Bob Mould
Modulate
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Bob Mould
Modulate
Granary Music, 2002
RiYL: Sugar/Husker Du, Underworld, Sasha & Digweed, New Order |
That's right: Bob Mould, king of loud, guitar-driven rock anthems from "Sorry Somehow" to "Hoover Dam," reinvented as an urban dwelling purveyor of slick electronic music which sounds infinitely more like New Order than New Day Rising. Mould seems to have gone through a period of intense self-evaluation in the years since 1998's The Last Dog And Pony Show. He spent six months writing storylines for a professional wrestling league (!!), cut all ties with standard record labels, got into globally revered DJs like Sasha & Digweed and Paul Van Dyk, and bought a studio full of electronic gear to help him embark on yet another new phase in his legendary career.
Although the whole thing begins to make more sense after (many) repeat listens, the overall results are at best uneven, and at worst, absolutely baffling. Especially on songs like "Lost Zoloft," one is reminded of the electronic-heavy demos Pete Townshend was writing in vain for the Who in their later years: still with interesting hooks and atmospheres, but of little precedent to anything he'd produced before. At first, Mould seems entranced by the tricks of the trade. God help us as he slathers on the vocoder within the first minute of opener "180 Rain," where his unusually dry vocals scoot across skittering dance beats. Car alarm sound effects and gurgling synthesizers do little to color this opaque, Bob-done-wrong-in-a-relationship number.
He moves into even more foreign territory on "Sunset Safety Glass," as shimmering keyboards and disturbing imagery ("smell of meat and suicide / guides me nearer to dementia") ride triple digit beats-per-minute backing. The blunt lyrics ("bus stop glory hole latrine") border on gimmickry on "Semper Fi," which features a quasi-fanfare of video game-style synth beeping and Mould's bizarrely croaked vocals. At least you can hear the familiar loud guitars, albeit buried in the back in the mix.
The middle portion of the album lightens up with all the electronics in favor of more traditional pop/rockers that wouldn't have sounded out of place on a Sugar album. Despite the redundant, relationship-themed lyrics, "Stay/Sway" and "The Receipt" make good on Mould's trademark electric/acoustic guitar blend. He finally gets the man vs. machine proportions right on the stellar "Comeonstrong," which also reveals Mould's need to continually adapt: "we try to find the balance / we try to keep it straight / we try to stay in tune / we modulate."
Even more oddly compelling is "Trade," which is the most musically interesting track on Modulate, even though it kind of resembles one of Cher's recent hitmaking forays into electronica. Over a superlative minor key melody and chorus hook, Mould wrestles with the most basic of requests: he won't give "the answer" until he can pre-determine what the implied tradeoff is. And there is at least a glimmer of light on closer "Author's Lament," which conjures the previously unfathomable musical love child of Joe Jackson and Aphex Twin.
"Inside this box / I spend most of my days creating lucid rhymes / In hopes that something I write / gives freedom to clarity," Mould intones over reverberating piano chords and slow, squishy beats. What does it all mean? I suppose that you can dress old Bob's music up in chic, ill-fitting clothes, but for the most part, it's the same guy underneath: emotional, creative, and still angry after all these years.
JONATHAN COHEN | Jonathan Cohen co-created Nude As The News with his Indiana University mates Troy Carpenter and Ben French. When not traversing the globe for business and pleasure, he holds down the fort as a senior editor for Billboard in New York. Stop him and he just may ask, "what for lunch?"