eMusic Review 0
For their third album, Sonic Youth moved up to the bigger indie label SST and hired the tighter and more technically proficient drummer Steve Shelly to replace Bob Bert, resulting in the first album to mix relatively catchier verse-chorus-verse structures with artier no-wave noise. Thurston Moore sounds like he's attempting to actually sing on key on the epic "Expressway To Yr. Skull" while "Shadow of a Doubt" gently glistens with pitter-pattering guitar harmonics and Kim Gordon's whispered coos. Steve Shelly's fierce backbeat on "Starpower," meanwhile, snaps and pops like the greatest 80s pop records, even amid all the alternately-tuned guitar chaos.
Not everything clicks and despite their more mainstream rock moves, Sonic Youth's annoyingly arty side remains intact. "In the Kingdom #19," for instance, mashes three minutes of white noise and found loops with Lee Ranaldo's indecipherable pseudo-beat poetry.







