Zen Arcade (studio album) by Hüsker Dü

From VictorVale 02/10/2022 17:02

Pilar do rock alternativo.

From Timestarter 08/09/2021 20:56

Highlights:

- Something I Learned Today
- Broken Home, Broken Heart
- Hare Krsna
- Pride
- I'll Never Forget You
- The Biggest Lie
- Masochism World
- One Step at a Time
- Newest Industry
- The Tooth Fairy and the Princess
- Turn On the News
- Reoccurring Dreams

From Jbalbinolr 05/02/2021 15:18

Album of the day, and it`s one of the greatest albums of the decade. The turning point for punk

From teague 07/01/2020 02:24

Two albums came out in 1984 that really helped to make progress in the hardcore punk genre; Double Nickels on the Dime and Zen Arcade. Hüsker Dü's effort is the more aggressive and straightforward of the two and is the one I prefer.

Really good album.

Favorites: Indecision Time; Beyond The Threshold; I'll Never Forget You; Turn On The News.

Its flawed, slightly too long and the audio fidelity is scratchy and staticky, but its those flaws that give it the greater impact. Its a dark brooding masterpiece of existential angst the best ever put to music, its grunge before grunge became a book of clichés. The styles are diverse and varied, which individually don't work in isolation, but when you add it all up create a sonic kaleidoscope that varies in texture and colour. Its cerebral with jagged hooks, its Rage to last a lifetime.


Top 5 tracks

Never Talking to you again
Standing By The Sea
Pink Turns To Blue
Whatever
Turn On The News

From Brad1770 09/22/2018 04:10

The seminal and almost legendary 'Zen Arcade' appears to have taken on a life of its own over the years but its not the panacea many claim it is

For starters its too long coming in at 70 minutes , the middle portion particularly becomes a slog as quite a few tracks being blurring into one

Secondly as a concept album it actually doesn't work . Supposedly telling the tale of a boy who leaves a broken home only to find the outside world is no better , this narrative thread is impossible to follow bar a few slices here and there

Thirdly the track listing has too many ho hum moments with tracks such as "Chartered Trips" , "Dreams Reoccurring" later repeated plus 13 minutes , "Indecision Time" , "Pride" and "Somewhere" as examples

Yet there are some gems to be mined within Zen , I can recommend Harts "Never Talking To You Again" , the weird but good "Hare Krsna" instrumental , the powerful "Standing By The Sea" , the 'Candy Apple Grey' - ish "Pink Turns To Blue" and twin closer's the excellent "Turn On The News" with cool monkey sounds and the full 14 minute "Reoccurring Dream "

Overall I find 'Zen Arcade' better than good but far from great

60/100

From Kalos 09/14/2017 16:09

R.I.P. Grant Hart. Thank you for this masterpiece that made my youth better.

From poppmusic 07/26/2016 00:35

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From buzzdainer 05/30/2016 00:56

Zen Arcade brings together two voices--a screaming voice in Bob Mould and a a warmer, more yearning one in Grant Hart--to tell vignettes of twentysomething white Minnesotan masculinity, doing so mostly in a loud three-piece rock format. There's a fourteen-minute instrumental, a short piano instrumental, a song with percussion swirls and general noise underscoring a reference to Hare Krishna's chanting practices, a frenetic acoustic number, and other points of variation. But mostly it's that three-piece arrangement, with Mould's guitar often a sheet of blazing noise that feels like a corrugated aluminum wall shattering in your face, other times a queasy backward masked swirl; Norton's bass skipping along and digging deep, standing out just enough to matter; and Hart galloping and crashing behind his drum kit. This is a band still chasing the land speed record that was the title of their first release, but with the added maturity shown in a greater sense of melody and purpose. A great rock band finding its authentic voice.