Loveslug - Beef Jerky (1990, Glitterhouse)

On the face of it, one is/was liable to dismiss Loveslug as little more than frivolous metalli-punks by no other measure than Beef Jerky's simpleton album jacket.  In fact, had the back cover been adorned with only a track list and no subsequent text, I would have slung this sucker right back in the rack.  To their credit, this long departed Amsterdam quartet had the good sense to enlist Jack Endino as producer.  Furthermore they won mega points with me for extolling props to Mudhoney, The Fluid, and Maximumrocknroll alum Mykel Board in the credits.  Loveslug could have passed for grunge stock, yet the only Sub Pop signees they truly recalled were Tad and the Afghan Whigs - and those comparisons are limited to a mere song or two at best.  Coincidentally or not, the folks these guys most sonically resembled were Aussie contemporaries the Hard-Ons, and much like them, for every bright idea Loveslug had ("Blood Like Ice" and "Last Man Alive") there was a turkey around the corner.  The incorporation of brass and saxophone simply fails to accomplish whatever these chaps were thinking, but luckily those accouterments don't appear from song-to-song.  Beef Jerky isn't without it's merits, so if you celebrate the era this disk harkens back to give 'er a spin.

01. Dogfood Sandwich
02. Coyote Date
03. Blood Like Ice
04. Lily is Dead
05. Love Ransom
06. Last Man Alive
07. Buttbuster
08. Turn the Tide
09. (I'm a) Party Member 
10. Work is a 4-Letter Word

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