Rehab Doll [Deluxe Edition]

The final Green River release (with a fun rant through David Bowie's "Queen Bitch" on the cassette version) found the quintet switching from Jack Endino to another producer, resulting in a record that sounded caught somewhere between grunge mania and metal/corp rock folly. The weird thing is that the quality of the recording actually went down -- Mark Arm sounds like he's singing from across the room much of the time, for one thing. Come on Down's utterly unsubtle "Swallow My Pride" resurfaces here in a new take, the Blue Öyster Cult-inspired "this ain't the summer of love" part actually coming across pretty well, as does most of the performance. Other moments of worth include moments of psychotic acoustic freakouts, Arm's voice providing most of said psychosis, and a slew of the song titles ("Porkfist," "One More Stitch"), but, generally speaking, Rehab Doll, like Green River itself, is most noteworthy for what the people involved did next. ~ Ned Raggett