SUGAR

Having already placed his indelible mark on modern music with Hüsker Dü and solo album Workbook, Bob Mould enlisted bassist David Barbe and drummer Malcolm Travis leading to the formation of SUGAR, who made their live debut in early 1992 at Athens, GA’s famed 40 Watt Club. Named by NME as its 1992 Album of the Year, SUGAR’s now-classic debut album, Copper Blue, immediately proved a sensation, earning worldwide acclaim and landmark status for the melodic strength and intensely cathartic popcraft of songs like “A Good Idea”, “Helpless”, and the alternative rock radio hit and MTV favorite, “If I Can’t Change Your Mind”. With the wind at their back, SUGAR unleashed Beaster in 1993, making a momentous debut at #4 onBillboard’s Heatseekers chart. Though recorded during the same sessions that yielded Copper Blue, the six-song mini-album evinced a more visceral energy and dark melancholy than its predecessor, highlighted by such pulverising expressions of sacrilegious fury as “Judas Cradle” and “JC Auto”. 1994’s second full-length LP, File Under: Easy Listening once again made an explosive arrival, this time landing in the upper reaches of the overall Billboard 200. The album saw SUGAR pushing boundaries yet again on songs like the Americana-tinged “Believe What You’re Saying” and the incendiary “Gee Angel”, tackling a wider range of musical approaches without sacrificing their signature intensity and unrestrained power.