[kenning]

Doesn't get enough love. It's at least as good as Bull in the Heather.

[Toxa]

really? As for me, it's the weakest song on ATL...

[jennthebenn]

it's worlds better than BITH, to me.

[ZEROpumpkins]

Stupid name, irritating song.

[toxic johnny]

I was playing ATL on vinyl the other day and was struck by the incredible beauty of this album... it really stands out on it's own from all of the others. I adore all Kim's songs on this record. The Ineffable Me is probably my favourite... and Contre Le Sexisme usually floats my boat.

But yeah a big up to French Tickler too!.....

[max]

wonderful name, wonderful song.

[to.w]

Originally Posted by ZEROpumpkins

Stupid name, irritating song.

Probably because you've never used a french tickler... Try and your opinion on the song will change

[Protectmeyou]

the vinyl Thousand Leaves sounds amazing. this album took me the longest to get into (getting the vinyl helped), but it pays off in the end. Karen Revisited is beautiful music.

[nicfit]

Karen Koltrane---

[Ono Soul]

"A Thousand Leaves" is without a doubt my all time fav SY album. I'll never forget how exciting it was when that album came out. It just somehow seemed like a culmination of everything they had done before then, but at the same time they were definitely breaking new ground as well, as they continued to refine their unique brand of "pop" and "avant garde", hitting upon a near perfect synthesis on this one. I thought "Sunday", "Wildflower Soul", "Hits Of Sunshine" and "Snare, Girl" were some of the finest songs Thurston had ever wrote at that point, and I still do. I also think it features some of Kim and Lee's best songs (yes, "French Tickler" is killer!). And of course, Steve is the glue holding it all together, as per usual. Seems everyone was at the top of their game. And what a great SOUNDING album, my god. Incredibly dense and clear, all at the same time. It's just perfect.....

[nowideau]

The best car-driving music disc I own and some of the greatest tracks SY ever put out. To me this is their "minimalist" disc , where they push the minimalist impulses of most rock/verse-chorus-verse/pop music beyond the popular music format towards the classical music form of minimalism as defined by composers like Philip Glass and Steve Reich. Consider Wildflower Soul, where an overpowering guitar riff is repeated over and over. At first it rocks in the conventional form, begins to annoy, but after a while ascends the listener to a sort of meditational state, much the same effect as Glass' Einstein on the Beach or most of Merzbow's output.
Hoarfrost and Karen Koltrane also spring to mind, the former nice and gentle, while Coltrane chews and erodes your speakers. Both contain the repetions mentioned above and, due to the stretched, unconventional (un-pop song like) compositional form, move out of "song" realm and become "compositions" in the classical minimalist sense of the word.

Sonic Youth even acknowledge this trend away from song-form. In the linear notes, they credit the tracks as "compositions", rather than songs. The latter crediting featured in the linear notes of Goo, where their music purposefully aspired towards more concise "songs", leaving aside most minimalist, drone tendencies found on DDN.

I remember reading a negative review of some Youth album years ago, the critic complaining about how the Sonics had never expanded their instrumental experimentation of choice beyond guitars. A Thousand Leaves proves that that criticism, factually inaccurate anyway, is irrelevant, because vast sections of A Thousand Leaves sound NOTHING like stringed instruments anyway, especially Karen Koltrane's intense, mid-song jams.

One thing I hate about the album are the Kim songs. The Ineffable Me is a nice little rant, but a throwaway next to the gargantuine tracks (Hits of Sunshine, Karen Koltrane, Wildflower Soul). Contre Le Sexisme is curious, and rewards repeated listens. It's mixed to give a sense of shifting depth, some sounds appearing clearly in view, others little more than a haze on the horizon, and slowly moves the sounds around, bringing some in to focus, others out. But as a prelude of sorts (it never develops as a song of its own, was never really performed live and moves right into Sunday), it's pretty weak. It's almost like music played just before SY blast out live, amplifying the moment when they actually begin to play, in this case, Sunday, the one conventional song on the album, which is absolutely amazing and the one truly conventional rock song on the album.

French Tickler has one great vocal hook: "I feel combustible, that's my will...". The rest of the song bores. Female Mechanic suffers a similar sort of, going nowhere repetition in the vocal line, but at least there's plenty of mangled noise guitar to tune in to over the Kim's tired singing, and the second half of the song, where everything is soft and autumny, is great(most of the album has an autumny feel, but that's probably just the album name brainwashing me). Even though it sounds uninspired compared to the later extended jams on tracks like Wildflower Soul and Hits of Sunshine, it shines brightly compared to the slog that makes up the first half of the song.

[nomowish]

Originally Posted by nowideau

...vast sections of A Thousand Leaves sound NOTHING like stringed instruments anyway, especially Karen Koltrane's intense, mid-song jams...

OH YES, as if they suddenly traded in their guitars for industrial objects to coax sound from. How the whole atmosphere of the song totally changes in an instant is really amazing to me. The way they produce sounds that seem cut to pieces and like living things.

Asia Argento used the 2nd half of the song in The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things.

[Torn Curtain]

Originally Posted by Toxa

really? As for me, it's the weakest song on ATL...

I love it. To me the weakest song is Contre le sexisme.

[samuel]

Free time, free time
I have got itttttttttt

[badgercorn]

It is great and better than Bull In The Heather by a long way, but can they still play it? Has this been affected by the stolen gear a while back?