Album Review | Ned's Atomic Dustbin's 1991 LP God Fodder

Is it pop? Is it rock? A look at a record that thirty-plus years later still refuses to be classified.

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God Fodder cover art courtesy of Columbia Records

Good Morning!

Today we’re taking a look at Ned’s Atomic Dustbin’s 1991 God Fodder LP

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When it comes to music, I'm willing to die on a couple of mountains.


The first is that 1991 was the best year ever for music.

Something new came out every week, and each release took us in a different direction. It wasn't just chart-friendly pop anymore (though there was still plenty of that). College radio was moving from a low-watt campus station into the mainstream and being rebranded as an "alternative," whatever that meant.

Industrial music continued to shapeshift, veering into grittier sounds that reflected a sketchy geopolitical era. Established artists took things in new directions.

This was the year my divorce from pop radio was finalized.

The second is that music saved my life in high school.

The former is debatable; the latter is not. High school is already a weird time, but in my case, it was doubly so as I lived at the far corner of an already large district, sentencing me to 4 years at a school literally built to be riot-proof, right down to the low ceilings and thin, narrow windows. It was also overheated, overcrowded, and lousy with everything we generally detest about schools. It was, in short, a structural stereotype.

Despite that, I somehow managed to finally(!) find my tribe. There were a million different directions I could've gone in, but I landed in a group of rabid music nerds. A happy accident that changed my life and one I'm forever grateful for. Our circle spent those years constantly hunting out new music, sharing copies of magazines like Flipside, and making mixtapes.

And one of our all-time favorites? God Fodder by Ned's Atomic Dustbin.

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I don't remember which of us first introduced this record to the group, but I very clearly recall the enthusiasm with which it was met. It checked all the boxes: new sound, something that had yet to be co-opted by everyone else, and (checks notes) two bass players? Look, the 90s saw a lot of gimmicks come and go— I’ve mentioned in these pages before that my personal red line was drawn at a show when someone took the stage in an armored knight suit. That was probably for the best; they were awful, but I digress.

Two bassists might've been seen as a gimmick, but that evaporated the second you pushed play. It wasn't a gimmick; it was novel. And it, too, was a happy accident, with frontman Jonn Penny explaining later, "I was drunk and invited two bass players to audition by accident. We kept them both: Alex (Griffin) played high bass, and Matt (Cheslin) played low."

Dan Worton rounded out the rhythm trio, giving it propulsive momentum. His two speeds were fast and really fast. Gareth "Rat" Ping's swirling guitar was layered over that, along with liberal doses of distortion. And across the top were Jonn Penny's lyrics, words that were at once cryptic and simple. "Kill Your Television " wasn't actually about killing your TV, but who cared?

Spun me all about
Pushed me out
Laughing as I fell about
Sat down for a drink
In your father's favorite chair

1991 was an era hungry for slogans. This fit right in with "Corporate Rock Sucks" and the like. And it made for a nice sticker on one's skateboard or car, so there's that. "Kill Your Television" also got a (relatively) decent amount of airplay on MTV back when the "M" still stood for "music." One of the messages that briefly flashed during the clip said, "Nothing Is Cool."

To disaffected suburban teens in the 90s, this was catnip.

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None of that would've mattered if it wasn't standing on a foundation of objectively great music. God Fodder is a record that takes roughly four seconds to grab you by the collar. "Kill Your Television" starts things off with a quick hint of what two basses would sound like before the Rat's trademark guitar bursts in. You might not know this song, but you definitely know his signature sound—it has influenced a bunch of your favorite bands.

"Grey Cell Green" is wonderfully chaotic in all the best ways. Again, this is a recurring theme across the whole record. Even songs with melancholy lyrics like "Until You Find Out" are all gas and no brakes. Ned's Atomic Dustbin simply did not do ballads.

Calling a favorite on a record with no skips can be tricky. If pressed, my vote would go to "Happy." The lead bass is impossible to ignore. Ditto the guitar and Penny's erudite lyrics. It's everything good about Ned's squished into 3:54 of sonic bliss. It's a song that insists on the volume being turned to eleven.

You fly off the handle
Wait 'til I'm not there
If you will fly off the handle
Wait 'til I'm not there
'Cause I will talk
Maybe you will listen
But you won't hear a single word I say
I will talk
You will listen

Penny's lyrics hit deep as someone who spent this era just wanting to be heard/seen. Never mind that this was more likely a song about a crumbling relationship than anything else.

As for everything good about the band, it can be hard to describe. They are quite good at defying description. People needed to figure out what to do with them, so the band often found themselves unfairly lumped in with bands like Pop Will Eat Itself, Jesus Jones, and other groups that might've looked/dressed similarly but didn't sound like them at all.

33 years on, I'm still trying to come up with an accurate summation. Adjectives like "fantastic" seem cheap. But I will say this: 33 years–and 1800 miles–from where after I first heard this record, I still listen to it. And it sounds as good today as it did on my Walkman in the halls of that overcrowded school.

That's no accident.

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Listen:

Ned’s Atomic Dustbin | God Fodder, 1991

Click the record to listen on your platform of choice.

What do you think of this record? Did you have it when it was first released? What were you doing in 1991? Share your thoughts below!

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Thanks for being here,

Kevin—