When I started writing my as yet, probably always doomed to be, unfinished series of blogs under the “Obsessive Album Project”* during lockdown, one of the drivers was the chance to talk about Sonic Youth.
And then, I basically chickened out of doing so. The band were and, even in retirement, continue to be such a part of the cultural landscape, that to try and write about them seemed an impossibly intimidating task. Especially given that the legend Kim Gordon (I may be misremembering this) once opined that nobody had ever written anything good about the band. Also, the fact they had basically been around my whole life – and I had somehow never taken any notice of them at all.
Not until it was way, waaaaaaaay too late and I come across a reference to them in David Stubbs excellent book, Future Days: Krautrock and the Birth of a Revolutionary New Music about five years ago and I thought, “Oh, that sounds interesting!”
The first thing I listened was actually, their side project Ciccone Youth’s Whitey Album, the big hook there being Into the Groovey, which takes Madonna’s Into The Groove, already a killer, and makes it better. Then came Bad Moon Rising and then – well, it was five years ago, I’m not sure I could tell you honestly. Suffice to say I swiftly fell into a Sonic Youth sized rabbit hole and I really only emerged from it relatively recently. But, oh boy, let me tell you, it has been a lot – and I mean A LOT – of fun. Especially Goo – fucking Goo! What a record that is. I mean, how many records will take you from Kim’s homage to Karen Carpenter to a takedown of LL Cool J, helped along by Public Enemy’s Chuck D no less, with only a Mary-Christ to bridge the two tracks? The clever/thick hook of My Friend Goo, “hey Goo, what’s new?” the riffing and the screaming of Mildred Pierce…
I write this blog post a a couple of days after having received the latest recording from their vaults, the infamous, 1986 bootleg Walls Have Ears. Infamous because the band considered its contemporaneous, unauthorised, release a transgression of trust and an assault on their standards of quality control. Nearly 40 years later, the band have come to the view that apparently everyone else who heard it at the time did: here is a vital piece of Sonic Youth history, the transition from no wave to alt. rock happening between your very ears.
That’s what I’ve read anyway. Having not listened to it yet, I couldn’t possibly comment. But, being someone who found myself hopelessly addicted to the dissonant, terrifying Confusion Is Sex a couple of summers ago, whose first Sonic Youth record was the aforementioned, psychedelic Bad Moon Rising and who thinks Evol is up there with the band’s very best records, the period of time occupied by this record is of obvious interest to me – and I can’t wait to dig into it.
And as I write this, I write knowing that I am on the verge of drowning again in the deep waters created by the band, submerging myself in the Diamond Sea, massaging my own history and reinventing myself as an obsessive listener to a band that I’ve only come to know posthumously.
I didn’t mention it above, but another of the reasons I haven’t been listening to Sonic Youth recently is that, despite us being on more or less the same wavelength about any band that means anything to either of us, Jo is very much Sonic Youth sceptic. And I have found this difficult in the way that any man who wants his partner to enjoy the same things he does (“you will pay attention to the Ashes, goddammit!” – I’ve never, ever said or, more importantly, thought that, I promise) does. And so, months ago, I promised Jo a Sonic Youth taster, ten songs that would change her opinion of the band for the better. Every time I listen to them, I am reminded that this is something I’ve not been able to nail down.
For many reasons, really. How many albums did the band put out? Lots. How many songs are there? Loads. How many different moods? Loads. Do I concentrate on the early, no wave stuff that is confrontational, intimidating but, actually might strike a chord with Jo (because she is confrontatio -no, no she isn’t)?
Or do I go with the later, what most people would think of as the imperial, phase running through Daydream Nation to Dirty? How about the more contemplative, relaxed offerings from Murray Street? There’s so much to get through and so many avenues to wander down with this band. I haven’t even mentioned A Thousand Leaves, or the appropriately muscular Rather Ripped and whilst I think I’m safe in saying the Sonic Youth record I’d like to be buried, or cremated with is Goo, definitely Goo, such is my level of confusion, I’ve only got one song from that record on there. After all, I’ve only got one shot at this.
Maybe, though, maybe I’m overthinking this and I just need to get ten songs together and send it her way. I mean, if Sonic Youth are, or were, half the band I think they are/were then I’m worrying about nothing. And if they’re not, then I’ve been worrying about nothing anyway because Jo will discard the playlist in a fraction of the time I’ve been thinking about it.
And like that, I seem to have written myself through a crisis of confidence. Here is the playlist for My Friend Jo.
*I keep thinking I might resurrect this at some point, in a more sensible, less anal way. I just need to work out what this might be!
antstothenational 