Buffalo Tom – Let Me Come Over

Hailing from the same Boston scene that spawned Pixies, Dinosaur Jr, Juliana Hatfield and others, the trio known as Buffalo Tom made a quantum leap in form and style on this third album, recorded in an old church out in a forest in New York state. They nailed the storytelling, atmosphere, melodies, and (a Buffalo Tom trademark) sense of world-weariness with this one, and while all their other records are great, in my estimation it's this one that stands tall as their finest work. The album's centrepiece, and for me their greatest ever song, is "Larry" - a soaring, emotional, heart-on-sleeve opus with poetic lyrics that partly borrow from Sylvia Plath ("I shut my eyes, all the world drops dead") and music that, as they once themselves described it, was like Van Morrison crossed with Hüsker Dü. It never fails to tug at my heartstrings, hard.