Even after the success of last year's triumphant, comeback LP The Tenement Year, even after years of being cited as an influence on just about everybody, even after all the changes in music that have taken place in the fourteen years since they first honked and squawked their way across a Cleveland stage, the thought of Pere Ubu, the icons of weirdness, landing on a major label is still a little scary, and definitely cause for jaws to drop and eyebrows to waggle. For their PolyGram bow, Ubu and producer Steven Hague (New Order, OMD) have turned the tubas and wheezing, whistling and noodling synthesizers way down (but if you listen carefully, they're all still there, buried in the mix) to reveal with startling clarity something old Ubu fans have always known; that beneath their hard, dissonant and inaccessible sonic exterior, Ubu are capable of writing some really catchy melodies. It should also startle more than a few onlookers (but then again, followers of Ubu would be surprised if there were no surprises) that the album's single, "Waiting For Mary," is actually one of the more eclectic, Ubuesque tracks on the entire LP-hardly the safe, stodgy move one would expect from a sell-out. Top of the Pops: "Breath," "Race The Sun," "Nevada" (sorta an Ubu-ization of "Sloop John B") and "Pushin'."

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