The Muffs - Blonder And Blonder

The Muffs' 1993 self-titled debut announced a band capable of channeling sixties girl-group melody through a wall of distorted, hard-charging punk energy, and it left fans wondering whether they could pull it off twice. Blonder and Blonder, released in 1995 on Reprise Records, answered that question definitively. Now working as a trio, the band reunited with producer Rob Cavallo, who's gone on to shape records for Green Day, Paramore, and Fleetwood Mac, and the result was a tighter, sharper record that became the band's biggest seller.

Kim Shattuck's songwriting drives all fourteen tracks, swinging between snarling aggression and genuine pop sweetness sometimes within the same song. "Sad Tomorrow" became the album's signature single, but cuts like "Won't Come Out to Play" and "End It All" show the same combination of melodic hooks and raw, fuzzed-out guitar that made the band stand out from the era's punk revival crowd. Bassist Ronnie Barnett and new drummer Roy McDonald gave Shattuck's material a rhythmic punch that pushed the songs even harder than the debut had, turning fourteen tight tracks into one of the more purely fun records to come out of mid-90s alternative rock.

This limited pressing arrives on opaque red vinyl, following the same format as the band's acclaimed 2015 self-titled reissue. The full-color packaging includes photos, drawings, and memorabilia alongside essays from Barnett and McDonald and track-by-track commentary from Shattuck herself, giving longtime fans real insight into how these songs came together. Thirty years on, Blonder and Blonder still sounds every bit as vital as it did on release.