Although
the Meat Puppets
would later become best known for their intriguing blend of country, punk, rock, folk, psychedelia, and whatever else they could toss in their musical blender, the trio's 1982 self-titled full-length debut was a furious hardcore album. Totally ferocious and red hot, the album rarely lets up on its full-throttle attack --
Curt Kirkwood
's vocals bear little resemblance to the wasted, off-key country-rock warbling on such seminal releases as
Meat Puppets II
and
Up on the Sun
; instead, the singing style consists of larynx-shredding screaming that renders the lyrics incomprehensible. Still, there's something special about such slop-rockers as
"Love Offering,"
"Blue-Green God,"
"Saturday Morning,"
"Our Friends."
And as a sign of things to come, for a few brief fleeting moments, the band attempts to conquer country (on covers of
"Walking Boss"
"Tumblin' Tumbleweeds"
). The 1999
Rykodisc
reissue more than doubled the original album's track listing, including their early
In a Car
EP and a total of 12 outtakes/demos, the best of the bunch being covers of
the Stooges
'
"I Got a Right,"
Neil Young
's
"I Am a Child,"
the Grateful Dead
"Franklin's Tower."
~ Greg Prato