by Moheak Radio
Album Review: Bob Mould – Silver Age
11:51 am in Album Review, Neon Noise by Moheak Radio
This new album is the acclaimed singer-songwriter and Sugar/Hüsker Dü founder’s first album of all-new studio material since 2009’s Life and Times. Inspired and informed by his recent shows opening for Foo Fighters, (as well as his shows commemorating the 20th anniversary of Sugar’s 1992 debut), Silver Age presents 10 new compositions in the punishingly loud yet melodically sparkling vein of his Sugar output.
The opening one-two-punch of “Star Machine” and the cathartic title track pair jarring riffs with equally brusque meditations on fame, immaturity, and the lessons and aftereffects thereof. Other highlights include the bittersweet yet romantic “Round the City Square,” and the fist-pumping “Keep Believing,” which sees Mould interpolating lyrics or song titles from everyone to The Ramones to The Pixies to The Who to KISS, and it is the pop-punk winner of the disc. The openly-gay Mould has delved in to some different sounds over his past few discs (everything from a less-than-stellar dance oriented record to a ballad-heavy effort), so it’s a welcomed gift to hear him drawing from the enlivened sounds of his early career in such an inspired way. He may be getting older and wiser, but he’s surely only getting better when it comes to this kind of blistering songwriting.
- Paul V. for Moheak Radio
