Atomizer
- Zone: Shallows (level 2 of 5)
- Genre: Rock, Noise rock, Industrial
- Mood: brutal, mechanical, sneering
- Sound: drum machine, clanking percussion, no frills
Atomizer is Big Black’s first full album, and it is built from two guitars, bass and a Roland TR-606 drum machine instead of a drummer. Steve Albini, Santiago Durango and Dave Riley recorded it in Chicago in late 1985 with Iain Burgess, and the guitars are bent and warped on tracks like “Passing Complexion” and “Kerosene” until they are hard to recognise as guitars. The lyrics are some of the band’s bleakest, written as fictional portraits of the American underbelly. The mechanical drums and abrasive attack made it an early forerunner of industrial rock and noise rock.
Track list
- Jordan, Minnesota
- Passing Complexion
- Big Money
- Kerosene
- Bad Houses
- Fists of Love
- Stinking Drunk
- Bazooka Joe
- Strange Things
- Cables (Live)