Sonic Youth Superstar full#

Sonic Youth’s response to 9/11 offers a simple but affecting plea for unity in the face of horror: “Gather round, gather friend, never fear, never again.” The music, meanwhile, evokes the ghosts of New York’s past: there are moments where the guitars entwine around each other in a way that distinctly recalls Television. Sonic Youth at Pukkelpop festival, Belgium, 1991. Its understated power is exemplified by the languid, Pavement-influenced Sweet Shine, disrupted by Gordon’s sudden shift to throat-shredding howl midway through.

Sweet Shine (1994)Īpparently recorded over the master tape of 1987’s Sister, Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star was a defiantly subdued, refusenik gesture in the wake of the post-Nirvana alt-rock gold rush. As Anti-Orgasm grippingly proves – spiky, clashing guitars heaving, monotonal riff beautiful, off-beam coda – it couldn’t have been the work of anyone else. Sonic Youth’s final album, The Eternal, might have been the most straightforward they ever released, but then again, that’s a relative term.

It starts out like jerky post-punk funk, then suddenly transforms: an unsettling Kim Gordon monologue over brooding, tense, detuned guitar noise. Thrillingly, you can almost hear the band finding themselves as Shaking Hell plays.

Sonic Youth Superstar full#

Sonic Youth’s first full album, Confusion Is Sex, was an abrasive leap forward from their awkward, half-formed debut EP.