Thursday, July 17, 2008

Hold Steady


It isn't often that Entertainment Weekly and Pitchfork Media will agree on something, so the high praise for the new Hold Steady album caught me by surprise. I've always admired this band for Springsteen-like stylings, but the party-hearty lyrics of the last couple albums didn't do a lot for me. But I'll agree with EW and Bitchfork, the new Stay Positive album has fascinating lyrics about war veterans and townies with shady pasts, and clever arrangements throughout. Not sure I agree with the Bitchfork observation of suggestions of Husker Du, however. Still, here's one of the top contenders for 2008.

4 comments:

Don said...

Husker Du? Isn't that a game from our childhood that nobody ever bought? I kinda wanted to play it though.

BTW, I Tagged you on my blog. Please don't feel obligated, but I thought of you when I was doing it.

Loring Wirbel said...

Thank you, Don! Well, maybe HD was a game, but as far as I knew, Husker Du was a big post-punk band of the late 80s, that Bob Mould started - he later went acoustic and electronic as a solo artist. Some of HD's bigger albums were Zen Arcade, New Day Rising, Candy Apple Red. I remember wearing a Husker Du T-shirt in what was then Leningrad in 1988 and everybody wanted it.

Don said...

Do you still have that shirt? That would almost be like keeping the 68mustang, (which I didn't)

Loring Wirbel said...

Hmmmm... (rummaging around in the drawer)... yes! Still have the shirt!