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The lord of acidic guitars has returned to soothe us from the blasts that have made our ears bleed over the years.
The path embarked upon with "Trees Outside The Academy" expands, stretching out along a road paved with acoustic guitars. Mr. Sonic Youth's introspective side is laid bare here, splendid in all its interpretations and forms. And if the aforementioned album had the touch of an equally acid colleague (J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr., who just this year gave us an equally splendid album), in this one we find Beck Hansen managing the work, taking care of production, mixing, and even adding vocals here and there, synths, and bass. And you can definitely hear the influence. The voice drags on inexorably between the tracks, there's the sadness of the producer's "Sea Change," which we find in the splendid "Illuminine," a heartbreaker meant for a sunny Sunday morning, alone, lost in nothingness. The rhythm accelerates on rare occasions ("Circulation"), and strings, of course following the guitar, dominate the scene, along with distant, elusive synthesizers ("Space"). There's also room for some acidic dilation at the end of "Orchard Street," but the strength lies solely in melody and melancholy.
I bought the vinyl edition, and the artwork is truly beautiful, made up of photos of a young Thurston, his companion Beck, and who I deduce to be Moore's mother in a New York of bygone days. The vinyls are two and they are blue, and if that's not enough, inside there's a booklet with the song lyrics and some little poems.
"Blessed are the noise musicians for they shall go down in history."
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