| Slo-Blo | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 1992, Germany 1993, United States | |||
| Genre | Alternative rock | |||
| Label | City Slang (Germany) Ecstatic Peace!/DGC | |||
| Producer | John Siket, Cell | |||
| Cell chronology | ||||
| ||||
Slo-Blo (also stylized as Slo*Blo) is the debut album by the American band Cell. [1] [2] It was released in 1993 by DGC Records; the band had been signed by Thurston Moore. [3] [4] The album was first issued by City Slang, in 1992. The band supported the album with a North American tour. [5]
The album was produced by John Siket and Cell. [6] It had been recorded as a demo. [7] The band concentrated on composing songs, rather than building on riffs. [8] Cell used DGC's money to remix the album for its American release. [9]
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [10] |
| Calgary Herald | A− [11] |
| Chicago Tribune | [12] |
| Entertainment Weekly | C− [13] |
| The Indianapolis Star |  [14] |
Spin called the album "a leaden fumble, as close to formula as indie rock gets." [15] The Chicago Tribune praised the "dynamic six-string melodic grunge, where magisterial riffs and probing guitar jams share equal time." [12] Trouser Press opined that, "if commercial post-punk noise were to get more formulaic than this, it’d have to be stacked in the generic-brand aisle." [16] The Washington Post thought that, "at its most tuneful, on such songs as 'Tundra', Slo+Blo recalled the plaintive, folkish punk of Husker Du." [17]
Entertainment Weekly noted the "muffled drumming, proudly tuneless singing, sprawling arrangements that sound as if they’re about to crumble," writing that "the band forgot to write good songs, making Slo-Blo much noisy ado about nothing." [13] Newsday concluded that, "on songs such as 'Cross the River' and 'Stratosphere', Cell's instrumentation gets very close to standard rock anthems." [7] The Indianapolis Star wrote that "raging guitars here offer a satisfying jolt but [there's] little melodic diversity." [14] The Calgary Herald called the album "hard, methodical, noisy." [11]
AllMusic admired the "fluid, meandering riffs that slowly build and overlap and begin to take shape as something powerful, hypnotic, and cohesive." [10]
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Fall" | 3:35 |
| 2. | "Wild" | 3:46 |
| 3. | "Cross the River" | 2:56 |
| 4. | "Dig Deep" | 3:27 |
| 5. | "Stratosphere" | 5:36 |
| 6. | "Two" | 2:59 |
| 7. | "Everything Turns" | 4:10 |
| 8. | "Tundra" | 4:10 |
| 9. | "Bad Day" | 2:24 |
| 10. | "Hills" | 4:09 |
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