Click here to talk about the next Sonic Youth album - The Eternal

I don't think RR fans are mental per se but I don't really get the enthusiasm, do y'all think it's dramatically different from or better than the 2 before it? It feels like such a continuation (but not improvement on) the sound of those albums to me.

Not that I didn't like Rather Ripped, I just feel like that aren't really advancing their sound anymore and that at this point they're treading water....

― someone who seems to only rep for ghastly prefab autotuned pop (The Brainwasher), Friday, February 13, 2009 3:55 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

um i had to say this, like saying "candyman" three times in the mirror..but..isn't this attitude sort of....rockist?

weird, sounds totally different to me ... shorter, peppier songs with parts more approximating "hooks" and choruses. i was pretty bored by murray street, sonic nurse, and i feel like there's another one in there i've completely forgotten about

RR is a continuation yes, but a marked improvement.

I guess it all comes down to songs, though. Unlike Sonic Nurse and Murray Street, there's not a single moment of RR I don't like.

I'd say SY's 00s output is more enjoyable than their 90s output.

Rather Ripped was enjoyable, cruisin in the car summer tunes in way that I can't say about the bulk of their output. That's a good thing.

So yay to The Eternal.

yeah maybe this is just a personal preference thing...to me the best of SY's later records are the ecstatic instrumental sections of 7+ minute jams like "Rain On Tin"...i don't really look to them for shorter, peppier songs with "hooks," although they did excel at those at one point earlier in their career.

the Blender article did mention one song on The Eternal being 8 minutes long, though, so there'll be at least one surefire jam for me.

rather ripped is fukkin great

btw this seems like a good candidate for another IMM tribute album

yay more SY summer jamz

03 Leaky Lifeboat (for Gregory Corso)

^this is just so "sonic youth" it makes me puke haha

(loooooooool at the username)

xp lol yes

some dude, i'm with you, i think the 00 epics surpass the 90 epics. listened to RR the other day and i like most of it, but it's not very memorable.

looking forward to this a lot, for mark ibold and the thurston remarks mentioned about the "freedom of being on a indie label again"

whoever called goo/dirty songs "sketches" for what SY are up to now = insane i/t brane. i think they're making very pleasant music these days, and the laid-back jams are exceptional, but the songwriting is much less interesting & memorable. plus i miss the jagged, angsty, headfucking rockaroll shit (but that's just me)

Wonder if they'll sell more now that they're on Matador? Would not be surprised.

Cover reminds me a lot of Imperial Wax Solvent.

..which is good

painting is cool, regardless of whose ass hairs it incorporates, but the "framed by white text in black stripes" thing doesn't work for me. i mean, it looks okay, solid design, but it's also kind of dull/flat/ordinary.

but i can't decide. there's also something very satisfying about it.

There was talk elsewhere of it being in a similar vein as Michael Gira's Young God art (up until recently, anyway). I can get behind that, but I would've gone another way with the typeface.

xpost don't you mean sASStisfying?

johnny fever OTM - basic design is very similar to OG young god house look, but less 80s clenched, foursquare. more i look at it, the better i think it'll look LP size, and the only problem i'm having is the big-on-top, small-at-the-bottom thing

http://i274.photobucket.com/albums/jj242/donaldparsley/swanssndtrks.jpg

young god = better font

i like the font sy used for washing machine, though

young god font = more "correct", but almost too much so. effect is right on, but kinda inert, too. washing machine font was perfect, but mostly cuz it was a picture of a font. i'm starting to think i like use of a more questionable font, makes the final result less stable, more indeterminate

I'm surprised there isn't a band called FONT yet (despite the lack of googleability).

(allmusic lists an empty stub for a "World" band called Font. But no history = no exist. That's all I could find)

washing machine font was perfect, but mostly cuz it was a picture of a font.

i was referring to the font used for the spine, track titles on the back, etc. i like the font because of it's "less determinate" quality.

iirc (don't have a copy of Washing Machine handy), it was just Helvetica Light or some variation thereof.

^ this. it's another perfectly serviceable and totally correct font that doesn't inject any tension into the design

topics discussed on ilm threads, in order of most frequent:

1) sociology
2) poll position placement
3) hipsters
4) strawmen
5) hipster strawmen
6) links to blogs
7) cover art
8) font
9) music

lol

10) bacon

yes, it's surprising there isn't more discussion of music in this thread about an album that hasn't been released yet

actually, my post had nothing to do with this particular thread and more to do with ilm threads in general, hence my not calling it "topics being discussed on this sonic youth thread"

sorry i got confused because you posted it in this sonic youth thread

i don't really know why i'm defending this shit, i hate ilm as much as anyone

1) sociology: hipsters
2) poll position placement: tbd
3) hipsters: check
4) strawmen: hipsters
5) hipster strawmen: check
6) links to blogs: countdown...
7) cover art: goatse
8) font: "indeterminate"
9) music:

here's #6.............http://www.matadorrecords.com/matablog/2009/02/12/coming-june-9-sonic-youths-the-eternal/

10) gear whinging that discussing the author, audience, social context, creation, or packaging of a piece of music isn't really talking about the music maaaan

that's #11

do keep up

my bad

http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/simpsons/images/thumb/6/6b/ItchyScratchyLemonade.png/250px-ItchyScratchyLemonade.png

i like their earlier fonts better maaaan

CALOTO, as opposed to CALBOTI

"‘The Eternal’ features many firsts for a Sonic Youth album, including a number of shared vocals between Kim, Thurston, and Lee...

Intrigued. Always loved "Kotton Krown" for the co-vocals and wondered why they never tried it again.

(Could it be that harmonies are for pussies?)

I wonder if they mean songs where all 3 sing lead? because there are plenty of songs where both Thurston and Kim sing lead, Thurston and Lee both on "Unwind," and a lot w/ all of them singing in unison (especially on NYC Ghosts).

I'm looking forward to hearing this. They've had a great run as of late. They make better records in the 2000s than they did in the 1990s. If we were to chart their decades/album career path on a graph, it would be a V shape.

Since it will be said, I'll be the one to say it: I hope 'Poison Arrow' is the ABC cover. I love that song.

Yeah, I've been waiting all day for someone to make that totally obvious comment. Sonic Youth and ABC, peas and carrots.

"Anti Orgasm" is the track Kim Gordon will sound like she's being fucked, right?

Rather Ripped mostly just sounded like ordinary MTVU-ish shaggy guitar pop to me, but not done especially well. Doesn't have most of the elements I like about SY (or about shaggy guitar pop!). With some exceptions, I generally don't think that straightforward pop/rock songs showcase the band's strengths (which IMO do not include tuneful singing or songcraft in any traditional sense).

Sundar, who else would you nominate? I mean I guess it all depends on how broadly you define "Sonic Youth-style band," but still, I feel like for all their influence they're still in a category fo their own.

It certainly depends, and I'm probably pretty broad (to a point many would find silly) with my definitions, but I pretty much think that most artists working with any of the ideas SY work with are doing more interesting things with them right now. For psychedelic indie sludge, I'd rather listen to Oneida or Dead Meadow. For Branca-ish guitar meltdown in a rock context, I'd rather listen to a Mick Barr project. For epic shoegazing, I'd rather listen to Alcest or Caina. For finely crafted avant-guitar compositions that still rock, I'd rather listen to the Nels Cline Singers; Bill Frisell for ones that are more pretty than rocking, etc. I'd probably even find, say, Deerhoof a more interesting band now.

Sonic Youth do have their own idiosyncratic sound despite all this though, even if it's just a product of their limitations.

(I'm probably burnt out from listening too much for too long, honestly.)

I wish I liked this album more.

"Malibu Gas Station" and "No Way" and "What We Know" are fantastic, among my favorite later SY songs

So the discussion on this thread got me to listen to Rather Ripped and The Eternal. I've actually really been enjoying them! Once you're willing to accept their late-period style, it's clear that they really had mastered it.

the fahey painting is ok but the cover design is pretty shitty imo

it looks like goatse

lol do you guys realize that it's supposedly from a series of painting fahey made with his butt?

― some dude, Friday, 13 February 2009 16:14 (nine years ago) Permalink

for whatever reason this factoid has lodged itself in my brain but i see like no evidence of it online. is it true?

SY made this album with their butt!!

+67 upvotes; -11 downvotes; 2 fp's

i read that elsewhere as well but haven't been able to track down info anywhere xp

interesting article from Simon Reynolds on the artist as consumer re: The Eternal.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2009/apr/07/sonic-youth-underground-influences

― Dan S, Saturday, April 11, 2009 10:26 PM (eleven years ago) bookmarkflaglink

i still dn really know what they're doing here but at least this SR review has this virtue (for all his frequent sniffy undercutting of records just not to his taste that he's found theses to indict them with), that he identifies something for them to be doing:

So The Eternal is literally a self-portrait of the artists as consumers.