Spiderland

I've known this for a long time: as I grew an interest for post-rock, I came to it 20 years ago or so. At first, I was very disapointed, because it has nothing to do with the post-rock I was listening to -- it's not even purely instrumental! It was pretty quirk, with lots of dissonant chords and not that much melodies. But I kept going back to it for some time, and it grew on me. And now, decades later, I still love it and it might have been the first post-hardcore (and noise) related album I've listened to. Because I tend to think of it has post-hardcore and/or noise more than post-rock: lots of dissonance, strange rhythms, walls of guitars. It might be more down-tempo than many other bands but it still has these signatures. Anyway, it's a strange but attractive album, and it probably opened my ears to something new back at the time, and I still love it, at least for that.

Grungy, mostly spoken word punk with a nice edge to it. I really enjoyed these tales of creepy carnivals, vicious vampires and sinister sea captains told in a voice that ranges to a mumble, to a shout, to a scream accompanied by wailing guitars and rumbling bass lines. There’s a very eerie ambient hidden track on the end of this album too.