The Day the Earth Met the Rocket From the Tombs (2008)

This set of demos and live recordings, made in 1975, is pretty much the only document of the band that would mutate into Pere Ubu, and here they sound as raw as the Sex Pistols in a snowdrift. The recording quality is dodgy, but by the time David Thomas' bestial wail morphs into Peter Laughner's steak-knives-through-sheet-metal guitar on ''So Cold,'' you won't care. PUNK EXISTENTIALISM Hearing the late Peter Laughner contemplate suicide in the bleak ''Amphetamine,'' while oblivious bar patrons yak it up. RIP, man.

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