Along with The Cure and The Pixies, Sonic Youth really forged my prime musical youth… My first live gig – I must have been 12 years old or something – was one of Sonic Youth in Deinze, with another indie band with which the New York no-wavers are still collaborating on various levels, namely Pavement, as a support act. And what a fuken master gig it was !!!
Though they were more or less mainstream bands (except for their earlier LP’s) while being undergroundish at the same time, these bands were aired regularly on television, especially in dedicated programs such as MTV Europe’s legendary “120 minutes” with Paul King. This was a time where experimenting was still hip, where audiences weren’t considered as a bunch of walking Visa cards and where music was about sharing real emotions… That’s why I’m really pissed at the so-called modern Gaga-era, where everything is show-off, theatre and big doe !!!
Mind you : there are terrific new bands around, but they can’t rely on the mainstream media to be heard. Furthermore, I don’t have anything against the Gaga-creature in particular : in a few years, she’ll probably come to understand how she was used and misused as a cheap market thing… No, it’s the unanimity, the reverence, the cult of void and fake that I can’t stand, because it makes sharing music and feelings between people impossible !
Sonic Youth leaving Geffen could only have a positive impact on the “indie degree” of their music, as their latest LP, “The Eternal“, clearly shows, cuz I must confess I briefly hooked off after “Washing Machine“…
All the band’s members are plural artists (making collages, paintings, etc.) and also have their numerous side projects. Besides Thurston’s, check out his wife Kim Gordon’s resume, as well as Lee Ranaldo’s…
As far as the former is concerned, his solo project ( There are others, Dim Stars for instance…) started in 1995 with “Psychic Hearts“, an album that could have been written by and for SY. From then on, Turston’s been navigating between intimist songs (as in “Trees Outside The Academy“), highly experimental stuff that could almost be considered contemporary music (the genre !) (as in “My Cat Is An Alien“) and even pop rock / electronica fusion collabs with some masters of the genre, in “Root” : there seem to be no boundaries to his creativity…
____________________
Sonic Youth : http://www.sonicyouth.com/
Thurston Moore’s own label : http://www.ecstaticpeace.com/
The Belgian musical goldmine : www.lamediatheque.be