Sugar - Copper Blue

Merge Records is re-releasing Sugar’s debut album, Copper Blue, with a bunch of bonus material and mix that was supposed to correct some Dolby error where Thomas Dolby actually came into the mixing sessions and made the right channel a tad bit louder than the left because Tom was blinded with science.

Regardless of the issue, and regardless of the desire of fans’ need to run out and acquire this re-issue, I do what I normally do in these instances: check out my copy to see if there is any inherent need for me to purchase the same shit twice.

For me, there wasn’t. The left and right channels play just fine for this untrained ear and Copper Blue was exactly as I remembered it. And if there are any novices looking to examine Bob Mould’s first band project outside of Husker Du, I would suggest visiting the local used record store (if you have anything local) because I remember seeing multiple used copies of this, Beaster and File Under Easy Listening in nearly every used record store that I visited during the 90’s.

I like Copper Blue. It brought me back to Mould after his pair of “adult” solo records which did nothing for me except declare Grant Hart the winner of the post-Husker solo record war. Sugar found him back in his element of a band unit, albeit one where he was the sole creative force and one where he could properly take advantage of the grunge era darlings in much the same way they took advantage of the Husker’s formula.

It’s glossy, but it’s filled with wall-to-wall guitars to the point where Mould’s vocals are impeccably places right between the distortion, strangely treated a bit to sound like they’re sung through a humbucker pick up.

Maybe that’s just the Dolby issue talkin.

Side one, to use the parlance of the original release date, is the stronger of the two sides with no evidence of a dud from start to finish. I remember dropping my guitar strings down to “D” and playing along with “The Act We Act” with the line “the confusion that persists/the decisions that you guessed” striking a reactionary chord inside of me for some reason.

But wasn’t this a record for the novices? The latecomers who weren’t around to care or notice every single song of brutal beauty that the Huskers laid forth previously? I say this because there’s nothing on Copper Blue that sways my heart away from “Celebrated Summer” or any number of tunes in the Husker’s cannon that spoke louder and clearer than anything since. While there’s nothing as good as the original thing, Copper Blue does an admirable job of bringing more people to the Bob Mould camp than anything since his time with a certain little power trio from Minneapolis.

And if it points them to the direction of his previous band, then Copper Blue is successful all the way around.

Grant Hart In Des Moines

My money was on Grant Hart after Husker Du broke up. He wrote some of the Husker’s best songs and may have even been a bit more consistent than campadre Bob Mould.
And then-within months, it seemed-he released the acoustic song “2541,” as in 2541 Nicolette Avenue, Minneapolis. As in the Husker’s rehearsal space. And it seemed a heartbreaking account of the band breaking up under the guise of a couple moving out of an apartment and moving away from each other. The line “things are so much different now/I guess the situation’s reversed/And it will probably not be the last time I have to be out by the 1st” ranks as good as anything that Mould ever wrote, but it’s Bob that gets all the critical accolades.
Don’t get me wrong, I love Bob too. In fact, I remember a fight I had with my ex-wife once after she called Mould a “sellout” upon learning that he was writing story episodes for WCW wrestling.
But Hart was completely off the radar; there were no verbal volleys about him, because he seemed to drop off the face of the Earth after Nova Mob’s The Last Days Of Pompeii.
I remember occasionally hearing stories about him, how he looked like he was struggling with addiction.
And there was little music to counteract those rumors.
Grant Hart recently made his way back to Iowa and visited Des Moines with a set. Our man in the D.M. reports, “He played my requests of “2541” and “Sorry Somehow.” That was cool.”
But damn if the dude don’t look haggard. And you would think the hipsters in the Twin Cities could add a buck to a fishbowl and chip in to buy him a leather jacket.
What’s with the getup? Did Hendrix’s “If 6 Was 9” inspire it? Someone needs to call Robyn Hitchcock and tell him that we’ve found the jacket from his Fegmania tour.
For real, those All Tomorrow’s Parties folks need to waive a shitload of money in front of Mould and Hart and get Husker Du back together for a reunion show.
If Greg Norton plays hardball, just threaten his food joint with endless surprise visits from the health inspector or something.
And he had better still have that handlebar mustache too.
Getting back to Grant: he has a new record called Hot Wax, which will probably sell as many copies as the Husker’s first single.