Certain Songs

Certain Songs #2357: Sonic Youth – “Teresa’s Sound-World”

May 9, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Dirty
Year: 1992

. . .

A lot happened between the the 1990 release of Goo and the 1992 release of Dirty. And I mean a lot a lot. First off, they toured with Neil Young, a long time hero of both Steve Shelley and Lee Ranaldo. This was the first time Sonic Youth opened for someone of Neil’s stature, and it was during the tour for Ragged Glory, perhaps the noisiest album Neil ever made.

And while Neil’s crew gave the band problems at first, to the point where they wanted to leave the tour, Neil — who apparently loved “Expressway to Yr. Skull” — and helped them out.

Certain Songs #2356: Sonic Youth – “Disappearer”

April 29, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Goo
Year: 1990

. . .

One thing I think I always knew, but just now came to the forefront of my consciousness is just how evocative many of the song titles on Goo were. I mean, “Mary-Christ,” “Mote,” “Cinderella’s Big Score” and “Titanium Expose” are all A+ song titles, evoking images and sounds even before you actually hear the song.

As is “Disappearer,” which — compared to the previous three songs from Goo I’ve written about — seems like it might be a deep cut, but was actually the second single from Goo. And while I always thought that “Disappearer” was about being kidnapped by UFOs from the perspective of the UFOs, that was because I really didn’t listen to Thurston Moore’s lyrics, which were kinda buried in the mix,
Quite literally, the only words I knew were these:

Certain Songs #2355: Sonic Youth – “Kool Thing”

April 28, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Goo
Year: 1990

. . .

There is, of course, a lot of backstory surrounding what was Sonic Youth’s first single and video for their evil major label. And my favorite detail is Bon Jovi, but we’ll get to that.

It’s not really surprising that as experimental noisemakers, Sonic Youth would like some of the harder-slapping hip-hop songs that were showing up in the second half of the 1980s, especially the big beats and loud guitars Rick Rubin added to those early Run-DMC, LL Cool J, and Beastie Boys albums. Not to mention how Public Enemy quite literally brought the noise on It Takes A Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, the other revolutionary album from 1988.

Certain Songs #2354: Sonic Youth – “Tunic (Song For Karen)”

April 27, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Goo
Year: 1990

. . .

Not only is “Tunic (Song For Karen)” my favorite Sonic Youth song, I think that — with the exception of “Alex Chilton” by The Replacements — it might be my favorite tribute song any musician recorded about another one. And “Tunic” has a much higher degree of difficulty: after all, in 1987, there was a natural crossover between Replacements fans and Big Star fans.

Not so much with Sonic Youth and The Carpenters three years later.

Certain Songs #2353: Sonic Youth – “Dirty Boots”

April 26, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Goo
Year: 1990

. . .

And so while Sonic Youth spent their first decade bouncing from indie label to indie label to indie label, after Daydream Nation was released, they followed in the footsteps of peers like X, The Replacements, Hüsker Dü and most recently, R.E.M., and signed with a major label. While that trio all ended up at Warner Bros or their subsidiary Sire, Sonic Youth went with DGC, the newest label formed by David Geffen.

Yes, the same David Geffen who once sued Neil Young for the sin of not making what Geffen considered “Neil Young Albums,” but of course I’m assuming that as the underground burbled above the surface, Sonic Youth had ironclad artistic freedom in their contract — which they threatened to test by considering naming their debut Blowjob? but wisely changed to Goo.

Certain Songs #2352: Sonic Youth – “Kissability”

April 25, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Daydream Nation
Year: 1988

. . .

The first song on side four of Daydream Nation — and the last song before the prog-bating Trilogy of songs that closed the record — was Kim Gordon’s anti-casting couch screed, “Kissability,” which was both the shortest (not counting the answering machine recording with effects “Providence”) and the most intense song on the album.

Certain Songs #2351: Sonic Youth – “Candle”

April 22, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Daydream Nation
Year: 1988

One of the cool things about Daydream Nation was that there are a lot of musical motifs that Sonic Youth repeat, only each time those motifs are slightly different. More than one song opens with lazily strummed guitars before the noise kicks in, or maybe they work weird time signatures during the opening instrumental parts, or maybe those opening instrumental parts go on for a very long time. Or in the case of “Candle,” all of the above!

Certain Songs #2350: Sonic Youth – “Cross The Breeze”

April 21, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Daydream Nation
Year: 1988

. . .

After the incredibly stellar first side of Daydream Nation — “Teen Age Riot,” “Silver Rocket” and “The Sprawl,” for those of you keeping score at home — they kept the streak going with the utterly gobsmacking “Cross The Breeze,” which is basically a cross between hardcore and prog, showing off the band’s chops while at the same time drilling through the center of the planet.

Or at least that’s what the instrumental parts sound like to me.

Certain Songs #2349: Sonic Youth – “The Sprawl”

April 20, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Daydream Nation
Year: 1988

. . .

And so it was probably lost to nobody that the longest song on Sonic Youth’s longest album to date was called “The Sprawl,” a reference to the setting of William Gibson’s initial cyberpunk trilogy, and the third straight Daydream Nation track with sci-fi overtones.

“The Sprawl” is a two-part epic which starts with a blistering humming Thurston Moore riff that never seems to resolve properly, propelled by Steve Shelley and Kim Gordon playing fast beats. (I initially wrote “fast beasts,” which would also work.) This first half of “The Sprawl” doesn’t isn’t as manic as “Silver Rocket,” but it’s still plenty fast, and Kim Gordon doesn’t even bother worrying about rhyming her words in the first verse.

Certain Songs #2348: Sonic Youth – “Silver Rocket”

April 19, 2022 by Jim Connelly

Album: Daydream Nation
Year: 1988

. . .

If Daydream Nation’s opening track “Teen Age Riot” was the sound of an alternative nation daydreaming about President Mascis, then the second song (and second single) “Silver Rocket” did everything it could to dissipate that dream, starting with a peal of feedback and a silvery picking riff from Thurston Moore, which instantly heads into lightspeed hardcore territory, with drummer Steven Shelley smashing his snare drum to bits while Lee Ranaldo tosses out his own bits of silver and gold and Thurston Moore breathlessly intones the lyrics.