Search - Sonic Youth :: Screaming Fields of Sonic Love

The Very Best of the Early Years

UntilAfter5Yrs | Dallas, TX USA | 03/17/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"In 1995, Sonic Youth's record company decided to re-release all six of the band's seminal 1980's albums: the violent, harsh 'Confusion is Sex'; the unsettling dreamscapes of 'Bad Moon Rising'; the pulsing psychedelic 'EVOL'; the straightforward indie-rock of 'Sister'; the avant-garde tribute to Madonna `Ciccone Youth'; and the quasi-symphonic masterpiece 'Daydream Nation.' To promote these reissues, DGC also issued this record, an assortment of 17 songs from the band's 1980's catalog. By no means would anyone consider Sonic Youth a singles band (they only issued six singles in their first nine years as a band; seven if you count "Into the Groove(y)" from the Ciccone Youth LP). But the band sounds surprisingly good stripped down to the singles and key album tracks. This unconventionally-sequenced retrospective (it begins with the selections from `Daydream Nation' and goes back to the earlier, less commercial songs) shows how the band developed from a cooler-than-thou art-noise clique into one of the most creative and enduring bands in rock history. The long and graceful interlocking guitar lines of "Teen Age Riot" and "Candle," the quintessential indie love song "Cotton Crown," the shimmering psychedelia of "Shadow of a Doubt," and the forbidding sturm und drang of "Death Valley 69" and "Inhuman" all make a case on how no one could touch Sonic Youth in the 80's, and for those looking to familiarize themselves with the group, this is an excellent place to begin."

Sonic Primer

Octoworm | 01/26/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"If you are already well into owning a substantial Sonic Youth collection, then you can pass on this album. If, however, you are a new initiate, then this is the perfect starting point. Spanning from their earliest years to the critically acclaimed Daydream Nation, this cd offers a good sampling of Sonic Youth's early catalog. If you like what you hear, the good news is that this is not a "best of" package. For every song on this cd, there are ten others just as good or even better. Again, the strength of this cd is the variety it represents, not that it's the best Sonic Youth has to offer. But don't worry, every song on this disc is a gem."