I remember talking to a friend about Hüsker Dü's New Day Rising, shortly after that album came out. "I hear Hüsker Dü are doing POP SONGS now," he laughed, dismissively.
Well, yeah. New Day Rising was the album where Grant Hart's pop sensibilities really stepped up to the mic; not coincidentally, that's also the album where Hüsker Dü went from being a band I genuinely respected to a band I truly loved. New Day Rising and Flip Your Wig (which followed it just eight months later) were my 80s Rubber Soul and Revolver — two perfect records that seemed joined at the hip sonically and artistically, even though the growth of the guys who were making them was happening almost too fast to be fully captured by recording technology. I can't even calculate how much time I spent in the fall of 1985 playing both albums back-to-back in my college dorm room, either playing guitar along with them or just laying back and absorbing their brilliance.
Flip Your Wig's "Flexible Flyer" was one of those rare songs — like the Music Machine's "Talk Talk" or the Flamin' Groovies' "Shake Some Action" — where the first time I heard it, it truly felt like it was written FOR me, a massive missive sent directly from the same lonely spot in the cosmos that I hailed from. The music was anthemic, the lyrics were positive and philosophical, and Grant Hart sang them like he was Paul Stanley's stoned-out younger brother. It still stirs my soul today as much as it did in the fall of '85.
"If your heart is a flame burning brightly
You'll have light and you'll never be cold
And soon you will know that you just grow
You're not growing old"
Rest in Funky Peace, Grant Hart.
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