Surprise party on a small scale: One of the quintessential indie rock albums of the 90s is celebrating its milestone birthday with two finds worth listening to.
What else can come? In 2013, by far the Breeders’ most successful album was released as a fat LSXX package on three CDs or seven LPs, including every pipe. The 25th anniversary was then celebrated with a no-frills re-release on vinyl. Five years later, they have actually tracked down two previously unreleased songs from that phase and put them on a separate 12” alongside the two records: “Go Man Go,” written by Kim Deal and Black Francis, would have made at least a good B-side .
“Divine Mascis” is – as the title suggests – a version of “Divine Hammer” with J Mascis on the microphone. The lively original helped the album achieve its status as an almost perfect work and as such cannot actually be improved. And yet this much more powerful version has its own charm, sprinkles in a Ramones-like proto-rock riff and, with the typically mumbled vocals, gives an idea of how The Cure could have developed if they had followed the indie rock path of ” Boys Don’t Cry” continued.
“Anger is an energy”
Fun Fact: One of the B-sides of “Divine Hammer” was a mix of “Do You Love Me Now?” with Mascis on backing vocals. The album’s artwork was modified by Chris Bigg, long-term creative partner of original artist Vaughan Oliver, who died in 2019. The waving band from the back cover now also greets you at the front – a moderately original idea for an album that is bursting with ideas and, given the rather unwieldy subsequent records, is perhaps more surprising today than ever before: what forces worked together back then to create such a gripping, melodic album and yet create a thoroughly weird album?
The main impulse may have been anger – “Anger is an energy”, as John Lydon already knew. Kim Deal wanted to show Francis, who always put her songwriting under the Pixies’ bushel, and did so with gusto: the chorus of “Cannonball” remains a resounding slap in the face, the instrumentals “Flipside” and that three years later by The Prodigy in ” “Firestarter” muddled “SOS” is still an excellent opener for any indie rock playlist.