Artist bio
Craig Wedren's flailing operatic tenor, Nathan Larson's big rock riffing, and the group's surreal, often incomprehensible songs all helped make Shudder To Think a love-it-or-hate-it proposition throughout the '90s. But for those willing to indulge the Washington, D.C.-originated band's many quirks, the sonic rewards were plentiful. One of the strangest acts ever signed to Dischord Records (and one of only two, with Jawbox, to later leave for a major label), Shudder To Think almost dared you to take its music seriously. On mind-blowing albums such as 1992's Get Your Goat and its stupendous centerpiece, "Pebbles," the band sounds like Queen one second and Fugazi the next. Both the hard rock and artiness quotients were off the chart by 1994's Pony Express Record, released by Epic at the zenith of the we’ll-sign-anything period in major-labeldom (Shudder had toured with and been championed by such acts as Smashing Pumpkins, Pearl Jam, and Foo Fighters). Unsurprisingly, the group was simply too weird to make much commercial headway, and its 1997 swan song, 50,000 B.C., traded all the distinctive traits for an inferior, overly polished sound. Still, it did little to tarnish Shudder To Think's legacy as one of the most original rock bands of its generation.
Albums by this artist
50,000 B.C. (1997)
Pony Express Record (Recommended) (1994)
Your Choice Live Series (1993)
Get Your Goat (Recommended) (1992)
Shudder To Think
Your Choice Live Series
» JONATHAN COHEN | SENIOR EDITOR
|
Shudder To Think
Your Choice Live Series
Your Choice, 1993
RiYL: Fugazi, Gang Of Four, Sunny Day Real Estate, Smashing Pumpkins, Dismemberment Plan |
Shudder To Think's installment in the Your Choice Live Series was released by the German label Your Choice in 1993, thus making it something of a rarity to find in the states. And ultimately, only true Shudder fans will find anything of merit on this disc, owing to a pretty average soundboard mix that obscures singer Craig Wedren's flamboyant vocals and the disc's haphazard construction (for some reason the crowd noise is edited out of some songs but not others). However, the album (drawn from a German gig in 1992) spotlights a particularly interesting evolution taking place with Shudder's sound, as guitarist Nathan Larson had just joined the band to replace dreadlocked axe-wielder Chris Matthews.
Although Larson would push Shudder into even artier and more bizarre territory on his first studio record with the group (1994's
Pony Express Record),
Your Choice finds him trying to meld his hard-rock playing style into the band's catalog of songs. For the most part Larson fits in pretty well, his jagged guitar tone toughening up an already muscular sound on "Rain-Covered Cat," "Rag" and "I Grow Cold," which is not available on any other record.
Always known as an incendiary live act, Shudder nevertheless is somewhat sloopy throughout the course of this disc (no doubt partially caused by Larson's relative rookie status). Still, the band rocks with convincing post-hardcore energy on "Chocolate" and "Shake Your Halo Down," which closes the disc in a deluge of ear-splitting feedback and primal drumming.
It will be up to the listener to justify paying import price for oddities like the 53-second "Birthday Song," which eventually became a part of
Pony Express' "No Rm. 9, Kentucky," or a cover of Atlanta Rhythm Section's "So Into You," which would also turn up on that album. Not for the uninitiated.
JONATHAN COHEN | Jonathan Cohen co-created Nude As The News with his Indiana University mates Troy Carpenter and Ben French. When not traversing the globe for business and pleasure, he holds down the fort as a senior editor for Billboard in New York. Stop him and he just may ask, "what for lunch?" 