See a Little Light

by Bob Mould

  Now it was time for the wild card, Malcolm. We didn’t know if the drum problems in Atlanta were Malcolm’s fault or whether it was just impossible for him to hear anything in that large live room. So instead of putting him in that room down in Boerne where we didn’t really know what was going to bounce around, we took him to Cedar Creek (now available), which was a smaller studio, in stark contrast to the palatial home studio in Boerne.

  We set up a kit in the living room, and Malcolm blasted through all sixteen songs with no problem—in the smaller room, he could hear everything. Turned out we were unfairly questioning Malcolm’s ability. He gave a lot of blood to get those tracks right; by the end of the second day, his hands were completely shredded and he was soaking them in buckets of ice water to numb the pain. He had redeemed himself and things were starting to feel back on track.

  After the drums were finished, Jim and I went back down to Boerne and mixed the entire album in two hectic weeks. By the end of the Texas sessions, I was both startled and disappointed to find I had gained forty pounds due to my late-night Mexican food binges. I looked puffy and felt sluggish. My jeans didn’t fit anymore. But we finished the album just in time for the Ryko and Creation promotional machines to stay on track with their grand plans for the fall 1994 campaign.

  FU:EL didn’t have the high drama of Beaster or the deep melodies of Copper Blue. After thirteen months of nonstop Sugar touring, moving 1,700 miles to set up a new home, producing the Magnapop album, and doing a solo acoustic tour, I’d had maybe twelve weeks to write as opposed to twelve months. And it showed. In the midst of all the hullabaloo, I wasn’t astute enough to notice that I had produced some of my best work (Workbook and Copper Blue) during periods of relative and sustained quiet. If I had taken more time, it might have been a stronger record. But the machine was rolling and wouldn’t slow down for anyone. This was a case of trying to capitalize on momentum, and in hindsight, the music suffered for it.

  I again called John Bruce, this time to make videos in the scorching heat of an Austin summer. “Your Favorite Thing” was filmed on a concrete overpass that was under construction, and “Believe What You’re Saying” was shot at an abandoned airstrip outside of town. We couldn’t have found two hotter locations. After twelve hours of standing out in the sun, I was miserable. John’s production assistant wore the hell out of me with his misguided ideas, and it strained my professional relationship with John. In fact, making those two videos soured me on working with John ever again—a shame, really, since he’d been documenting the band from its inception.

  Despite the difficulties with the recording and videos, there were a few bright spots on the horizon. I loved the artwork for FU:EL, which was created by an Athens artist named Lou Kregel. Lou had spent time in north Texas and was also somewhat connected in the entertainment world. The colorful retro designs that made up the core of the FU:EL packaging were originally created for a clothing line that was to be sponsored by River Phoenix, before his untimely passing. I saw the artwork in a coffee shop in Athens, and it ended up being recycled for the packaging of the album.

  Also, the publicity machine was revving up, and I was hopeful that the positive momentum of the previous two albums would continue. The key national pieces were falling into place, and the centerpiece of the campaign was to be a multipage feature in Spin magazine. That article would become more of a historical talking point than anyone could have imagined.

  CHAPTER 17

  The writer Dennis Cooper was a huge Hüsker Dü fan. He’d even touched on the band in one or two of his novels. Now he was trying to build a name for himself as a journalist. Dennis Cooper is gay. So in the summer of 1994, Spin magazine asked Ryko, How about we send Dennis Cooper down to Austin to spend some time with Bob?

  I knew what was about to happen. This was to be the “Bob is gay” story, and I could do this the easy way or the hard way. I wasn’t thrilled about it for a number of reasons, beyond personal ones. My first concerns were that this news would make it tough for my family, and that my fans and peers would recontextualize everything I had done with my work. I also knew that the press was always going to write whatever they were going to write. I could try to steer the story the way I wanted it to read, but ultimately, editorial always wins out. It’s the business.

  I talked about it at great length with Kevin. This article would have a lasting impact not only on my professional life but also on our personal lives and our private relationship. Once my story was public, everything in our lives would be viewed in a different light. Kevin would be viewed both as a part of the operation and as my partner in life. We were fine with that, but it was a big decision to make and agree upon. I went back to Ryko and said, “If this is what everyone thinks is best, I’ll do it, and we’ll be done with it.” Ryko was happy, of course—it was a large feature that would certainly get people talking about me and the album. I had made my decision. Kevin and I agreed to open our home to Dennis for two days.

  The first day was relaxed. Dennis arrived from Los Angeles and the three of us bopped around Austin, chatting about music, sexuality, and people we knew in common. Dennis was a modest sort, flattering and quite ingratiating. All pretty innocent stuff.

  The second day, Dennis and I sat down in the TV den for the formal part of the interview. For the first time in those two days, he brought out his tape recorder, and for the first time in my life, I spoke publicly about my sexuality. We talked for an hour. I had rehearsed certain parts, but in the heat of the moment I was pretty candid. Though I’d been interviewed many times before, I felt odd this time, knowing that anything I said about my sexuality would be out there for everyone to read—including my family.

  Dennis turned off the tape recorder, said he had what he needed, and headed back to the airport. I thought it had gone as well as could be expected, but one never knows with a piece this big. It’s easy to say things that can be taken out of context and blown out of proportion.

  As it turns out, that is exactly what happened. For a single moment, on one specific line of thought, I made a very awkward choice of words: “I’m not a freak.” Those four words were the highlight of the article. That statement haunted me for a long time. The context was in talking about gay-pride parades, and how it really gets to me that the mainstream media always focuses on the more outlandish characters and not the folks who dress in everyday clothing. I’m gay and I’m a normal person like everybody else, I maintained—or so I thought.

  A month or so later, the tear sheet from Spin came through on the fax machine. I read the pull quote, “I’m not a freak,” and knew I was in trouble. I’m thinking, All the things that Dennis and I talked about, and that’s what they zero in on? I was beside myself, not happy about this at all. I slipped up on one line and now it was about to be this huge mess. Kevin tried to reassure me that everything would be fine.

  Ryko publicist Carrie Svingen could sense how upset I was. I took it upon myself to call Spin editor Craig Marks and ask, “Craig, do you realize what you’re doing here? Do you realize how you’re portraying me? Is this really what you want me to look like?” He basically said, “You know, I really can’t do anything about it at this point. My hands are tied on this.” I was incredulous. “You know what? Fuck you. Fuck yourself, and take fucking Dennis Cooper with you.” I didn’t talk to Spin for fifteen years.

  I saw Dennis Cooper a few months later in Amsterdam. He came to the show and was sheepishly trying to ingratiate himself to me. I forget exactly what I said, but it was something to the effect of “Dennis, you did a hell of a job on me. All those years of writing fiction have really served you well.” And then I walked away.

  In the end, though, Dennis Cooper was just a pawn; my anger had little to do with him. He just happened to be the one who showed up to do the job. I was more upset with myself. I was upset that it took me so long to acknowledge what most everyone already knew.

  In professional circles my homosexuality had been an open secret for years. Gene
rally, I figured most people knew, but since I wasn’t drawing attention to it or living a double life, I never thought much about making a proclamation. But now it was to become a big thing. It was to put me in a different public light. Coming out is never quite as graceful as in an ABC after-school special, but this was the most awkward coming out I could imagine.

  I told my parents about the Spin article before the street date. I said, “You’re going to hear things about me, they’re true, and you might feel some repercussions.” I always sensed my mom knew I was gay; we didn’t talk about it, but I knew she understood what I meant. My dad never acknowledged I was gay other than the one episode when he blew up on the phone. He still does not acknowledge my homosexuality.

  For years I had lived in a fearful yet protective state. My parents were in a small town where people didn’t accept or understand homosexuality. I didn’t want to cause any undue stress in their lives by coming out. I remembered what happened to my high school acquaintance who ended up slaughtered in the woods. My coming out might create a hardship on my brother’s kids too—Syracuse, New York, where he now lived, was not a progressive bastion.

  I had looped all the different possible fallouts and fears in my mind, a big one being that for fifteen years I had gender-neutralized my work so that it would be all-inclusive; as a result, my music was highly personal, and yet it affected a lot of people, whether they were gay or straight. But my fear was that 90 percent of my audience would have the meaning of my songs ripped out from underneath them. A song that straight people related to, now they find out it’s about two guys? The flip side, or what I now know to be the upside, was that I had a large audience who might not have known about my homosexuality, were very attached to the work, and could now see that love and loss and hope are universal emotions that can’t be owned, controlled, or denied by law or religion.

  I had my suspicions as to how the gay community would react when they saw the Spin article, and some of the reactions were well founded. I got mail from a few gay fans saying, “How dare you portray us like that!” The gay press neither condemned nor glorified me. I never sensed I was going to appear on the cover of a magazine, sitting in a barber chair, getting shaved by someone of my own gender, like k. d. lang did the year prior when lesbian chic was all the rage.

  And later on I felt some professional backlash. A handful of radio stations in the Southeast pulled their support of my music, simply because I was gay. I understood completely and I didn’t care. I know how the game goes. The people who advertise to keep that station in business are going to say to the program directors, If you continue playing this guy’s music on the station, we’re going to pull our money. There are things in life that I personalize, but this was not one of them. I knew this was business. So I didn’t tour the Southeast as much as I normally might. It hurt my pocketbook a little—so what? I wasn’t going to let one interview, or a handful of Bible Belt radio stations, decide the fate of my music.

  * * *

  As a kid I’d always feared the consequences of my actions. If I made a wrong move, chaos would ensue. It’s hard to shake that stuff. And that dynamic played out in my public life too. When Hüsker Dü signed to a major, I thought the repercussions would hurt us. I was wrong—it hardly mattered. And same with the Spin piece. In the end it didn’t actually amount to much. But I still think this way. I worry too much about the potential fallout of what I say or do. I hoped to have gotten past those worries when I quit drinking, but apparently not. I keep trying, but I haven’t yet finished the work.

  The other side of the issue is inaction, not doing or saying anything—not telling people the things they might need to hear for fear it will send everything spiraling. But not doing anything can hurt people as well. I’m still working on that too.

  I now recognize that walking away with no explanation is likely related to whatever abandonment issues I was feeling from my early childhood. My father wasn’t always emotionally or physically available, and I became the same when I felt betrayed or hurt by people I cared for. Instead of confrontation, it was easier for me to walk away, avoid the conflict, and spare everyone more pain. What I didn’t know was that by leaving, say, the closing of a relationship open-ended and unexplained, I was causing more anguish than would have been created by actually talking through it.

  * * *

  Amid the confusion of the Spin article and the problematic recording sessions, Creation asked me to perform a solo acoustic set on June 4 at the Royal Albert Hall. The event was called Undrugged, in celebration of the label’s tenth anniversary.

  As soon as I stepped out of the taxi, I was awed by the size and history of the building. Kevin and I were met at the stage door by a hobbled old gent. He led us to the conductor’s dressing room, which was my inner sanctum for the evening. The farther we went into the bowels of the building, the lower the ceilings became. In the conductor’s room, the ceiling could not have been more than six and a half feet high. I felt completely oversized in the room, and not in a good way—I was already under pressure, and the low ceilings added more weight while subtracting oxygen. When I walked onto the stage for sound check, I was again struck by the sheer size and beauty of the building—the rich red and gold colors, the large oval shape, and the thousands of empty seats.

  At one point I was introduced to a guy who said, “I’m Liam, I’m in Oasis, and we’re the best band in the world.” Bold, I thought to myself. Turns out that, for a moment anyway, he was right—they went on to become huge.

  Toward the end of the evening, I walked onto the stage to a strong response and sat down to play. I started with a shaky version of “Walking Away” from Beaster. I’m not sure why I chose a song that was written and recorded on keyboards and had no previously existing guitar part. Moving along, I went to “Hoover Dam” and froze up in the second verse. I lost track of where I was in the song, or more likely, where I was, period. I abruptly stopped, looked up, and apologized to the audience. I then lurched into a positively harrowing version of “Too Far Down” from Candy Apple Grey, a strange choice for the party-like vibe, and I ended my set with an offering “to the boss” (Alan), a solo electric version of “Makes No Sense at All.” I felt terrible about my performance, and barely remembered the rest of the evening. I left the building as quickly as I left the stage. That was a high and low professional moment, all wrapped in one.

  * * *

  During the first half of 1994, Ryko retooled certain departments of the label in preparation for, among other things, making FU:EL a huge record. They brought in a new director of marketing named Bob Carlton to replace John Hammond, who I thought was great at his job. Though well intentioned, Carlton turned out not to be the best fit. This change was one small piece of the beginning of Ryko’s downfall. But I was merely an artist on the roster, and all I could do was continue marching forward.

  The songs from the FU:EL sessions broke down to three different styles: perfectly good pop songs, acoustic-flavored sprawl, and punkier songs like “Mind Is an Island” and “In the Eyes of My Friends.” But I needed to grow, so I changed things up and dropped the punk stuff in favor of the acoustic material. “Panama City Motel” tied together images of a house in my neighborhood being transplanted to Barcelona. Living in Austin, being around the country cats and roots-rock players, I wanted to do a country song; I thought “Believe What You’re Saying” had a real good shot at country radio. Among the pop songs, “Gift” was loosely based on the effects pedal that kicks in on the guitar at the twenty-five-second mark. I had spent an evening with Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine, and he gave me the Octavia pedal he used on the band’s legendary “You Made Me Realize.” I wrote “Your Favorite Thing” to be the single, and it occupied the number three slot—where I always put the single. The pop songs opened the record, and had I closed the album with the punky stuff, I would have given the people exactly what they expected and wanted. Maybe that would have made it a more commercial record, but artistically speaking,
it was time to move on.

  FU:EL entered the UK national charts at number seven, a decent showing. I was hoping for better, having seen Beaster enter at number three; Creation must not have been too disappointed at that chart number though. In late September we did a big three-week tour of the UK and Western Europe. We did very good business, playing venues comparable to or larger than those on the previous tours, but it was an uneventful trip. We returned to the United States and embarked on a tour of large clubs, small theaters, and ballrooms. Everything was proceeding according to plan: the first single was getting lots of airplay, there was plenty of press (including the Spin feature, naturally), and tickets were selling well.

  We continued for a few more months, but Sugar was essentially finished on November 13, 1994, the night after we played the cavernous Roseland Ballroom in New York City. We were staying at a Motel 6 outside of New Haven, Connecticut, planning on a quiet night off. We checked into the motel and David said, “Bob, I need to talk with you, can you spare a little time tonight? Just me and you.” I said, “Sure, David, of course. Let’s get checked in, let me take a shower, and then I’ll come knock on your door, and we can go for a walk.”

  We walked along a quiet road, chatting about the weather and other nontopics. When we were far enough from the hotel to have privacy, David turned serious and said, “Look, I’ve been on the road nonstop, I’m going to miss baby steps, my kids are acting out, my wife is ready to kill me. I can’t keep doing this.” I knew it was coming—I could sense it.