Bug: Remastered

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Customer reviews

review by: Billyjay date: 2007-10-03 rating:
When we were kings.
This album recalls the glory days when alternative/underground music really was that. You felt as if you were in on the secret and the rest of the world didn't have a clue. That a record this good, this exciting, this much fun, could exist and yet not touch, or conversely, be contaminated by, the 'mainstream' was part of its appeal. br /Perhaps the most interesting thing that this album did was overthrow the critical wisdom of the day by proving you could rock out without sacrificing your integrity. br / br /'Freak Scene' is great but 'Let it Ride' is just as good, and although "You're Living All Over Me" is now touted as the definitive 'classic DJnr album', I've always preferred this myself. Don't agonise, just get it.


review by: stipesdoppleganger date: 2005-04-15 rating:
A Bug thats well worth catching
Back at the end of the 80,s label "Blast First" had a roster of brilliant bands: Big Black, The Butthole Surfers, Head of David and then there was Dinosaur Jr. Released in 1988, Bug was their first album for the label, their previous the superb "You're Living All Over Me" was on S.S.T. Unlike the nihilistic Big Black, and the conventional hardcore metallisms of Head of David, Dinosaur Jr with J Mascis, s lethargic drawling vocal style were forerunners for the grunge/slacker scene of the early 90.s. Bug could have broken huge like "Nevermind", but maybe the time was wrong and they lacked Cobains ear for disillusioned anthems and the gnawing hairball of fury that drove Cobain on. Mascis couldn't be bothered man; he drove interviewers wild with his monosyballic torpor and mumbled indolence.brThankfully the music is much more forthcoming and eloquent." Freak Scene" should have been huge like "Teen Spirit". Like that song it still sounds fresh and relevant today. It's a loser's anthem and society will always create those. It could also be viewed as a comment on the fracturing relationship between Mascis and Lou Barlow (Who left after Bug to form Sebadoh) Whatever way you interpret it, Freak Scene is the definitive tired lament of a generation that can't be bothered, told in the guise of a failing relationship with Mascis and concluding that everything's "A mess/ Best just to leave it". The guitars blaze amid the spiralling solo at the songs heart which probably Mascis is finding his true voice.brIn truth the rest of the album is unable to match this song in intensity and stylistically the albums limited and at times dour in its six stringed mewling frenzy. "Budge", though is a tremendous short sharp blast of strident scorching fury. "Pond Song" is like R.E.M. around "Reckoning" with added flayed strips of rough edge guitar "Yeah We Know" breathes through it's choppy chord structure and peals of wah wah. "How did we ever get together?" Mascis moans as the songs pirouetting solo ignites. Most remarkable is the final track "Don't", a five minute tour de force of shrieking feedback and rib popping distortion. Barlow screaming repeatedly "Why don't you like me?" and sounding like the demon in "The Exorcist". I dunno Lou maybe she was into Tallulah Gosh and found all this noisy stuff a bit too much. Or maybe he's talking to Mascis?brWhile never an all out classic-it lacks variation and one or two tracks are bog standard blithe rock - this is still an under acknowledged album , paving the way along with bands like The Pixies for the explosion of the early 90.s. Whether that was entirely a good thing is another debate but this definitely one Bug you need to catch, at least once.

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