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

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.)

so do live versions of any of the new songs exist anywhere?

I remember when I was younger being such an obsessive SY newsgroup/mailing list nerd that I heard a bunch of live recordings of the A Thousand Leaves and NYC Ghosts songs before the albums were out, and ended up being really unsatisfied with the studio recordings for that reason (or maybe not just for that reason? I still don't think those albums feature particularly good performances/production even when I like the material). I'm kinda glad I've been hearing the last few albums in more of a vacuum where I can take them on their own terms.

I'm so stoked that Mark Ibold is now an official member of Sonic Youth; it's like your dopey uncle finally passing the bar or something.

lol. i guess Kim's just so into playing 3rd guitar at this point that they're always going to have a 5th member on bass from now on?

If "Slow Revolution" (the one xclusif from the Starbucks comp) is an indication of The Eternal, this will be awesome. (Granted, "Slow Revolution" is mostly an instrumental.)

fifth member should be dj olive (lol trip hop)

With Michael Duane back in NY (I think) and Ibold bassing for SY, this is the best shot at a Dustdevils reunion that I can imagine. Someone send a plane ticket to Australia.

Didn't hear the last two but I feel ready for new Sonic Youth. Fahey's arsehole art is a subject of great personal interest to me but unfortunately I can't find any information. Tour would be good.

I'm in the excited crowd.

Apart from it being a Fahey arse-painting the cover is dull though.

this site's pretty dope - http://sonicyouth.utkonos.org/lossless/

Did that St@rbuck's comp ever actually come out? I never saw a single copy in any store I stopped in. I'm not a daily coffee fiend, but I stopped by often enough to assume I'd have seen it at some point.

Ha, did I know you in alt.music.sonic-youth days, some dude?

maybe! I know there was one other person on ILM a couple years ago that remembered me from there, can't remember who but I don't think it was you (IIRC my screenname was "hotel opera" and i signed my posts "al").

jvc, it was only available in "New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C."

Dunno if that extends to the entire metropolitan area of each of those cities, but if not, then that might explain it. (I'm most of your Starbucks visits are in the suburbs.)

*I'm assuming most...

Unfortunately they are, that must explain it. I don't think I would have shelled out $16 or whatever for the one unreleased track, but I was wondering why I never came across it.

Malibu Gas Station (feat. Ludacris & Jeremy Piven)

free live record when you order the eternal, sounds pretty cool

For the curious (and those who wish to mock), here's where the "leaky lifeboat" reference comes from in Gregory Corso's poem "For Homer," written, I think in the '80s or early '90s.

For Homer

by Gregory Corso

There’s rust on the old truths

-Ironclad clichés erode

New lies don’t smell as nice

as new shoes

I’ve years of poems to type up

40 years of smoking to stop

I’ve no steady income

No home

And because my hands are autochthonic

I can never wash them enough

I feel dumb

I feel like an old mangy bull

crashing through the red rag

of an alcoholic day

Yet it’s all so beautiful

isn’t it?

How perfect the entire system of things

The human body

all in proportion to its form

Nothing useless

Truly as though a god had indeed warranted it so

And the sun for day the moon for night

And the grass the cow the milk

That we all in time die.

You’d think there would be chaos

the futility of it all.

But children are born

oft times spitting images of us

And the inequities

millions doled one

nilch for another

both in the same leaky lifeboat

I’ve no religion

and I’d as soon worship Hermes

And there is no tomorrow

there’s only right here and now

you and whomever you’re with

alive as always

and ever ignorant of that death you’ll never know

And all’s well that is done

A Hellene happiness pervades the peace

and the gift keeps on coming…

a work begun splendidly done

To see people aware & kind

at ease and contain’d of wonder

like the dreams of the blind

The heavens speak through our lips

All’s caught what could not be found

All’s brought what was left behind

Wow, it took about 50 seconds of the "montage" of that album to convince me that I never need to hear it. Thank you, montage.

really? ah, well, I liked the way a lot of those snippets sounded ... maybe a little throwback to Goo-era stuff? Trashier?