky's Box" is a powerful, dissonant track from their 1986 self-titled debut album. Like many of Kristin Hersh’s early songs, its meaning is layered between literal objects and intense emotional states. Despite various fan theories, Kristin Hersh has stated that the title refers to an actual physical box she received as a gift. The "Vicky" in the title is Victoria Cessna, an artist and friend of Hersh's (and wife of musician Slim Cessna). When the band's A&R representative at the time tried to probe for "spicy confessionals" or specific meanings regarding the song's "homosexuality references," Hersh famously told him, "Please stop listening to the lyrics". Critics often describe the song as a "tale of domestic hell" or a "cage". It explores themes of entrapment and imprisonment, using the "box" as a metaphor for a home or a body that feels like a confined space. The lyrics contain oblique imagery—such as "carnival wigs" and "two shiners"—that alludes to identity questioning and a sense of "soul-freezing" power. The repeated cry of "welcome home" in the song is described by The Guardian as being as "appetizing as a cockroach infestation," subverting the idea of home as a place of comfort and instead presenting it as a source of rage and horror. The song’s structure reflects this internal turmoil, beginning with a "hard groove" and "shimmering riffs" before descending into a "one-chord noise fest" and "demented psychobilly". Overall, the song is viewed as an experiential piece rather than a traditional narrative, designed to make the listener feel the raw "aggression and mental chaos" Hersh was navigating at the time. 5) "Rabbits Dying" Like much of the album, the song’s meaning is elusive, but Kristin Hersh and fans have offered several layers of interpretation: In an interview on Eyesore.no, Hersh described the song as being about "not being too safe... not living in danger". She has also characterized the song as exploring how "danger and rain keep you safe and dry," using the imagery of a lean-to (a simple shelter) to represent a fragile sense of protection. The lyrics describe a character who is "crawling on the trail" with legs "giving out" while running in the rain. This suggests a state of exhaustion, collapse, or a desperate attempt to reach "home." Some listeners interpret the title as a reference to the historical "rabbit test" for pregnancy, where a positive result was colloquially called "the rabbit died". One prominent interpretation suggests the song is about a homeless runaway facing an unplanned pregnancy; when presented with this theory, Hersh confirmed. Written during Hersh's period of undiagnosed dissociative disorder, the song's fragmented structure and "glassy-eyed" vocal delivery reflect the mental chaos and "shifting personalities" she experienced at the time. "Stay in, stay in / It rains" reinforces a theme of seeking refuge from an overwhelming or "evil" external world, a sentiment echoed in other songs on the album like "Hate My Way" 6) "America (She Can't Say No)" the song is a visceral, fragmented expression of internal trauma, fear, and dissociation rather than a traditional political or social commentary. The lyrics—"America can't say no / Stand up / She can't stand up"—depict a state of total vulnerability and inability to resist or move. This reflects the "barking fear" and psychosexual dread that characterizes the album's atmosphere. Written when Hersh was 18 and experiencing undiagnosed dissociative disorder, the "She" in the song often represents a fractured part of her own identity. Hersh has described her lyrics from this era as a "puking over the music," where her subconscious spoke through "bones and muscles" rather than planned self-expression. The song includes haunting lines like "It was a funeral / Mine," suggesting a loss of self or a symbolic death occurring within the narrator's mind. Similar to "Hate My Way," this track is part of Hersh's exploration of an "encroaching awareness of evil". The lyrics use disjointed commands ("Follow the road / Swallow a snake") to convey a sense of being controlled or manipulated by internal "demons". The song is noted for its unorthodox structure and "mercurial" vocal delivery, shifting between a "carnal cry" and a terrified whisper. Critics highlight it as one of the tracks that established Hersh's reputation for writing "belljar lyrics"—intensely private and claustrophobic observations that feel like a "dining hall conversation set to antagonistic electric screeching". Bell jar I guess just means lyrics that are covered by glass. A bell jar is a glass jar, shaped like a bell, used in laboratories to create a vacuumThe Metaphor: In literature (most famously Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar), it symbolizes entrapment and isolation. A person under a bell jar can see the world but is cut off from it, breathing their own "stale air." In Music: Labeling Hersh's lyrics as "belljar" suggests they are intensely private, claustrophobic, and reflect a mind trapped within its own trauma or distorted perception. 7) “Fear" refers to both a specific early song and a recurring atmospheric theme in their work. "Fear" is an early track that appeared on the band's 1985 Doghouse demo tape (also known as The Doghouse Cassette). The song is noted for its high level of experimentalism, featuring sampled vocals and noise to create a disorienting, claustrophobic effect. It is often cited as a prime example of the band's ability to sing about panic and despair as if they were everyday occurrences, making the listener feel the "bloody realism" of mental distress. Broadly, fear is the "keynote" of the band's 1986 self-titled debut album. Kristin Hersh’s early lyrics are frequently described as fighting off "night fears" and a general sense of "unidentified psychosexual dread". The "Encouraching Awareness of Evil": Many critics point to "Hate My Way" as the centerpiece of this theme—a song that induces fear by exploring the encroaching awareness of societal and internal evil. 8 “Stand Up" is less a song of empowerment and more a frantic, rhythmic exploration of paralysis and identity. Following the track "America (She Can't Say No)," where the narrator repeatedly laments "She can't stand up," this song acts as the urgent, almost violent response. It represents a desperate attempt to regain control over a body and mind that feel frozen or "stuck" in a dissociative state. The lyric "I'm your mirror / You're my mirror" suggests a terrifying lack of boundaries. For Kristin Hersh, who was experiencing undiagnosed bipolar disorder and hallucinations at the time, this reflected the feeling that she didn't exist as a solid person, but only as a reflection of the "noise" or personalities (like the "Rat Girl") inside her. The song includes the line "I'm a mother / You're a mother / She's a mother / She's evil," which twists the traditional concept of maternal safety into something dark and threatening. This mirrors the album's broader theme of domestic horror and the subversion of "home" and "family" as safe spaces. The song is built on a nervous, jittery guitar riff and a driving beat that feels like a racing heartbeat. It’s meant to sound uncomfortable—capturing the physical anxiety of trying to "stand up" when your brain is telling you that you are falling apart. In her memoir Rat Girl, Hersh describes these songs as "liquid," flowing out of her as a way to survive the "hallucinatory weather" in her head. "Stand Up" is the sound of that survival instinct in real-time. 9) "Soul Soldier" characterized by its shifting tempos and vivid, battlefield-inspired imagery. Like many songs on the album, it was born during a turbulent period in Kristin Hersh's life, which she describes as the "Doghouse" era—a time of intense creative "possession" and undiagnosed mental health challenges. The song uses war metaphors to describe a fractured or intense relationship. Lyrics like "He crawls along the battlefield / The sky spitting shells" and "Fate spits in his face" suggest a character struggling through a hostile environment, possibly representing the narrator's partner or an internal facet of herself. The refrain "She needs her soul, soul soldier" implies a search for a protector or a grounding force amidst chaos. It reflects the album's recurring theme of needing a "tether" to reality or emotional safety. The line "That cut / That kills the knife" is a classic Hersh paradox, suggesting an action or emotion so intense it destroys the very thing causing the pain, reflecting the theme of "forces a heartbreak". In the song, Hersh repeatedly calls out "Danu, Danu". Danu is a complex figure, appearing as an Irish mother goddess (associated with fertility and the earth) and a Hindu water goddess. Her presence adds a mythic, timeless layer to the song’s exploration of suffering and need. In later live performances, Hersh altered the lyrics to include the line "An apple run to heaven, damn you, damn you, goddamn you," heightening the song's sense of spiritual frustration and raw intensity. The song is famous for its two-part structure: It begins with a "grumbly, growling Afrobeat riff" that creates a tense, driving energy. It then pivots into a "stretch of backwoods raga," showcasing the band’s signature "mercurial" mood swings and unconventional song shapes. In Hersh's memoir, Rat Girl, she describes these early songs as "ugly tattoos" that wrote themselves onto her skin—inescapable and permanent documents of her struggle with trauma and identity. 10) "Delicate Cutters" is the haunting final track, widely considered one of Kristin Hersh’s most "chilling" accounts of a mind losing its balance, often compared to the literature of Sylvia Plath (The Bell Jar) or Charlotte Perkins Gilman (The Yellow Wallpaper). The term "delicate cutters" was a label used at the time to describe mentally ill young people who engaged in self-harm by giving themselves shallow cuts. The lyrics describe a room full of these individuals—"All sitting down, the room has many doors / All but one of them are closed"—symbolizing a state of shared but isolated suffering. The central imagery of throwing one's hands or head through a window ("I throw my hands through the window, crash / Like poetry") represents a violent, desperate attempt to break through the "glass wall" of dissociation or mental illness. The "Last Step" for Kristin Hersh, this song serves as a deliberate conclusion to the "most obscure chapter" of her life. It was written during the period she calls the "Doghouse" era, when she was 18–19 years old, pregnant, and experiencing undiagnosed dissociative disorder and hallucinations. Closing the Door: Hersh has described the song as a "purgatory" that she needed to get through before giving birth to her son, Dylan. It marks the end of her "psychotic" debut album, clearing the way for her to enter the "physical plane" of motherhood. Musical Structure The song is famous for its extreme tension. The Vocal "Tightrope": Hersh moves from a "telluric" accuracy in describing her hallucinations to a vocal performance that critics describe as "doing a tightrope on her vocal chords"—shifting from terrifying whispers to erratic intensity. By the end of the track, the "room full of delicate cutters" is transformed as a figure goes around "opening the doors," suggesting a potential for escape or a different ending Her 2010 memoir Rat Girl (published in the UK as Paradoxical Undressing) is based on a diary she wrote when she was 18, touring with Throwing Muses, diagnosed with bipolar disorder and pregnant with her first child. Rob Sheffield in The New York Times called it an "uncommonly touching punk memoir," and named it No. 8 in Rolling Stone's "25 Greatest Rock Memoirs of All Time." Her 2015 book Don't Suck, Don't Die: Giving Up Vic Chesnutt, is a rumination on her friendship with the singer-songwriter Vic Chesnutt. She cites him as being one of her songwriting influences with his "fluid timing and the grace of a melody that breaks the rules of meter." Hersh was married to her former manager Billy O'Connell for 25 years and they divorced in 2013. They have four sons. As of 2020, she is engaged to former Throwing Muses bassist Fred Abong. Hersh has talked openly about her bouts with mental illness and its role in her musical process. When she was 16, she was struck by a car while riding her bicycle, suffering a double concussion that affected the way she hears sounds. She described it as hearing ambient sounds continuously and "the sounds would alter their sonic vocabulary until I was hearing syllables, and drums... then all these words would come". She has said that hearing "pieces of songs" in her mind compelled her to take the pieces apart and craft songs from them. She claims that she doesn't remember writing her early songs—that "they wrote her". Hersh has synesthesia; she sees musical chords in colors. She has had more than one diagnosis (and misdiagnoses) for her condition including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and most recently post-traumatic and dissociative disorders, which she says have been successfully treated with eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy. All songs written by Kristin Hersh except "Green", written by Tanya Donelly. Favorite Tracks: Green and Vicky’s Box, Soul Soldier is good. 1. "Call Me" 3:59 2. "Green" 3:04 3. "Hate My Way" 4:06 4. "Vicky's Box" 5:09 5. "Rabbits Dying" 3:49 6. "America (She Can't Say No)" – 2:47 7. "Fear" 2:45 8. "Stand Up" 2:56 9. "Soul Soldier" 5:10 10. "Delicate Cutters" 3:53 Throwing Muses is Kristin Hersh – guitars, vocals, synthesizer Tanya Donelly – guitars, vocals, percussion Leslie Langston – bass David Narcizo – drums, percussion Dave Knowles – keyboards Ronald Stone – additional guitar Gil Norton – production

5/10

I like this, but, do you know what else I like? Albums that I can actually check out without the need of a Frankenstein playlist!

I remember seeing Throwing Muses in 1991 and being so thoroughly entrenched in punk/hardcore that I couldn't appreciate it. Being a narrow-minded 17-year-old boy really screwed me on a lot of things musical, because this is some really solid post-punk. Great songwriting. Perfect mix of power and melody. Really enjoyed this a lot.

It was ok. Sounds a bit more early 90s than 80s, I think.

Groupe connu par le morceau 'Fish', présent dans la compilation 'Lonely is an Eyesore' de 4AD. C'est la première fois que j'écoute un album entier. Les premiers morceaux sont vraiment originaux (structure non standard, changements de rythme, harmonies), mais il s’essouffle un peu vers la fin. Je l'écouterais de nouveau avec plaisir, mais il ne rejoindra donc pas ma collection. Par contre il m'a vraiment donné envie de découvrir d'autres albums du groupe. =>3/5

Theres an energy and a tempo to this which is fun but the songs ultimately run together for me and I barely realised it had started again. Very 3pm at a music festival or 9pm at the pub. RYM: N Saved a song: N

L’ho ascoltato troppo poco per valutarlo, ciò nonostante gli do un 3

It was ok, fell a little bit into the background but when I remembered what I was listening to, I quite liked the sound.

The gothic tangle of spikes, Siouxie-esque lament, diatribe and gargoyle is boldly unpretty, but its turbulence doesn’t exhilarate me. I admire it, and hear its kinship to subsequent records by I love - Fugazi, Come and Shannon Wright pick up some of the same threads - but it hasn’t taken off today.

Well, thanks for the super-obscure only-on-youtube album when I'm on vacation with poor signal.. Nevertheless, he persisted and discovered something pretty good and oddly familiar. Indeed, "Hate My Way" was covered by The Divine Comedy on a long-forgotten picture disc! Would have sounded quite distinct in 1986, Kristin Hersh's Patti Smith-meets-Siouxie vocals and weirdly-anthemic songwriting well served by Gil Norton here. I should listen to a few more of these.

Écoute très hachée entre le fait que ça durait 1h40, puis que ça n'était pas le bon album Mais les propositions sont sympa, la voix est bonne et donne une identité à l'album Par contre je n'aime pas du tout la guitare qui est stridente sur certains morceaux et qui entache l'album

Good solid rock. Above average even, but it's still not above 3 stars. This came out in the 2000s and the average stream count on Spotify for a song is about 50k. Not exactly in high demand. Good, but not great.

Intresting

I never got into this band for some reason, but this album marits further listening. I find the chord progressions a bit generic, but there are some nice hooks, and some good heavy guitar tones.

Couldn’t even find the album on Spotify , but what I heard was just ok

It's hard to keep up with Throwing Muses. You can imagine how difficult it must be to dance along to their music at a gig, with all of their ever-changing tempos. I love it though. It's what really makes them stand out, and it's what makes their music so interesting. Songs speed-change multiple times mid-chorus, mid-verse and sometimes even mid-word. While their 4AD label colleagues the Pixies became known for their loud-quiet-loud dynamics, Throwing Muses use their unsettled tempos to shift energy levels in their songs. It works really well too. The rhythm changes somehow blend together smoothly, so it never feels jarring. It never feels like a gimmick, more like the core makeup of their music. As a big Pixies fan, I'd heard of Throwing Muses, but had never gotten around to listening to them. The melodies, themes and musical styles are very different, but the guitar tones really, really remind me of the Pixies. The connection doesn't end with 4AD. These bands are so linked that Tanya Donelly even went on to be a member of The Breeders for a while. Basically, this is right up my alley. And it doesn't disappoint. The guitar riffs are great, the dual vocals of Kristin Hersh and Tanya Donelly soften the rough edges, and of course, the crazily inventive drumming of David Narcizo brings those jagged rhythms that keep me on my toes for the entire album.

They buried their best songs at the end of the album! Half blast is my favourite on the album, and it’s second last! Overall a fun album, I enjoyed it. Incredibly 90s.

Finding the album was a little annoying. The link provided led to an album from 2003 with the same name. However, looking at the album cover, I saw the text "In a doghouse", and ended up finding an album from 1998. Checking the Wikipedia page for this album, I found out the original 1986 album only included the first 10 songs that are also present on "In a doghouse". TL;DR Original 1986 album doesn't exist on Spotify. Listen to the first 10 songs on "In a doghouse" from 1998 instead.

Can’t listen

8/10

This was totally new to me, and I enjoyed it way more than I thought i would. I spun it twice. It got better

Different , but fun. I would spin this one again ..not sure how or why it made the list ..don’t see much on this album on the web