Bad Moon Rising

Sonic Youth's second full-length LP Bad Moon Rising was originally released on Homestead and Blast First in 1985. The album is a fascinating examination of "the junction where hippie idealism [meets] the cold hard world," says guitarist Lee Ranaldo, "where Woodstock [meets] Altamont - Death Valley, Charles Manson, Brian Wilson, musicians, murderers, heroes and villains."

Its original eight-song tapestry of droning guitar feedback, distant clattering percussion, and sullen vocals, all held together with interstitial noise loops and shadowy haze, ambles through a long, dark night before the feverish 'Death Valley '69,' driven by runaway guitar riffs and a frantic Thurston Moore / Lydia Lunch vocal duet, pounds the capstone into place.