Screaming Trees: Sweet Oblivion Vinyl LP

Why you'll love it

This LP comes with a printed inner sleeve and the bonus track "For Celebrations Past." Sweet Oblivion became the band's best-selling record, moving more than 300,000 copies on the strength of "Nearly Lost You."

This edition

Printed inner sleeve
Bonus track "For Celebrations Past"
Lyrics included

About the album

Sweet Oblivion came out in September 1992. Some records get a leg up from a movie. "Nearly Lost You" landed on the soundtrack to Singles, a Top Ten, platinum-selling album full of Seattle bands, and suddenly a lot more people knew Mark Lanegan's dark, rumbling baritone. Around the same time, the band swapped original drummer Mark Pickerel for Barrett Martin, who plays on the whole album.

Don Fleming produced, Andy Wallace mixed and Howie Weinberg mastered, and the result is the band's brightest blend of psychedelia and Northwest grunge. Guitarist Gary Lee Conner wrote most of the music, often with his brother Van on bass; "Shadow of the Season" opens with a roar, "Dollar Bill" slows to a smoulder, "Butterfly" and "Winter Song" turn more reflective, and "Julie Paradise" closes things out.

Lanegan went on to a long solo career and a stint with Queens of the Stone Age, but this is where most listeners first met that voice. It has the texture of a gravel road and, somehow, the manners of a choirboy. Michael Lavine shot the photographs for the sleeve.

Also at Kops: more Screaming Trees on vinyl · browse Alternative