I am in the middle of my Hüsker Dü phase. You have always been able to count on me to yell, "I LOVE Hüsker Dü!" whenever they come up in conversation but these days I actually play their records.
My Hüsker Dü phase started at an interesting point. At the time, the fella I liked had a habit of making dates with me and then standing me up. It got to the point where I would make alternate plans any time we were supposed to go out. It was bad. It got so bad in fact, I once won money from a friend when I didn't get stood up. I had what are known as issues.
Fortunately, I had my Hüsker Dü. And when I gave a careful listen, I realized that the guys in Hüsker Dü had issues as well. LOTS of them. More than I can ever hope to accumulate. I may have been getting stood up fairly frequently, but I had nothing on the Hüsker Dü guys.
My main Hüsker Dü listen at the time was their last studio album, Warehouse: Songs and Stories. According to local legend, the "internal differences" that broke up the band was actually the bitter breakup between Bob Mould and Grant Hart. I don't know if that is true, but I have no difficulty believing it when I listen to that album. As near as I can tell, they were using that album as a vehicle to rip each other to shreds.
LCG and I would be driving around, because that's what we do, and I would be blaring the Warehouse: Songs and Stories, because that's what I did at the time. Every now and then I would say, "Check it out! Another song about being stood up! I wish I could have been at THAT rehearsal." LCG envisioned a world where one guy showed up with his new tune, and the following conversation took place:
Bob: What's that song about?
Grant: Nothing.
Or sometimes, maybe they mixed it up a little:
Grant: What's that song about?
Bob: Nothing.
Yes! That rules! I can see it plain as day. The Bob and Grant tunes are so far beyond the Lindsey Buckingham-Stevie Nicks school of public breakups, I'm almost embarrassed to listen.
We have Bob saying things like, "Sometimes I just pretend that all the lies are true, then I know I might depend on you." And, "I should have guessed that you'd stand me up, why did I even go now." Or how about the classic, "It doesn't mean that much to me sometimes I don't mean that much to you." Well, I can see that Bob is a little underappreciated and therefore a little bitter.
Grant's responses are things like, "Together we went nearly nowhere, nowhere really worth going to." And, "You never used to have a reason to be bored." Apparently Bob isn't the only one feeling the effects of being taken for granted.
Fan-tas-tic! I love Hüsker Dü! I love public breakups! I love airing dirty laundry in public. I love Bob, I love Grant, I love all their issues, and most of all, and I can't stress this enough, I love Hüsker Dü!
By the way, I am well aware that Greg Norton exists. I acknowledge the fact that there was a third member of Hüsker Dü. I do tend to ignore him because, as far as I know, he wasn't an active participant in the bitter, bitter breakup of Bob and Grant. I imagine him just standing around rehearsal, smoking a cigarette (or twirling his cartoon villain moustache) while Bob and Grant glared at one another. It must have been tough being the Art Garfunkel to a pair of Paul Simons going through the equivalent of a divorce. No wonder he quit music altogether and became a chef.