Metal Circus by Husker Du

Metal Circus, the EP Hüsker Dü put out on SST Records in October 1983, is where the Saint Paul trio's hardcore blur starts to crack open and let some melody leak through. Bob Mould's guitar still roars, but it's thickened now with shimmering chorus-style effects, and he sings like every line costs him blood. The songs Grant Hart sings are the tell: "It's Not Funny Anymore" is practically pop underneath the racket, with Greg Norton's bass keeping the whole thing from flying apart.

"Diane", another Hart vocal, is the chiller, an anguished retelling of the real murder of a West St. Paul waitress named Diane Edwards. The record runs only 21 seconds shorter than their debut LP Everything Falls Apart, and it very nearly came out as a 12-song, 30-minute album; the leftovers finally surfaced in 2017 on a 7" called Extra Circus. Heard now, it's the sound of a band clearing its throat before the leap of Zen Arcade.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.