Released

J.G. Thirlwell had already released two full-length albums and several 12” singles when this 1984 album arrived like a mail bomb. The lyrics were a hysterical collage of pop-culture references, surreal braggadocio, and priapic nihilism delivered in an out-of-breath shout; the music was a riot of tape loops, pounding drums, and borrowed styles from surf rock to manic and deliberately ersatz big-band swing. The most unsettling track, “I’ll Meet You In Poland Baby,” layers a Hitler speech within a constantly shifting mosaic of synths and sirens, as Thirlwell takes Elvis Costello’s concept of “emotional fascism” and runs with it. On “Satan Place” he fuses the Beach Boys, the surf instrumental “Wipeout,” the Trashmen’s “Surfin’ Bird,” and ? and the Mysterians-esque garage-rock organ, swamping the listener’s synapses like a tidal wave striking a building.

Phil Freeman