Sonic Youth: Classic or Dud/S&D?

their blatent careerism and continued barking for some sort of icon status, it's pathetic. most good alt. bands hit their stride, did it, recorded it, and then went and did something else. not sonic youth. they're different from everybody else. yeah right.

so they need some talent/ideas, recruit o'rourke who sycophantically barks, and still, just like what Phil said upthread, Murray Street is such feeble garbage, so over the hill

they had this sept 11th event that they
(1) cashed in on shamelessly
and
(2) failed to address in any interesting way on the actual record (oh i forgot, unlike downtown bahgdad, disconnection from isp or electricity can be traumatic for americans if they can't sort it out within a few days)

most everybody i know thinks the same thing about sonic youth -- they should have disbanded years ago, have failed to be relevent except to themselves in the last ten years, are not the alt. flag-bearers for all the other bands they purport to be part of some lineage in, and would appear to be nyc scenester middle-class brats with nothing better to do -- why don't they
(1) grow up
and
(2) shut up

isn't Watt in there in the "tuff-titty rap" ? burning up ? but didn't Watt help them around the studio ? if not, who did help them around the studio ? if they can do that stuff themselves why aren't they trying to save the world with rap/pop type stuff that youth might actually be interested in listening to ?

as to DV69, who wrote the words ? who points the gun ? who co-sings ? the riff's the easiest part of the song .. but "you're right" .. who did that, that great middle section ? the idea .. who's idea ? could they have come up with that idea without all five of them ?

if sy could rock like that then why isn't lunch guesting on seminal sy dross like "society is a hole" from that time ?

i'm not sure why above you indicate that "murray street" necessitated some kind of obligation / intent on the part of the band to address 11 sept? had they addressed it only then could you claim that they "cashed in" on it. but, seeing as how they did not address it directly what, exactly, are they cashing in on? and, could you define "cashing in" for me? i'm not intimately familiar with the sales of recent sy albums, but i have a hard time seeing all 5 band members laughing their way to the bank on however many copies of murray st soundscanned.

from what i've read recently nyc ghosts and flowers, murray street and whatever album comes next are a "new york trilogy" of sorts. i am much happier that "murray street" can exist without 11 sept significations than have it be some trite fucking bruce springsteen bullshit.

i often fall into a camp of "x band used to be so good", but belaboring the point really won't convince anyone...

My bridge from Smashing Pumpkins/Soundgarden type stuff when I was fourteen (still love all that, actually) into what was then a novel and unnatural idea to me - that dissonance could sound really great (bridge album: Experimental Jet Set, for what it's worth).

I detest nyc ghosts and flowers, love Sister and DN madly, and love everything else enough to never tire of listening to it.

About image - frankly, they could be the most pretentious indier-than-thou fucks that have ever walked this earth, but the way Cross The Breeze makes me feel when turned up loud outweighs all of that for me.

why call it murray street w/out risking linking the two ? and is disconnection notice not about events in new york ? is it an attitude thing ? 'teenage riot' part two, as some have suggested ?

"cashing in" is a bit strong, but i was expecting something topical or political for part two or three of the 'nyc trilogy' -- they are there, they admit it, i look forward to part three, but was dissapointed by stuff like "radical adults suck .." on part two -- in fact i get angry, visceral for it -- to me they're a different band now, and maybe i'm left feeling dissapointed at perceived indifference in their music to to many things -- perhaps i should drop my lack of indifference to them

i guess that the old sonic youth visceral experiences i have had with ''cross the breeze' will have to wait for part three -- i hope that happens, but sometimes it feels like waiting for part three of the second star wars trilogy

have you some C8703 list you could post ? since the live stuff seems to be what people still like here, and they have a formidable arsenal in their back-catalog.

i've thought about this a lot, mainly be reflecting on various O'Rourke ad Eno projects

i've lost the latest maybe late Stereolab cd (with the 'cul de sac' imagery), but i remember it being sequenced alternating Mcyntire produced/ O'Rourke produced, and i can't quite remember whether it was the O'Rourke re-sequenced on it's own that i like the most, but i really liked one of the sequences a lot more than the other, and i think it was the O'Rourke 'side'

it was a bit like an album where you got to enjoy the "how is the enoffication ?" thing because of the enormous differences between the two sides -- at least it clearly demonstrated how much producers can influence the sound of a group

I think of the key Eno albums of the '70 and the subtle use of synth, as though wiggling a synth filter could be one of those semi-chance operations. jamming real time with most synths is hard, with the EMS thing Eno had being an exception, an exception to almost all synths post-'79 and most other brands before it)

i remember Thustin citing Roxy's first post-Eno album (Stranded, which i still does have at least some Eno ideas or methods on it) as his #3 album of 'influence' in an interview somehwere, so presumably Thustin's a fan of most of that Eno crowd stuff

so why can't SY strip down a bit and become a laptop band ? (and maybe find touring easier ?)

Most rock groups run for some time, admit they've used up their best ideas, stop. Why this eternal youth cult ? A prize for against the odds attitude ? Why doesn't thurst'in do the normal corporate wisdom, move into A&R and actually make some sort of difference, like Ecstatic Peace! and Protest Records, great praiseworthy eforts, (admittedly deferring to others' talents).
How did Kim's art installation go last year ? At least it sounded fun.
But in stark contrast to side-projects and stereolab, thustin's own indie sacred cow group sonic youth, hasn't that been well and truly milked out ?

If i was to see them live, would it be better than the good songs on the records ? When i did see them supposedly "improvise" live on that xpressway song it was fifteen minutes of nowhere. I don't want to see some greatest hits from twenty years ago effort either (just like i don't want to see Bryan Ferry in 2004), and the "strictly 20th c. show" or "strictly rock show" posturing i read about sounded like it took the fun out of both appearances.

Anyway, the best:
Daydream Nation (everyone agrees - hooray!)
Sister
EVOL
Goo
Dirty

honorable mentions to Washing Machine and Experimental/Jet Set/Trash/No Star. A Thousand Leaves was fairly useless, and I haven't gotten around to the last couple records. People seem to approve of Murray Street, maybe I'll get that one...

It occurs to me that the "sonic youth" brand is such a catchy one that they'd rather not drop it, but how about franchising it to some young deserving sonically talented guitar-lap-topper mutants (by which i mean hiring some good songwriters, electro-free-improv composers, etc.., some non-NYC 21st-century youthful people for a bit of positive discrimination)

(anyway, i want O'Rourke to help them become a proper laptop/ guitar band/ collective, since their guitar tunings and "media dialog" seem very exhausted in 2004, by them anyway)

"It seems to me that a lot of the bitterness that gets directed at them - particularly at Thurston - for doing their elder statesmen schtick is coming from people who are just bitter that *anyone* would condescend to adopt such a mantle. "

that would be a hilarious comment from said elder statespeople if it were as immaculate and funny and otm as the whitey album was back then, comment along the lines of "indie" going grunge/electro-rock, and i would be keen to hear it, the whitey album perhaps finally vindicated as the fantastic timepiece it may be, prophet of punk idm.

i'm not bitter about anything particularly here, but i have noticed that i-know-more-records-than-you wise old man thing rolled out for years -- that would be fun if they made it funny -- ie if they hadn't been so po-faced, condescening and conservative in their earnestness all those times they weren't being funny,.. condescending and rude, not all the time, but still often "high art".

i just wished they'd taken more of the people on the comparitively intelligent course they were on circa '90.
In 2003, it's the "free" eps here vs. "artistic freedom" on Geffen there -- i just want to hear some worldly lyrics about current politics in these very strange times -- i want sonic youth to say something about US foreign policy, something i would consider actually taking a risk (as opposed to that "cool" = "slack" work ethic), and i want them to do it on Geffen, not the special EPs (ie not perceived as a throwaway/ work in progress/ improv. sess.)

reflecting on Daydream Nation, it is i suppose by defn. partly inward looking -- well, how inward looking is the american media right now ? watching CNN, Fox and BBC tv, the differences in emphases are quite staggering -- well i suppose everybody who's got cable in the US keeps half an eye on the BBC, right ?

"Sonic Youth", just say something about the current situation, do it on y'r major label Geffen, and get worldwide distribution. That would be what i would expect from some "intelligensia" elder-statesman, especially with said "group" having some A&R input into Geffen.
Rock music that communicates some of the doubts so many people all over the world have about the direction the US is taking right now, uses rock music to get around the media-brick-wall of American media, speaks to general college radio age people and hopefully provokes thought, rather than pandering to collector-completists and critics.

from what you have said Shakey, this experienced well-connected 'round-the-block group ought to be able to do some of that, maybe providing contrast to the sadly blighted-by-circumstance Murray Street. If i didn't think they once did have more stuff to say then _i_ wouldn't expect anything -- that's why i'm dissapointed with the seemingly politically ambiguous Murray Street. Rock music has been such a great political ideas generator in the past, however idealistic some of those ideas. Here's a band with alleged power and creative asylum within Geffen, so why aren't they on MTV ? Why not suspend high art or at least include it in a broader discourse ?

(at least in the UK stereolab can present as real or mock marxists -- would blunt political content from sonic youth however hypothetical be "un-patriotic" right now ? what _is_ their position ? please, someone point me to an interview or reference, anything really, where thust'in has something to say about important stuff like current US foreign policy, an interview where he's not simply hyping stuff like O'Rourke's inclusion or his sept 11 experience)

then you would want New York City Ghosts And Flowers, an explicit comment/attack on the anti-hobo/anti-culture policies of Mayor Giuliani that's beautiful, poetic and angry at the same time. and a fuck of a lot more cogent and insightful than 'Youth Against Fascism'.

I love all their albums. Their last five or so most of all.

I recently read Reynolds' c.1988 (?) Daydream Nation essay. That was bad too, alas.