Sonic Youth

In the promotional materials that accompany Live in Brooklyn 2011, Sonic Youth guitarist Lee Ranaldo says "It was a pretty magical, if kinda weird day." As far as understatements go, that one's a pretty rich double whammy. When Sonic Youth took the stage at the Williamsburg Waterfront on August 12, it was not only their last U.S. show ever, but it was also a band that was imploding before the crowd's eyes. The marriage of Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore—a relationship which had been both a creative and personal fulcrum of the band's entire history—was ending in a spectacularly acrimonious way, and two months later, the two would announce their separation after 27 years of marriage.

The discography of American rock band Sonic Youth comprises 15 studio albums, seven extended plays, three compilation albums, seven video releases, 21 singles, 46 music videos, ten releases in the Sonic Youth Recordings series, eight official bootlegs, and contributions to 16 soundtracks and other compilations.

“Culled from three 1985 gigs in the UK during a transitional and transcendent time in the band’s story, Sonic Youth’s The Walls Have Ears appeared / disappeared as a 2LP set in 1986, not just a live album but an artful tapestry full of live experimentation with songs, between-song tape segues, darkness, humor and audio verité. It’s now issued for the first time officially under the band’s auspices.

Sonic Youth emerged from the experimental no wave art and music scene in New York before evolving into a more conventional rock band and becoming a prominent member of the American noise rock scene. Sonic Youth have been praised for having "redefined what rock guitar could do" using a wide variety of unorthodox guitar tunings and preparing guitars with objects like drum sticks and screwdrivers to alter the instruments' timbre. The band is considered to be a pivotal influence on the alternative and indie rock movements.

Deluxe Edition 2 CD set features 35 tracks including b-sides and previously unreleased versions. Sonic Youth's second major-label album, produced and mixed by Butch Vig and Andy Wallace (a team that had helped turn Nirvana's NEVERMIND multi-platinum) was not the barefaced bid for mainstream acceptance that surly underground souls grumbled about in the pages of fanzines. While Vig and Wallace give guitarists Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo, bassist Kim Gordon, and phenomenal drummer Steve Shelley a wide-screen panorama for their bizarrely-tuned assaults, DIRTY is probably Sonic Youth's most uncompromising album since 1985's BAD MOON RISING–particularly in the lyrical department. Dropping the deliberate obscurantism, Philip K. Dick references, and smart-alecky snottiness, Sonic Youth brackets a slew of pointed political attacks ("Youth Against Fascism," "Swimsuit Issue," and the Jesse Helms-bashing "Chapel Hill") with two passionate tributes to the band members' murdered friend, Joe Cole ("100%" and "JC"). That DIRTY is Sonic Youth's most commercial-sounding album makes it that much more subversive.

Sonic Youth's 2004 release Sonic Nurse followed Murray Street and together the two are considered by many fans as among the band's best work. These songs mark a return to form for the group, reminiscent of the Sonic Youth of the late 1980s, but honed by several years of experience.

n all-ager-rager in Denver; I am so glad this one is up cuz my late '80s live-tape-swapping-obsessive self has always been hopped up about this 1986 gig.

ミュージカル パ一スペクティブ is the 2000 CD by Kim Gordon, DJ Olive and Ikue Mori, It is the 5th disc in the Sonic Youth Records series of releases and is sometimes called SYR 5 by fans in place of the Japanese title.