Various

Related Content

• "W.E.": Madonna Fetishizes Subject at Story's Cost
  February 8, 2012
• Madonna Is Playing the Bay Area This Fall
  February 7, 2012
• Six Reasons We're Really Glad Jon Bon Jovi Is Not Dead
  December 21, 2011
• MySpace Says It's Bringing TV to the Web -- But It Isn't
  January 10, 2012
• A Cold-Stricken J Mascis Talks About Dinosaur Jr. Playing Loud, SF Hippies, and the Relative Inferiority of Bug
  December 13, 2011

More About

• Don Henley
• R.E.M.
• Bon Jovi
• Punk Rock
• Surfing

Like this Story?

Sign up for the Music Newsletter: Keep your thumb on the local music scene with music features, additional online music listings and show picks. We'll also send special ticket offers and music promotions available only to our Music Newsletter subscribers.

Privacy Policy Cancel Continue

In the decade before Nirvana made it safe (and commercially viable) to rock alternatively, the underground music world sporadically coughed up "quirky" bands like R.E.M. or the Cure into a mainstream bewitched by Madonna, Don Henley, and Bon Jovi, while the rest of the oddities were relegated to grubby college radio stations and that tiny parcel of airtime MTV gave Tim Sommer on Sunday nights to spin postmodern vids. This four-CD, 82-song collection does a fine job of cataloging the wildly disparate sounds of that vast subterranean scene. Sure, the Violent Femmes' "Blister in the Sun" and Joy Division's "Love Will Tear Us Apart" are predictable entries, but there are deeper cuts from the Smiths, Butthole Surfers, Dinosaur Jr., XTC, Gang of Four, and the Minutemen, plus welcome exhumations of the Feelies, Passions, the Go-Betweens, and Gun Club. Although some may squabble over which staples and obscurities are missing (whaddaya want, a 15-disc, $250 set?!), additional tracks from the likes of Minor Threat, Throbbing Gristle, the Sugarcubes, Beat Happening, and Kate Bush make for a well-rounded and satisfying five-hour alt-'80s flashback.