Music

Sonic Youth: Three Decades of Dissonance

Thirty essential songs by the indie institution

March 28, 2012

This month marks the 30th anniversary of Sonic Youth's first EP in 1982. Though the band started out as part of the No Wave scene in downtown Manhattan, they evolved into one of the best and most innovative guitar bands of all time. Over the course of a catalog that includes 15 studio albums and a number of side projects, experimental EPs and soundtracks, the group has explored the possibilities of abrasive dissonance, pushed the limits of punk rock and created elaborate tapestries of overlapping melodies. Click through for a guided tour of their discography, with highlights from all of their major works over the past three decades.

By Matthew Perpetua

‘The Burning Spear’

Sonic Youth began their career with this propulsive, dub-tinged rocker from their debut EP. Whereas the studio version was fairly clean, the group's live arrangement, which you can check out in this footage from 1992, is exceptionally loud and abrasive.
‘Making the Nature Scene’

This track from Confusion Is Sex, the band's first proper album, was inspired by Kim Gordon's impression of Manhattan in the early Eighties. This footage of the song was filmed during the quartet's first tour of Europe in 1983.
‘Brother James’

"Brother James," an intense punk tune with a churning, menacing guitar hook, has been a staple of the band's setlists since it debuted in the early Eighties. This performance, filmed during their tour of Europe in support of Goo, was featured in the documentary 1991: The Year Punk Broke.
‘Death Valley 69’

"Death Valley 69," the single from Sonic Youth's grim 1985 album Bad Moon Rising, is the band's finest merger of punk rock and horror movie aesthetics. This rendition, filmed live at the Summer Sonic Festival in Japan in 2009, stretches out into a cathartic noise jam.
‘Shadow of a Doubt’

"Shadow of a Doubt" reimagines Alfred Hitchcock's 1950 thriller Strangers on a Train as an erotic fantasy, setting Kim Gordon's breathy, passionate vocals against a lovely, strangely tuned guitar.
‘Tom Violence’

"Tom Violence," the opening cut of the quartet's 1986 record EVOL, is a rumbling mid-tempo number that depicts the inner life of a young punk as a sort of waking nightmare.
‘Expressway to Yr Skull’

"Expressway to Yr Skull," a dreamy quasi-ballad that ends with an extended outro of lightly humming noise, is said to be Neil Young's favorite Sonic Youth number. The song has been a staple of their live set through the years, typically closing out shows with up to 10 minutes of meditative droning.
‘Schizophrenia’

The opening cut from 1987's Sister was a breakthrough for the band, with an elaborate instrumental section bridging the gap between verses sung by Thurston Moore at the start and Kim Gordon at the end.
‘Cotton Crown’

"Cotton Crown," a ballad sung as a duet by Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore, is the band's most overtly romantic tune. It's not sappy, though, as lyrics about love being "like a wish coming true" is balanced out with more surreal lines like "New York City is forever kitty / I'm wasted in time and you're never ready."
‘White Cross’

This punk thrasher from Sister, inspired by Thurston Moore's experiences as a kid in Catholic school, has been one of the band's go-to rock tunes since its debut in 1987.
‘Teenage Riot’

The opening track from Sonic Youth's masterwork Daydream Nation is one of the band's most recognizable and tuneful tracks, with a highly hummable melody spreading out over dense tangles of rhythm and melody.
‘Candle’

"Candle" is one of the group's most stunning compositions, with guitarists Lee Ranaldo and Thurston Moore firing off enough beautiful melodic arpeggios and crunchy riffs to fill out an entire album in just five minutes.
‘Eric’s Trip’

Lee Ranaldo sang a bit on Sonic Youth records prior to Daydream Nation, but his contributions to that album signalled a new level of craft and confidence. "Eric's Trip," arguably his finest song, is a propulsive rocker with a dramatic noise part performed by Thurston Moore running a drum stick over his guitar's fretboard.
‘Kool Thing’

Sonic Youth his the big time with "Kool Thing," the first single from their major label debut Goo. The song has become a feminist anthem, with Gordon raging against "male white corporate oppression."
‘Mote’

Lee Ranaldo's "Mote" merges the muscular, heavy sound of the Goo era with introspective lyrics and an ingratiating pop melody.
‘100%’

Thurston Moore may be the one singing "100%," but its lyrics – which pay tribute to the band's murdered friend Joe Cole and feature the immortal line "I've been around the world a million times and all you men are slime" – were penned by Kim Gordon. The song has become one of their best live numbers, in part because it gives Moore an excuse to ham it up onstage.
‘Drunken Butterfly’

This performance from a 1992 episode of Even Later with Jools Holland finds the band ripping through the Dirty single "Drunken Butterfly" at their most glammed-out.
‘Sugar Kane’

"Sugar Kane," a song that nods in the direction of both the Velvet Underground and Marilyn Monroe, is one of the band's most straightforward pop songs, even with its extended instrumental middle section.
‘Bull in the Heather’

The lead single from 1993's Experimental Jet Set Trash and No Star is one of the band's most graceful combinations of pop songwriting and off-kilter experimental noise, with some of the song's best hooks coming out of unorthodox guitar techniques set against a galloping beat.
‘Starfield Road’

"Starfield Road" is just over two minutes long, but there's a lot going on – wailing drones, a section that sounds like a busted fax machine and a punk rock nursery rhyme that ends with Thurston Moore shouting, "Ahh, ye butt cheeks can't be tamed as I splooey my name in flame!"
‘The Diamond Sea’

Sonic Youth ended every gig on their headlining Lollapalooza tour with "The Diamond Sea," a 30-minute epic. Even though it ended with over 15 minutes of freeform noise and was unreleased at the time, it was a major crowd-pleaser.
‘Skip Tracer’

Lee Ranaldo's "Skip Tracer" has become one of the band's most-played songs from the Nineties. The tune zooms forward with increasing momentum before reaching its climax as he greets the future: "Hello 2015!"
‘Washing Machine’

Sonic Youth were so enamored of "Washing Machine" that they briefly considered changing their name to that, but they settled on using it as the title of their 1995 album. The song, with its jagged rhythms and spacey sections, is one of the group's most ambitious compositions with Kim Gordon on vocals.
‘The Ineffable Me’

"The Ineffable Me" started off as an 18-minute instrumental jam called "Slaapkamers Met Slagroom" on the SYR2 EP, but it was pared down into a vicious, volatile rocker for the band's underrated 1998 album A Thousand Leaves.
‘Free City Rhymes’

The band's beatnik-inspired NYC Ghosts and Flowers is their most divisive record, with some fans going so far as to say it's the worst thing they've ever done. That's a bit harsh, particularly when the LP contains a song as pretty and gentle as the opening track, "Free City Rhymes."
‘The Empty Page’

Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon moved to suburban Massachusetts to raise their daughter Coco in the early 2000s. That change of scenery led to Murray Street, a mellow, pastoral record that was nevertheless recorded in Manhattan before and after the hysteria of 9/11.
‘I Love You Golden Blue’

Sonic Youth opened every night of their tour in support of Sonic Nurse with "I Love You Golden Blue," a spacey ballad sung by Kim Gordon that echoed their older song "Shadow of a Doubt" while pushing them into uncharted territory with live keyboards.
‘Jams Run Free’

"Jams Run Free," a moody ballad with a galloping beat recalling "Bull in the Heather," was a highlight of Rather Ripped, the band's most straightforward rock record in years.
‘Incinerate’

"Incinerate" is prime late-period Sonic Youth – confident, relaxed and effortlessly tuneful. This performance from British television circa 2006 features former Pavement member Mark Ibold on bass.
‘Calming the Snake’

Depending on whether or not the recently separated Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore can reconcile their differences, 2009's The Eternal could end up being Sonic Youth's final album. If so, they went out on a high note, particularly in harrowing rockers like the Gordon-sung "Calming the Snake."