'100%' is how it begins. A song about the death of a friend who bit the bullet as it blew a hole through his head. "And LA story. One of limitless violence", Thurston Moore describes it as in an interview. Ironically, Sonic Youth's first Top Forty hit, it opens with choking guitar and rock'n'rolls on through, the sadness hidden beneath the good-time riffing. "Can you forgive the boy/Who shot you in the head?/Should you get a gun/And go and get revenge?"

'Swimsuit Issue' was partly inspired by the Anita Hill/Judge Clarence Hill sexual harassment case. The song is hyper as Kim Gordon dictates: "Don't tough my breast/I'm just working at my desk/Don't put me to the test/I'm just doing by best". Moving from the office to the kitchen, 'Shoot' steals in on a prowler bass line, examining the exploitation of women in the home. The woman character has an anger that has brewed for a long time. She has come to a decision.

Forget about issues and slip smoothly into 'Theresa's Sound-World', Thurston's voice is soft with hurt. Think of the splendour of a sun sinking into a blood and orange dusk. Let your lungs imagine the air that circles the top of the Cliffs of Moher. Just sit back and try to remember the prettiest thing you've ever seen. A similar mood is pursued into 'Wish Fulfilment', only it is broken up half-way through by bitter guitars, just like the relationship it's dealing with.

There is much about Dirty that is melancholy and brooding. The guitars, as usual, have that totally unique and twisted feel, but often they are used to create an atmosphere of crushed innocence. 'Sugar Cane' has a melody that is simply beautiful. But the music tugs and bounces along to a vocal that reaches for enthusiasm and finds only despair.

A similar sense of foreboding and loss is played out on the larger landscape of Kim's 'On The Strip'. It's about a former girlfriend, a midnight Cinderella, a heroin addict who injects her life away. "Close your eyes and pretend/This is how it should end". In 'JC' Kim again looks back, this time to an old boyfriend who she has fond memories of "You're walking through my heart once more/don't forget to close the door".

As Dirty moves towards its conclusion it shrugs its shoulders, lifts its head and looks to the future. It knows that things are not going to be easy, but it's also aware that, as Johnny Rotten said, "Anger is an energy". 'Chapel Hill' knows its targets, knows that they're hard to hit but takes pot shots all the same. "So why should we run when we cannot hide?/And my flag is burning/We could be wrong but that's alright/We'll rise again". 'Pur' opens with a classic rock'n'roll riff, adds on a wild yell and then follows through with a simple love lyric. 'Creme Brulee' is a fine way to wind down an otherwise angry and intense album. It's a jog and finishes with the funny though ambiguous line, "I'm so happy we're just friends".

Dirty is a flawed masterpiece. On 'Drunken Butterfly' and 'Orange Rolls, Angel Spit' Kim Gordon pushes her voice too much and ends up sounding like some manic street preacher. 'Nic Fit' is 60 seconds of rapid-rapid punk that should have been left back in the late seventies. 'Youth Against Fascism' has it's heat in the right place, but its melody and lyrics could do with a transplant, and as Thurston sings, "It's the song I hate".

It may be flawed but where would beauty be without the beast? I'm certain that when this decade is being wrapped up we'll still be thinking and talking Dirty. We'll be remembering where we were the summer it came out. And as we look about The Velvet Underground. "They didn't have many fans but it seemed everyone they did have went out and started a band".

Or maybe we won't. Maybe they'll be simply huge by then, as they so richly deserve to be.