Sonic Youth (album)

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Sonic Youth
Sonic Youth cover
EP by Sonic Youth
Released March 1982
Recorded Radio City Music Hall, New York City December 1981 – January 1982
Genre Alternative rock
Length 24:16
Label Neutral Records
Producer(s) Sonic Youth
Professional reviews
Sonic Youth chronology
Sonic Youth
(1982)
Confusion Is Sex
(1983)


Sonic Youth is the debut EP by Sonic Youth. It was recorded in 1981 at Radio City Music Hall, New York City and released on Glenn Branca's Neutral label in 1982. It is the only recording featuring the early Sonic Youth line-up with Richard Edson on drums.

It was reissued in 2006, now lasting 63:10 (making it a full length album). Added are 7 songs from a live performance recorded on September 18, 1981. These tracks were based on pieces composed by the band for the Noisefest festival held earlier in 1981. Also added is a studio recording of a song that appears in the live performance, "Where The Red Fern Grows". This version was recorded in October, 1981.

Also added in the booklet of the reissue are new photos as well as extensive liner notes from Glenn Branca, Richard Edson, Byron Coley and a "few notes" concerning the album from Thurston Moore.

Despite the CD reissue on Geffen Records, logos for Neutral Records, which the album was originally released on, can still be found in numerous places in the package.

On the Geffen CD reissue, the piece of paper underneath the CD tray that contains the track listing is double sided - the side that faces out contains the track listing with a bar code and an RIAA anti-piracy notice and the opposite side has the same track listing without a bar code or an RIAA warning.

On the 1987 cassette release of the EP by SST Records, the first side of the cassette has the same 5 tracks as the original 1982 release, but the second side has the same 5 tracks recorded in reverse, from the end of the last track to the beginning of the first. In addition, the second side's track listing printed on the cassette is the same as the first side but printed in mirror-reverse, as well as the track listing for said side on the j-card in the cassette case.

The album is distinctly lo-fi and rather inaccessible to many listeners. Sonic Youth is largely representative of the bands' early experimental No wave approach to music.

This is the only Sonic Youth album in which the guitars use standard tuning.

Contents

[edit] Track listing for original album

  1. "The Burning Spear" – 3:28
  2. "I Dreamed I Dream" – 5:12
  3. "She Is Not Alone" – 4:06
  4. "I Don't Want to Push It" – 3:35
  5. "The Good and the Bad" – 7:55

[edit] Track listing for 2006 reissue

Tracks 1-5 are the original recording.
Tracks 6-12 are from an early live recording.
Track 13 is an early studio recording.

  1. "The Burning Spear" – 3:28
  2. "I Dreamed I Dream" – 5:12
  3. "She Is Not Alone" – 4:06
  4. "I Don't Want to Push It" – 3:35
  5. "The Good and the Bad" – 7:55
  6. "Hard Work" – 3:19
  7. "Where The Red Fern Grows" – 5:47
  8. "The Burning Spear" – 3:23
  9. "Cosmopolitan Girl" – 3:35
  10. "Loud and Soft" – 6:48
  11. "Destroyer" – 5:32
  12. "She Is Not Alone" – 3:29
  13. "Where The Red Fern Grows" – 6:45

[edit] Personnel

[edit] References

Sonic Youth
Kim Gordon | Thurston Moore | Lee Ranaldo | Steve Shelley
Jim Sclavunos | Richard Edson | Bob Bert | Jim O'Rourke | Coco Hayley Gordon Moore
Discography
Albums:

Sonic Youth | Confusion Is Sex | Sonic Death | Bad Moon Rising | EVOL | Sister | The Whitey Album | Daydream Nation | Goo | Dirty | Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star | Screaming Fields of Sonic Love | Washing Machine | Made in USA | A Thousand Leaves | NYC Ghosts & Flowers | Murray Street | Sonic Nurse | Rather Ripped | The Destroyed Room: B-sides and Rarities

Extended plays:

Kill Yr Idols | TV Shit | Silver Session for Jason Knuth

SYR series:

SYR1: Anagrama | SYR2: Slaapkamers Met Slagroom | SYR3: Invito Al Ĉielo | SYR4: Goodbye 20th Century | SYR5 | SYR6: Koncertas Stan Brakhage Prisiminimui

Singles:

Flower/Halloween | Flower/Satan Is Boring | Teenage Riot | The Diamond Sea | Little Trouble Girl | Sunday

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