[This review was originally published in Badaboom Gramaphone #3 and appears here with permission.]
The Incredible Force of Junior, three upstate New Yorkers relocated to Seattle, raised eyebrows and shook booties with an impressive self-released debut single, “Greatest Thing,” in 1994. The charging instant indie-rock classic landed the group on a slew of compilations (including the second Shreds), airplay on John Peel’s radio show and a deal with Up Records.
Let the World Fall Apart was released to little notice in 1996, which is a shame since a good two-thirds of the record is some of the best up-tempo indie pop the movement ever saw (kudos to producer Phil Ek for maintaining the rock on a pop record). The first four tracks — “Blue Cheer” (a new and improved version of a slightly older single), “Five-Eight,” “Trailer Home” (the best teen-pop anthem by people in their mid-twenties) and “Walrus” — are unstoppable bounce that’d shake the barrettes from the head of the smoothest scenester. Susan Robb’s bass lines give these songs a heavy bottom that makes them last while Chris Munford’s guitar work swerves over and around the familiar jangle found on contemporary records. Robb’s alto speak-singing alternately duels and harmonizes with Munford’s tenor (an odd throaty combination of the B-52’s Fred Schneider and Superchunk’s Mac McCaughan), but their combined vocals, smeared in spots with subtle reverb and inclined to tossing “shooby doo-wop bops” and “hoo hoos” all over the place, really give the band its standout sound. “Stronger” (also reprised from a single) soars here, a rock song in the classic sense that it gets better the louder you listen to it. There are some weak tracks, and the instrumental “Roswell,” which closes the record, should’ve been left off entirely (perhaps in favor of the absent “Greatest Thing”). All in all though, a great debut. But it was the band’s swan song as well.
By early 1998, Robb and Munford had ended a long romantic relationship and drummer Steve Lodefink had left the band. Munford went on to a long career with Tullycraft and Robb undertook a solo hip-hop project as MC Milksnake before concentrating on visual art projects.