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Left Of The Dial: Dispatches From The '80s Underground

$64.98 CD

"...virtually all of these songs and recordings have held up beautifully." (4 stars) -- Rolling Stone

"...this labor of love is a vital, often profound, super-fun ride." (4 stars) -- Blender

"The music on this set influenced most everything Pitchfork slobbers on today." -- Pitchfork Media

"No collection I've heard has so well evoked the awkward gear shifts you've come to expect from actual college radio." -- Seattle Weekly

"Heard now, these songs sound both idiosyncratic and classic" -- The New York Times

"...the indie-rock scene of the 1980s remains one of the richest, most inventive periods in rock history." -- Chicago Sun-Times

People will say otherwise, but music didn't suck in the '80s -- it just went underground. As the well-financed end of the art form turned to synthetic sounds and short-attention schtick, the punk and new wave of the late '70s evolved and mutated in the capable hands of scores of independent-minded musicians.   

This four-disc boxed set celebrates the stuff that dwelt just beneath the topsoil -- everything from R.E.M., The Smiths, and The Cure to Black Flag, Ministry, and The Cramps. The spiritual progeny of a boxed set ancestry that includes Loud, Fast & Out Of Control, Nuggets, and No Thanks! The '70s Punk Rebellion, Left Of The Dial houses four jewel-cased CDs in a lidded box. A separately bound 64-page book features essays and notes by independent rock writers Karen Schoemer, John Srebalus, Tim Scanlin, and Kathleen Billus, plus written reflections from The Dream Syndicate's Steve Wynn and Factory Records' Tony Wilson, and Q&As with SST's Greg Ginn and Twin/Tone's Peter Jesperson. 

Selection # 76490