's second, and last, record is filled with the same angular guitars and high-pitched rants that made their first album, , an exhilarating blast of bad-attitude . But differs from its predecessor in four important ways. First, the guitar and bass parts are more harsh and minimal, though the interplay among them is more complex. Guitarists and and bassist play in jagged, incongruous counterpoint to one another, boiling their lines down to only a few notes and snapping them off strangely. Second, 's words are more urgent because their subjects are less obvious, as is the case on this lyric from : "First they steal my thunder, now they want my organs/Can't stand to see me breathe, much less succeed." Third, the album was recorded more cheaply than the slick , and while the recording isn't indistinct enough to dull the album's impact, it does succeed in creating a sense of mystery. The vocals are somewhat buried and some of the words are hard to understand, and the drum sounds are, happily, matter-of-fact. Fourth, and most importantly, the songs are more streamlined and perversely catchy. All four of these differences make even more punchy, nasty, and compelling. is a brilliantly venomous slab of D.C. . ~ Charlie Wilmoth