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House Tornado

By: Throwing Muses
Label: 4ad
Released: 31 Dec 1993
RRP: £8.99
Average Rating:

Customer Reviews

1987's classic album with bonus mini-LP. - By: Jason Parkes, 17 Feb 2003
House Tornado was the strongest release of the early part of Throwing Muses career- advancing on the brilliant eponymous debut. As with the CD-version of The Pixies Surfer Rosa, this cd issue comes with a bonus mini-LP- in the form of The Fat Skier.

Tanya Donelly is advancing as a songwriter here- River is as good as the brilliant Green from the debut & her other track Giant sounds like the Go Betweens playing a Belly song. Kristin Hersh dominates for the most part- Juno, Colder, Drive, Mexican Woman & Walking in the Dark as good as it gets. This is an album to get lost in- & was not topped by the following releases, which contained some great songs- but were more commercial (see Hunkpapa, The Real Ramona). The Fat Skier bonus tracks are as great as the Chains Changed ep (also of this era, sadly not included)- Garoux Des Lames sounding like an avant garde Blondie, though it is Pools in Eyes & balllad A Feeling that stand out.

This CD is excellent value at this budget price, definitely one for deep dark nighttime- Walking in the Dark being the key song- Hersh's subtle piano motif underpinning something between alt-country & the avant garde (such as the frequent shifts in rhythm, which recalll The Slits). Certainly one of the key albums of the late 80s & easily up there with such releases as Liberty Belle & the Black Diamond Express, Fables of the Reconstruction & Mary Margaret O'Hara's only album...

The high-point of Throwing Muses, which is saying a lot... - By: , 03 Jan 2000
This album is virtuallly perfect. The beauty of some of the textual & melodic structures is frequently physicallly staggering. The vocals of Kristin Hersh on this record are halfway between compassion & sarcasm, & that twilight emotional hue is the essence of the political & musical ground we're treading here. This is barely a 'pop' record at alll, being as it is so thoroughly loaded with artistic density. The rhythms & phrase-proportions lend a structural originality & irregularity only normallly found in modernist composers such as Nono or Gerald Barry. The language is American politeness refined to perfection, at once smilingly clever & direct in its expression of pure abstract intensity. Buy this remarkable record if you love classical music, art-poetry or the finest artistic achievements of American underground pop. This is one to cherish as much as your deepest, most painfully permanent love.