Tall Dwarfs - Canned Music (1983)

Review by Patrick Foster
Canned Music is the third piece of the Tall Dwarfs puzzle, and, like the other key pieces of this stunningly beautiful and original tapestry, it shines with a homemade pop glory that is nearly matchless. From the giant-grub march of "Turning Brown and Torn in Two" to the drugged-up winter trance of "This Room Is Wrong" to the shimmering and righteous "Beauty" to the chill-bump-inducing "Shade for Today," the record overflows with the kind of ideals and standards that set the stage for the U.S. indie movement of the early 1990s. One envies fans of Pavement and Sebadoh who have never heard these tracks, going giddy with the pure inventiveness of the craftsmanship here. The whole of Canned Music is available on the Hello Cruel World compilation, but hardcore fans will need to at least see the marvelous soup-can cover and the hilarious two-headed-monster drawing on the back of the vinyl original.