Mission of Burma - A Gun To the Head

Note to all future music industry execs: When a well-respected band reunites after more than a decade, it's the prime time to release a collective of their past work, whether it's two albums or twenty albums of material to cover. In Mission of Burma's case, A Gun to the Head only has to cover a couple years' worth of work, with the first four songs from 1981's Signals, Calls, and Marches EP, tracks 6-14 from 1982's full-length VS., and two live cuts from the band's final tour in 1985, also on The Horrible Truth About Burma, tacked on at the end. Having been revived last year to release a new set of songs for Matador Records, interest in Mission of Burma has piqued again, and that interest spurred Rykodisc to put together this collection with full input from the band. Not a bad choice--A Gun to the Head is an ideal starting point for anyone wanting to immerse themselves in the works of one of the more important post-punk/early indie rock bands. Kicking off with the slightly rougher, less composed (and better, in my opinion) material from Signals, Calls, and Marches, this collection tackles the obvious classics--"Academy Fight Song" and "(That's When I Reach For My) Revolver," and then shortly after takes more than half of the band's only real album, VS. for a spin, before wrapping up with the spectacular live cuts "Peking Spring" and "Go Fun Burn Man." Mission of Burma fans will find this useless, as they'll more than likely own all of these songs anyway. Not one track previously unreleased, and the liner notes are nothing of a band biography. Rykodisc succeeds in their mission to release a quality overview of an amazing band's illustrious but short first era, and A Gun to the Head should be purchased by anyone wanting to discover the brilliance that is Mission of Burma. [www.rykodisc.com]