My Top 1000 Songs #875: Missing Presumed Drowned

[I've been writing up my Top 1000 songs on a daily basis--you can see them all in descending order by hitting the All My Favorite Songs tag.]

New Zealand's Straitjacket Fits were among the many late 80s bands on the Flying Nun label I explored after branching out from my initial discovery of acts like The Clean, The Chills, and The Bats. Their more experimental, heavier sound, infused with splashes of psychedelia, was a little tougher to wrap my arms around, but they had a few tracks that made a lasting impression. 

"Missing Presumed Drowned," off 1990's Melt, was a personal fave at the time, a dense, sludgy stew from which an infectious hook emerged, a song that simultaneously creeped me out while making me subconsciously hum along with the chorus. It's much less immediate than the more pop-inclined Flying Nun bands, dark psychedelic grooves with slithering guitar lines, but something mysterious in the track made it stay with me long after their records found their way into the dustiest corners of my collection.

Live (about 2 minutes into the clip, after a brief interview):

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