RIP Grant Hart

I moved back to teaching grade 3 the past couple of years, and I'm glad I made the move, but I really wanted to be back in grade 6 this week. I would have spent a half-hour talking about Grant Hart and showing YouTube clips--talked about Husker Du's importance to me, but mostly tried to place them in the context of 1984, alongside some names they knew at least a little bit about (Michael Jackson, Madonna, Prince). One thing I really liked yesterday was when the guy across the hall, who I'd estimate is 10 years younger than me, said that news about Grant Hart showed up on his Facebook wall. I said that mine had been wall-to-wall; just a single post on his--he'd never heard of Husker Du till I mentioned Hart's death the previous day. These things resonate more with me nowadays when I move outside the bubble where Husker Du are as much a fact of life as the Beatles. I love that, even though the biggest part of my social world was immersed, there's this whole other part who have still never heard of Husker Du, and for a few of them that would change now.

A clearer explanation of some of that, down towards the bottom (I wrote this about 15 years ago, and don't want to repeat it all).

That's the sort of stuff I was thinking about earlier on one of the HD threads. At the band's peak they were still lower profile than, say, the Replacements. Even back when the band was broken up but the music was fresher it was still something many had to discover. Now it's been, what, 30 years since the band broke up? That's as far as the Beatles were from their end in 2000 (coincidentally when the "1s" album was released and "reintroduced" a new generation to the Beatles, of all bands, the one band you'd think wouldn't *need* to be reintroduced). I figure only a fraction of people who bought Copper Blue in large numbers worked backwards toward HD, and then I figure only a fraction of those people clicked with HD. Anyway, I think a lot of people took HD's legacy sort of for granted, but I've been heartened by the number of pieces I've come across the last couple of days that have capably provided both context and also a fair assessment of the group's indie/punk/pop/whatever linchpin status.

This is a all a jumble, sorry, but it reminds me of my shock when "Never Mind the Bollocks" finally went platinum maybe 25 years after its release, and I thought, really? One of the most written about bands of all time, a true before/after touchstone, and there's literally just one album, and it took that long to sell a million copies? Husker Du never had a chance, let along Big Star, or the VU, or Eno's solo records, or the Stooges, or all sorts of cult touchstones.

If my estimation is correct, the guy across the hall is around 45. He's a music fan, but far from obsessive--family, etc., not anything that would ever come up in conversation. He said that Nevermind was important to him when it came out (making him 20 at the time), but he'd never heard of Husker Du. That seven-year gap from 1984 to 1991, in view of his age, would be significant.

has anyone considered that saying the words "Hüsker Dü" was intimidating to people*, so they didn't buy the records? i had to find Zen Arcade at the library -- and obviously i am eternally grateful to the person who put it there -- but walking up to a record store clerk and asking for Hüsker Dü? nah. Also I think people confused them with a metal band bc Metal Circus + they sounded like a metal band name.

I always thought their name was a clever gatekeeper. Once you get past it. you are rewarded over and over and over. Getting past it isn't for the weak though!
Bob went on to name his next band Sugar, which is definitely more...wait for it...palatable. haha!

*ps I am a woman and I know exactly 1 other female genuine HD fan, my hs bff. (real = had/cherished albums, wasn't just a fan of a song or two or Sugar)

I think that's absolutely true about Metal Circus--first time I saw that title in print, I assumed they were a metal (or at least noisy industrial) band that wouldn't be of interest to me.

It is sort of metal, though!

RIP. Love this band and have been listening to them a lot.

A lot of people who like them still hesitate over how to pronounce it! Yesterday on the interstate car ride I had to restrain my pedantic side

And the umlauts, at that point in music culture, meant you were at least on the outskirts of metal

Clearly the band clicked with me, but I wonder if it really does boil down at least in part to a childhood affinity for the Husker Du memory game that my family and I played.

Yeah it was an instant recognition for me too, we had that game since I was a toddler

This is the one I still have:
https://vinylthriftchaser.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/il_fullxfull-99292466.jpg

My mom keeps everything but I don't think she kept the board games :(

We had that game too. In the Twin Cities, people le drilled through the playing pieces and wore them on necklaces to show the likeminded they were in the Hüsker Dü fandom (the game itself is Hūsker Dū).

the name creates a strong insider/outsider dynamic -- which is good for the insiders but not exactly inviting to outsiders
huge reward for those who make the leap though!!

There's some novel--haven't read it; maybe someone knows the title--where, in a terse, noirish style, the detective-narrator says something like "She asked if I had any Husker Du. She pronounced it 'Hŭsker.' I let it pass."

Is it "hoosker" with "oo" like "hood"? Iirc, that's how Kim Gordon sang it on "Screaming Skull". I sort of figure that no one except maybe Frederik is pronouncing it like the Danish anyway so don't stress about it too much.

(Just went from Metal Circus to '83 Iron Maiden, btw.)

I figure only a fraction of people who bought Copper Blue in large numbers worked backwards toward HD

hi!

It's Hoooooosker - they're named for the game, and that's how the v/o guy pronounced it in the game commercial, and how the band members said it. Grant was the only one of the three I actually knew, because we hung out at the record store I discovered downtown when I was 15. John Peel pronounced it the 'other' way, so most of Europe does too (except for the Scandinavians).

It is sort of metal, though!

― No purposes. Sounds. (Sund4r), Saturday, September 16, 2017 10:29 AM (twenty-seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It's funny, in relistening to Husker Du over the last few days, I'm reminded of why I could never get into most metal, and how Grant Hart is the reason. He had this loose, swinging, but still ahead-of-the-beat-rampaging quality to his playing (he is among *maybe* the 3 or 4 other drummers ever who really internalized Keith Moon's innovations) that I love, whereas so many speed- and thrash-metal drummers were all about precision. I never understood that...it struck me as a really conservative and predictable approach. I can't think of hardly any post-Husker Du drummers who even attempted to swing the way Grant did.

It's pronounced like Big Hoos the OTMarker

OK, found a commercial and KG does sing it that way. Hm, interesting: everyone I knew in Ottawa who talked about Hüsker Dü used the "hood" sound for the first vowel and put the stress on "dü". 2xp

That's an interesting point about the drumming, Tarfumes. I never really put my finger on what it was that distinguished his drumming style: that's a good description.

yeah, agreed, thanks for that

Him and Hurley were really original, idiosyncratic SST drummers whose unique attributes I think became more apparent later. The blitzkrieg swing of Hart is just nuts, though. Like the non-stop fills of, say, "Divide and Conquer" or "Every Everything?" Just lunatic. Keith Moon comparison on the money.

Holy shit, I just googled to see if the band ever covered the Who, and maybe they did, but I came across this, which is just so unlikely and maybe fake that I believe it's real:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvnEcz6PJKQ

Thanks, and I remember when I first saw Sugar I thought that Bob needed Grant's drumming far more than he probably ever realized.

xxp

yeah that Palmer cover is real and has popped up in all sorts of places (Ned's a fan).

I must admit to being none the wiser about the pronunciation. Not that it really matters. Heh. I've had an off/on relationship with the band, and totally understand the issues folk have with the production, which seems maddeningly muddy and flat, albeit absolutely part of the aesthetic. Hart always seemed too old to me - one of those characters who seemed borrowed from death. 57 is no age. RIP.

Ha, speaking of Husker Du and the Who and Sugar...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m7rw6ow-YI

(I was at this show, mainly to see openers Scrawl, but I left four songs into Sugar's set because I was so disappointed. Needless to say, I should've stayed.)

I seem to recall one reason Sugar dissolved (hah) is because Malcolm Travis, the drummer, had panic attacks trying to live up to Mould's perfectionist standards or something. It can't be a coincidence that Mould first went with session guy Anton Fier then the metronomic approach of Travis (which I actually like).

And xpost yeah, I want to say early Sugar also covered Iggy's "Dum Dum Boys" a bunch.

I thought Travis a fine drummer for Sugar.

I remember when I first saw Sugar I thought that Bob needed Grant's drumming far more than he probably ever realized.
otm!!

"fine" is fine but it's gonna sound weak compared to grant's playing
tarfumes so otm about his style too

I remember when I first saw Sugar I thought that Bob needed Grant's drumming far more than he probably ever realized.
otm!!

"fine" is fine but it's gonna sound weak compared to grant's playing
tarfumes so otm about his style too

weak is the wrong word -- just less interesting, less full of heart.

I never thought of that moon-grant comparison... that's really fruitful!

Needs to be said how much the drummer in MBV owed to grant (and Keith)

Colm would happily agree.

We watched Every Everything last night. Easily one of the best rock docs I've ever seen, but more importantly, just a good character study. Having him be the sole focus of the story, clips aside, and having it be all his words, no narrators, no comments from peers or anyone else, means that while plenty is left unsaid that could be, at the same time he gives a real sense, throughout, of telling things as they are -- and his elaborate similes and points of comparison and, simply, his vocabulary, his sense of words and their use -- makes it clear as to why that was the best approach. He doesn't spare himself at all but you never get a sense that he knows exactly where he stands and why in terms of ethics either, whether he measures himself internally or considers how the outside world would. It's hard to say it caught him at the 'right' time, I suspect -- a couple of years later, maybe in the first blush of the active Numero planning, would have produced something a little different I'm sure, and given that per reports he reconciled with his son as well as finding love, that could have changed the documentary in the end a bit. But there is no such thing as a right time, and having the story framed by his description of his old house before the fire, and what was lost as a result, was a lovely and sad choice -- and in light of jjjusten's stories about how Hart was as a customer and friend, his wide ranging intelligence and interests, and also the realization about his beloved guitar, the deeper waters were more clearly sensed.

Muddled a phrase earlier -- I said 'never get a sense' but that should be 'always get a sense'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NeqyCwAeT3I

So yeah, I will take the Keith Moon comparison as well, some super busy playing but with incredible groove and feel.

Mould first went with session guy Anton Fier

there's this hilarious moment in one of the outtakes in the Replacements documentary where Kot and DeRo talk about how much more influential Husker Du was.
clearly takes the interviewer by surprise.

All I remember about Anton Fier is that he said playing with the Feelies made his hands bleed
What is he up to these days? Is he really thought of as a session guy?

In the 90s sometime I bought Intolerance for like $5, ie. at the time very much "let's get rid of it" money, and to this day it's a special record to me. Maybe not an all time great or whatever, but soulful and beautiful, and p much every song on it (maybe not Reprise, lol) means a lot to me. One of those understated albums that it's easy to connect to personally. RIP and love, Grant.

Is he really thought of as a session guy?

Although
https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/3283-dreamspeedblind-light-1992-1994/

Anton Fier, one of the more underrated drummers of the New York jazz/rock scene, has had a remarkable career. He was the drummer for The Feelies, The Lounge Lizards, and Pere Ubu, as well as a session musician for everyone from Jeff Buckley to Yoko Ono.

He's been a drummer for hire since the Feelies. Lotsa work with Bill Laswell.

http://www.allmusic.com/artist/anton-fier-mn0000493946