Sonic Youth: Classic or Dud/S&D?

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)

both SYR 1 and 2 are really worthwhile as well IMO, esp #2

murray st is very very excellent. it was the first SY i ever owned, actually. i didn't give it enough time back in the day because i shortly thereafter "discovered" their classic late 80s stuff, which thrilled me as a teen. but murray st turns out to be the gift that keeps giving

thx, sleeve -- I'll check out SYR 2

at this point I think Sonic Nurse is my fave of the 21st century SY (also maybe their best-recorded album?).

I miss Sonic Youth

Aw, yeah. So great. Murray Street is just straight one of their best ever albums. I really really like Sonic Nurse as well.

I saw the Sonic Nurse tour with Jim O’Rourke, at the Enmore in Sydney, and it was the best sounding show I have ever been to. I love that record to death.

since we're on murray street, let me just say: "Sympathy For the Strawberry". it's a brilliant song that deserves to be mentioned more than once in a sonic c/d thread

seconded. and ms is in my absolute top 4 sy albums, along with bmr, dn and wm

it's my favorite 'late period' album of theirs

late period to me is anything after Dirty

co-sign on Sympathy

Jeez just realised I haven't actually heard Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star. Definitely have the Bull in the Heather on single somewhere though. Today will be fun!

Murray Street and Sonic Nurse are my favourite late period albums. The Jim O'Rourke magic touch.

I remember experiencing Stones on a "Best of 21st Century So Far" mix tape from a different forum in maybe 2006 and it just blew my mind. At that point I only had a few of the 80's albums and hadn't really any idea of 90's - 00's SY.

I saw the Sonic Nurse tour with Jim O’Rourke, at the Enmore in Sydney, and it was the best sounding show I have ever been to.
I went to the second show, and yeah, co-sign.

The Murray Street show in Montreal sounded incredible and they were so tight. Not what I expected after the two previous tours. The album didn't excite at first but it has grown to become one of my favourites.

"Sympathy For the Strawberry". it's a brilliant song that deserves to be mentioned more than once in a sonic c/d thread

Yes, it’s really a standout... if I had walked into a room where it was playing, I’d be like “What is this??”

at this point I think Sonic Nurse is my fave of the 21st century SY (also maybe their best-recorded album?).

― tylerw, Friday,

seconded

Wonder what I’m missing with that one; the songs don’t grab me...

Sonic Nurse is great. One of the few SY releases where I not only like-to-love every tune, but at any given moment could point to one or the other as an album highlight: Pattern Recognition, Stones, I Love You Golden Blue, Peace Attack... so many good ones.

Upon release, Rather Ripped sounded tepid in comparison, but has aged well in its own right.

After A Thousand Leaves I felt like SY shrugged off the chaotic distortion element of their music and became much more about pure musicality (if that doesn’t sound ridiculous). Their late period music has much more in common with CAN which might be why I like it so much.

Rather Ripped (which I think is OK) always sounded to me like the record Geffen probably wish they had made in 1994 — fairly tight, melodic guitar rock, nothing too far out. it might be where thurston's lyrics really start to get not so good.

I was listening to Goo and Dirty the other week and man, did Kim's lyrics get on my nerves. Esp. "Kool Thing" and "Swimsuit Issue," the latter of which I could not hear without thinking of the Ben Stiller parody. Made me think a lot of her book, too, which I really didn't like.

Those albums both still sound awesome, though.

xp that is a very good point tyler

I dig Rather Ripped, "Rapture" and "Rats" are two of my "late period" tunes

("late peroid" is post-Washing Machine for me, it's interesting how subjective this is but I personally place it at the start of the SYR series)

I think that's a fair dividing mark. Washing Machine felt like the last (fruitless) gasp of any external commercial expectations, and the last recorded in an outside studio, iirc.

Yeah:

A Thousand Leaves is the 10th studio album by the American experimental rock band Sonic Youth. It was released on May 12, 1998, by DGC Records. A Thousand Leaves was the band's first album recorded at their own studio in Lower Manhattan, which was built with the money they had made at the 1995 Lollapalooza music festival. Since the band had an unlimited amount of time to work in their studio, the album features numerous lengthy and improvisational tracks that were developed unevenly.

SY to me has early (80s), middle (90s), and late (00s) periods.

yeah i think the SYR series is a good demarcation point...
also — there's a ben stiller "swimsuit issue" parody?!

The “mid-period” LP that I like best is “EJST&NS”... there’s something about the tight, minimalist, bluesy sound of that era that appeals to me. (I guess it’s also their “indie rock” album, haha, based on what Wikipedia says about its background.) I’ve also always really liked “Psychic ❤️s,” which has a similar aesthetic, I think.

It feels weird to lump their earliest, more no-wavey releases into the same “early” period as crowd pleasers like daydream nation.

yeah, I'd personally define "mid" as Daydream thru Washing Machine

but I could see purists starting "mid" with Steve Shelly, i.e. EVOL

xp – me too; exactly the same

These are some interesting tidbits (from Wikipedia):

Re: Dirty

After recording was completed, the album needed to be trimmed down from 18 tracks. Moore, Gordon and the band's A&R person, Gary Gersh, agreed that Ranaldo's song "Genetic" would be removed. Ranaldo did not react well to the decision; coupled with personal issues he was facing at the time, it led him to consider leaving the group. After a few weeks, the matter settled and Ranaldo stayed with the band.

Unlike on previous Sonic Youth albums, Ranaldo did not write or sing any songs because he did not like how his compositions were treated and assembled for Dirty and its predecessor Goo.

Gordon's book drives home that it was always Thurston's band first and foremost. I figured the ratio of songs per author/singer was under his control.
Ranaldo's tunes are generally well spaced on their albums. I always welcome them, but don't really want more of them.

don’t have the book on hand, but the “goodbye 20th century” biography delves into that stuff a bit more if memory recalls.

yes, it does - definitely recommended reading for fans

I'll put in a good word for Silver Session for Jason Knuth. I guess it's the outlier release among outliers - maybe their version of Metal Machine Music? Thurston's liner notes:

we didn't really know jason knuth -- its possible we had met him, or had been in the same room as him, but we didn't recal... we heard about his passing on the internet -- a flurry of grievous and surprised reaction -- people were asking us if we were aware of how much he identified and championed our music -- as music director for kusf he seemingly used sy as a standard for playlisting -- indeed at his memorial his friends played 'the diamond sea' in acknowledgment of his enthusiasm towards us -- he was affectionately referred to as 'sonic knuth' ...here in nyc, so far from the sf community, we were touched and more than intrigued. we learned jason was a vibrant, well loved guy on the music scene w/ a completely genuine exhuberance towards art & music. his demeanor obviously shroued a complex inner life which led to suicide. what jason's feelings were towards his own human existence we may never know but we do know he will be missed by many as a companion. sonic youth wanted to make some gesture towards him as well as focus on suicide prevention. proceeds from this cd will help fund the san francisco suicide prevention hotline (415-781-0550). it is manufactured and distributed by revolver, a company with close and personal associations with jason.

a note on the music: silver sessions were taken from an evening when sy had to do vocal overdubs for 'a thousand leaves' -- the band upstairs was hammering out some funky metal overdrive and we couldn't "sing" properly (?!) -- we decided to fight fire with molten lava and turned every amp we owned on to 10+ and leaned as many guitars and basses we could plug in against them and they roared/HOWLED like airplanes burning over the pacific -- we could only enter the playing room with hands pressed hard against our ears and even then it was physically stunning -- we ran a sick outmoded beatbox through the p.a. and it blew out horrendous distorted pulsations. Of course we recorded the whole thing and a few months later we mixed it down into sections, ultra-processing it to a wholly other "piece" -- in a way, it's my favorite record of ours -- I hope jason digs it. --- keep on keep on keep on --- thurston/sonic youth/nyc 1998.

That’s a cool story; but it also would have been cool if they had gone upstairs and jammed with the funk-metallers, and recorded that.

I love Silver Sessions and need to spend more time with it, I know some other ILXors are big fans as well (Raymond Cummings?)

silver sessions is great. friend from long ago was obsessed w/ that one