A Gilded Eternity (Remastered)

Since this was Loop's third and final album, 1990's A Gilded Eternity can be heard as the South London band's long goodbye. Groups such as Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. had turned up the noise quotient in the Amerindie underground, while My Bloody Valentine was deafening everyone on its side of the pond by the end of the '80s. Loop's Robert Hampson never tired of his hypnotic eternal riffing, but he also pressed his mates to creep outside the box. "Blood" encourages drummer John Willis to go tribal while vocals swim in and out of the mix with an eerie distance that's purely magical. "Vapour," "Afterglow," and "Breathe into Me" have an assuredness that comes from years of making variations on the same record. (That isn't a knock; many of the best bands slowly refine and repeat their sounds.) Neil Mackay's bass guitar leads the near–Joy Division apocalypse of "From Centre to Wave." "Be Here Now" serves as a perfect farewell anthem.