The Bob Mould Band, October 19 at the Troubadour

The Bob Mould Band didn't put on another incendiary show like they did at Coachella but they didn't have to. Once I saw them at the festival, though, I knew I had to check him/them out again for a full show. I've been a big Sugar fan since the early '90s but never got to see them when they were together. The Coachella performance was amazing, and was all that I could ask for. Maybe Bob had more to prove there or he knew that he had a more captive audience that might be there for other bands and he wanted to really sell himself to them or he was pissed about having such an early slot. Whatever it was, I could be a fan for life just for that Coachella performance if nothing else, though that's not to say that there was a thing in the world wrong with the Troubadour show. Just as many Sugar songs and, predictably, more from his newest solo work. I didn't have any Hüsker Dü stuff until just before this so I didn't know any of that, though what he played of it (seeing the crowd's reaction to it, knowing that that was the classic stuff), was great. I'd love to get a set-list so I could see what I heard but didn't realize the greatness of at the time (except that I recognized "New Day Rising" toward the end) but I couldn't find anything. Bob's solo stuff was always hit or miss with me, as I always liked the raw volume of Sugar and his stuff without them is sometimes too acoustic or too experiments, but he mixed it all up together really well, starting with Sugar tracks, going through solo stuff, and ending with mostly Hüsker Dü. As a retrospective of a career up to this point, it was well-rounded and sounded great and in a great venue for it. Opening for him was Spiral Stairs, the other guy from Pavement, and it was a likable set but I never got around to investigating the music more.