The Long Walk Home

Pere Ubu named themselves after Alfred Jarry's absurdist antihero, and the Cleveland band that formed around David Thomas in 1975 made records that deserved the literary reference. The Modern Dance (1978) is one of the most disorienting debut albums in rock history — post-punk before post-punk had a name.

The Long Walk Home is characteristic Thomas: a voice that shouldn't work and does, the arrangement lurching between rhythmic passages and near-silence, the band operating at the edge of coherence as a deliberate choice. Cleveland's industrial landscape is audible in the music.

Pere Ubu have continued in various configurations for nearly fifty years. Thomas's refusal to make things easier than they need to be has kept the project honest.