"Never too old to contain my rage," bellows 51-year-old Bob Mould on his new solo LP, proving it on 10 songs (in 38 minutes) blistered with blow-torch riffs. The lyrics on Silver Age echo Mould's recent memoir; "The Descent" could even be read as an overture toward a long-hoped-for Hüsker Dü reunion tour. But sugar-crusted blitzkriegs like "Keep Believing" show he's doing fine on his own.

Listen to 'Silver Age':

“He Will Break Your Heart”

A lightly swinging Latin-influenced, almost cha-cha groove and close harmonies decorated Jerry Butler's early soul hit "He Will Break Your Heart," delivering a stately warning that his rival would never love his girl like he did. The melody came to Butler as he was driving on the highway from Atlantic City, New Jersey, to Philadelphia with Curtis Mayfield, and as Butler told Rolling Stone, "I just sang the melody and Curtis put the chords to it." The song's premise, Butler added, "was something that I'd lived ...The lyric was an experience rather than a revelation. Whereas music is usually a revelation."