Loop - The World In Your Eyes [3CD Remastered Set] (2009)

The World in Your Eyes compiles the entirety of Loop's 16 Dreams and Spinning 12" singles and adds four extra songs. Their earlier phase tends to concentrate centrally on pounding a giant riff into submission with the least amount of backing necessary, with all the sunshine happiness of the most downered Stooges sub-blues imagined. Generally, The World in Your Eyes captures some of Loop's most straight-ahead material, and Robert Hampson's vocals are at their least fiddled with, production-wise. Bex's Spartan drum patterns usually consist of "thwack," "thwack-thwack," or "thwack-thwack-pish"; she might not stand a chance in King Crimson, but she fits the bill perfectly on minimally stomping songs like "16 Dreams" and "Head On." The ten-minute "Burning World" and 13-minute extended version of "Burning Prisma" (how many other bands do extended versions of ten-minute songs?) both have the entrancing qualities of the best Spacemen 3; the lengthier version features some extended soloing that avoids flash and wank. "Brittle Head Girl"'s melancholia strikes upon third album Velvet Underground, bizarrely using shades of new wave synth. A brilliantly fevered cover of Suicide's "Rocket USA" (from a Peel Session) captures all the rush and frenzy of the original; Hampson's vocals do Alan Vega proud, evoking all the evacuated headspace required: "Gonna crash/Gonna die." A racing rhythm box drives it in the same manner of the original, but the stun guitars add something that the earlier version arguably lacks. [Part of an extensive Loop remaster/reissue program across late 2008 and early 2009, overseen by Robert Hampson and released on his Reactor label, this edition of The World in Your Eyes contains two extra discs -- filled with compilation appearances, 12" material, demos, and live tracks -- that must come close to completely emptying the Loop vault.]