Difficult Music

The Youth of Today Have Their Thing
I feel like smacking my temple with the heel of my hand and muttering, “what was that?” It was one of those weekends.

I’ll just talk about the Sonic Youth portion of it right now. Greg, the belter, and I arrived at the Vogue well after the doors had opened on Saturday night. JR saved us some seats, though—really good seats next to the soundboard. Top man. We had about 20 minutes to acclimatize before the opening act, Quixotic, came on.

They were a trio—women on guitar and drums, and a guy on bass. Their grasp of their instruments was pretty rudimentary, something I found off-putting at first, but as the set progressed I realized that their material suited their instrumental capabilities. The songs mixed primitive blues with an old-time spiritual feel. It was clearly a case of some white kids taking inspiration from “negro music,” but I didn’t mind it too much, unlike my three companions. Anyway, I liked that when the drummer (who sang about half the songs) announced a song called “I Am the Light of This World,” the audience shared an ironic chuckle, then fell silent during the song itself (it had a simple dignity), and gave the performance a healthy round of applause afterward. They ended the set with a bass-and-drums version of Black Sabbath's "Lord of This World.” As opening acts go, Quixotic were all right, but I’m very a generous listener, I suppose.

Sonic Youth! They were great! The best I’ve seen them since they turned Crazy Horse’s stage into an equipment-strewn mess back in ’91! SY were in full rock-band mode, playing hit after hit after hit, as well as the whole of “Murray Street,” which didn’t drag down the set at all. In fact, most of the evening’s best moments came from that album. My concept of SY as progressive rockers was fully reinforced by this show. The new stuff has lots of King Crimson parts, lots of Hawkwind drones…even a couple “Xanadu” moments. But never mind my boring old fartiness. I should keep such thoughts to myself. So…There were rock show lights and video projections and tunes like “Candle”, “Kissability,” “Schizophrenia.” The belter swooned at “Skip Tracer” and I swooned at “Shadow of a Doubt.” “100%” false started, but ruled once it got going. Thurston told a story about scamming his and Coco’s way into the IMAX Bears movie at Science World, which was pure comedy. They encored first with a new one and a very old one (“Making the Nature Scene”), then came back for a final tear through “Kool Thing,” complete with audience participation call-and-response and a Kim rap about the troubled career of “Sister Mariah.” Yep.

Oh, and this was my first experience of the new five-piece Sonic Youth. Jim O’Rourke is a valuable asset, taking on six and four-string duties, padding out the sound, and freeing up Kim and Thurston. I think he contributed a lot to the whole “rock” aspect of the show, especially when he and Steve Shelley were the rhythm section. For at least one song on Saturday, Sonic Youth had a bassist who plays with his fingers.