February 2, 2016 Playlist

Happy 60th birthday, Lee!

 

CLASSIC ALBUM OF THE WEEK Sonic Youth "Goo"  1990 (USA) Happy 60th birthday Lee Ranaldo! Two-thirds of the founding members of Sonic "Youth" are past three score years of age, which is fine because the group broke up five years ago and anyway the Youth referred to in their name transferred from a description of the band to a description of the audience around the turn of the century. SY was perhaps the most crucial band of the indie rock/grunge era of the 80's-90's: an influence on many other bands and a paragon of scenester virtue, though not a group that necessarily sold a lot of records or had hit songs on the radio. Lee Ranaldo was always seen as the George Harrison of the group: technically their lead guitarist, but "the quiet one" who was always overshadowed by "the popular one" (Thurston McCartney) and "the serious one" (Kim Lennon), riding in the back seat with "Ringo Shelley." But I think of Lee as being more of a Jerry Garcia type: sensitive, mystical, laid back. But since we're talking about the artsy punk rock scene (which was always frankly egotistical) rather than the idyllic hippie era (too stoned to know better), a character like Lee was not likely to become the leader of a band. But he always brought the classic psychedelic edge to the SY sound -- on this week's CAOTW (their major label debut released a year ahead of grungemania), Lee as often was the case only contributes one song, but it's the longest, most kosmik, and farthest-out on the band's first stab at a more "pop" sound (they even got Public Enermy's Chuck D to do a guest rap!) Since the Sonics "went on hiatus" in 2011, Lee has released two fine solo albums which show that perhaps he always had more to do with the catchier elements of SY songwriting than previously suspected (SY tunes never credited individual authors, so it was always hard to tell who was responsible for what).

(N) = New Release
(R) = Listener Request