Shoot

The third song on the LP Dirty is called "Shoot."

I've always held this song in high esteem and I've always referred to it as fan favorite.

"Shoot" is one of my favorite Kim vocal songs because she uses her very sensual/sexy/whisper voice. The vocal performance is what makes this song what it is. The lyrical content is very teen angst driven an Kim's vocals allows the song to have that flare. In 1992, Kim Gordon was 39 years old, I find it kinda funny that she's singing "can I have the car keys? I wanna go for ride/can I have the car now? I wanna leave this town." Then again, the band was in the their 30's, and they had the weird YOUTH in their name. Go figure.

The song is not all teen angst driven. The song actually depicts a toxic relationship. This theme seems to be re-occurring from time to time. I t was around 1991-92 Kim Gordon began carrying the female rocker torch. The 90's were a very interesting time for music as the underground of he 80's were beginning to emerge in the mainstream of pop culture, and with that, came women in rock bands. But not just women, women playing side roles and not just fronting a band. Kim Gordon, Kim Deal, D'arcy, Juliana Hatefield, and many more were stepping in filling out major roles in rock bands. Kim seemed to be Queen of indie rock.

I like to think that this song, even though it depicts a toxic relationship, isn't about that all the way. Kim was never really the loudmouth Kathleen Hannah of the Riotgrrl movement, but had her own ways of displaying the power of the woman. "Shoot" is example of a woman doing what she wants and deciding not to take No for an answer. Whether the character in the song wants to play bass in a band or leave her lover, she is taking the power away from the over powering male and using it to make herself who she really is in the world.

Stop me if this isn't making any sense.

"Shoot" was regularly played nightly on the Dirty tour of 1992. It was normally the set opener. This is another song that has yet to resurface from that era. I always felt it would make a nice encore piece with the newer material.

Updates

I was going to post "Shoot" from Dirty today but then I decided to wait. This blog needs some work. I've got a bunch of new posts to bring out but I will be doing to some cleaning on all the earliers posts. There is tons of info and personal commentary I've been meaning to add to them, so I will be doing MANY blog updates over the next few days. After that is finished, I will then give the front page a new look. After that, there will be more new posts. The goal is to be done posting by the end of May. That will bring this project to a full 2 years in the making.

Thanks for reading. Stay tuned!

Mildred Pierce

The 8th song on the LP Goo is called Mildred Pierce.

I was never a big fan of the album Goo. Some friends find that hard to believe. Earlier today I decided to listen to the album in order to finish out the rest of this blog. The band really has me up until this song.

I have always felt that Goo sounded too slick and not dirty enough for Sonic Youth. As I have stated in previous posts, most notably Dirty Boots, the band was making compromises in order to please the hand that was about to feed them. Goo is complete with a few potential hit singles. This song comes off as filler. I never thought I would say it, but that is how I honestly feel. "Mildred Pierce" is a simple three chord punk rock song that has only two words. The song clocks in at 2:13 and leaves something to be desired.

"Mildred Pierce is also cleverly placed in the end sequence of the album. I like to think that it acted like the dividing line between two sides of the band. The first side of the LP comes off as a pop record but the second side is pure avant noise rock.

I still like to think the album is overproduced for a reason. Once again, please refer to Dirty Boots.

For some reason, I always seem to put this song on SY mixes.

This song is in standard tuning and has never been performed live, although, I could be wrong.

Sunday

The second song on the LP A Thousand Leaves is called "Sunday."

For an album that is as abstract as A Thousand Leaves, it manages to have a "hit" on the record. I noticed a trend with Sonic Youth: stay true to your art while making the powers that be happy with it. It seems that every album that SY has put out on Geffen contains a possible radio single. In my experience in the record industry, as long as they have something to sell (wether they want to sell it or not) they are happy. SY seems to always deliver a single that we will never hear on the radio but it exists to make the suits happy. This is why Sonic Youth managed to release all 9 of their contractual obligated record with Geffen. This is also the reason why Geffen built the band Echo Canyon, a studio for them to spend endless hours of recording and keep the studio bills to a minimum. No matter how commercial Sonic Youth can be, they always manage to do it in a very punk rock/avant garde way. This is why "Sunday" is one of my favorite songs.

"Sunday" doesn't seem to fit amongst its brothers and sisters from the same album. Yet, A Thousand Leaves would be naked without it. After the dirg intro "Contre Le Sexism," the album takes a dramatic turn. Mood-wise, "Sunday" is the perfect transition from one track to the other, but arrangement and sonically speaking, "Sunday" takes the album into another direction. I've always felt the band was saying "psyche!"

"Sunday" is a song that is centered around a riff. There is an intro riff and then a main riff. We don't hear the intro again in the song but it prepares you 

This song first appeared on the soundtrack for the film Suburbia in 1997. This version is slightly different. It contains a much longer intro, a longer middle jam, and a spacey outro. Obviously, the song was shortened for the album but the radio single was cut even more. I've never heard it, but I heard the edits were terrible. I often wonder if this song was intended for the Suburbia movie and not an album release. Like I stated above, its the one song that doesn't seem to fit. Plus, it was recorded at a different time from the bulk of A Thousand Leaves but I could be wrong about that. The soundtrack version of the song sounds more like the rest of the LP. Even though it contains the same parts, the edit for the record was more than likely intended for the use of a single. It would not surprise me if Geffen requested the song to use a lead single for the album.

"Sunday" was debuted in 1997 as an instrumental. The song was played regularly at shows from 1998-99. It managed to survive with "Hoarfrost" on the 2000 tour but rarely gets played now.

Unmade Bed

The second song on the LP Nurse is called "Unmade Bed."

I love the opening chord to this song. It's comes of very spooky and soothing at the same time. The opening portion of the song is very relaxing and allows you to just slide into the song with an undying familiarness. A familiar feeling you don't want to give up.

That's exactly what this song is about: Comfortable Familiarness That You Can't Let Go Of No Matter How Miserable You Are.

The band does a great job painting the picture of two lovers. The female in the relationship is miserable and the male comes and goes as he pleases. "Look whose come back home again." The female knows she must get out of the toxic relationship but he manages to "sucker her back" every time. "Now that you're in arms, know that you're just in his way." All she wants is him to be there physically and mentally. Even when she gets what she wants, she doesn't. The song ends with the line "now its time to fade away." We are left wondering if she realizes her woes and leaves or just falls back into the routine of the toxic lover. You decide.

Dripping Dream

The third song on the LP Nurse is called "Dripping Dream."

Lately I have been in a mood that wants to remember the summer of 2004. Nothing reminds me more of that summer than the album Nurse.

One of the disappointments of the 8/25/2004 show was that Dripping Dream was not played. It remains one of my favorite songs on the album.

The song is slow to start and features classic sonic arpeggiations that go from light picking to a muted riff. These parts signify the changes in verse but the song picks up during the "caught shadows, sex meadows" part. The song builds in tempo slowly and erupts. The difference in noise eruptions is that this time the chaos is controlled and Lee's guitar noise still retains the riff and melody. The song ends a lot like "Rain on Tin" from Murray Street or the dream-like intro to "The Sprawl" from Daydream Nation.

According to the tour archive this song was only played 4 times during the 2004 tour. It also specifies that Thurston had problems remembering the words and the melody. This makes sense because there are lots of words to this song. Most of them don't make sense, but its just another great example of Thurston putting random lines together that flow like poetry and not song.

Jams Run Free

The 5th song on the LP Rather Ripped is called "Jams Run Free."

I have always wondered what this song was about. The only portion of the song that could/would allude to any sort of meaning is the first set of lyrics: " Blast ID earth, OM immersed, gold in cave, the blondes come first." The lryics were written by Thurston, so abstract is the name of the game, but is he referring to the end of the world? those that are judged in the end? did Thurston find religion? or just a god to worship? It's possible. Thurston has a tendancy to lead the listener on when putting forth his philosophy on life and living. I also think that the song is just about the end, the world, the band, life, death etc. The end. In the end, the jams will run free. No control, and no structure. Does this make sense?

I also think it's another jab at the bands dance with fame. In years past, Thurston has been quoted by having a "what if" attitude about fame. I think this song aims to set the record straught by stating they would change nothing of their career and truly love what they do. The title itself describes the band on many levels.

Debuted instrumentally sometime in 2005. This song was the centerpiece of the 2006 tour. Often clocking in at 10 minutes. I think this must be the bands favorite song from Rather Ripped as it is one of the only tunes from that album that is still played live.