Copper Blue
Sugar
Rykodisc,
1992
Reviewed by
Jonathan Cohen
After internal tensions split apart seminal Minneapolis rockers Hüsker Du in
the late ‘80s, frontman Bob Mould aired his personal demons for all to hear on two
subsequent solo albums. Workbook was primarily acoustic, but Black Sheets Of
Rain found Mould plugging back in to get his point across.
Indeed, old habits seem to die hard for Mould, whose hard-rocking days in Hüsker Du
provided the inspiration and impetus for the next generation of American alternative
music: The Pixies, Dinosaur Jr., Nirvana and even transatlantic colleagues such as
Swervedriver. So Mould returned to Hüsker’s power-trio configuration, drafting
bassist David Barbe and drummer Malcolm Travis for Sugar’s debut album, Copper
Blue.
The results are nothing short of outstanding. Mould has an absolute knack for writing
loud, extremely catchy pop songs, more often than not buried under thick sheets of guitar.
That he can also pen meaningful lyrics with the best of them is certainly a plus. And on Copper
Blue, Sugar maximizes Mould’s strengths to create a record that really grabs the
listener by the head and, occasionally, the heart too.
Travis’ thunderous drumming transforms what are more or less simple pop songs into
visceral slabs of emotion, especially on the chiming “Changes,” with its jagged
solo section, and the awesome, Pixies-esque “A Good Idea,” a tale of love’s
ulterior motives. And while Travis and Barbe’s accompaniment certainly motivated
Mould to indulge his love of all things loud, the pair do not trample on the disc’s
lighter moments. “If I Can’t Change Your Mind” is the kind of classic pop
song that probably could have been a hit for any teen idol back in the day, and the
acoustic guitar at the beginning of “Hoover Dam” only gradually morphs into a
thicker, keyboard-tinged rumble. Shifting gears like that gives Copper Blue a
great variety (although subsequent live tracks released as b-sides demonstrated the
band’s difficulty with switching from loud to soft).
Mould’s lyrics are meaningful without submitting to clichés or conventions. On
“The Slim,” the album’s most powerful and musically creative cut, his
internal conflict over the death of a lover to AIDS simmers and ultimately boils over into
relentless riffing and lyrical rage: “in sickness and in health / for richer / for
poorer / for anything / til death do us part.”
Copper Blue does not contain one weak number, from the rock-out splendor of
“Fortune Teller” and concrete-thick opener “The Act We Act” to the odd
chord progressions of the hazy “Slick” and the exasperated pop of
“Helpless.” One of the more unheralded debut albums of the decade, and further
proof of Mould’s significant creative vision (six songs recorded during the Copper
Blue sessions were released in 1993 as Beaster).
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