Videos!

I have been posting the last few blogs from work. The computers all have flash and other media players disabled which will not let me view or post videos from YouTube. Here some videos from the last three posts....Enjoy!

Teenage Riot 2007 Tour

Silver Rocket video 1988

The Sprawl 12-22-2007

Cross The Breeze

The 4th song on Daydream Nation is called "Cross The Breeze."



After the 8 minute opus of "The Sprawl," Daydream Nation is amped up into hyperspeed with "Cross The Breeze." This song is a masterpiece in the sonic catalogue, it features 5 very distinct parts, all with different sections and varying tempos. This song seems like it would difficult to pull off live.But they did, always, even 17 years later....



The song begins the same way it predecessor does, only it launches into a two chord punk riff backed by a galloping drum beat. Is it possible to have a punk song thats over 6 minutes? Does that defeat the purpose? The song can be divided up into 5 parts A B C D.



Here's how it breaks down:

Part A: Intro
Part B: Upbeat intro/lead in main section instrumental
Part C: verse/chorus "lets go walking on the water....i want to know"
Part D: "running cross the breeze"
Part B
Part A

The band began a reginment of labeling ever portion of every song with letters. Kim claimed they would lay them out on the floor, some songs would go up to Z!

Cross The Breeze's multi sectional approach made the song very difficult to pull off live especially with all the time and tempo changes. It was played nigtly on the '88-'89 tour and got some play in 1990 but was not dusted off until 2006 when the band began slowly placing Daydream Nation songs in their set to ultimately be played in its entire form. Cross The breeze shared some extra stage time on all the scattered 2008 dates.

Video to come soon....

The Sprawl

The 3rd song on Daydream Nation is called "The Sprawl."

There are two kinds of Sonic Youtn fans, those that love Daydream Nation and those that think its too long and drags. "The Sprawl" is easily the song that gives the listener the "drag" red flag. After the high powered "Teenage Riot" and sonic-punk "Silver Rocket," The Sprawl takes a nose dive in tempo, clocks in at over 7 minutes, and features 3 minutes of an instrumental outro. Sonic Youth is showing no signs of slowing down if you can make it past this song. It has its finer points. When the band set out to "extend" their jams and songs, the Sprawl HAD to be one of the forst songs set in that direction. Although the track has a "free flowing" feel, it is highly orchestrated and resembles the wall of noise we once loved from the Confusion Is Sex era.

The song features a chorus that repeats in the same place. A veyr pop type attribute for a song of this type."Come on down to the store, you can some more." The rest of the vocals feature a typical sonic youth style of "spoken" word singing. The lyrics sound simple and improvised, in fact they more than likely were even though some of the lyrics were taken and inspired by "The Stars At Noon by Denis Johnson. Favorite line "does this sound simple enough? fuck you! does fuck you! sound simple enough?"

The loose outro is what feels as if the song drags. The layered guitars playing the same drone over and over seem to go on and on until it melts into the next track....then things pick up....

"The Sprawl" ws debuted with the rest of the record in 1988. It was played nightly during the '88-'89 tour but layed to rest until 2007 with the re-release of Daydream Nation.

video to come....

Silver Rocket

The second song on Daydream Nation is called "Silver Rocket."

There is a surprise in  every song. Sonic Youth finally managed to write a "punk" song. Silver Rocket begins with an apreggiated but dives right into a two chord riff. The song is tight, and gets the point across...but then...

In typical Sonic fashion there MUST BE A BREAKDOWN and then a RETURN. Only this time, the sudden onslaught of noise comes at you when you least expect it. Its almost as if the band falls apart only to regain itself in the return to the chorus.

Silver Rocket is an indication that Sonic Youth is not only perfecting their song writing but managing to stretch their legs and "jam" a bit. Daydream represents the culmination of 6 years of musical evolution. Everything that is Sonic Youth from this point is thrown into Daydream Nation, Silver Rocket is pop, punk, noise, art, and attitude.

Silver Rocket was the song Sonic Youth performed for their first ever national television debut on the Night Music show. Don Fleming joins them on keys.

Silver Rocket was played mostly during the '88-'89 tour. It dropped off the setlist until 2000. It then saw periodic plays until 2006, but was being geared up for the 2007 Daydream Nation tour.

Video to come...