Does everyone dig how "Passing Complexion" was so on point? Atomizer rules so hard.

For guitar sound, my favourite Big Black record is probably ‘Sound of Impact’. Durango’s guitar’s never had more of a growl than on that first side, to my ears. Shame that the bass is a little quiet on the same side.

Atomizer by a cunt hair, because of Kerosene and because it was so hard to find on LP for so long. Adds to the mystique, you know?

Atomizer, tho as previously mentioned, if opened up to EPs, I'd go with Racer X.

Atomizer is my knee-jerk reaction; I think the songs are bit stronger and it holds together better as an album for me. I think “Bad Houses” might be the secret key here, in it’s way as bleak & tormented as anything else but the “quiet”, introspective aspect gives the whole record a deeper, creepier vibe. Plus “Cables”. That opening, shrill, “sparking” (that’s the only thing I can think to call it) sound on “Passing Complexion” is, well it is really unlike anything else. And “Kerosene”. And…

The overall sound of Atomizer I don’t know that it has really been remarked on and I don’t even know that I can really quantify what it is exactly I find so appealing and again probably because it really doesn’t sound like anything else. The way the guitars have moved into a kind of pure sound divorced from notes or gear or noise, like they have become alive. The bass & drum-machine both anchoring and pummeling along with the electric howling voices (human & otherwise). I dunno…something about how everything sits together in the mix, it is just perfect.

None of this is really meant as a patch on Songs, which is another perfect album, but for the reasons above Atomizer is the one that pops into my head when I think “Big Black”.

Atomizer, mostly for Side A. Better, more memorable songs. Plus, "Kerosene," Jesus Christ. That tune was played to death in the late '80s but the first time I heard it, it was a what-the-fuck? moment. Nothing on Songs About Fucking was half as startling, although that might just be b/c I heard it later. The second side of Atomizer isn't nearly as good, but still more than fine.

Songs About Fucking is excellent and gnarly but doesn't flow half as well. It somehow feels less monumental as a result of that.

jason from volo wrote: Sat Jul 03, 2021 2:15 pm If we're keeping it between these two albums, I like Atomizer better.

But if we're counting EPs and LPs, my vote would be for Bulldozer.

i say SAF over atomizer but i agree with you on bulldozer. i think it's the best big black release

The Classical wrote: Thu Jul 29, 2021 8:51 am I think “Bad Houses” might be the secret key here, in it’s way as bleak & tormented as anything else but the “quiet”, introspective aspect gives the whole record a deeper, creepier vibe.

Atomizer for me, and "Bad Houses" pushes it just slightly ahead of SAF'ing. "Bad Houses" to me is what BB would have sounded like if they'd listened to way more of Pornography-era Cure.

SOF is one of the most memorable first listens of my life. It was shocking and inhumane to my young ears; like everything that clicked with me when I had encountered Huskwr Du, but in some horrifying inversion.

I neither loved nor hated it, but feared it. So cold. Perfect though.

SOF. :WF: zero

wow surprised this poll is so close, SAF in a canter for me, Atomiser is all good and fine and awesome but SAF upped the ante baby, that shit was some next level incendiary brain excoriation