Albums by this artist

Body Of Song (2005)

Modulate (2002)

The Last Dog And Pony Show (1998)

Features

Bob Mould: The NATN Pantheon
Published May 7, 2007

Bob Mould

Body Of Song

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» MARK T.R. DONOHUE | STAFF WRITER

Bob Mould Body Of Song Yep Roc, 2005 RiYL: Sugar/Husker Du, Paul Westerberg, Billy Corgan

Bob Mould's favorite word must be "itinerant." Since Husker Du called it quits nearly 20 years ago, Mould has been constantly on the move, musically and literally -- he's shuffled from Minneapolis to Austin to Washington D.C. since Sugar blew their last eardrum. On at least three separate occasions he's announced his retirement from rock music. Somehow, he always keeps coming back. It's hard to describe any of this behavior as out of character. After all, Zen Arcade is still the single best record about running away from home that's ever been made.

Body Of Song is in many ways a typical Bob Mould solo album. It doesn't immediately grab a hold of you the way his best band work always did, but the third or fourth time you spin it you realize it's better than you initially thought it was. There are more vocal and guitar effects than usual on this record, a requisite hangover from the resentfully electro Modulate, but structurally tunes like "Paralyzed" are not too far removed from File Under: Easy Listening-era Sugar. "Missing You" in particular catches the vibe of the good old days long removed.

Then there are the bad parts. Like seemingly every other rock songwriter who was alive during the mid-70's, Mould has finally given in to the siren's call of the vocoder, and three Body Of Song tracks are wholly ruined by outdated Frampton-ing. Not every experiment is a failure, though. The swirling bass, dissonant guitars, and sublimated vocals of "Always Tomorrow" recalls June Of 44 at its most hypnotic. The unabashed 60's ballad "High Fidelity" works so well you're surprised Mould hasn't tried something like it before now.

The standout is "Gauze of Friendship," which somewhat resembles Sugar power ballads like "Explode And Make Up" only with a Workbook cello. "Gauze" has the only lyric that really registers on Body Of Song, delivered in a style that will seem completely alien to anyone who's been closely following Mould since the turn of the last decade: the vocals are single-tracked. Crazy.

While Body Of Song is certainly a huge improvement from Modulate, it's too disjointed of a listening experience to rank with Mould's best work. Move around a few tracks and it would sound like three separate EPs -- a Sugar disc, a mellower Workbook-esque disc, and the disco stuff. The presence of Fugazi's brilliant Brendan Canty on drums raises the performances to a level Mould hasn't seen since Sugar's Malcolm Travis and David Barbe left the fold, but Body lacks both coherence and a spark of creative inspiration.

I'd dearly love to hear Canty tackle some of the devastating tunes from the drum machine-scarred, self-titled "hubcap" record. Maybe a live album from the fall 2005 tour? I want to keep believing, Bob.

MARK T.R. DONOHUE | Mark T.R. Donohue is a prolific freelance writer whose areas of expertise include Rockies baseball, video games, genre television, English soccer, and pub rock. He lives in Colorado, where he cultivates the largest and creepiest private collection of Alyson Hannigan memorabilia in the Mountain West.