SYR
Rock N' Roll is a young girls game, many will tell you. And sure, there's plenty of evidence to back that up. But hey, it ain't necessarily so and Sonic Youth is a textbook example of how to age gracefully as a Rock band. That they have remained relevant for nearly 30 years is even more impressive given the bands roots in No Wave, a scene that was hardwired to self-destruct and ended up with about the same shelf life as shellfish.
There are plenty of naysayers out there who write off everything the band did after Sister, or Daydream, or Evol, or after they signed to Geffen, or whatever. Bollocks I say. The band has managed the highwire act of growing without losing what made them great to begin with. The more nihilistic noise tendencies of their earlier work have morphed into emphasis on songwriting and drawn out pastoral soundscapes, but overall, the major components of the Sonic Youth sound have changed little over the years. Few bands have been able to maintain a sound for so long without becoming a boring caricature of themselves. Hell, 28 years in, even the Stones were starting to lose it. The Fall, maybe, But overall Mark E. Smith's output hasn't been anywhere near as consistent over the years.
These two tracks come from the Rather Ripped sessions and are quite a bit rawer than anything that showed up on that album. A lot of people found the record to be a bit too mellow and there was talk in some circles that they where getting old, going soft, or getting boring. I can't help but wonder if the simultaneous release of this single wasn't meant as a reminder, to anyone who might doubt it, that the Youth ain't lost shit over the years.
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