Goat

Fantastic, lean noise rock album. It's insane that this album came out in 1991, it feels so ahead of its time. It still sound fresh today.

Excellent noise rock album (another Steve Albini) that sounds like a steamroller between your ears. Then Comes Dudley makes me think it's better if he stays the hell away from me.

Hell yeah, awesome add. Discovered this LP last summer and have had it in some sort of rotation since, given it feels stunningly fresh for an album released in the 90s. Between the untamed vocals, rock-solid drum and bass, and wiry technical guitar, this feels like the original incarnation of Daughters or other recent mathcore bands two decades ahead of time. Lots to dig into from a technical perspective, but what matters here is the overall sweaty, animalistic feel that exists alongside an overwhelming sense of control, two opposites building on and tearing into each other. The result is an absolutely wild, feral ride that's become hard to find in rock music nowadays, and one I don't mind returning to again and again (especially as a native Texan, Austin represent).

This album was released exactly a week after I was born. Musically, this album is post-hardcore with some experimental and noise aspects thrown in as well. It’s not as melodic or catchy as grunge, but it’s still accessible. I found it to be a great and important listen.

Just as good as I remembered. Probably my favourite JL album but their other work is great too.

That Albini-sound is basically the sound of my youth. Those instantly recognizable drums and distorted guitars. If it's Albini-produced it usually ends up pretty high on my enjoyment-meter. Jesus Lizard is no exception although I always struggle to get through an entire album in one sitting. They have all elements that I like in a heavy rock band, but deliver it with such a heavy punch that I end up on the ropes, holding on for dear life. But from time to time I can handle and actually like this kind of sonic-ass-kicking. "Don't get me wrong, he's a nice guy, I like him just fine.....But he's a mouth breather" 🤘

Big fan of albums that sound like they were recorded inside a giant pressure washer. RIP Steve Albini, greatest to ever do it. Gets better with every listen.

A good pick with long lasting influence. ”Mouth Breather” has such a kickass riff

The music is good, the voice doesn't seem to me to be enough and he has the type of speaker rather than an interpreter. The voice is simply "unreadable." 2.5 stars

Great inclusion! One of the best records of the 90s.

Noisy punky proto-grunge, by a really interesting band who were a clear influence on loads of huge acts. An album I would have loved to have heard sooner; as such it gets my vote to go in the book.

I didn't know what the Jesus Lizard sounded like. I think because of Mary Chain I thought they were shoegazey. They're actually on the same lines as Fugazi. Brilliant stuff.

A seminal album, The Jesus Lizard's *Goat* is a nineties noise-rock classic and an essential record for anyone who loves the Steve Albini sound. Plus, David Yow's crazy vocal performance here is also one for the ages. The first side is packed with (rough) gems -- bangers such as "Monkey Trick" -- also a very "meta" song -- and "Mouth Breather", whose lyrical inspiration draws from a real life event which is both hilarious and astonishing (one involving Albini and Slint's drummer, check it out online!). Let's not forget opener "Then Comes Dudley" and the lively swamp rock of "Nub", where David Yow sorts of fantasizes about his guitar player having his arms amputated (!). "Seasick" also nicely exemplify Yow's unstable persona. "I can swim! / I can't swim!" he goes, which really gives you the impression you're about to drown. In keeping with those lyrical muddled waters, the musicians playing behind Yow are equally menacing. Tight drumming, deep basslines and great guitar hooks all around. Only, the music that's played here is like a perverted, very twisted version of blues rock -- which greatly benefits from the Albini sound treatment, by the way, just like PJ Harvey's own twisted blues rock in *Rid Of Me* would benefit from it two years later. Both records are indeed the platonic ideal of what an Albini recording should sound like, and only for this, they deserved to be mentioned in a list of the most influential recordings ever. After the prison-sex-fantasy-gone-horribly-wrong of "Karpis" and the lewd ratiocinations of "South Mouth" ("Sometimes we act like animals / We act sometimes like little girls"), the last leg of the album doubles down on the offensive card, thanks to the bonkers, deranged and very graphic "Lady Shoes". Then the western-flick-adjacent "Rodeo In Juliet" closes the proceedings on a less claustrophobic note, even if still quite an unsettling one. Think of Francis Bacon and William Burroughs put to tape, and you're not so far off the mark. Offensive, I said? Yeah, sure. The line between provocative art and sheer gratuitousness is often straddled in *Goat*. Yet the intensity and ambiguous goals that are displayed in this LP are also what makes it stand the test of time, beyond the purely musical merits. The greatest of all time indeed. At least in its genre. ---- Number of albums from the original list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 465 Albums from the original list I *might* include in mine later on: 288 Albums from the original list I won't include in mine: 336 ---- Number of albums from the users list I find relevant enough to be mandatory listens: 32 Albums from the users list I *might* select for mine later on: 42 Albums from the users list I won't select for mine: 78 (including this one) --- Émile, je sais, ça fait un bout de temps que je te promets des nouveaux bouts de réponse (as-tu vu les derniers au dessus ?), mais je suis en vacances à la mer, et les journées sont courtes. Ça fait du bien de moins faire d'écrans, ha ha. Aussi fun que cette petite expérimentation sur le générateur a été, on pourrait aussi ptet simplement se contacter via les réseaux sociaux ou Messenger ? Dis-moi ce que tu en penses...

Lizard, and Mary Chain, Jones, Christ; I always get confused by all these. But I think these are the American ones everyone loves, and I can hear why. Somewhere between grunge and post-rock.

I'm a sucker for interesting cover art. Added a half star just for that. Neat noise rock artists from Austin, TX. I had heard of them, but never listened to an entire album of theirs. This was pretty good, I must admit. 3.5/5, but rounding up to a 4 due to solid cover art.

Deserves a place on the list, and could easily take the place of a Britpop album without anyone noticing.

This is kind of what I imagine inhabiting Isaac Brock's brain feels like. Crazed. Deranged. Fun, but a little punishing. I think, despite it's short length, it's a lot to take in on one go-around, but I could see myself really growing into this. Favorite tracks: "Nub", "Seasick"

An enjoyable antidote to grunge - by far and away less self-destructive, and definitely a fresh take at the time.

Really interesting and impactful noise rock that covered a lot of ground in its very short run time

Good record. The vocal style is one that I don’t have a tolerance for very long. I am good with it in short bursts, but it does prevent me from coming back to it too often.

Somewhat notorious band I've been hearing about for years but never really listened to. Seemed like pretty straightforward hard-core kinda dirt bag rock. Not completely my cup of tea but I didn't mind it at all.

A fine little rocker. Slides into rockabilly at times (in a good way). Vocals not strong but they don't need to be. Sounds like 1991.

Whatever else there is to say about Goat, the "there comes" is rendered as literally as it possibly can be in stereo. The band's affect is rather blunt, though vocal insanity and hypnotic melody lines are also in evidence. Bonus tracks contribute to one evaluation and not another: The Jesus Lizard seems to track back over the pop songs in their midst before releasing music full-formed. The band sounds fascinating; This particular record is less-favored by my snap judgement.

Rating: 6/10 Best songs: Seasick, Karpis

No frills, hard rocking, strategically noisy. I'm not a huge fan of the whole "low in the mix" approach to the vocals, and it's probably for the best if you don't try to decipher the lyrics. But I still enjoyed this quite a bit, and would listen again. Thanks for recommending it. Fave Songs: Rodeo in Joliet, Mouth Breather, Nub, Then Comes Dudley, Seasick

Uninspiring

Grimy 90s garage rock!

Great

Felt like a nice 90’s rock album

Some really good moments on this. But I did zone out a bit towards the end.

It's pretty good for what it is- crisp, clear rock with no frills. Whether it's any different from all the other bands I don't know. It's early on and pre-dates a lot. But is that enough?

Interesting noise rock album, enjoyed this but didn’t love it, might grow more over time .

It was ok

I'm not familiar with this album but the album art is top notch. First song I thought oh, ok, second song I'm like, this is kind of good. Stayed hit and miss. Sunday You Need Love is great, Seasick is really not, Lady Shoes is somewhere in between. Overall pretty strong and a good share.

Hey it's not my bag but I sure do admire it's drive and passion. Noise rock

Has it’s moments

Noise rock, post-hardcore. No me ha gustado. Un 2.

There are days I have the patience for early 90s sludge and today is not that day

Mmm, not for me. I get Noise Rock, but I feel like it is so easy for it to go over a ledge of unenjoyable accidentally.

Didn't care for this much at all. 2 stars.

These guys used to get late-night play on Australia's version of MTV in the 90s. It caught me multiple times, because they had a cool name but sounded like dog shit. But that was 30 years ago now and my tastes have surely matured. Time to give it the chance I never did. With so much more breadth of experience and a full adult vocabulary, I can now use words like jarring, annoying, loud, abrasive, dissonant, unstructured and pointless to describe it. I couldn't do that in 1994; I could only really say it sucked. But it's still just as fucking awful and disappointing as I remember. Imagine sitting up late as a kid, waiting for the heavy stuff, wanting Alice in Chains and Pantera, and instead you get this. Into the BIN. 2/5.

Initially thought the music was poor, but their take on psycho-rockabilly swamp bluesy rock grows on me. The “singing” is uniformly awful. The short album length is truly wonderful. I think I may have seen these fellows at Reading Festival 1993, so at that point they had an extra couple of years to hone the sound… I was probably similarly unimpressed!

Very much not the GOAT. Rating: 1.5 Playlist track: Mouth Breather Date listened: 28/07/24

This was a pretty odd album. Being in a genre called noise rock sums it up pretty well. Not sure why a disjointed muddled sound would be considered a good idea yet the mates of the Jesus lizard thought it would be. I couldn’t get into this album. It was messy (probably intentionally). 4.7/10

This is one of those albums just like scum by napalm death that I can't say I liked but I couldn't stop listening. It's the kind of post-hardcore punk that makes me feel like I'm in the movie Green Room and gives me the urge to take a shower but something keeps me from turning it off and idk what.

Not for me

I can’t say I enjoyed this much - not really my thing - although I did kind of like the song “Sunday You Need love.”

Noisy rock that unfortunately did more to drive me away than pull me in. Seasick was the most promising, though overall it was a bit of a chore to make it through.

Hmmm... monkey trick has a Pixies feel to it. A bit of a debaser feel... but doesn't really have the hook. The rest of the album doesn't really hold too much appeal. I'll save my stars for another album.

Passable

Not an album for me.

GOAT doesn't do it for me, it sounds pretentious, especially the vocals, which are really grating. The music is standard enough noise rock which also isn't for me, a couple of good moments get a 2/5 but I didn't like this much.

It was okay

Spiky and thrashy, with a plethora of tough, hot licks – very much the kind of thing people who are into this sort of thing will be into. A slightly artier-modernized (with some temps and shifts pauses that were probably intended to calm the audience and make them stop moshing for a second and think [or perhaps not] ) take on the basic punk formula of shouty vocals + shearing guitars + bashing percussion, which in this case mostly equals tunelessness, pointlessly angry posturing and unconvincingly (if gravely) self-seriousness. Not one's thing – hello, melody, hello structure – though the record is better (more precise, cleaner sound – probably thanks to Albini) than one remembers their early '90s live sets (which one had to endure as a nightclub deejay at the old Masquerade haunted house in the ATL – maybe one once had a viable OSHA claim). One senses a clear plan – in other words, the chaos is surely contrived because this feels too willfully difficult, to specifically unpleasant and voluntarily abrasive. And it goes on too long, for sure. Age may have tempered the shock value a touch, but this definitely does not belong on the list proper.

Proto-post hardcore, but mostly yelling

A massive slab of noise.

Nope!

No, the voice is unintelligible on many tracks and the whole vibe is very black and downbeat. No from me, 1star

Not my style or taste at all. I liked one of the bonus tracks (listed as a "single version" which makes sense), but other than that it just didn't hit for me. There are some days when noise rock works more for me than others - listening to this was not one of those days. 1.5/5