release date: Apr. 30, 1996
format: cd
[album rate: 4 / 5] [4,18]
producer: Bob Mould
label: Rykodisc / Creation Records - nationality: USA
Track highlights: 1. "Anymore Time Between" (4,5 / 5) - 2. "I Hate Alternative Rock" (4 / 5) - 4. "Next Time That You Leave" - 5. "Egøverride" (5 / 5) (official video) - 8. "Deep Karma Canyon" - 9. "Art Crisis" (5 / 5) - 10. "Roll Over and Die" (acoustic live version with interview)
3rd studio album by Bob Mould as solo artist following 6 years after the album Black Sheets of Rain (1990). However, in the mean-time he has released three albums with the band Sugar and most recently its final album File Under: Easy Listening (Sep. 1994). The self-titled release (aka the 'Hubcap' album, which btw. is not a photo of a hubcap) is not his debut album but probably has to do with his desire to have a new start after the short-lived period with the project-band Sugar, which kind of explains the six year gap since his last solo album.
In my mind, Bob's third solo-album is his best ever and it's also his most homogeneous album but it's also one of his last really good releases for a long period of time, reminding us that he was THE auteur of Hüsker Dü. The successor The Last Dog and Pony Show (1998) signaled an end but he kept releasing and experimenting with styles and ways of expression. However, in 2012, he would go on and release a very strong comeback album Silver Age, which, I think, musically has a lot in common with this one. It sort of combines the melodic simplicity of Copper Blue with more obscure elements from F.U.E.L. and especially the darker Black Sheets of Rain. I must've played this album... a 1.000 times or more - and often way too loud. I just hope my ears survive better than Bob's.
Highly recommendable.
[ allmusic.com 4,5 / 5 stars ]
1996 Favourite releases: 1. Bob Mould Bob Mould - 2. Fatboy Slim Better Living Through Chemistry - 3. Ryuichi Sakamoto 1996
