Bob Mould at Webster Hall April 29, 2016
“…Count to three, no more, no less. Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out!” – Brother Maynard
Power trios hold a special place in the pantheon of rock bands. Minimum personnel; maximum results: The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Cream, The James Gang, Nirvana, Gov’t (for a while) Mule, METZ…Nowhere to hide. No time to rest.
With Husker Du, (where are the umlauts on this keyboard) and Sugar on his resume, Bob Mould has led a pair of power trios that could go shirts and skins 3 on 3 with some of the classic lineups. After nailing a trifecta of albums: The Silver Age, Beauty & Ruin, and now Patch The Sky, his latest group featuring Jason Narducy and Jon Wurster has staked a claim to be in the conversation. With four songs apiece from the Husker Du and Sugar catalogs, Mould let his fans enjoy all three eras. The Webster Hall show’s charms did not end there. The first encore was a cover of Beat On The Brat that opener Ted Leo (captured here with Aimee Mann in The Both) came back to the stage for. This would have displeased Brother Maynard from the cast of Monty Python & The Holy Grail but it was necessary so Ted could play drums while Wurster handled the vocal.
My pal Alisa Ali sat down with Bob when he rolled up to the bronx earlier this year to do an interview and session at WFUV.