Hüsker Dü - 'New Day Rising' (SST)

This is imperfect perfection, a joyous contradiction. Your surroundings are still a wall of screaming, distorted electric guitar, and the speed is always above average. Yet comparing this to Metal Circus is like comparing adults to kids. Of course, in between came a 70 minute double LP concept album which I don't have a copy of to discuss here (but I wish I did); that may have been a conditioning exercise. On the other side, well, it's a new day. The voices are a hell of a lot higher in the mix here, and it's like all of the screamy angst gets out during the title track. Mould's first song here is 'I Apologize', a great and catchy song that deftly analyses communication breakdowns in a relationship. Such mature territory! I don't like to oversimplify the intention of a pop song, but one of the things I love about music is how it can be so simple and so complex in a four-minute package. And what I love about albums is how they assemble to a narrative, even when not a concept album. This one has a really cohesive first side and then a messy, blocky second side. It starts and ends with almost abstract ragers, the title track a focused, monotonous banger and then 'Plans I Make' at the end, a total jam-mess with guitar that sounds like Lee Ranaldo is playing it, and a false ending too. Hart's songs are more schizo in tone; 'The Girl Who Lives on Heaven Hill' is a perfect minor key pop song while 'Books About UFOs' has a lurching rhythm and even some honky-tonk piano in it. Mould is incorporating more arpeggios and chorus into his guitar sound than the earlier work, and understandable as the pace slows down a tad so there's actually space for it. 'Celebrated Summer' is a slice of gold, weaving together nostalgia and regret into something still uplifting, and with a beautiful acoustic outro. On 'Perfect Example' and '59 Times the Pain' he's mumbling, even moaning, as if Michael Stipe was crossed with a Beluga whale. It's a mid-LP mood slump, a vocal delivery that absolutely suits the songwriting, and by the end he crawls out and screams again to great effect. I've been listening to Mould for so long that I kinda forget how uniquely odd his voice is; his background vocals behind Hart's 'Terms of Psychic Warfare' are the secret ingredient that makes it click. It's amazing to me how far this band progressed in such a short time; I always think they broke up at the end of the 80s, but Warehouse came out in January '87 and they were kaput soon after. This is the first of two great albums in 1985 alone, and that's coming off Zen Arcade. This may be the peak, but it's a tiny peak among a long, high plateau.