POLL YR. IDOLS: The official SONIC YOUTH RESULTS thread!

what is it about "junkie's promise" that's so objectionable to y'all? don't love it, but it strikes me as a better song than "becuz" (which i don't loathe, just strikes me as a third tier track by a band with plenty of top shelf business).

'Becuz' is probably my second-favourite song on Washing Machine, I think it's a great opener, it's just a shame 'Junkie's Promise' is such an awful momentum-killer.

Hmmm good question

Thurston's vocal jumps out as a big reasob

Hah, I have no problem with that really Raymond. I love Daydream, but for some reason can totally get why it would turn someone off. It is pretty monochromatic, and if you aren't engaged by the first song or two that whole album could turn into a real slog.

i think the "junkie's promise" lyrics are pretty on-point, tbh. i like the sense of compassion hardened into anger. rings true for me.

"becuz" has decent lyrics, too, fwiw. it's the music & vocal that fail me.

Becuz was one of those songs that I liked a lot more than I remembered when relistening to the albums for this poll. It ended up at #8 on my ballot. I really love Kim's raspy vocals on this.

The experience of re-listening and thinking for this poll is really driving home how noisome TM can be, sometimes, as a singer; Kim was ultimately the star vocalist of this band, could do almost no wrong. I always felt comfortable with Lee's singing style.

For me "Junkie's Promise" just comes off as turgid. Picks up at the end but I never make it that far. Listening now and it even sounds like there are ghost bongos or roto-toms on it somehow, which if that is random guitar detritus is kinda cool I guess (I don't imagine that there are actual bongos or roto-toms on it).

As far as lyrics go, they aren't bad, and you know I have been angry and sympathetic to junkies. The whole business with, let's say, heroin, is extremely ugly, so perhaps this song is extremely appropriate and I never want to hear it again despite that.

I run hot and cold on panty lies

I considered putting panty lies on my ballot. I like that song. I can understand why many people hate it though.

Yeah, kinda so awkward/goofy that it works for me (though certainly it is not a great song). I mean, it's fun in a way I can appreciate. I definitely like it more that "No Queen Blues", the other song I don't really listen to much off of this album.

Best song on Washing Machine? Probably "Washing Machine"

the "Little Trouble Girl" -> "No Queen Blues" -> "Panty Lies" sequence on Washing Machine is one of my favorite sequences on any sonic youth album. Those 3 songs just work really well together for some reason.

individually they don't really sound as good though

"panty lines" is another one i have problems with. strongly disagree with raymond on the kim "could do almost no wrong" thing. everyone in SY drops the ball occasionally. (except steve, maybe. have never felt let down by the drumming.)

to my mind, as a vocalist, kim is both the best thing about the band and the worst. she's got the highest highs and the lowest lows. lyrics are thurston's real weakness, sometimes horrifyingly bad, while kim's are uniformly excellent.

Well, don't wanna reveal what I voted for off of Washing Machine yet. I am really glad "Saucer-like" placed though, as I came close to choosing that over "Paper Cup Exit" on my ballot but wanted to make sure that that song got a vote or two. I have been on a big Sonic Nurse kick too, so songs from that album were hard to keep off the ballot.

I love Daydream, but for some reason can totally get why it would turn someone off. It is pretty monochromatic, and if you aren't engaged by the first song or two that whole album could turn into a real slog.

I like a lot of individual songs on Daydream but overall it's so samey that I can never get behind the familiar idea of it remotely being SY's peak

Yeah, it is a monochromatic record as I said, which really works for me on DN. I get really absorbed in it as a full album, almost like one continual song with a lot of peaks and valleys. To me the sequencing is pretty excellent, but again I completely get why people either get over it and move onto other SY records or just never really have it take at all with them.

Wasn't "Junkie's Promise" inspired by Thurston's obsessive record collecting? I thought I heard that but maybe it was a joke.

Loved "Becuz" in high school; not so much now.

xposts I have to say that I never agreed with this, even at the peak of my WM fandom!: the "Little Trouble Girl" -> "No Queen Blues" -> "Panty Lies" sequence on Washing Machine is one of my favorite sequences on any sonic youth album. . NEVER liked "Panty Lies".

'Panty Lies' is my least-favourite SY song (it's possible there are worse ones I've forgotten on, say, Goodbye 20th Century). It's just really really grating.

I've never gotten the DN love either. For this poll, I did go back to relisten, and realized that there's an album in the middle of DN that I'd probably have liked much better: Eric's Trip through Rain King. Which is also Ranaldo land, but I think that's just a coincidence as I'm not especially Lee-centric.

First two songs on the album, that get so much love, still strike me as uninspired, and the title track is way too long...

Whoops, not title track. Teen Age Riot...

The WM track I'm really not sure about is 'Little Trouble Girl' - the guitar intro makes me laugh, I like the overall 'feel' of it but the chorus is pretty annoying even though I love Kim Deal's backing vocals. The video iskind of funny iirc.

Whenever I hear people lament the popularity of "Teenage Riot", I totally start to sympathize. Lyrics can be goofy (though I like most of them), song is maybe too long, kinda doesn't fit the tone of the rest of the album (which is way less peppy in tuneful way), etc. etc. But then I think back to the first time I heard the song, and the way the Kim intro transitions into the other intro which leads to the main verse and how cool it was, and I am just reminded of what an undeniably great moment that was. The "Teenage Riot" riff is one of those perpetual motion machine type of riffs that I seemingly never tire of. The riff is enough.

I love the guitar intro on "Little Trouble Girl", sounds like a warped record.

like a lot of individual songs on Daydream but overall it's so samey that I can never get behind the familiar idea of it remotely being SY's peak

i often find myself thinking just that, but when i take it apart and set aside the few tracks that don't quite grab me, i can't deny the greatness of the remainder. for me, that's:

Eric's Trip
'Cross the Breeze
Providence
Silver Rocket
The Sprawl (can't deny, though i hedged earlier)

Rain King
Total Trash
Trilogy

that adds up to a GREAT (if rather long) single album. and while i rate "candle" and "kissability" just a cut below, i have no problem w either.

"little trouble girl" is great, one of the most moving (and disturbing) SY tracks post sister

Wasn't "Junkie's Promise" inspired by Thurston's obsessive record collecting?

lol, i dunno, that'd be funny cuz i've always taken it so serious. a few of kim's songs do seem to address that, though "heather angel" is the only one that springs to mind atm.

http://www.melson.nl/ILM/sypoll/051.jpg
51. Hits of Sunshine (For Allen Ginsberg)
A Thousand Leaves, 1998
(145 points, 9 votes, 1 #1)

Cool, my #25. Sure that this song is one reason some people did not dig ATL at all.

It was my #4. Just a flat-out masterpiece, maybe especially because it's not a guitar freakout in the regular sense.

One of the few tracks whose form and content are indivisible; the thing really sound like the aural equivalent of tripping balls watching colors change on a wall.

yeah, and one of the main reasons i do dig ATL. or parts of it anyway...

currently obsessed with "I Love You Golden Blue", thanks poll!

And so we enter the top 50...
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50. Youth Against Fascism
Dirty, 1992
(151 points, 9 votes)

Oh come on. TOO LOW

never really understood the appeal of this one

WOOT! i'm just glad it showed up. lot of fans seem to hate it.

the appeal is the part where it gets really fucking loud and especially "we're gonna bury you, maaan"

cracks me up every time

Sonic Youth - "Youth Against Fascism"

I was once in a band who covered this. It's definitely fun to play.

goo strikes me as a oddly snarky portrait of indie-rock-as-legitimate-counterculture, a principle they seemed much more heavily invested in on their early albums. "youth against fascism" is the most explicit articulation of this new attitude. it seems sincere enough on a certain level, but it also seems to mock both itself and the idea that "punk rock" has anything to say.

i enjoy that about it, but can see why the goofiness might be off-putting.

Ian Mackaye on the collab (apparently from Swingset, posted in that ILM thread about YAF linked above):

Ian, how did you end up playing on Dirty? (1992 SY record)

IM: It's a good story actually. It's fucked up man. I was in New York and eating at a restaurant called Spring Street Natural and I called Thurston just to say "Hi," and there was a message on his machine saying that they were in the studio. I think you left the number too.

TM: Yeah.

IM: I was at the restaurant and I had just ordered. I called on a pay phone, the studio was half a block away, and Thurston said to just come down. I ran down and went in and those guys were all there and we're talking-- my food was coming, so I had to go. They just said, "Oh we want you to play on something." I don't do that, but all those people were hanging out and saying it would be great. I'm just not a player like that; it would not occur to me to play a lick on something. I go in the room and-- who was doing the record?

TM: Butch, I think. Was it Butch?

IM: The first thing I had to do was find a guitar I could play, which is of course is impossible, because they're all tuned bizarrely. I picked up the only SG because I can recognize it as a guitar. I plugged it in, put on the headphones and I was really nervous. First off I don't know what to play, I don't know how to play because it was such a weird tuning, and my dinner is going to be ready in two minutes!

(everyone laughs)

IM: So they run the tape and I'm standing in front of the speaker and I'm trying to find something, anything. So I just played some feedback. We do it once, Butch comes in to check the mic. I told him that I thought I had an idea and to turn me up in the headphones, and Thurston walks in and was like, "That was great!" Ok, cool, I said goodbye, walked out and went back to have my dinner. I never went back. Six months later we're on tour in Europe, and every interviewer is asking me about my collaboration with Sonic Youth. I had no idea it was on the record. I didn't hear the song until two months later. When I first heard it I couldn't even figure out what I played on it.

TM: The nature of the song is just this repetitive bass/drum thing and the guitars are just squalling. That was the thing, just turn your amp on and do whatever it is will sound happening.

IM: It was one pass. I love that kind of thing frankly. For me when Thurston came in and said "perfect." It was great, I put the guitar down said "Great to see you guys." I walk out and all the people hanging out were like, "Yeah, you were really great." Cool, that was perfect for me.

lots of rong on that thread

Didn't read much, but I was actually looking for that quite and the ILM thread was one of the first things that came up in the search. I have no doubts that there is plenty of wrong in there though.

Uh, "quote", not "quite"

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49. Kill Yr. Idols
Kill Yr. Idols, 1983
(155 points, 12 votes)

yeah shit yeah

I wonder how high "Youth Against Fascism" ranks as a reason people don't like, or stopped liking, SY/Thurston Moore? Big guest spot on their highest-profile/most zeitgeisty record with lyrics that are really easy to rally around as being "not my thing" on many levels. I mean, I always dug it, but I could see this as being a big jumping off point for a certain demographic.

xp yaf was my no.2. i love the energy and punk attitude of it. how it gets heavier and heavier. it is really powerful in a joy division kind of way. my favourite song from my favourite (and first) album by them.