In the beginning, Mudhoney were cranked-up, distorted, long-haired rockers who helped give grunge its name, and Superfuzz Bigmuff helped give it a sound. So it is only fitting that Sub Pop, on Mudhoney's twentieth anniversary, re-released and expanded the band's seminal 1988 EP.
The band's songs about physical and mental sickness and the recklessness of youth, all heavily regurgitated through distortion pedals, stand up as examples of aggressive rock music perfectly suspended in its era. Never could it be replicated with the same purity ... until now. With Mark Arm personally weighing in on the track listing and archival material, Superfuzz Bigmuff: Deluxe Edition features two discs of material, not a single track of which is a throwaway.
With guns blazing, the first disc launches into the stalwart grunge anthems “Touch Me I'm Sick” and “Sweet Young Thing Ain't Sweet No More” before hitting its target with covers of The Dicks' “Hate the Police” and Sonic Youth's “Halloween.”
The second disc is a veritable treasure trove of rarities, including a college radio session recorded back in November 1988 (which includes a slow, dope-weary version of “Mudride”) and their Berlin show a month earlier at which frontman Mark Arm challenged bemused punters to "pull down your pants if you like us." No one did. "Aw, no one likes us," adds Arm, sounding genuinely hurt.
The key component of Superfuzz Bigmuff: Deluxe Edition is right there in the title, a union of the group's guitar pedals of choice. Fuzzy guitars are essential to the seminal Seattle group's two-pronged, brilliantly sloppy guitar assault, the hallmark of the grunge sound that thrust the Northwest scene into the global limelight.
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