Warehouse Du

January 19 marked the 35th anniversary of the release of Warehouse: Songs and Stories, Husker Du's final album before they blew up in everybody's faces. Via HERE:

Hüsker Dü’s tumultuous demise was defined mainly by the animosity between the newly sober and increasingly business-minded Bob Mould and the bare-footed, laissez-faire Grant Hart. After all, they were the band’s songwriting pair and, more accurately, internal rivals. The tension between the two reached its nadir on the group’s last studio collection, double LP Warehouse: Songs And Stories, which turns 35 this month. It marked the end of the trio’s prolific, if ultimately short-lived, 1983 – 1987 output, and it hosted Hart and Mould’s epic final showdown. The album was their sonic battlefield, its length born out of stubbornness and unwillingness to compromise as they hurled three-minute blasts of buzzing fury back and forth in quick succession. 

Their friction wasn’t the only pressure surrounding Warehouse‘s recording and release. David Savoy, Hüsker Dü’s long-term manager, took his own life on the eve of their national tour (an event that Mould cited as “the beginning of the end”). Hart’s worsening drug use was making life difficult as well, so Mould abruptly canceled said tour part-way through and without conferring with his colleagues. Therefore, their farewell was far from a jubilant valediction. Still, their swansong manages to deliver subtler goodbyes—back pats to fans, parting aperçus, and future plans—within its fuzzy folds.

Of course, I've blathered on and on for years on Xmastime about much I love Grant Hart. In particular, it's his playing and singing on Husker Du's live album The Living End that brought to life much better versions of the songs on Warehouse, which can seem like one long, compressed song. Warehouse has plenty of good songs on it but should've been shorter, and better produced. It's nobody's favorite Husker album, but it does have the greatest liner notes of all time:

Sometimes you feel real old, older than you are. Check the aches and pains, the hairline, the demands of life. Responsibilties, responsibilities. Worse things have happened to all of us; the circus wasn't as good as you though it would be, the movie stunk, etc., etc....

Punching the clock, punching the wall, hating your boss. You can't go if you don't know, and you can't know if you don't go. and everybody in the world has their own song in their heads. The best songs ever. Problem is figuring a way to get them out and present them to others.

You've got to know where the brakes are. Enjoy life at a realistic pace. You crazy youngsters, what with your nightlife and everything. And it's important to trust other people, while putting stock in yourself as well. Reevaluating your priorities, checking yourself daily.

Not everyone is a victim of circumstance; conversely, nobody should feel like a martyr all the time. Problem? It's hard enough to communicate these days; some of us don't even get the chance. Some others don't know they have a chance.

When you travel frequently, you find a lot of images. And sometimes, you have to try and make the best of a bad situation: more often than not, we grin and bear it. Other times, you learn to enjoy some small facet of your predicament. Nothing too elaborate, just an attempt to adjust priorities. Revolution starts at home, preferably in the bathroom mirror.

Example? Winter always comes too soon. This year was the worst I can remember, except when I was five years old. Pushed open the front door, got lost in the snow.