Disappearer

I don't know Thurston Moore. I know people who have a lot of opinions about him, however, and they aren't all... complimentary, shall we say.  

With no personal point of view on those things, all I can tell you is this: the man is a massive musical talent.

Imagine, if you will, being such a good songwriter that you write a song as spectacular as Disappearer, and your band only ever plays it live once (at the Vic in Chicago in 1990).

It's insane.

Thurston's 63 today. May he rock on, and, I hope, write a few more like that one.

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I've seen Sonic Youth only three times. Each was spellbinding. 

The first was in 1987 at the Chestnut Cabaret in Philly. It was a rare all-ages late-afternoon show. Live Skull -- with the menacingly talented Thalia Zedek on lead vocals -- opened with a crushing, pulverizingly brutal performance that made me wonder if SY could keep up. I shouldn't have lost even a second of confidence in our heroes. They were touring the Sister album and they were firing on all cylinders, even closing the show with a Ramones medley. The combined onstage swagger of Kim, Lee, and Thurston is truly one of the most powerful things in rock, and Steve Shelley's relentless pounding behind them? Well, it's just what the doctor ordered, says this drummer. They were an absolute force of nature.

Next time? 1991 on a triple bill at the Philadelphia Civic Center. Social Distortion opened, then SY, then Neil Young and Crazy Horse on the Ragged Glory/Weld tour. A funny thing happened at that show. The majority of Neil-heads liked Social D quite a bit -- so much that it surprised me. SD were touring their breakthrough sef-titled record, and, apparently, had enough roots in their roots/punk hybrid at the time to keep the classic-rock crowd satisfied.

Sonic Youth? Not so much. Let me be clear: I loved them. They were aggressively noisy and confrontational. They did a version of Eric's Trip that stopped time: sending Thurston and Lee careening around the stage crashing into one another and then rolling on the floor. 

But the Neil crowd hated them.

At one point the guy behind me asked me what appeared to be a genuine question: "You obviously love this band. <pause> Can you explain to me why?" 

I tried to give him a short lesson on discordance and power and dynamics and the value of carefully curated noise (I mean, for fuck's sake, my friend, surely you appreciate noise if you're into Neil and the Horse, right?). He was polite. I'll even say that he tried to understand, but no. I don't think he went out later and bought Daydream Nation. At the show, Thurston yelled, "KILL YOUR IDOLS!!!" over and over. Mostly, though, the crowd just wanted to kill Sonic Youth. Not me, man. I loved every second.

I was duly impressed.

But they didn't come through town a lot, and my next SY show was the Washing Machine tour in 1995. It was also pretty damn great -- with an opening set from the Dirty Three no less -- but just a little less perfect than the two SY tours I had seen previously. 

And then... well, in retrospect, I'm not entirely clear what the hell happened next, but I never saw them again. To some degree, there was a run of SY albums post-Washing Machine that I found to be a bit spotty. Those records just didn't beckon me to the live shows like their predecessors had. But when the SY albums improved -- for instance, The Eternal is fantastic -- I still didn't quite get back to seeing them again. I'm not big on regret, but now that they're gone, I really wish I'd caught them again, especially on the tour for that final record.

Which brings me to a post-ending tangent: life is short; see that show. You just never know what the future brings, for you or that band.

Happy birthday, Thurston.