[foreverasskiss]

Originally Posted by Jim72

Experimental Jet Set is at least better than A Thousand Leaves,

ok, you've gone too far. Experimental is a transitional album (spacy and jamming and good as it is, it should've been an EP) which sets up WM and ends with NYC Ghost. just like BMR, but i consider BMR to be apart of a trilogy like EVOL and SISTER. Daydream is the start of the common rocking phase that lasted until Dirty which forces Experimental to exist. some don't agree.

then you have NYC Ghost, which is king of the last best trilogy phase----so that means Murray Street is the start of another. so i guess Rather Ripped doesn't count. right? i think not.

[Mortte Jousimo]

Originally Posted by foreverasskiss

ok, you've gone too far. Experimental is a transitional album (spacy and jamming and good as it is, it should've been an EP) which sets up WM and ends with NYC Ghost. just like BMR, but i consider BMR to be apart of a trilogy like EVOL and SISTER. Daydream is the start of the common rocking phase that lasted until Dirty which forces Experimental to exist. some don't agree.

then you have NYC Ghost, which is king of the last best trilogy phase----so that means Murray Street is the start of another. so i guess Rather Ripped doesn't count. right? i think not.

I don´t know about trilogies, but agree about that BMR & Experimental are transitional albums. I think there are cycles from experimental to more common albums and back experimental. Their career start in experimental, then in EVOL they change to more common in every album. In Experimental the direction changes again to the experimental & the peak is NYC ghosts. Then RR is the peak of the common albums, so if they will make albums anymore, they should be experimental.

[foreverasskiss]

yeah, but The Eternal to start off is not so experimental. i think it kinda blows. besides a couple of tunes.

maybe if Steve gave up local pizza and taco bell burritos

[Mortte Jousimo]

Yes, if you compare Nyc Ghosts & Eternal, Eternal belongs of course to Sy "common" albums. But if you compare RR & Eternal, I think Eternal is more experimental than RR. And SYR9 is naturally more experimental. So I think their direction was towards experimental. I really love also Eternal, there is just few mediocre tunes (What We Know, Thunderclap).

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

Originally Posted by Mortte Jousimo

Yes, if you compare Nyc Ghosts & Eternal, Eternal belongs of course to Sy "common" albums. But if you compare RR & Eternal, I think Eternal is more experimental than RR. And SYR9 is naturally more experimental. So I think their direction was towards experimental. I really love also Eternal, there is just few mediocre tunes (What We Know, Thunderclap).

Interestingly I think that it could be argued that Rather Ripped is one of Sonic Youth's most experimental albums because it is the most conventionally musical, using conventional strong structures, actual chords, and surprisingly rock and roll sounding lead riffs!! THAT is very radical experiment, especially from that crescendo of experimentation that was the A Thousand Leave through Sonic Nurse era...

Also, I think it can be argued that The Eternal is experimental in the sense that it combines a lot of elements of sounds and styles that Sonic Youth had experimented with over the previous 30 years.. if anything the more I reflect on it the more The Eternal feels like a perfect concluding record for them, because it feels like it synthesizes elements of ALL the different Sonic Youth eras.. The Noise era from 1981-1985.. the noisy college rockish era from 1986-1989.. the Geffen era from 1990-1995, the art-noise era from 1997-2005, and the conventional rock and roll era from 2006-2009.. Its a real composite record!

[Mortte Jousimo]

I just meaned there are more noise elements in Eternal than RR. In RR almost every song has those great Sonic sad melodies I love the most in Sonic music!