Guitar for the Practicing Musician, Jul 1987

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Nicely written Bob Mould feature in this issue, with a bit of technical stuff and a whole lot of reminiscing. Photo credit: Daniel Corrigan/Artist Pub.

by BRUCE POLLOCK

n a rock 'n' roll world seemingly littered with spandex sheep, Bob Mould is a definite character, from his solid, Midwestern farmboy
semi-crew and lumpen prole demeanor to the sound and stance of his minimalist speed punk band Hüsker Dü. Who else but a character of the first order would choose to release as a homemade single, a cover of "Love Is All Around," the theme from The Mary Tyler Moore Show? WHo, of course, but a fellow native of Mary's own turf, Minneapolis. It was Mould and cronies, you may or may not be surprised to discover, who offered one night to a not-quite standing room only crowd in Northern Oklahoma, a 45-minute encore of a single note.
      "That was interesting," Mould snickered, recalling the event with an insurgent's glee. "A lot of people were pinned to the wall. A lot of people left. After we stopped it took the people who were pinned to the wall about five minutes to gather their wits back up, and then there were sort of these blank looks on their faces and they were walking around bumping into each other. They didn't quite know what to make of it. 45 minutes of the same note will do it."
      A chubby American original out of Mark Twain, Bob Mould was not designed for the haute couture guitar politics of Princeville. "People hated our guts with a passion," he recalled with a certain Lou Reedlike detachment. "We were obnoxious brats; we were brats of the first degree. We told everybody where they could stuff it. And we were so fast you couldn't tell one song from the other. We said, 'Why don't you all go to hell; we don't give a shit what you think. You're not going to make us go away just because we don't come to your parties after the gig.' In Minneapolis we were not cool; we were not a skinny tie band and we didn't sound like Prince, so we didn't fit in. We were brats; we told everybody where to go. It paid off."
      Not fitting in never bothered the likes of Mould, or his compatriots in Hüsker Dü, which may be why their music is widely accepted among college students. Something about that eternal quest for identity and intellectual stimulation must be stirred by Hüsker Dü's emotionally and sonically shattering sound. "They have strong personal beliefs, and they have a strong belief in themselves," Mould commented of this college constituency. They're strong individuals, or maybe they're the opposite. Maybe they're really weak individuals and find strength in what we're doing. Our main message is that we don't have answers for people. You really have to think your own life out yourself and be responsible for what you're doing on all levels."
      Mould has done a lot of thinking about the uses and abuses the guitar has undergone in its varied history as the spokespiece of rock 'n' roll. Not taking up the instrument until he was 16, Mould was moved to future greatness by a seminal moptop quartet. "Believe it or not, the Ramones were the people who got me to pick up a guitar," he admitted. "I just heard all that power chording and I was going, 'if it's that easy, anybody can do it.' They had a good sense of upper harmonics. I liked that overring they got out of their instruments. Nobody's really gotten that for years, just that sound out of one guitar."
      Characteristically, Mould is somewhat of a guitar purist. "I think for a lot of people the accoutrements, whether it's the look or the whammy bar or whatever, is a confidence builder for them. The more cliches, the more trappings they can surround themselves with, the more comfortable they think they are because it's tried and true. To get out there in your regular clothes and break convention and just play what you feel like playing is a big challenge. We used to get a little nervous before we played; now we look forward to it. Every night is a challenge for us to get it across the way it's supposed to be." The way it's supposed to be for Mould is to play what he feels.
      "Not even worrying about breaking convention, just doing emotionally what's coming out of your hands and your head at that moment and hoping that you can

This was Norman, Oklahoma (misheard by the author, or maybe a typo).
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