Confusion is sex

CD (Goofin)

Available from 21/09/2016


Also Available in LP12 Vinil (View All)

14.50 €

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SONIC YOUTH

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SONIC YOUTH - CONFUSION IS SEX


First complete Sonic Youth album is one of Thurston
Moore's favorites. Includes live cover of The Stooges' "I
Wanna Be Your Dog". Vinyl includes digital download.
Originally slated to be a 7" to follow up their self-titled debut,
Sonic Youth's Confusion Is Sex blossomed into the band's
first album: a brain-bludgeoning, completely fried endeavor of
dissonance and disarray, a perfect soundtrack for running
from a chain-wielding gang near the SIN Club. This was the
sound of 1983 New York City, nothing like the jangly roots of
college radio rock starting to formulate in Athens, Georgia. It
sounded like no one else on Earth, for that matter. The raw,
Wharton Tiers 8-track production is dark, the Kim Gordonscrawled cover figure art of Thurston Moore is dark, Lee
Ranaldo's back cover photo-collage and Catherine Ceresole's
crumpled-xeroxed images that adorned the inside are dark.
It's an album that moves Sonic Youth forward from their first
EP almost by devolving backwards into true ugly, lo-fi
primitivity. The bareboned arsenal of junkpile guitars and
implementation of alternate tunings was growing, and so were
the songs that matched the individual attributes of each
instrument: certain ones groan and growl a specific way that
the band started to realize itself could become the
compositional germ of a song. Herein is the threshold of a
new explosion of the band's creativity, replacing the
comparatively cleaner buzz of the Sonic Youth EP with guitars
that spew fractured, uglier chunks of sound everywhere, held Thurston on half of this LP, and for the only time ever on
"Protect Me You," Lee) and the brutal-yet-controlled
metronomic drumming of Jim Sclavunos, augmented with
replacement drummer Bob Bert's notable bashing on "Making
the Nature Scene" and grotty no-fi live rendition of "I Wanna
Be Your Dog." Hearing the crashedwindow intro of "Inhuman"
and subway-brake screech of "The World Looks Red," you
can attest that while Sonic Youth's guitars are not quite yet
being utilized in the totally controlled, lyrical fashion seen later
on albums like Evol, Daydream Nation et al., they were well
aware of the colors and tonalities that were unfolding and the
possibilities presented. Also, they were getting a grasp on
adding colors to the chaos with tempered, simmering
moments like Gordon's "Shaking Hell" and Renaldo's chimy,
home-taped "Lee is Free." "Making the Nature Scene" and
"The World Looks Red" even toss in glints of hip-hop vocal
approach way ahead of its time, albeit through a blender.
While its confrontationalism might have put off some critics,
time has rewarded Confusion with a truly distinctive air and
atmosphere in the Sonic discography, enough to have Moore
declare it his fave along with the band's swan-song The
Eternal. Brian Turner, WFMU.
TRACKLISTING: 01. (SHE'S IN A) BAD MOOD 02. PROTECT ME YOU
03. FREEZER BURN / I WANNA BE YOUR DOG 04. SHAKING HELL
05. INHUMAN 06. THE WORLD LOOKS RED 07. CONFUSION IS NEXT
08. MAKING THE NATURE SCENE 09. LEE IS FREE

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