Album Review: Teenage Fanclub - A Catholic Education

Teenage Fanclub's debut album was released in 1990 before, it seems, the band heard Big Star.  It's rockier and less distinctive than subsequent albums.  There are not one but two tracks entitled Heavy Metal (both instrumental), the latter of which pre-empted the blues-metal of Metallica's Load.

Second track in is Everything Flows, a ragged yet in control rocker with shades of the Wedding Present about it, with what became their trademark: the harmonies of Norman Blake, Gerard Love and Raymond McGinley.  Elsewhere, Catholic Education and especially Critical Mass are again reminiscent of the Wedding Present.

Tracks like Too Involved and swaggering Stones-y rockers Don't Need A Drum and Eternal Light are enjoyable but somewhat anonymous.  The album comes off sounding like the leading lights of the indie music scene circa 1988-1990, ie Wedding Present or even Primal Scream (in their pre- Screamadelica phase).