Don't tell the indie rockers, but Bob Mould has fully made the transition to shiny, happy, gay man. Anyone who reads his blog knows that the 47-year-old legend spends his days working out, writing music, and enjoying the benefits of being comfortably out in Washington D.C.'s gay community. Though you may prefer to remember him shredding on the First Avenue stage with Hüsker Dü, he looks back on that time without much pleasure. In fact, in commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the band's dissolution, he recently posted his resignation letter, with commentary: "Freedom, sweet freedom! One of my best decisions ever. The end of one trip, the beginning of an amazing journey." Though he's resumed playing electric guitar on tour, for five years one of his main gigs has been running a D.C. dance event called Blowoff, which expanded to New York last year. (He recently described it as a "really sexy party" to a D.C. gay magazine.) Long reticent to make details of his private life public, Mould has opened up and is finally happy.
So, what does this mean for his music? Unfortunately, on District Line he has largely abandoned the snappy, acerbic poetry that characterized the first decades of his catalog in favor of rambling journal entries. "The shape shifting, weightlifting," he sings on the chorus-less "Who Needs To Dream?" "Hope the presentation will catch his eye/ And it did, and then he saw the string/ He grabbed it and leads you on your leash/ You offered it up/ So don't blame anyone but yourself." Angsty-sounding song titles like "Return to Dust" betray Hallmark sentiments: "True blue star/ Would you stay in my heart/ Or will you fool me once again?" "Old Highs, New Lows"'s lyrics seem lifted from a note passed between junior high students: "We lock the gaze tightly upon each other/ No others come near, no others come between."
That said, Fugazi drummer Brendan Canty is again along for the ride, and District Line hits all the right rock touchstones. The tempered, driving guitar bliss of "Return to Dust" sounds like a File Under Easy Listening outtake, while "Walls In Time"-- the album's six-minute, acoustic, heart-on-sleeve closer-- actually is a Workbook outtake. Meanwhile, "Stupid Now" is that head-banging jock-jam Mould's fans have been craving during his poison, er, electronic years. Indeed, much of the club music influence that informed Modulate and Long Playing Grooves has been eliminated here, although there are hints of vocoder and snippets of synth. Like Mould's previous disc, Body of Song, District Line contains one out-and-out dance track, "Shelter Me", which could be described as a great club track for people who don't like going to clubs.
If only Mould weren't so gosh-dang happy, this might be an essential album. It's not that it lacks tension -- indeed, almost every song touches on relationship strife-- it's just that the squabbles are gentle, the rage subdued. "Watch me walk the ledge, I am comfortable out here by myself," he sings on "Again and Again". Sure, he's contemplating suicide, but he's * comfortable* doing it. Sheesh.
