SONIC YOUTH
The Destroyed Room
Geffen
· Besides what?
I imagine that a day in the life of Sonic Youth (SY) would be like this – you get up (noonish) looking great (silver instead of gray), stroll down to the studio (the musical equivalent of Warhol's Factory), plug in your guitar and make beautiful noise, all captured on tape by Wharton Tiers, Jim O'Rourke or whoever's the coolest up-and-comer Brooklynite recorder going. Much of what you lay down even you don't bother listening to again. You head out for dinner (where any hipster/Brooklyn trash worth their salt knows who you are and nods approvingly in your direction whilst stabbing your back as a has-been once you leave), and then to a show (where kids one-thirds your age are once again re-inventing music). By the time you get back home, you've completely forgotten what you recorded early that day, but that's alright – tomorrow's another skronk just waiting to happen.
The Destroyed Room sees Sonic Youth scrolling through a collection of toss-offs, compilation tracks and B-side explorations captured in the decade between 1994's Experimental Jet Set and 2004's Sonic Nurse. While Jeff Wall's 1978 titular cover image implies a raucous thrash waiting on the inside, the focus of The Destroyed Room is more on how beautiful (as opposed to merely pummelling) a controlled sonic mess can be. While the 25-minute run-through of Washing Machine's "The Diamond Sea" is indeed one of SY's best tricks, the rest of Destroyed Room feels a little more tightly-coiled – on occasion refusing to release.
It's always neat to see what Thurston, Kim, Steve, Lee (and sometimes Jim) are up to. Coming so close after this summer's Rather Ripped however, it's not the easiest thing to delve into The Destroyed Room, especially when the music waiting inside is fittingly rare on purpose. And besides – given the wandering instrumentals and weird static pieces floating throughout The Destroyed Room – it's easy to imagine SY coming up with another batch of this stuff a week from now. And really, how vital and necessary is that?
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