In Case You Were Sleeping: Sugar

I admit it. I came late to the Bob Mould party. I was too young and far too engrossed in the glut of heavy metal and mainstream pop that was my personal soundtrack to the eighties, to know anything about Hüsker Dü. My umlaut-rocking band of choice 25 years ago was Mötley Crüe and much like my culinary diet, my musical diet wasn't ready for such delicacies as Zen Arcade back then. But as I graduated from Chef Boyardee to restaurant-quality cannelloni, I eventually progressed from the Crüe to the Dü.

Bob Mould, along with bassist Greg Norton and drummer Grant Hart, comprised Hüsker Dü, a Minneapolis band hell-bent on bringing the noise and laying the groundwork for an alternative scene to emulate. The band, significant for hiding melodies under layers of guitar and breakneck beats on which Mould's scream/singing called home, broke up in 1987.

Mould took a pronounced 180 degree turn on his first solo record, the largely acoustic Workbook, released in 1989. Another solo album followed. Black Sheets of Rain was released in 1991 and featured more of the electric energy that was a trademark of Mould's Hüsker Dü days. It proved a precursor to Mould's next band proper, Sugar, which released its debut, Copper Blue, in 1992.

Copper Blue was the product of a man who found himself releasing an album that fit in with the musical landscape of the time - a landscape that was made possible in part by Hüsker Dü's contributions a decade earlier. The album flowed effortlessly from the opening chords of its full-throttle first track, "The Act We Act," to the "arcadey" keyboard outro of "Man on the Moon." Between these bookends lay an impressive 45 minute career-retrospect carved from the granite slabs of Dü-noise and the melodic moments of Mould's two prior solo efforts.

"If I Can't Change Your Mind" and "Hoover Dam" wouldn't have sounded out of place in stripped-down form on Workbook. Both songs showcase Mould's melodic sensibility, Though often buried behind fuzzed-out guitars, they somehow sound comfortable in their sludgy pop skin. "Helpless," the essence of noise-pop perfection circa early 90s, should have been a huge hit, but as is the case with nearly all of Mould's output, it was appreciated on an insider level and overlooked by the masses.

Digging under the noisy layers of "Slick" and "A Good Idea" reveals some of Mould's darkest moments on Copper Blue. The former dropping the chorus of, "They said the road was slick. I said I've been feeling sick. My head went through the mirror. Why did they send you here?" and the latter spinning a skewed tale of a lover drowning his blissfully complicit girlfriend. Perhaps an aural acting out of the frustrations felt by Mould after being incorrectly diagnosed with AIDS in

Copper Blue, along with the far-noisier follow-up EP, Beaster, and second full-length, File Under: Easy Listening, comprised the entire Sugar oeuvre (save for the requisite b-sides collection titled, "Besides"). While Beaster and FUEL were both great records, it's Copper Blue that remains Sugar's zenith and one of Mould's finer vehicles for his unique marriage of melody and noise that many bands have emulated for nearly three decades, its songs still sounding as fresh today as they did 17 years ago.