Bob Mould @ Manchester Academy 2 on 7.2.16‏

Since reverting to raw power trio mode with the superlative "Silver Age" Bob Mould has really been on a roll doing what he does best: great catchy tunes high on emotional content surfing waves of guitar noise that most bands would need two or more guitarists to equal. I never saw Husker Du play a gig so its nice that he's recently been playing some of their songs, although I don't think there were any oldies in the set that weren't also played last time in Manchester. Bob looked as though he was really enjoying himself, dispatching songs in quickfire trios, much like Husker Du used to. "A Good Idea" indeed. No need to make some "Changes" as "I Apologize" sound a great blast from a past full of so many classics he could have played for hours!  His thick glasses made his eyes seem to bug out at us, but fashion tips be damned its the songs that matter. Just before standing on the edge of the "Hoover Dam" as he so often does, big eyed Bob asked us all if it was loud enough. It certainly was, but not over-powering like last time in the smaller Academy 3. I took the opportunity of the comedic volume debate to take a piss break and from the toilet the intro to "Hoover Dam" sounded like "Classifieds." Despite a big backdrop with the Bob Mould logo from the hub cap album there were no songs from any but the three most recent albums released under his Mouldy name rather than a band name, although Sugar's "Come Around" offered  a short break from the otherwise frenetic pace.The new songs all maintained the high standard of "Silver Age" and "Beauty and Ruin" although he played maybe just less than half of it. Whilst it would have been nice to hear a few more "Silver Age" songs, it was really those from "Beauty and Ruin" that stood out in terms of the tightness and enthusiasm. "Mr Grey" was my personal highlight of the set and "Kid with Crooked Face" wrong-footed me for a  moment as I mistook it for Husker Du's "Real World." That wasn't in the set, but he finished with extended wild "Chartered Trips" and a headlong dive through "Something I Learned Today" then an encore of three songs from the first Husker Du album I ever heard: "Flip Your Wig," "Hate Paper Doll" and "Makes No Sense at All." That brought him full circle for me, as he finished with the first Bob Mould song I ever heard. If I had to churlishly throw down negative criticism it'd be that a change of oldies might be in order, as he seems to be sticking to a tried and tested few, but right now I'd be more than happy if he keeps touring with bassist Jason Narducy and Superchunk drummer Jon Wurster. However if the past is anything to go on, Bob might soon feel the need to make some changes...

This review was written for Optical Sounds zine.

Mudhoney Goin' Back to Ritzville

I long ago lost count of the number of times I've seen Mudhoney play but opening self-styled "middle aged folk singer" Barton Carrol was new to me. Playing an acoustic guitar alone he had to battle crowd chatter but bearded Mudhoney guitarist Steve Turner joined him for a couple of songs which helped. He had a bit of amusing banter between songs about his Appalachian roots and saved the best for last, a song about an unfortunate German woman's experience at the hands of Russian Soldiers at the end of the second world war. Rape was subtly implied but not made explicit. The folk angle continued with Wolf People, a dynamic English two guitar quartet. Although they had the same instrumental set up as Mudhoney their sound was more akin to Fairport Convention and Arbouretum. The singing guitarist and bassist had haircuts that looked very English Civil War.

Mudhoney might not throw themselves around like they did a quarter century back but these jovial children of the Stooges played with as much raw power as ever. As they were playing the Ritz, it would've been great if they'd opened with "Ritzville" or at least played it, but that was not to be. Instead the single from "Piece of Cake" hardy perennial "Suck You Dry" did the honours and "Into the Drink" and "I Like It Small" ensured energetic lift off. Four songs in Steve Turner struck up the "Cinnamon Girl" coda they lifted to start "Broken Hands," a song I don't think I've heard them play since the "Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge" tour, and also the song I'd have asked for if I'd had a request so I was happy. Mark Arm looked mournfully down what could be the best nose in rock as he wailed desolately about the bones in someone's hand getting crushed. Old favourites "Sweet Young Thing" and "Poisoned Water" really got the crowd moving but everyone slowed for
"Beneath the Valley of the Underdog." That segued nicely into a revved up punk attack on anti-abortionists "Fearless Doctor Killers" which I at first mistook for a new song, it being so long since I'd listened to 'My Brother the Cow!' In the end they played no new songs but what the hell? They had enough old ones! Touring with no new album out is quite unusual and it was good of them to do so. They had plenty of old albums, DVDs, T-shirts and badges to sell anyway. Unlike Wolf People they had no tankards but had a neat line in advertising those tankards for their support band between songs, and bassist Guy Maddison took great pride in swigging from one. He also had to laugh when someone heckled a request for their Spacemen 3 cover "Revolution." A request for "Let It Slide" also went unheeded, but we did get many righteous blasts from the past: "Flat Out Fucked," "Get Into Yours," "No One Has" and sadly just one song from 'The Lucky Ones' "I'm Now." Of course "Touch Me I'm Sick" got the biggest reaction, and their most psychedelic song in the set "Sonic Infusion" wrong-footed many clappers with its false ending. Way too much booze got thrown about considering how expensive it is in the Ritz, but thankfully none of it was in skull crushing Wolf People tankards, The end of the long set of more than twenty songs found Mark Arm let loose from guitar, free to twist and shout around a mike lead at one point dangled from up above his head as he sang skyward. Amongst the 'Vanishing Point' songs "What to do with the Neutral," "The Final Course," "The Only Son of the Widow from Nain" and "Chardonnay" were a couple of old punk covers; Angry Samoans' "You Stupid Asshole" and the Dicks "Hate the Police." As the latter is a frequent finale it was a surprise when "Chardonnay" followed it with even more hate. After some collective stomping they were back for a fine five song encore of "You Got It," "Who You Driving Now?" "Here Comes Sickness," "When Tomorrow Hits" and "In'n'out of Grace." The last two were neatly segued: as Mark sang, "That's the lowdown" he hit the opening "In'n'out" chords and soon Dan Peters was playing the most welcome silly extended drum solo in rock as Mark and Steve drank and watched. Guy joined in on a bass run and the tension was released in the most cathartic muffin' explosion of super fuzzed gunge grock that day. No wonder they end so many of their gigs that way.

This review was written for Optical Sounds zine.

HArpooned into the Unknown

Killing Joke really wiped the floor with everyone last year in terms of my favourite songs of 2015 witch wir:


1. Wire - Harpooned
2. Killing Joke - Into the Unknown
3. Killing Joke - Dawn of the Hive
4. Killing Joke - I am the Virus
5. David Heumann - Ends of the Earth
6. The Pop Group - The Immaculate Deception
7. Killing Joke - Autonomous Zone
8. Killing Joke - New Cold War
9. Bardo Pond - In Every Dream Home a Heartache
10. Loop - Radial

Twenty Fifteen

My fifteen most listened to records, CDs and tape of 2015 were


KILLING JOKE - Pylon (double CD version)
WIRE - Wire
WHITE HILLS - Walks for Motorists
THE POP GROUP - Citizen Zombie (and remix 12")
CARLTON MELTON - Out to Sea
GODSPEED YOU BLACK EMPEROR - asunder, SWEET AND OTHER DISTRESS
DAVID HEUMANN - Here in the Deep
THE JON SPENCER BLUS EXPLOSION - Freedom Tower
LOOP - Array 1
BARDO POND - Is There a Heaven?
ELEVENTH DREAM DAY - Works for Tomorrow
DBH - Mood
LOCEAN tape
DEAD SEA APES - High Evolutionary
TALONS - New Topographics


The last 2 were released in 2014 but I only heard them last year.


Since then I've also listened to and liked the 2015 albums by Low, Yo La Tengo & Lightning Bolt.

Wire In Manchester

If change became Wire, then perhaps in reworking and recording songs that would very likely have appeared on a 1980 follow up to "154" they switched to a parallel dimension where their eponymous album was not their fifth album of the 21st century but their fifth album. It would then have been followed by all the other 21st century albums (Red Barked Trees, Object 47 and Send) and then their eighties/nineties albums. In some ways this sounds a more logical progression than except that the album titles "Send" and "Object 47" wouldn't make sense and in 1981 the whole lyric of "Blogging" would be prediction. Then again maybe in the dimension of CHANGE the internet developed earlier. Only in Manchester did I realise the song "Blogging" had been reminding me of "Echo Beach" by Martha and the Muffins so maybe in dimension CHANGE this was Wire's one big hit and that lots of people heard without ever hearing much else they recorded. The internet has however made any idea of linear progression in music old hat as almost any recorded music is easily available online and anyone can grab anything from anywhere. They could have done this before the internet was flooded with music, but it is a lot easier now. The way that Wire have taken a look at their past music and recycled and redeveloped past ideas has focused more on their earlier years and this has left much of the eighties music sounding more advanced and complex, perhaps overly so. This would reveal why "Silk Skin Paws" and "Drill" sound more ahead than anything else in their current set, as if these were not from the late eighties but were actually new songs for a future album. Of course they have almost certainly played these two songs more at gigs than any other songs in the current set, and both are played faster than the eighties recordings. Support band Pins wouldn't sound out of place in 1981, but I prefered singing along to Guided By Voices in Big Hands to listening to them again. In Manchester Wire played exactly the same set as in Leeds and Hebden Bridge but it was louder and had extra noodling between songs. "Harpooned" almost hit the overload of their prevoius Manchester gig at Gorilla, but the sound seemed to break up as if they soundman couldn't keep it together that far into the red. Colin Newman played a twelve string guitar on "Shifting" but not on any other songs. The old/new arrangement of "Used To" didn't sound so much like a song off "Pink Flag" than the little brother of "Pink Flag" itself. The highlights of this tour's set for me were Drill, Silk Skin Paws, Stealth of a Stork, Harpooned, Blessed State, Adore Your Island and Sleep-Walking. I enjoyed the previous tour more because I mostly liked the previous album's songs more and the soundman did a much better job.

Six Six Sixties on page 154

Concurrent with Wire's UK tour I am reading Drew Daniel's 33.3 book on "Twenty Jazz Funk Greats" by Throbbing Gristle. Page 154 features the lyrics of the song "Sis Six Sixties" and the next page explains Genesis' contact with the spirit Mebar. Sit in a chair and pictures CHANGE.

Wire In Leeds

Graham Lewis had his hat on, hip hip hip hooray! Graham Lewis had his hat on and was coming out to play! Out to play exactly the same set as in Hebden Bridge. The Brudenell however had better sound and they got a fly asking for itself. When a fan shouted "I am the Fly" Lewis informed him, "Not according to Kafka." Kafka was dead so he couldn't have made the gig. I hear he prefers "Underwater Experiences" anyway. Colin Newman spilt some water and Graham proved that he has not only read Kafka, but also Douglas Adams, as he knew where his towel was. This prompted one of my best ever heckles. As Colin mopped up the water just before they played "Blessed State" I sang another song from 1979, "Smash It Up" by The Damned, but I changed the words to, "Mop it up! Mop it up! You've been spilling water for much too long, now you're gonna play us another song!" This was the third time Wire had played Brudenell Social Club, and I went to all three gigs. This one had poorer sound than the previous two, and there were less people there. The most interesting thing about support band Pins is that their name backwards is Snip. I suspect their music would sound better played backwards too, but I think perhaps their lack of peni may have endeared them to Colin?