The Eternal

Sonic Youth were always synonymous with art-rock weirdness but the most striking thing about their recent output is how myth-bustingly conventional it’s been. Marking their debut release on indie motherlode Matador, The Eternal is perhaps their most straightforward album yet. Indeed, with its treacly surf-rock guitars and Kim Gordon-led cheerleader choruses, it feels like a neat splicing of everybody’s favourite Sonic Youth records, 1988’s Daydream Nation and 1990’s Goo. Gordon’s in control for much of the opening half: ‘Anti-Orgasm’ is a beautiful chugger, steeped in sweetly frazzled guitars; ‘Sacred Trickster’ is Kim being Kim – shouty, sloganeering – against a backdrop of nu-gazy distortion. When Thurston Moore does eventually assume leadership, it’s on the implausibly funky Velvets pastiche of ‘Poison Arrow’ (tragically not an ABC cover), wherein he gets to show off a deft falsetto. There’s not much variety over the course of the 12 tracks but, as long as Sonic Youth keep on producing sweet pay-offs of the quality of ‘Thunderclap (For Bobby Pyn)’, it seems hardly to matter. And for those who have dismissed Sonic Youth as indulgent guitar abusers, The Eternal constitutes a pretty definitive slap in the face.

Key Track: ‘Sacred Trickster’