Sonic Youth - Sonic Nurse
(DGC)
In 2004, it's rather hard to be completely objective about Sonic Youth, especially for the many music fans whose tastes and knowledge were heavily shaped, in one way or another, by the band. A consideration of the quintet's music, over twenty years since their inception, is almost impossible without regard for their history and influence on today's underground (or, alternative, if you will) rock landscape. Is there value in examining Sonic Nurse on its own, in a vacuum, as if it were created by a band whose fingerprints weren't all over the last two decades of independent music? Does such an examination do a disservice to the band? Or, is it the other way around? There's definite merit in the idea that any work in an artist's career must be viewed as part of a greater series of work, only one smaller part of a larger whole. New Sonic Youth albums tend to raise these questions in people's minds, but they're largely futile, as it's impossible for most to listen to Sonic Youth as "just another" band, or to disconnect their past from their present music.
Sonic Nurse continues the trajectory first taken by the band on A Thousand Leaves in 1998, embracing melody and fragile beauty, though some of the album's more aggressive music hearkens back to the group's early days on DGC more than any of their recent work. The lush and layered songwriting, with well-placed squalls of noise and dissonant accents, continues what could perhaps be labeled as Sonic Youth's "adult contemporary" years, as they were, however, Sonic Nurse isn't simply a Murray Street clone. The album's most pleasant surprise is that it contains some of Kim Gordon's strongest vocal work since A Thousand Leaves and Washing Machine. Whereas her more recent work has found Gordon almost exclusively in a sort of speak/sing mode, this disc features a return of Gordon's more aggressive snarl as well as her distinct style of hushed delicacy, and though her vocals tend to create a love/hate dissection of the Sonic Youth fanbase, a return to more varied vocals from Gordon is a welcome surprise.
With Thurston Moore & Lee Ranaldo delving into mellow, contemplative territory almost exclusively, the throwback Sonic Youth sound of "Pattern Recognition" and "Kim Gordon and the Arthur Doyle Hand Cream" offers a well-placed alternative.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of Sonic Nurse is not one that can be easily quantified with a simple rating out of twelve, and is something that, in fact, has no real bearing on the quality of the album, more, instead, on the development of their sound. Since their first EP in 1982, Sonic Youth have been a band that's found a way to constantly reinvent themselves and their sound, often using their current musical contemporaries as a springboard for their own transformation. Sonic Nurse, however, seems to be a continued sign of the band disconnecting themselves from that cycle, as their current output has become almost a signature Sonic Youth sound as identifiable as some of the more singular classic Sonic Youth releases. It will be interesting to see if this trend continues, and if Sonic Youth follow this path on future releases, or, as they've always seemed wont to do, if they'll naturally come upon a new direction, perhaps one influenced by Thurston & Kim's energized reaction to the burgeoning underground noise community that they've embraced. One thing is more certain, no matter what direction Sonic Youth's music takes, their survival as a functioning, interesting, and meaningful rock band, more that twenty years into a groundbreaking career, will always be reason enough to pay attention.
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