Welcome to The TopDollar Hour. This is Tunacan Jones. Tonight's show is 3 hours that feature the work of Grant Hart.
In Husker Du, Nova Mob and his solo work, he was always honest with the art, relationships and the emotions involved. His music and words has influenced my own work from first listens to the revisits that I have done in the last couple of days. These next 3 hours, i hope, will give you what he gave me. I'll start the show with
a fun bonus track, an intro demo from The Last Days of Pompeii, named simply, It's Nova Mob
Nova Mob - (Intro) It's Nova Mob (bonus track) (1:26)
Nova Mob - Wernher Von Braun (2:17)
Grant Hart - Barbara (4:17)
Hüsker Dü - She's a Woman (and Now He Is a Man) (3:21)
Grant Hart - A Letter from Anne Marie (6:00)
Hüsker Dü - Pink Turns to Blue (2:42)
Nova Mob - Admiral Of The Sea (79 A.D. Version) (2:24)
Grant Hart - I Will Never See My Home (4:36)
Grant Hart - Run Run Run to the Centre Pompidou (3:45)
Hüsker Dü - Don't Want to Know If You Are Lonely (3:31)
Husker Du - Terms Of Psychic Warfare (2:19)
Hüsker Dü - Sorry Somehow (4:29)
Nova Mob - Introduction (3:16)
Nova Mob - Over My Head (3:42)
Hüsker Dü - Charity, Chastity, Prudence, and Hope (3:15)
Nova Mob - The Last Days of Pompeii (rough mix) (4:18)
Nova Mob - Little Miss Information (3:49)
Hüsker Dü - Dead Set on Destruction (3:01)
Grant Hart - Twenty-Five Forty-One (4:47)
Nova Mob - If I Was Afraid / Coda (6:02)
Q: Have your sources of inspiration for song writing changed over the years?
A: I would say that it’s probably more broad now. Quite a bit more broad. For example on the last album released, as well as there being the Echo and Narcissus song, there’s a song about Charles Hollis Jones, who’s a furniture designer, as well as something that is based on a remark made by a Buddhist monk during the selection of the Panchen Lama. He said, in reference to the candidate for Lamahood: “Oh, he is like the reflection of the moon on the water but he’s not the moon” and I used that as an inspiration. I guess I would have to examine the earlier stuff but I think it was probably more like emotional involvements, feeling your way through relationships and things like that. But that seems to find it’s integration into the new stuff as well.
Interview by Imelda Michalczyk
(August 2013)
Rockshot Mag
Hüsker Dü - She Floated Away (3:38)
Grant Hart - I Am Death (2:33)
Grant Hart - I Knew All About You Since Then (2:08)
Hüsker Dü - No Promise Have I Made (3:41)
Husker Du - Books About UFOs (2:49)
Grant Hart - California Zephyr (2:59)
Hüsker Dü - Flexible Flyer (3:02)
Grant Hart - Shine, Shine, Shine (4:33)
Hüsker Dü - Green Eyes (3:02)
Nova Mob - See and Feel and Know (2:43)
Q: Where do songs come from? I've listened many times to this explanation: "they are out there floating and you just have to be 'tuned' so you can get them". It's the classic idea of inspiration as an outer force. Is it just easier to attribute it to higher powers?
A: I believe we attribute to higher powers that which we find god-like in ourselves. There is a mystical moment often called the moment of inspiration when we realize we have an exciting idea. If it were a duplicable event, then it would not be special feeling. There is a certain gloating that happens when we realize that we are to be given credit for something that just occurred. What is better than to be able to say, if only for a moment, “I am brilliant!"' Whether we acknowledge it or not it, is satisfying to be creative, to be a creator, to match God. Doing what we like to do, in a fashion and to a degree uncommon, (it) feels pretty fucking good.
From an Inteview by Luis Boullosa
(August 2013)
Website: Perfect Sound Forever
Hüsker Dü - Turn On The News (4:27)
Hüsker Dü - Keep Hanging On (3:19)
Grant Hart - You're the Reflection of the Moon on the Water (4:20)
Hüsker Dü - Never Talking To You Again (1:40)
Grant Hart - She Can See The Angels Coming (3:47)
Hüsker Dü - Every Everything (1:58)
Hüsker Dü - Actual Condition (1:52)
Nova Mob - The Sins of Their Sons (2:49)
Hüsker Dü - Dreams Reoccurring (1:40)
Grant Hart - Now That You Know Me (3:56)
Grant Hart - Come, Come (3:17)
Grant Hart - Underneath the Apple Tree (3:09)
Grant Hart - Teeny's Hair (3:17)
Grant Hart - It Isn't Love (4:15)
Grant Hart - Charles Hollis Jones (4:23)
Grant Hart - Out of Chaos (1:57)
Grant Hart - Morningstar (4:19)
Grant Hart - Awake, Arise! (5:16)
Grant Hart had demons that could fuel a life or tear it down. He has managed to navigate through them all with his relationshop to art, music and the written word. His success was defined by his unwillingness to compromise on an artistic and personal level. As the cliche goes, it was a blessing and a curse. Grant Hart's legacy, however, is best left up for him to define.
“A long time ago, I started looking at my permanent record — the history of me after I’m gone,” Grant Hart said. “Even to speak of it reeks of egotism run wild. But I think when all is said and done, the work that I produced in this lifetime will more than repay the world for any inconvenience I’ve caused it.” - from a 2009 Star Tribune interview.
We're going to end the show with Grant Hart's song, "The Main" from his first solo album, "Intolerance", which was released on December 12, 1989.
Thank you for listening.
Grant Hart - The Main (4:06)
Nova Mob 1989 - 1994
Grant Hart (Solo) 1995 - 2013