Sonic Youth: Classic or Dud/S&D?

i liked a lot of latter day SY, but I'd definitely say that Thurston's lyrics were the weakest link in there. but i've enjoyed pretty much all of the solo stuff from the various members, even if none of it is super brilliant.

Was lucky to have a long (audio) interview in Brussels last week, on his new album, Trump, end of SY, E. P. Library,.... Also received the recording of his solo set that night (new ones, stuff from the Best Day and Psychic Hearts). Airs tonight 9pm CET, will post an archive link afterwards.

Here it is: https://www.mixcloud.com/Sterrenplaten/sterrenplaten-25-november-2016-thurston-moore
Very happy with the result

Playlist that night (at the Brussels venue called Les Ateliers Claus, Forevermore was the opening song, decided that placing the almost 20 min song at the end would suit the interview more):

* Speak To The Wild (from The Best Day)
* Aphrodite
* Turn On (from Rock n Roll Consciousness)
* Anti-Weapon (also called 'Cease Fire')
* Miss Liberty (Based on Ono Soul, from Psychic Hearts)
* Queen Bee And Her Pals (from Psychic Hearts)
* Psychic Hearts (from Psychic Hearts)
* Forevermore (from The Best Day)

Serious bummer, was recalled tonight by Ecstatic Peace for using the live songs. Let's say we were a bit too enthousiast after the wonderful gig and dito interview that both of us misinterpreted things. Re-uploaded the whole interview again and replaced live songs with studio songs. The cherry might be missing, but the cake is still here:
https://www.mixcloud.com/Sterrenplaten/sterrenplaten-25-november-2016-thurston-moore/

Man, I was really looking forward to listening to those live tracks.:(

Looks like Lee and Steve might be on ep 8 of the PBS show soundbreaking, talking about cassettes. https://instagram.com/p/BNVlbpVBC7n/

great interview maarten!

Oh thanks Tyler, very appreciated!

Yeah, sorry, that was a little harsh! Will definitely listen to the interview!

ha, i was looking forward to the live tracks too, but the interview was good enough...

I finally watched Heavy (from 1995!) now that Netflix is carrying it. Somehow, I remember really wanting to watch it as a teenager, for no real reason other than that Moore did the score, but never got around to it. I was actually pretty impressed with how well the score worked with the film. Sounds like he was layering prepared electric with acoustic at times, sometimes with some very light percussion?

that's exactly what it sounds like.. some of his prettiest tracks

Huh, never heard this. Had no idea it even existed.

Was that the movie with liv tyler about the twitchy short order fry cook? I loved that movie.

Yeah, it was a lovely film.

I thought this was interesting. This guy from Chile has uploaded a tonne of faithful solo acoustic guitar versions of Sonic Youth songs. It's surprising how well a lot of it translates.

Interestingly, his covers of latter-day SY seem to work better than the 80s/90s stuff.

Winner's Blues & Massage The History were some rare acoustic-driven tunes that I wish they'd done more of.

Just listened to "J'Accuse Ted Hughes" while reading Plath ("Tulips"). It worked pretty well, although the vocal bits could distract from the poetry at moments.

Speaking of acoustic covers (with gobs of reverb):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dGB7mkOm0I

"Theresa's Sound World"

haha, sweet

I finally memorized it;
Sort of
People see rock and roll as youth culture and when youth culture becomes monopolized by big business, what are the youth to do? (Do you have any idea?)
I think we should destroy the bogus capitalist process that is destroying youth culture

Is this really the closest thing they have to a “Best Of” comp?: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hits_Are_for_Squares

Aren’t they a shoo-in for a lavish, career-spanning, 2-disc retrospective (or even 4-disc box)? Most their stuff is on a single label, too... Why hasn’t it been done?

Theres this one too — https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screaming_Fields_of_Sonic_Love

But I agree — it does seem like a box set of some kind would make sense.

At this point what would that consist of? Most of their best known records have been deluxified and/or padded out (not EVOL and Sister I guess).. Maybe there are some live shows (although I think the three prime era live records are tough to beat...) They seem like a band where you should just buy the record anyway.

The only one that ever got a deluxe edition was Daydream - it got a second disc full of live stuff and some cover tunes from compilations. The SST and Homestead albums haven't ever even been remastered, I don't think, even though the band put out EVOL and Sister on their own Goofin' label in 2015/2016.

They seem like a band where you should just buy the record anyway.

Easy to say if you’re a big fan! They have tons of albums... surely there are ppl who don’t want to buy them all, but would buy a distillation if the “best of” their output (nicely packaged and contextualized)?

I think they're looking for something more like a concise best-of like Forty Licks or the 1990 Zep box, as opposed to even more additional live or unreleased material? Idk, is there still a market for that kind of thing, esp with a m/l cult band? 2xp

The only one that ever got a deluxe edition was Daydream

In a world less yoked to streaming - and were the mood within the band rosier, and were the band more interested in convention - we might have a real compilation.

Agree with Josh. I think Dirty was where the deluxe reissue series stopped. (The Goo/Dirty reissues were Geffen-related, I believe.)

well isn't that partly because the next album's tapes were lost, or something like that? aside from viability of an EJNS deluxe ed.

I think they're looking for something more like a concise best-of like Forty Licks or the 1990 Zep box, as opposed to even more additional live or unreleased material?

Exactly... a collection that could even become the “go-to” SY thing to buy, for new/casual listeners, considering how sprawling their discography is.

Looking at Amazon, it appears the Dirty deluxe was 2003, the Goo was 2005, and Daydream was 2007. They left Geffen not long after, and between that and what went down w/both the band and the business*, I imagine that put the kibosh on any more of them.

*There's probably something up about this on discogs or rateyrmusic, but iirc the Universal "Deluxe Edition" line began to taper off around 2010 or so?

...and there is! Seems like the line remained a thing in Europe until recently, but the stateside releases did slow down earlier in the decade.

there have been two archival releases (the smart bar and the spinhead sessions) since the band called it quits — more of those kinds of things would be awesome. they're both fantastic.

well isn't that partly because the next album's tapes were lost, or something like that?
You might be referring to the claim that EJSTANS was recorded over the Sister master tapes, but I'm pretty sure that was a joke

i knew about that, but i thought i remembered some other claim (here on ilm, even) that no reworking of that album would be forthcoming.

Seems like The Destroyed Room gathered up most of the DGC-era B-sides that weren't on the deluxe editions, which suggests that more of them (post-Dirty, anyway) weren't planned at that point.

On the one hand it seems like a career-spanning SY box set wouldn't sell a lot, but then I recall that Cherry Red is redoing the 50,000 Fall Fans comp from 2004, and I imagine that will sell rather less than a comparable SY set would. It does seem though that for all the marginal SYR releases and whatnot, posthumous releases have been relatively restrained. I wouldn't be surprised if the personalities involved make doing a career retrospective/celebration more trouble than it's worth. Maybe it's just what's in a name, but Sonic Youth seems like a project that doesn't want to call itself finished (not that I'm aware of any recent rumblings on the subject from the people involved).

Oh, I forgot about that Destroyed Room thing. That probably figured into Universal not doing further reissues.

On that tip, I wonder what the sales were on the three they did do? Seems like they wouldn't have been super-high as those things go, certainly not in league with the Nirvana or the heavy canon Classic Rock stuff in that series.

Is that “Screaming Fields of Sonic Love” a good comp? I’ve never heard any of their pre-DN albums; does that CD feature the choice traxx?

It seems crazy to me that in the era of streaming people would need greatest hits/retrospectives of a band like Sonic Youth, when you can audition the canonical albums with little effort and purchase one of those, if you like it. Re: Screaming Fields, the tracklist is good - but SY are one of y favourite bands, and I find it weird to hear songs out of context of their parent albums, as I rarely don't listen to the albums in toto.

MorrisP I recommend you buy Sister because it's front-to-back excellent - EVOL is great too but not as universally loved. Before that, the greatness is patchy (ducks).

Screaming Fields arguably features arbitrary, not-particularly-representative selections from Sister but it's decent enough. Perhaps just get Sister then EVOL if DN floats yer boat.

XP: er, what MatthewK just said.

I'm not a big enough SY fan to go digging through their albums, but I'd definitely buy a 1 or 2CD best of. Did we ever poll SY, if so I'll just compile my own best of by taking the top 15 or 20 songs from that.

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

I bought Screaming Fields at the time of release and it was a great gateway to navigate their pre-Geffen stuff (which was kinda obscure and hard to find where I lived at the time)

I've been spending a lot of time with their "late period" albums, which I wasn't previously familiar with (I stopped at "Washing Machine," back in the day). Just the major albums, not the soundtracks and SYR stuff. The ones I find I like the most are "NYC Ghosts & Flowers," "Rather Ripped," and (especially) "Murray Street." (That last one is just plain great; I'm really glad I did this exercise and "discovered" it!)

The others, maybe not so much... though it's interesting how they settled into a nice groove of trying different approaches/variations/ideas, some of them maybe more "successful" than others, but without knocking themselves out trying to make another "Daydream Nation" or whatever. It's a nice model for a late-career era of a band that has been around a long time and doesn't really have anything left to "prove."

"NYC Ghosts" is an interesting one... if you had just described it to me (beat poetry slams over plinking gtrs), I would have thought "no way"; but there's something oddly nice & relaxing about it. And "Rather Ripped" is really strong -- big, pleasing, anthemic tunes (is it their most "accessible" album?)

Yeah Murray Street is definitely my favorite at this point (tho haven’t listened to it in 10 years)