While this could at times best be described as “AOR”, since it’s done by Bob Mould it gets punk rock credibility. If it was anyone else, I doubt I’d have given this much of a passing thought. The first song only starts to gets interesting just as it starts to fade out; thankfully the rest of side A is great, starting with The End Of Things. Overall the album has a really slick production quality and beefy, overdubbed guitars - a sound so thick it could be Swervedriver, particularly on Lucifer And God and Black Confetti.
This record is holistically better than Blue Hearts, but less urgent - no punk anthems on this one, but a great record regardless.