The third Throwing Muses album was Hunkpapa (CAD 901); produced by Gary Smith, it offered a brighter, punchier sound than earlier releases. One of the most prominent tracks was Kristin Hersh's "Dizzy" - perhaps the first Throwing Muses song to which the phrase "amazingly catchy" could be fairly applied. The song was released as a single not long afterwards in a variety of formats (including a "self-opening" 10-inch whose gatefold cover was too stiff to lie flat), coupled with powerful live versions of "Mania" and "Downtown" which were drawn from the previous year's UK tour (BAD 903).
With The Wolfgang Press still touring aggressively in support of Bird Wood Cage, two further singles appeared during 1989. "Kansas" (BAD 902) - re-modelled from the album version - was the closest the group had yet come to a hit. But a similar re-invention of "Raintime" (BAD 907), despite having a great video, didn't quite manage to keep the momentum going.
The Pixies returned with a classic album in Doolittle (CAD 905), produced by Gil Norton, sequenced by Ivo and packaged with an elaborate lyrics book featuring Simon Larbalestier's disquieting photographs. The album was bookended by singles featuring two of its strongest songs. "Monkey Gone To Heaven" (BAD 904) was a tour de force which counterpointed the band's incendiary power against a churning string section to memorable effect. "Here Comes Your Man" (BAD 909) had been among the songs that made up the band's original demo tape, and it had long been earmarked as a possible single. 4AD licensed the album to Elektra in the United States, where the band were by now developing a devoted underground following.
Ultra Vivid Scene employed a similar tactic to The Wolfgang Press, releasing a newly recorded version of "Mercy Seat" - the original featured on UVS's debut album - as a single (BAD 906). Later in the year, a promotional single, "Something To Eat" (BAD 908) - one of the very few promo-only 4AD releases ever to be assigned a regular catalog number - featured two demos from Kurt Ralske's work-in-progress. [As it turned out, "Something To Eat" never made it onto any other UVS release.]
With Ultra Vivid Scene the only signing in over a year, Ivo had begun to actively seek out new talent. As fate would have it, interesting demo tapes from two new bands reached Ivo within a few days of one another. And by an improbable coincidence, both bands also happened to be sharing the same bill at the Falcon in Camden a few days later. Ivo went along, and wound up signing both of them shortly thereafter. The Pale Saints were a trio from Leeds, part of a new generation of British bands drawing inspiration from the work of The Jesus & Mary Chain and My Bloody Valentine. Ivo sent them into the studio with Gil Norton and John Fryer; the result was the three-song EP Barging Into The Presence Of God (BAD 910).
4AD's other new group, Lush, were a London quartet fronted by songwriter / vocalists Miki Berenyi and Emma Anderson. Although they were drawing on much the same influences as the Pale Saints, their sound had yet to gel completely. But the three tracks they recorded in a two-day studio session with John Fryer had a compelling rawness to them; another three song session followed, and, combined, the results made up Lush's debut mini-album Scar (JAD 911).