Double Nickels On The Dime - Critical Recognition

Critical Recognition

Upon its release, Double Nickels on the Dime received critical acclaim from a range of American critics; however as a regional independent record label, many of SST's releases did not attract attention from British music magazines. Village Voice critic Robert Christgau gave Double Nickels on the Dime an A- rating, describing Boon as a "somewhat limited singer" but "a hell of a reader, with a guitar that rhymes", and remarking "this is poetry-with-jazz as it always should have been." Christgau later said that he underrated the album on its original release. Double Nickels on the Dime placed at number 14 in the publication's end of year Pazz & Jop critics' poll. Reviewing the album in February 1985, Rolling Stone's David Fricke awarded the album three and a half stars, and also praised Boon's technique, stating: "The telegraphic stutter and almost scientific angularity of singer-guitarist D. Boon's chordings and breakneck solos heighten the jazzier tangents he dares to take," but that "Double Nickels on the Dime's best moments go far too quickly."

Later reviews have also been positive: Allmusic's Mark Deming described Double Nickels on the Dime as a "quantum leap into greatness" for Minutemen, describing the album as "full of striking moments that cohere into a truly remarkable whole" and awarding a maximum five stars. Journalist Michael Azerrad, profiling Minutemen in his book Our Band Could Be Your Life (titled after a lyric from the "History Lesson — Part II"), named Double Nickels on the Dime as "one of the greatest achievements of the indie era" and described it as a "Whitman's sampler of left-wing politics, moving autobiographical vignettes, and twisted Beefheartian twang". Several publications have raised their rating of the album in the years since its release; Rolling Stone re-reviewed Double Nickels on the Dime for the 2004 Album Guide and gave it its classic rating, a maximum five stars.

Although not commercially successful upon its release, Double Nickels on the Dime marked the point where many punk bands began to ignore the stylistic limitations of the hardcore scene. According to American Hardcore: A Tribal History author Steven Blush, Double Nickels on the Dime was, along with Zen Arcade, "either the pinnacle or downfall of the pure hardcore scene." Watt later commented that Double Nickels on the Dime was the "best album I ever played on."