Bearers of Nihilistic Rock
Sonic Youth returns with their 16th studio album, “The Eternal,” released by Matador Records on June 9, 2009. Born out of the No Wave era in the late 1970’s/early 1980’s, Sonic Youth’s experimental sound has remained a modern blend of abrasive rock and jazz. “The Eternal” is a 12-track continuation of the Sonic Youth tradition. As in their previous albums, the band falls into their usual shtick with their latest effort, giving us an anti-music, “we’ll do what we wanna do” kind of attitude. With instrumentation reminiscent of noises created by first-year music students and vocals that resemble yelling or talking rather than actual singing, Sonic Youth waves the proverbial middle finger in the faces of every other genre.
The opening track, entitled “Sacred Trickster,” is a grungy girl anthem with punk rock riffs. The music itself is exciting and fast – something to slam to for sure. The lyrics, though, while they get the point across, are for from original or poignant. “What’s it like to be a girl in a band? / I don’t quite understand,” sings Kim Gordon (bass, guitar, vocals). Well, by the end of the song I didn’t understand either because the track gives nothing but surface-value lines with little to no connection.
“Anti-Orgasm,” the record’s second track, is over six minutes long, but could easily be split into two completely different three minute songs. The first half is a sexually suggestive anti-war onslaught of distortion and out of key vocals. Through the wailing of the lyric “Anti-war is anti-orgasm,” we see Sonic Youth using an incongruous metaphor to explain similarities between the two most basic animal instincts: procreate and fight like mad. The second half of “Anti-Orgasm” is a flowing psychedelic instrumental that sounds more like a promotion of peace and love than sex and war.
Despite the mediocrity of much of the album, there were moments where I nearly fell out of my chair at glimmers of lyrical brilliance. “What We Know,” track four, is full of scratchy, dirty guitar and drum based grooves, and includes my favorite line of the entire album, “Heaven’s not about your reputation.” A duet of Gordon’s and Thurston Moore’s (guitar, vocals) voices, the song is an observation of human behavior culminating in an expression of two lover’s eternal devotion to each other.
Many tracks on “The Eternal” follows a definite formula, beginning with long intros followed by a few verses and a couple of choruses, then launching an instrumental break down played at a slower tempo than the rest of the song, and ending with a refrain of the chorus. While “Walkin’ Blue” also follows this same formula, it is still my favorite song on the album. Truly Woodstock-worthy, track 11 is reminiscent of old school jam-rock with a bluesy twist. The song is about how we are all just sauntering around lost and confused but painfully aware of it. Theband preaches, “I’m here to tell you that what we need to do is just to just let go.”
Sonic Youth’s “The Eternal,” while it probably won’t go down as the greatest rock record of all time, is worth checking out if only to have the Sonic Youth experience. “The Eternal” is one of those albums where each song needs context, they need to fit into the bigger puzzle. If you hear any of the songs alone, the first thing to pop into your mind would be, “What the hell is this?” So what’s a listener to do? Hear the entire album, from start to finish, then form your opinion.
For more information head to www.sonicyouth.com.
