Sonic Youth

Recorded between December 1981 and January 1982 and released in March 1982 on Glenn Branca's Neutral label. It is the only recording by the early line-up with Richard Edson on drums, and it runs about 25 minutes. Gordon calls it an EP in her autobiography, although the band regard it as their first studio album.

It sounds unlike what came later: mostly standard tuning, clean guitar tones, crisp production and a post-punk feel. Edson's roto-tom drumming pointed toward ESG and Liquid Liquid. One thing carried forward was prepared guitar, as on The Burning Spear, where Moore put a drumstick under the strings at the 12th fret and Ranaldo played a power drill. Retrospectively, Pitchfork's Brandon Stosuy gave it 8.2, and AllMusic's Andy Kellman called it a fusion of no wave and an early Factory band.

SST reissued it in 1987 on vinyl, cassette and CD, with Blast First handling the UK. A Geffen reissue in 2006 added seven live tracks from the Music for Millions Festival at the New Pilgrim Theatre in New York on 18 September 1981, plus a studio instrumental of Where the Red Fern Grows from October 1981.