Sonic Youth: From The Basement session

Brio · November 2022

Trawling YouTube for Sonic Youth footage I stumbled on a grunge/alt channel with some stuff I liked…. Live studio performances.

Check it out. Or Not.

From The Basement

Vintage65 · November 2022

Nice find.

ewal · November 2022

Never really listened to how Thurston and Lee's guitars interact before. Even though I've been a fan since Bad Moon Rising. It's very clear on this recording.

jonnyburgo · November 2022

I like elements of Sonic Youth and certain songs but they've always struck me as being self consciously too cool for school, I saw a video of Iggy and Thurston at Iggy's house and Iggy starts singing Johnny B Goode (iirc) with Thurston playing along and he cannot play it, he seemed very embarrased and like a fish out of water. Maybe he just can't play "normally" he's certainly inventive and more of a textural/noise player, whereas someone like Nels Cline can play all that trad stuff and the stuff that sounds like you are just a bit rubbish.

stickyfiddle · November 2022

From the Basement is a great series - created by NIgel Godrich iirc.

I must say I can't figure out Sonic Youth. I've tried but it's just too close to a bunch of noise without a song for my tastes. I know that's kinda the point but it doesn't work for me.

26.2 · November 2022

stickyfiddle said:

From the Basement is a great series - created by NIgel Godrich iirc.

I must say I can't figure out Sonic Youth. I've tried but it's just too close to a bunch of noise without a song for my tastes. I know that's kinda the point but it doesn't work for me.

The last couple of albums, Rather Ripped and The Eternal show just how good they could be when they ditched the noise for noise sake.

I do kinda like the noise though…..

ewal · November 2022

I first saw Sonic Youth in 1986 at the now legendary club night (well at least for Glasgow music fans of a particular age) - Splash One. It transformed music for me. They were probably at their noisiest round about then, so to my ears they have done lots since that I'd categorise as straightforward garage/alt rock, interspersed with their more extreme noise rock epics of course. One of the reasons I loved them so much was their ability to combine rock/punk styles with more extreme noise.

I think a band like Mogwai are similar in that regard - lots of their music is actually pretty conventional, but still capable of an extreme very few other bands can match. I love that.

Edited to add: I think you need to see bands like Sonic Youth live volume to hear them at their best.