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Rugged debut albums you love

Started by alan nagsworth, September 06, 2018, 12:39:20 PM

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alan nagsworth

I'm a big fan of rough-around-the-edges debut albums. The start of a musical career that captures so much magical energy of a band/artist launching feet first into their labour of love, not arsed about it being a bit messy, the innocence of youth and all that. It's not always the case, but often I feel like there's so much more to enjoy in these albums than in an artist's more polished and fleshed-out later work. A real, genuine spark of joy.

This thread is for debut albums that are unpolished, raw and all the better for it.

SOME EXAMPLES

Queens of the Stone Age. Fantastic debut album, chugging along with that wonderful robotic pace, unashamedly stoned off its tits, still miles and miles better than anything they've put out since Songs for the Deaf. The fucking surly amble of Walkin on the Sidewalks is magnificent, and the bass hook of Give the Mule What He Wants is one of my all-time faves.

Metronomy. I largely don't have much time for this band, but Pip Paine, written and recorded by Joe Mount probably in his bedroom or whatever, is superb. You Could Easily Have Me, man, what a jam! WHAT A FUCKING AMAZING SONG SERIOUSLY AAHHH. This album is so abrasive and cute, it carries all of the cool charm and fun that I find really lacking from the band's later stuff. It's like Ratatat, and Ratatat are fucking excellent.

Mastodon. Okay, so I feel like I bang on about Remission enough on here, but I'm gonna say it again. NOTHING this band has done since that first album is even remotely as close to the perfection they so brutally hammered into the dirt here. Unapologetically savage from start to finish, a fifty-minute sucker punch in the guts. Brann Dailor's drum work is unparalleled on this album and accounts for so much of why I utterly adore it, the most compelling and jazzy drumming I've ever heard on a metal record. Jaw-dropping stuff.

I'll leave it at that for now. Hit me up with yours.

jobotic

I've never heard a Teenage Fanclub record that I liked as much as A Catholic Education. More messily indie, less Byrdsy.

If I could only own one Stereolab album it'd be Peng! and one Pavement album it would be Slanted and Enchanted. Maybe it's coloured by nostalgia but I don't think so.

the science eel

I also like Pavement's first above everything else they did.

I think the Clash's debut fits your definition - it's a fierce, scrappy little beast with shitloads of charm. They lost most of that by the second album (and all of it by the third). It's easily my favourite by them, and would probably feature in my all-time top 10.


Paaaaul

The Modern Lovers - The Modern Lovers

A bunch of demos curated into one of the greatest albums of all time.

Neville Chamberlain

Those early Cardiacs recordings The Obvious Identity and Toy World are things of utter, majestic beauty. In the words of an anonymous band member:

Quote"The recordings were so shit it wouldn't matter if they were copied onto washing up sponges."

I love pretty much every Fall era, but Live at the Witch Trials and Dragnet are truly something special.

BeardFaceMan

Earth Vs The Wildhearts. Recorded as demos onto used quarter inch tape, decided they couldnt rerecord it and make it  sound better so they didn't.

the science eel

Quote from: Neville Chamberlain on September 06, 2018, 01:31:31 PM

I love pretty much every Fall era, but Live at the Witch Trials and Dragnet are truly something special.

The first was unusually polished, tho', wasn't it? those rolling drum fills, the smooth, trebly guitar runs.

I think MES had more of an influence on the overall sound by the time they got to Dragnet.


thraxx

Gorky Zygotic Mynci's Patio...

It sounds like it's a ramshackle and amateurish anthology of all the bits they had from radio recordings to demos to stuff taped in one of theirs Dad's front rooms, in fact it is, so perhaps unfair to call it a debut album, but it's stuffed full of charm and banging tunes. The only album better they did better than this is Bwyd Time.

Neville Chamberlain

Quote from: the science eel on September 06, 2018, 02:08:17 PM
The first was unusually polished, tho', wasn't it? those rolling drum fills, the smooth, trebly guitar runs.

I think MES had more of an influence on the overall sound by the time they got to Dragnet.

I haven't listened to LATWT in a while, come to think of it. Dragnet I listened to just last week. I think you're probably right in that LATWT is more of a Martin Bramah-led album...

SteveDave

Quote from: thraxx on September 06, 2018, 02:55:12 PM
Gorky Zygotic Mynci's Patio...

It sounds like it's a ramshackle and amateurish anthology of all the bits they had from radio recordings to demos to stuff taped in one of theirs Dad's front rooms, in fact it is, so perhaps unfair to call it a debut album, but it's stuffed full of charm and banging tunes. The only album better they did better than this is Bwyd Time.

Is that the one with "Barbed Wire" where their mum comes in and says "The noise is unacceptable for the neighbours!"?

chveik

Come on Pilgrim
From Her to Eternity

Egyptian Feast

Quote from: thraxx on September 06, 2018, 02:55:12 PM
Gorky Zygotic Mynci's Patio...

It sounds like it's a ramshackle and amateurish anthology of all the bits they had from radio recordings to demos to stuff taped in one of theirs Dad's front rooms, in fact it is, so perhaps unfair to call it a debut album, but it's stuffed full of charm and banging tunes. The only album better they did better than this is Bwyd Time.

Love this album. The interruptions from their parents complaining about the noise are wonderful. I'm always thinking of their Dad saying "Bass. Sounds. Travel." when I'm playing particularly thumping music.

SpiderChrist

I've always loved Macca's first album, all stoned and ramshackle.

the science eel

Quote from: studpuppet on September 06, 2018, 02:29:29 PM



Best cover ever. Best logo ever. Best sound ever.

I LUV-UV-UV that album.

sevendaughters

I think that Meat Puppets, II, and Up On The Sun are as perfect a 1-2-3 punch can be but there's not enough love for the rattly debut compared to the praise for the latter two. It's thrash and trash and the heralding of a band with a pretty unique sound and take on things. They'd smoke more weed and write more melodic tunes but this one does me just as well.

Twed

Hate Slipknot, but their demo album Mate. Feed. Kill. Repeat. is very charming. They clearly haven't found their niche at this point, and made an album with a lot of jazz & funk influences. It's adorable.

alan nagsworth

Quote from: Twed on September 06, 2018, 06:39:35 PM
Hate Slipknot, but their demo album Mate. Feed. Kill. Repeat. is very charming. They clearly haven't found their niche at this point, and made an album with a lot of jazz & funk influences. It's adorable.

Interestingly, I find that their "proper" commercial debut album, the self-titled one, is their best. Blistering piece of work, still sounding rough around the edges but all held together by Joey Jordison's amazing drumming. They quickly got really boring after that; I don't even really like Iowa.

MFKR is like a poor man's Mr. Bungle debut album to me, it tries way too hard and leaves me cold.

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

The first album by Love is a fantastically rugged, ramshackle affair. Folk-tinged garage punk played by a bunch of kids on amphetamines. I love the baroque psychedelia of Forever Changes as much as all sane people do, but I'll always have a soft spot for their snotty debut.

DukeDeMondo

It's absolutely hanging in bits, and some of it is... well. It's a wee bit excruciating, to be honest. And it feels sort of weird to be listening to it - and getting swept up in it - as a Grown Up. But still. A Collection Of Songs Written And Recorded 1995-1997 by Bright Eyes will always have a great big massive place in my heart.   

"Well that's pretty..."

Gregory Torso

Although it isn't technically their debut, it might as well be, Deerhoof's "The Man, The King and the Girl" is a mashed, scrappy, beautiful junkyard mix of the borderline unlistenable pre-Satomi guitar noise they started off doing and the broken keyboard yip she brought into the band. "Polly Bee" is a wonderful pop song buried under speaker fucky murk; "The Pick-up Bear" sounds like the whole band are falling downstairs; god it's all lovely to me and my ears, the birth of a sound they perfected on later albums like Reveille and Apple O. It's tough, ragged, difficult and I love it.


the science eel

You were doing well until those last two...

alan nagsworth

Original Pirate Material is a fucking work of art. Everything else from Skinner is very weak in comparison. I love that album a lot.

thraxx

Quote from: SteveDave on September 06, 2018, 03:10:49 PM
Is that the one with "Barbed Wire" where their mum comes in and says "The noise is unacceptable for the neighbours!"?

Barbed Wire (tooty louw!) is a tune.

Sally Webster is the one where their Dad comes in cuts the power and at first very patiently tells them off before getting all shirty and tells them that he's VERY SERIOUS BUT CAN GUARANTEE THAT THEY WILL DO THIS AGAIN.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szvUwooG1Ag

Brundle-Fly

Monks ? The Specials? FFS, they both only released two albums under that line up/ moniker. If that.

the science eel

Monks certainly didn't do anything else. There might have been a tribute/collab album a few years back to go along with the doc.

Brundle-Fly

Quote from: the science eel on September 07, 2018, 04:35:49 AM
Monks certainly didn't do anything else. There might have been a tribute/collab album a few years back to go along with the doc.

Monks though?  'kin brilliant!

the science eel


non capisco

Quote from: the science eel on September 07, 2018, 04:35:49 AM
Monks certainly didn't do anything else. There might have been a tribute/collab album a few years back to go along with the doc.

I thought their comeback song 'Nice Legs, Shame About The Face' was a bit of a let down.