by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

It’s Monday night in Omaha, which means concert night. Tonight it’s Bob Mould at The Waiting Room. And the show appears to have sold out over the weekend.

Mould’s latest, Here We Go Crazy (2025, Granary/BMG), is his first solo album since 2020’s Blue Hearts, and a respectable follow-up. If you’re a Mould fan, you’ll be satisfied, though compared to his early solo work, Sugar or his Husker Du output, it can be somewhat passive and predictable.

Everyone has their favorite Mould era. Mine is ’89-’90 Mould of Workbook/Black Sheets of Rain – one album a full-spectrum acoustic/electric gut-wrencher, the other an emotional tour de force that was a prelude to his more accessible work in Sugar. 

While there’s plenty of guitar and energy on the new record, it suffers from a lack of variety and feels like he recorded it over a weekend with his ol’ rhythm-section mates, bassist Jason Narducy and drummer Jon Wurster, who will be backing Mould tonight.

His 27-song setlist from last Friday’s show at Marquis Theater in Denver included only five songs from the new album along with seven Husker Du songs (including favorites es: “Love is All Around”/“Makes No Sense at All,” which he closed the show with). Also, a nice selection from his last few albums, but alas, nothing from Workbook/Black Sheets. You can’t always get what you want. Mould has been known to throw in a wildcard, so you never know. 

There could be as many folks at TWR tonight to see The Hold Steady’s Craig Finn as to see Mould. Finn’s new album, Always Been (2025, Tamarac/Thirty Tigers), has been getting plenty of huzzahs, including a review by the dean of rock critics, Robert Christgau, who gave the record an “A” and said “its 11 songs achieve a literary pitch that could win this alt-rock lifer a short story prize.” He also said the story-songs can be a bit of a bummer, but such can be the case from aging rock stars looking back at their lives. 

Finn has only been playing nine songs on this tour (like at his April 7 show in Seattle, according to Setlist.fm), only three songs from the new album and no Hold Steady songs. I’m unsure if this will be a solo acoustic set or not. I guess we’ll find out tonight.

Like I said, it’s sold out. Show starts at 8 p.m. See you there.

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2025 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.