20. Savage Republic - Ceremonial (1985)

Savage Republic is one of the few great post-punk bands of the 80s still releasing quality material, although they've yet to top 1985's Ceremonial. In the beginning their work was typical harsh sounding post-punk with an industrial hint and strange chanted lyrics being their gimmick or spin on that style, but as they went on that industrial side grew to be more than a hint as they explored the unique instrumental drone for which they became known. Over the eight tracks on this album - some releases have nine, including the track "Valetta" from the Trudge EP, but this one doesn't because I'm bad with computers - Savage Republic show off both the hypnotic drone of later releases and the post-punk jams in the vein of New Order or The Pop Group that made up their early work in a combination not matched since. The whole thing is great but the tracks Andelusia, Walking Backwards, and, one of my all time favourite songs, Dionysius, are the most memorable. Fun and fast songs like those have a broad appeal to fans of more pop-ish or dance-y music and to anyone into noise, drone, and industrial.

Download here.

5. Fire Engines - Hungry Beat

If Orange Juice is the Oasis of the Scottish post-punk scene, and Josef K is the Blur, then the Fire Engines have to be the Manic Street Preachers. Under-appreciated and almost forgotten, yet artier and messier and, on the whole, much more interesting than the bands in the spotlight. OJ and Josef K are very nice bands, but if you're looking for more than "angular" guitars backed by a straightforward disco beat, Fire Engines is a good example of what made post-punk so great. Sure, it was swell of Edwin Collins to bring his fascination with Chic into the underground music explosion, but is "Rip it Up" really post-punk? Farther down the Scottish totem pole, yet light years away in terms of sound and technique, Fire Engines give us a noisy mess that you can dance to. Hungry Beat, released in 2007, is a near-discography, compiling the full-length Lubricate Your Living Room and the various 7"s put out during the band's extremely brief existence. The packaging includes a blurb from Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand. If there was ever proof that good influences do not make a good band, this is it. Listen to Fire Engines, not Franz Ferdinand; listen to Joy Division, not Interpol; and don't listen to Vampire Weekend (not really relevant, just had to slip it in there).

Fire Engines - Hungry Beat