Sonic Youth

[battery chucka' one]

Somebody please explain to me the fascination with these guys (and girls). Out of tune noise is all I hear. Thank you in advance.

[Rack Fu]

Many of us already had this conversation with you a year or two ago. Go search those posts and go nuts.

Alternatively, you could look up your previous comments about how great Poison and Cinderella were and then spend a second or two wondering why you should go fuck yourself.

[battery chucka' one]

Many of us already had this conversation with you a year or two ago. Go search those posts and go nuts.

Alternatively, you could look up your previous comments about how great Poison and Cinderella were and then spend a second or two wondering why you should go fuck yourself.

So you see, you don't understand the fascination with them either. By the way, the emperor's not wearing any clothes, regardless of what the crowd says.

[BSmack]

Many of us already had this conversation with you a year or two ago. Go search those posts and go nuts.

Alternatively, you could look up your previous comments about how great Poison and Cinderella were and then spend a second or two wondering why you should go fuck yourself.

So you see, you don't understand the fascination with them either. By the way, the emperor's not wearing any clothes, regardless of what the crowd says.

"Regardless of what the crowd says"???

Are you fucking high? Poison and Cinderella outsold Sonic Youth about 8 billion to one. "The crowd" was all about hair metal.

[Rack Fu]

Many of us already had this conversation with you a year or two ago. Go search those posts and go nuts.

Alternatively, you could look up your previous comments about how great Poison and Cinderella were and then spend a second or two wondering why you should go fuck yourself.

So you see, you don't understand the fascination with them either.

The 12 SY albums I own say otherwise.

[battery chucka' one]

Many of us already had this conversation with you a year or two ago. Go search those posts and go nuts.

Alternatively, you could look up your previous comments about how great Poison and Cinderella were and then spend a second or two wondering why you should go fuck yourself.

So you see, you don't understand the fascination with them either. By the way, the emperor's not wearing any clothes, regardless of what the crowd says.

"Regardless of what the crowd says"???

Are you fucking high? Poison and Cinderella outsold Sonic Youth about 8 billion to one. "The crowd" was all about hair metal.

Ahh yes. I agree. However, the 'crowd' of music critics was always propping up SY as 'cutting edge' while hair/glam metal was always demonized as irrelevant. And I just don't get it. I just want to know what Sonic Youth fans see in this band.

[battery chucka' one]

Many of us already had this conversation with you a year or two ago. Go search those posts and go nuts.

Alternatively, you could look up your previous comments about how great Poison and Cinderella were and then spend a second or two wondering why you should go fuck yourself.

So you see, you don't understand the fascination with them either.

The 12 SY albums I own say otherwise.

Yes. You own them. But do you know why you like them? That's what I'm trying to understand. Thank you in advance for your insight. And I've heard plenty of VU if you want to use that as a springboard. Fallen Angels were a far superior VU influenced band, if you want my opinion.

[BSmack]

Ahh yes. I agree. However, the 'crowd' of music critics was always propping up SY as 'cutting edge' while hair/glam metal was always demonized as irrelevant. And I just don't get it. I just want to know what Sonic Youth fans see in this band.

Really? Which obviously means that because Rolling Stone or Spin slagged your heroes ALL critics are slagged them? You seem to forget that there are people who LIVED though the worst of the hair band crap and that we know that the bullshit you're peddling about "everybody" listening to or pimping alt rock is a bunch of poorly thought out crap.

The facts are that very few people, critics or otherwise, were giving bands like Sonic Youth, Husker Du, The Bad Brains etc... any kind of respect. To even listen to them in most cities required that you listen to a crappy low power college station on the low end of the FM dial who's DJs alternately sounded like they were either reading their between song banter from cue cards or sounded like they had just finished hitting a gravity bong. You never heard them on MTV or any other form of commercial rock radio and their albums and tours were promoted almost entirely through college radio, playbills and word of mouth. The lone exception to the rule were a few music critics for Rolling Stone, Spin and some other east and west coast mags who, in the back pages of magazines littered with stories about and interviews with top stars of the day, would give a few paragraphs worth of praise to these bands otherwise totally unknown to the general public.

But even those critics hardly represented ALL the critics. Obviously you never read Circus or Cream in the 80s. Never mind Metal Edge or any of the gaggle of guitar mags. There were plenty of critics who jumped all over the glam/hair bandwagon, if only to get a sloppy 5th or 6th from some of their groupies.

[battery chucka' one]

That's just totally false. The Minneapolis scene was glommed onto by the entire music press. Circus, Metal Edge, and Hit Parader were anomalies. I remember when Rolling Stone desired that heavy metal go away with an article on Motley Crue stating that it's loud, rude, and won't go away. 120 Minutes was started mid-80's on MTV. They created Headbangers Ball as a place to toss the hair bands.

[Rack Fu]

Ahh yes. I agree. However, the 'crowd' of music critics was always propping up SY as 'cutting edge' while hair/glam metal was always demonized as irrelevant. And I just don't get it. I just want to know what Sonic Youth fans see in this band.

Really? Which obviously means that because Rolling Stone or Spin slagged your heroes ALL critics are slagged them? You seem to forget that there are people who LIVED though the worst of the hair band crap and that we know that the bullshit you're peddling about "everybody" listening to or pimping alt rock is a bunch of poorly thought out crap.

The facts are that very few people, critics or otherwise, were giving bands like Sonic Youth, Husker Du, The Bad Brains etc... any kind of respect. To even listen to them in most cities required that you listen to a crappy low power college station on the low end of the FM dial who's DJs alternately sounded like they were either reading their between song banter from cue cards or sounded like they had just finished hitting a gravity bong. You never heard them on MTV or any other form of commercial rock radio and their albums and tours were promoted almost entirely through college radio, playbills and word of mouth. The lone exception to the rule were a few music critics for Rolling Stone, Spin and some other east and west coast mags who, in the back pages of magazines littered with stories about and interviews with top stars of the day, would give a few paragraphs worth of praise to these bands otherwise totally unknown to the general public.

But even those critics hardly represented ALL the critics. Obviously you never read Circus or Cream in the 80s. Never mind Metal Edge or any of the gaggle of guitar mags. There were plenty of critics who jumped all over the glam/hair bandwagon, if only to get a sloppy 5th or 6th from some of their groupies.

Well said.

[Rack Fu]

That's just totally false. The Minneapolis scene was glommed onto by the entire music press. Circus, Metal Edge, and Hit Parader were anomalies. I remember when Rolling Stone desired that heavy metal go away with an article on Motley Crue stating that it's loud, rude, and won't go away. 120 Minutes was started mid-80's on MTV. They created Headbangers Ball as a place to toss the hair bands.

For Headbangers Ball, the carrot dangling from the stick was throwing in a large mix of hair bands to placate pop metal fans while giving everyone a good dose of real metal music. What I always found odd was that they even bothered playing the hair metal crap to begin with on that show. Wasn't that stuff already in very heavy rotation on MTV to begin with? It's not like 120 Minutes played U2 videos all the time since you could see those videos on MTV whenever you'd like.

[Shoalzie]

I'm kind of on a lo-fi kick right now. A band that has been in rotation with me has been Times New Viking.

[Dinsdale]

BCO, Stryper was in Falls Church last week. I'm sure they missed your presence.

Any time someone can pull off a "you listen to Stryper" blast within the context of a thread, it will generally garner an auto-RACK from me.




RACK


Dropping it on Siggy is just icing on the cake/Cheeze Whiz on the cheesesteak.

[BSmack]

That's just totally false. The Minneapolis scene was glommed onto by the entire music press.

No, really they were not. Unless you count Prince and Morris Day as part of that scene.

Circus, Metal Edge, and Hit Parader were anomalies.

They were hardly anomalies. They represented a fair amount of the newsprint dedicated to covering the music scene of the day. Along with Creem, Guitar for Practicing Musician and a whole fucking boatload of other magazines I am certain that Van plastered all over his bedroom walls.

I remember when Rolling Stone desired that heavy metal go away with an article on Motley Crue stating that it's loud, rude, and won't go away.

So what? To this day I don't know anyone who subscribed to Rolling Stone. Certainly not the folks I knew who listened to Sonic Youth. In my own lifetime I have bought maybe 10 copies of the magazine, usually when there was a Hunter Thompson article in the magazine. I've bought even fewer copies of Spin. Yet you read these magazines who continually berate your tastes in music? Please, tell me why? Is it so that you can justify listening to wankers wearing ass-less spandex pants and more makeup than Tammy Faye Baker as a form of "rebellion"?

120 Minutes was started mid-80's on MTV. They created Headbangers Ball as a place to toss the hair bands.

Sorry, almost forgot about 120 minutes. Once a week, for 2 hours in the middle of the night when I was usually (along with the rest of us who had lives) either putting a good buzz on or getting in some chick's pants, MTV decided to play something other than hair metal, top 40 or dance music. But I'm glad you remember it. It speaks volumes to who was having more fun in the 80s.

[battery chucka' one]

Next thing you know, BCO will say he just doesn't get Dinosaur Jr. either.

BCO, Stryper was in Falls Church last week. I'm sure they missed your presence.

Not a Stryper fan. Great voice. One (kinda') decent album. The rest was rather forgetable. How was the show? Did you enjoy it?

[battery chucka' one]

That's just totally false. The Minneapolis scene was glommed onto by the entire music press.

No, really they were not. Unless you count Prince and Morris Day as part of that scene.

Never heard of Husker Du, Replacements? There's a bigger list, but that's for another time. The Athens scene was pretty big too, from what I remember.

Circus, Metal Edge, and Hit Parader were anomalies.

They were hardly anomalies. They represented a fair amount of the newsprint dedicated to covering the music scene of the day. Along with Creem, Guitar for Practicing Musician and a whole fucking boatload of other magazines I am certain that Van plastered all over his bedroom walls.

I remember when Rolling Stone desired that heavy metal go away with an article on Motley Crue stating that it's loud, rude, and won't go away.

So what? To this day I don't know anyone who subscribed to Rolling Stone. Certainly not the folks I knew who listened to Sonic Youth. In my own lifetime I have bought maybe 10 copies of the magazine, usually when there was a Hunter Thompson article in the magazine. I've bought even fewer copies of Spin. Yet you read these magazines who continually berate your tastes in music? Please, tell me why? Is it so that you can justify listening to wankers wearing ass-less spandex pants and more makeup than Tammy Faye Baker as a form of "rebellion"?

I only know of the article because the Crue was on the cover. It was on the inside of their Decade of Decadence album in a collage. However, I have never read the article. I read Rolling Stone several times. Never really found anything that appealed to me within those pages.

120 Minutes was started mid-80's on MTV. They created Headbangers Ball as a place to toss the hair bands.

Sorry, almost forgot about 120 minutes. Once a week, for 2 hours in the middle of the night when I was usually (along with the rest of us who had lives) either putting a good buzz on or getting in some chick's pants, MTV decided to play something other than hair metal, top 40 or dance music. But I'm glad you remember it. It speaks volumes to who was having more fun in the 80s.

I believe it was on Sunday nights. But you apparently didn't enjoy it. Neither did I, for that matter. Hearing the Jesus and Mary Chain really didn't really do it for me. The Church, either. Lewis Largent was annoying in the days that I remember it. But then, what do you expect from a program director at KROQ (alternative radio LA)?

[battery chucka' one]

All this discussion of the 80's is neither here nor there. Let's get back to the grind:

Can any Sonic Youth fans PLEASE explain what the fascination is with this band? If you can't, like Rack Fu, then just say so. Or say nothing. Thanks in advance.

[Rack Fu]

All this discussion of the 80's is neither here nor there. Let's get back to the grind:

Can any Sonic Youth fans PLEASE explain what the fascination is with this band? If you can't, like Rack Fu, then just say so. Or say nothing. Thanks in advance.

What???

Would you ask a Picasso fan to explain their fascination with his art? People like what they like. People who like Poison and Cinderella just happen to be jerkoffs.

[Shlomart Ben Yisrael]

I bought their Death Valley '69 EP in 1985 because it didn't sound like anything else around at the time.

I liked that.

[battery chucka' one]

All this discussion of the 80's is neither here nor there. Let's get back to the grind:

Can any Sonic Youth fans PLEASE explain what the fascination is with this band? If you can't, like Rack Fu, then just say so. Or say nothing. Thanks in advance.

What???

Would you ask a Picasso fan to explain their fascination with his art? People like what they like. People who like Poison and Cinderella just happen to be jerkoffs.

Sonic Youth ain't Picasso. Picasso had perceivable talent in his art.

Now, can anybody who considers themselves a fan explain them, please?

[battery chucka' one]

I bought their Death Valley '69 EP in 1985 because it didn't sound like anything else around at the time.

I liked that.

Thank you for your response. I can respect getting into them for that reason.

[BSmack]

I only know of the article because the Crue was on the cover. It was on the inside of their Decade of Decadence album in a collage. However, I have never read the article. I read Rolling Stone several times. Never really found anything that appealed to me within those pages.

You've got to be kidding me. You're citing an article you NEVER FUCKING READ???

STFU you God dammed retard.

I believe it was on Sunday nights. But you apparently didn't enjoy it. Neither did I, for that matter. Hearing the Jesus and Mary Chain really didn't really do it for me. The Church, either. Lewis Largent was annoying in the days that I remember it. But then, what do you expect from a program director at KROQ (alternative radio LA)?

I don't know what fucking night it was on. MTV was pretty irrelevant in my life by 1986. For one thing, I was in college for most of the late 80s, and didn't have cable in the dorms/apartments that I was living in. And furthermore, MTV fucking sucked. My introduction to "college music" was through friends, same as just about everybody else from that time.

[battery chucka' one]

[battery chucka' one]

I only know of the article because the Crue was on the cover. It was on the inside of their Decade of Decadence album in a collage. However, I have never read the article. I read Rolling Stone several times. Never really found anything that appealed to me within those pages.

You've got to be kidding me. You're citing an article you NEVER FUCKING READ???

STFU you God dammed retard.

I believe it was on Sunday nights. But you apparently didn't enjoy it. Neither did I, for that matter. Hearing the Jesus and Mary Chain really didn't really do it for me. The Church, either. Lewis Largent was annoying in the days that I remember it. But then, what do you expect from a program director at KROQ (alternative radio LA)?

I don't know what fucking night it was on. MTV was pretty irrelevant in my life by 1986. For one thing, I was in college for most of the late 80s, and didn't have cable in the dorms/apartments that I was living in. And furthermore, MTV fucking sucked. My introduction to "college music" was through friends, same as just about everybody else from that time.

So, peer pressure brought you to 'enjoying' Sonic Youth? Now you see. THAT'S why you like them. I guess that's a legitimate reason. Not helping us understand anything about the band or your fascination with them but that's the reason that you 'enjoy' them.

[Shlomart Ben Yisrael]

I remember when Rolling Stone desired that heavy metal go away with an article on Motley Crue stating that it's loud, rude, and won't go away.

Not surprisingly, you completely missed Rolling Stone's intent with the quote on that issue cover.

I've always given you the benefit of the doubt, in the sense that you just have an awkward, quirky style.
I'm slowly coming to the realisation that you are indeed, a moron.

[battery chucka' one]

Martyred. Do me a favor and imagine that cover flipped around, with Sonic Youth on it, and the caption:

Noisy Rock
It's loud. It's ugly. It won't go away.
On the road with Sonic Youth.

Now, how would you feel about that? Does it give you a feeling that Rolling Stone cares about giving this band (or their scene) a fair shake?

I don't desire to discuss journalistic characteristics of the 80's. I want to understand why Sonic Youth fans like their band. Thank you again.

[Rack Fu]

I remember when Rolling Stone desired that heavy metal go away with an article on Motley Crue stating that it's loud, rude, and won't go away.

Not surprisingly, you completely missed Rolling Stone's intent with the quote on that issue cover.

I've always given you the benefit of the doubt, in the sense that you just have an awkward, quirky style.
I'm slowly coming to the realisation that you are indeed, a moron.

I love that he still doesn't get the intent of the quote. I guess someone needs to explain it to him...

BCO, the quote was meant as a declaration. It was not Rolling Stone whining that metal should go away because it sucks. Rolling Stone was stating that metal was here to stay so everyone might as well just get used to it.

[battery chucka' one]

Go ahead and believe that if you want. Here's some reviews that this magazine spewed toward the hair metal bands you claim they 'fawned' over.

Motley Crue-Shout at the Devil

In short, originality is not this group's long suit. But then, who expected it to be? The whole point of bands like Motley Crue is to provide cheap thrills to jaded teens, and that's where the album ultimately disappoints. Although "Ten Seconds to Love" boasts enough sexual innuendo to amuse the average thirteen-year-old boy until the next issue of Penthouse, Motley Crue's promise of sex, rowdiness and rock & roll falls short on at least two counts.

J.D. CONSIDINE Feb 16, 1984

Poison-Flesh and Blood

The downfall of Poison, whose first two albums showcased a carefree marriage of Sixties bubble-gum to Seventies hard rock, can be traced to the day the band decided to stop wearing makeup and girls' clothes. Somewhere between the "Fallen Angel" and "Every Rose Has Its Thorn" videos (in the autumn of 1988), the band members apparently noticed that Guns n'Roses were breaking the bank with the natural look, so these Philly-born Nerf bangers traded in their lipstick and pink guitars for body hair and Harley shirts.....

...The sorry state of Poison's third outing can't be blamed entirely on Fairbairn, though. The loss of heart and humor is just as depressing. C.C. DeVille's six-string solos are detached from the melodies; singer Bret Michaels's bedside bravado has grown perfunctory and generic. And where does hogwash like "Ride the wind/Never coming back again/Until I touch the midnight sun" come from – too much marijuana, old Kansas records, health-food-eating groupies, maybe? Say it ain't so!

In Flesh & Blood's best fast song, a doofus Doobies-circa-1972 boogie called "Let It Play," rock & roll helps Michaels forget his crummy car and bitching boss; in the best slow tune, a dippy Elton-circa-1972 piano blues called "Something to Believe In," Michaels makes his protest move. (He figures out that people died in Vietnam and that homelessness is bad!) These tunes aren't half as transcendent as "Every Rose" or "I Won't Forget You" or "Talk Dirty to Me," but they'll sound fine on the FM when their time comes. The rest of Flesh & Blood might very well make me change the station. For Poison, that'll be a first.

CHUCK EDDY
Sep 20, 1990

[battery chucka' one]

But then, back to the original topic. Can anybody please explain to me about Sonic Youth? Why do you like them? What appeals to their fans? Thank you again.

[Shlomart Ben Yisrael]

But then, back to the original topic. Can anybody please explain to me about Sonic Youth? Why do you like them? What appeals to their fans? Thank you again.

You already got some answers. Are you on some sort of fucking crusade?

You are equal parts retarded and annoying.

[BSmack]

So, peer pressure brought you to 'enjoying' Sonic Youth?

Nope. Back in the 80s my musical attention was focused more on things like acid rock, blues, 50s era rockabilly, roots reggae and ska. I merely meant to say that my first exposure to alternative bands had nothing to do with these music critics you prattle on about and everything to do with multiple hits of blotter and hearing records like "How Soon Is Now?" at parties. Peer to peer download services brought Sonic Youth albums to my record collection at a much later date. They're a solid group that I wish I had discovered much, much earlier in life.

[battery chucka' one]

But then, back to the original topic. Can anybody please explain to me about Sonic Youth? Why do you like them? What appeals to their fans? Thank you again.

You already got some answers. Are you on some sort of fucking crusade?

You are equal parts retarded and annoying.

I got 1 1/2 answers, of which yours was the most 'thought out'. I need more. Sadly, this isn't enough.

[battery chucka' one]

So, peer pressure brought you to 'enjoying' Sonic Youth?

Nope. Back in the 80s my musical attention was focused more on things like acid rock, blues, 50s era rockabilly, roots reggae and ska. I merely meant to say that my first exposure to alternative bands had nothing to do with these music critics you prattle on about and everything to do with multiple hits of blotter and hearing records like "How Soon Is Now?" at parties. Peer to peer download services brought Sonic Youth albums to my record collection at a much later date. They're a solid group that I wish I had discovered much, much earlier in life.

You already said it, that your friends liked them and got into them, hence you liked them. That's called peer pressure. It's alright. But you should at least be honest about it.

[battery chucka' one]

Oh wow, here's another review from Rolling Stone, a home of all things hair metal (in the words of some) in the 80's. This one is for Warrant-Cherry Pie

In view of Mötley Crüe's and Ozzy Osbourne's ongoing mega-stardom, it's hard to imagine that success in heavy metal is the result of anything other than blind luck. (This is the sentence that starts this incredibly respectful and loving review)

(and this is how it ends) Ultimately, these guys are about nothing more than their yearning for wealth and sexual power. Virtually every grunt, every shriek, every sixty-fourth-note triplet guitar figure, every pout and tattoo and pelvic thrust in their oeuvre seems calculated to induce white suburban teenagers to marvel and yell, "Rock and roll!" – and to spend more money on Warrant product. In short, Warrant is New Kids on the Block with nipple-length hair and Marshall amps.

JOHN MENDELSSOHN-Oct 18, 1990

NOW, let's look at how 'ignored' the indie rock scene was by RS in the 80's. Shall we?

Replacements-Tim

In this era of synthetic sound and an increased emphasis on the cosmetics of media geniality, the Replacements are probably too true to be good. While they haven't exactly reinvented the fourman guitars-bass-drum lineup, they have dramatically reaffirmed its primal essence without pandering to any oldfogy revivalist tendencies or formulaic banalities. They jolt the nervous system with the disturbing correctness of their sound -- a nose-thumbing energy that plugs in and out of professionalism -- and they grab the heart with the compassionate yet bratty conviction of their songs.

If the Replacements have a theme, it has to do with the necessary failure of fun and the equally necessary drive to have it. The band has a reputation for being boozy and erratic, but they never back off from the truth. Tim is simultaneously mature and adolescent. Lead singer Paul Westerberg has developed an authorial voice capable of collapsing complex contradictions into a single phrase. On "Waitress in the Sky," a seemingly harmless countrified ditty about a stewardess, the band constructs a paean to the profession before slagging the poor dame for believing in the euphemism "flight attendant." "Little Mascara" is a greasy teardrop running down the cheek of marital disappointment.

Tim's themes are most eloquently expressed in the closing songs on each of the sides. In "Swinging Party," life is a lilting series of ultimately empty, but nonetheless compulsory, soirees. The record closes with "Here Comes a Regular," a resigned and dissolute salute to the salt of the earth from the rim of a shot glass. "Here Comes a Regular" is the realistic flip side of Springsteen's "Glory Days" sung from the point of view of a man in his twenties who's capable of looking neither forward nor backward but only downward at the melting ice cubes clanking in his drink.

The Replacements are no mere vehicle for Paul Westerberg's moving and emotionally intricate songwriting and singing (any more than the Velvet Underground was a vehicle for Lou Reed). They are the real thing, a true band, produced with insurrectionary fervor by Tommy Erdelyi, the original Ramones drummer. Guitarist Bob Stinson heaves thick chunks of metal and dinky, skewed melodic fills against Westerberg's chordal structures. Little brother Tommy Stinson adroitly moves from bass grunge to harmonic filigree, and through it all, Chris Mars maintains an eloquent heartbeat that never misses the mark. While threatening to careen off center, the music always coalesces into the proverbial greater whole. Tim, the Replacements' most focused and consistent album (and first for a major label) sounds as if it were made by the last real band in the world.

Minutemen: 3 Way Tie for Last

After five years' and ten records' worth of trailblazing, the Minutemen pause to assess the landscape. Equal parts angry politics and affectionate musicology, 3-Way Tie (for Last) is about as patriotic an album as we're going to hear in 1986. Not that "The Big Stick" will be included on the next Rocky soundtrack, mind you. "This is what I'm singing about," declares the late guitarist and singer D. Boon: "The race war that America supports/And the fact Indians will never die/They'd do just fine if we let them try." This punk power trio may be repulsed by U.S. foreign policy, but they display an awesome fluency in American music – rock & roll to you, buddy – and between its jaunty melody and Boon's rockabilly-drenched solo, "The Big Stick" is apt to elicit as many tapping toes as raised fists.

Once virtual sixty-second men, grinding away over hyperinventive bursts of invective, Boon and bassist Mike Watt developed into songwriters whose originals stand up next to their covers of influences like Creedence Clearwater Revival and Blue Oyster Cult. Side one is Boon's, and his antiwar rants are at once more straightforward and more subtle than before. Rather than churn out musical ideas, he's mulling them over, setting the ruminative tone of "The Price of Paradise" with a jagged lead line or summing up the threatening confusion of "Political Nightmare" with a power-chord-provoked landslide. One of John Fogerty's prettier as well as more political songs – "Have You Ever Seen the Rain?" – sounds strained here, but on "Lost" Boon turns a hazy Neil Young tribute by the Meat Puppets into a stomping evocation of suburban rootlessness.

After faithfully detonating BÖC's song "The Red and the Black," Mike Watt reveals the band's more poetic nature on his side of the album. "Spoken Word Piece" lays it on a bit simplistically, but songs like "What Is It?" are pithy and quick, addressing Big Questions from ground level. Watt's bass and Boon's six-string usually share melodic duties; they build vein-bursting tension by playing crushing funk riffs against each other on "No One," then provide joyous release by locking into step and dancing around George Hurley's flexible beat on "What Is It?" Yet for all their utilitarian punch, the Minutemen can wax psychedelic ("Situations at Hand"), thrash like mad ("Ack Ack Ack") or go all sweet and flowery on the sarcastically titled instrumental "Hittin' the Bong."

The Minutemen were forging a new direction by examining (and expanding on) where they'd been when D. Boon was killed last December. If his tragic death renders this an accidental epitaph, it's an eloquent one. You can bet that in ten years there'll be groups who sound like the Minutemen – maybe they'll even cover their songs. No matter how one arrives at 3-Way Tie (for Last), these three guys come out on top.

fIREHOSE: Ragin' Full On

In a better world, neither of these albums would exist. D. Boon, the hulking frontman and guitarist of the Minutemen, would not have died in a van accident three days before Christmas 1985, and the trio's surviving rhythm section (bassist Mike Watt and drummer George Hurley) would not have had to find a new partner. But since we can't alter fate, we'll have to console ourselves with a raucous wake, in the posthumous compilation Ballot Result, and a life-affirming funeral, in the debut album by Watt and Hurley's new band, Firehose.

Watt's sign-off to his liner notes of Ballot Result – "I love you d. boon, forever" – is the one mournful note on a farewell album that is anything but sad. The heart of this thirty-one-song album is the nearly three full sides recorded for Atlanta and Los Angeles radio stations. The trio charges through ferocious versions of Minutemen classics and sloppy but endearing covers. And for poignancy's sake, nothing tops this version of their autobiographical "History Lesson – Part Two," sung by an unusually serene Boon.

Ballot Result was originally planned as part of a triple-LP set, Three Dudes, Six Sides, Half Studio, Half Live, that was to consist of newly recorded live versions of songs voted as favorites by the band's fans. When Boon's death scrapped those plans, Watt scoured for versions of those songs. The kitchen-sink nature of Ballot Result hasn't made for an album destined for compact disc. Yet from the ramshackle 1980 practice tapes to Boon's volatile solo version of a song against U.S. involvement in Central America, "No! No! No! To Draft and War," recorded five years later, Ballot Result is a striking audio vérité history of a band that died too soon.

Boon's ghost looms over Ragin', Full-On – and not merely owing to Watt's dedication of "this and all future fiREHOSE records ... to d. boon." When the trio – Watt, Hurley and new frontman Ed Crawford – start pummeling their instruments with odd jazz-funk-rock punctuation, you may think you're hearing Minutemen outtakes. The titles alone of Watt's witty new songs ("Under the Influence of Meat Puppets," "Another Theory Shot to Shit") recall Minutemen raveups like "Political Song for Michael Jackson to Sing" and "Do You Want New Wave (or Do You Want the Truth)?"

But Ragin' surveys enough new territory to qualify Firehose as its own group, whether it's with punchy power-chord rockers, skittery funk or the disarmingly gentle closer, "Things Could Turn Around." Granted, foisting all the vocal responsibilities onto twenty-four-year-old Crawford has its drawbacks. When his guitar playing isn't recalling Boon, Crawford's voice recalls Michael Stipe, especially on the lumpy folk rock of "The Candle and the Flame" and "Choose Any Memory." Yet, as Crawford intones earnestly, "So difficult, we care enough to try." There's no need to explain – the very existence of Ragin', Full-On is more than any of us had expected. (RS 500)

Sonic Youth-Daydream Nation

A single album never seemed to offer a broad enough canvas for an inclusive view of the Sonic Youth experience. Last year's splendid album Sister, on SST, came close, with its tight song structures and controlled bursts of sonic mayhem. But the definitive Sonic Youth vinyl was still the live double-album bootleg issued several years ago in England -- until the arrival of Daydream Nation, the band's first official double album and its first record of any kind with major-label distribution behind it.

Daydream Nation gives this influential quartet its best forum yet for demonstrating the broad harmonic palette, sharply honed songwriting skills and sheer exhilarating drive that have resulted from seven years of what guitarist and vocalist Thurston Moore calls "Sonic Life." The twelve songs range from the driving slamtempo pop power of "Teen Age Riot" and the gorgeous "Candle," to the deliriously grungy noisefest of "Eric's Trip," to the ambitious, panoramic instrumental sound painting of "The Sprawl." And lest we forget that Sonic Youth were retrofitting Seventies rock tropes before the rest of the rock underground began to shake its Sixties fixations, there's "Total Trash," a surging ode to disposable pop metal that wouldn't have sounded terribly out of place on Alice Cooper's School's Out.

Urgent, winningly over-the-top vocals from guitarist Ranaldo and bassist Kim Gordon serve as bracing foils for Moore's more poppish singing. And Gordon and drummer Steve Shelley have become one of rock's most feral, kinetic rhythm sections. Moore may be complaining that "there's bum trash in my hall, and my place is ripped/I totaled another amp, I'm comin' in sick," but you can almost see him smiling as he says it, and why not? Daydream Nation presents the definitive American guitar band of the Eighties at the height of its powers and prescience.
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All of the above are reviews from Rolling Stone. Too bad they 'ignored' the indie rock scene in the 80's in favor of hair metal. Wouldn't you say?

[BSmack]

You already said it, that your friends liked them and got into them, hence you liked them. That's called peer pressure. It's alright. But you should at least be honest about it.

No, i said that "my introduction to "college music" was through friends". I did not say which groups I was exposed to or which ones I liked or disliked. I only said that my exposure to those groups was at parties where friends played their albums. Later in life, with the ability to download pretty much whatever music I wished at will, I started to discover that some of the bands my buds were playing were better than I had given them credit for back in the day. One of those bands was Sonic Youth. Get that though your fucking head.

Jesus, having a conversation with you is like arguing with a piece of furniture.



PS: Nice of you to post all those RS reviews. I'm certain that I've read absolutely none of them before. Way to make your point.

[PSUFAN]

:facepalm:

[King Crimson]

just to 80's indie/punk geek out for a minute, the RS review of 3 way tie fails to mention that Ack Ack Ack is a Urinals cover (and had already appeared on the Politics of Time release before 3 way). having noted Red and Black as a BOC tune, it might seem like valuable info (especially to LP/new band hunters like me at the time) to give the Urinals some play. would have saved me about 15 years before i finally DID discover the U's and also the Homosexuals working the same territory (but largely ignored).

daydream is pretty hard to beat, and might be the best SY LP. 3 way and Tim were lesser efforts for both the Mats and Minutemen, IMO.

Poison is by far the worst band of all-time.

[Bizzarofelice]

The Bad Brains etc

never heard of 'em

[BSmack]

The Bad Brains etc

never heard of 'em

Maybe you know them better as Bad Brains?

[PSUFAN]

Ed from oHio lives a mile from me, plays in a band with one of my friends, and stars in a youtube video with my daughter and her friend, singing together at a block party. Dude is really washed up...he needs to just get a yob, sad to say