Sonic Youth

If the main obstacle to grasping the full enjoyment of EVOL was its drab, tedious, exasperated lyrics, then Sister is a full rectification of that, plus more. Those same vocals may well still be just as shrouded in reverb, but this time they’re actually interesting. Performed with a delivery that could be seen as a prelude to the unrivalled Stephen Malkmus, and over instrumentals that are infinitely more captivating and memorable, Sister is by all means an impressive forward move.

Perhaps it’s the Philip K. Dick concept album-like thingy (that Sister isn’t really committed to but whose glamour it thrives off) that spurs this creative leap; but more likely it’s the actual music that makes it such a forward bound from EVOL. Throttling noise pop, Sonic Youth maintain the same aggression of previous records but focus on more melodic and memorable instrumental phases. Sister is a near-flawless post-punk noise pop record, a moment of realisation for a band that had previously done little of lasting relevance.

Despite the new wave style of their previous records, somehow Sister has far more urgency to it. It’s the rapid tunefulness of ‘(I Got A) Catholic Block’ that pummels the listener, rather than any sludging atonality of their previous work; while the breaks in pacing prove rather pleasant sidesteps to make those tuneful bursts even more ecstatic. Compared with the brash experimentalism of EVOL, here Sonic Youth feel like a genuinely and deliberately inventive band rather than a series of lucky mistakes.

Furthermore, no other albums in the incredibly vague genre of “post-punk” come close to sounding like Sister does. It’s the guitars that make this distinction, an unceremonious tone combined with a very certain niche of experimental play. Within this play, the temperament of heavily distorted work with more intricate sections is melded in a particular way that hadn’t been done before and many have failed to do since.  

Sister isn’t completely without faults, but it’s pretty close. Minus the pretty cheesy cover of Crime’s ‘Hot Wire the Heart’ and a couple of tracks that aren’t quite as brilliant as the rest, it’s better than any could have expected following EVOL and a straight-cut post-punk classic.

#34 - Sonic Youth - Sonic Nurse (2004)

Sonic Nurse was Sonic Youth’s 13th (of 15) and represented the band at an evergreen state. after a troubled period in the 90’s providing some mixed work, the turn of the century became highly fruitful for the band, in tragic circumstances. 2002’s Murray Street, the band’s ode to New York City post 9/11, saw the band revitalised with the sort of energy barely seen since Daydream Nation let alone Dirty. It came after what will probably go down as the band’s least successful period (Experimental Jet Set through to NYC Ghosts & Flowers - bar Washing Machine) but it was a necessary period of exorcism in order to get to this wonderfully revitalised late period of the band.

Murray Street saw the band still daydreaming, but writing with some of the most captivating song-structures and melodies the band had ever capitalised. Sonic Nurse however goes a step back to go forward (which they went even further back on the power-pop Rather Ripped) in that it has echoes of the great Evol or Sister but nearly two decades of experience added. Sonic Nurse in many ways is one of the most rewarding Youth albums in that it keeps it’s noodling to a manageable level, produces some wonderfully constructed songs, and is quite possibly the best produced record of their tenure.

On Sonic Nurse, as you may expect from a band playing together for just over 20 years at this stage, everyone seems to in tune with each other. Every song comes together with such precision but without forgetting the ability to still excite after all this time. So many songs, like “Pattern Recognition” or “Dripping Dream” or “Stones” just show the band at their absolute best. The clear stand though, belongs to the quieter Lee Ranaldo who always pops up just when you’ve started to forget his influence. “Paper Cup Exit” sits near the end of the record but it sums up everything that is great about Sonic Nurse and a lot about the band and what they became. It belongs in the bands annuals of one of their greatest works as it builds from it’s humble beginning to an explosion of sound and vision, all the while keeping one of the band’s catchiest yet subtle melodies they would ever create.