Best/Worst Sonic Youth Songwriter
 

Is it just me or does Lee come up with the most consistantly brilliant songs and Kim comes up with the worst? Thurston is the most prolific songwriter. he writes most of the songs. Kim writes the second most and Lee writes the least. Yet Kim comes up with crappier songs more often than Lee or Thurston. Any thoughts?

Hmm, I like all three personally. Thurston's my favorite songwriter out of the three, and I like Lee and Kim evenly.

I think KIm has written some of the worst osngs, but over all they're all good. Lee's are always good, and most of kim and thurstons are good. Kim just has what i like to call hissy fits (mariah and the arthur doyle hand creme, plastic sun, etc).

But i also gotta say kim writes some of my favorites.. cross the breeze, bro james, shaking hell, shadow of a doubt, orange rolls angles spit, washing machine, the list goes on.

Thurston is my favorite writer by far. Lee makes great songtexts but not so incredibly special, and Kim her texts are... well they're not that good.

I would have to agree. Lee only put out one song in Sonic Nurse & it rocked. I didn't like mariah and the arthur doyle hand creme song I felt like they should have put a Lee song instead. & to find out that in the UK promo Kim added an extra song makes me wonder is Lee writing enough song or is it that the other members in the band don't agree with Lee's songs, or can it be that Lee just wants to put his songs in his solo projects. All in all I think they all write great song but, if I would have to choose to who puts out my least fav SY song it would have to be Kim (sorry Kim just being honest).

Lee comes from a quite 'classic' songwriting background, as he is far the most studied out of all the Sonic Youth guitarists; he had pretty much mastered EADGBE by the time he began experimenting with other tunings. Lee was also very into classic song structures, growing up listening to the Beatles and the Beach Boys in his teen years, as well as soaking up the era's beat poetry, which gave him the right knowledge to construct great songs as well as write the lyrics.

Thurston comes from a more punk background, coming of age as he moved into NYC- just as NYC punk was in it's best form. The Ramones, Blondie, Richard Hell, fuck, Glenn Branca were all around for Thurston to dig. Thats why he's so badass. Thurston isn't as studied as Lee is in terms of music. He was just about competent in EADGBE to start with by the time he started using alternate tunings.

Kim... I don't know. She's always been a painter and a writer. I think she combines the two for amazingly creative lyrics. Imagery is mostly the key to her writing, but she also has some country-ish influences as well as no-wave chants. I think you need an imagination to become immersed in the visions she has (or wants you to have).

They're all very different people.

I love Lee though.

Thurston wrote that song. ;)

Lee's later stuff is definately amazing, and I like it better than stuff he produced in the early 90's. I think Mariah Carey was amazing though, it's one of the highlights of the album I think! It really grew on me.

really?

nicely done.

Thurston Moore wrote Plastic Sun. The lyrics, anyway. He also wrote Inneffible Me, another song occassionally refferred to as a Kim hissy fit.

The answer is obviously going to be Kim as the worst; Thurston as the best.
I don't think Lee has had a fair share of songwriting priveliges.
As for Kim, she just hasn't written anything outstanding.

that's another one i can attribute it too... makes sense, i knew they swapped, but not on those songs. I too write songs I'd want a girl to sing.

Thanks. Hah, reps, people, reps?

And yes, Thurston did write Paper Cup Exit.

I sometimes misjudge Kim because of the way ATL was kinda ruined by the out-of-place Kim songs. However, any of the early albums would definalty not be the same w/o Kims songs. You can always skip songs, but you cant add ones, so i dont hold anything against Kim. But Orange Rolls sucks horrribly.

Thurston has had alot of bad songs too IMO: 100%, Screaming Skull, Junkies promise, mostly the early-mid nineties era held little sassy songs by him.

Lee is the most consistant of the three, but he lacks the material. Maybe he would have the same problem if was forced to produce as large a quantity of songs.

With that said, id like to say Thurston is my favorite.

by the way mariah and arthur doyle...as a tune rocks! i din't like it at first, but then, when i heard it live it was amazing. an in connection with that lyric it's ment to be like funny lyric therefore i can't look at it as it ment to be or should be some kind of "serious" piece of "poetry". it's hard to say who i like most, coz each of them have some great lyrics. it's impossible to choose in my case.

I hate lee's songs. Kims earlier writings were amazing: Shaking Hell, Early American, Halloween.

i like lee's stuff the best and i like kim and thurston equally

lee it seems very rarely writes the basis of the song but writes parts that complement the skeletal song that thurston brings even on some of the songs he sings.

like skip tracer-thurston song-
whorefrost thurston song-

right now mote, beauty lies in the eye and lee #2 are the only sonic youth songs that lee wrote the meat of the tune.

definitely looking forward to his solo songs cd.

matt

Uh, Lee wrote both of those songs. Scattered parts of Hoarfrost are all over 'Road Movies', as are parts of Skip Tracer.

What do you mean songwriters? Are you talking about the lyrics?

How does the Sonic Youth songwriting process work? I had thought Sonic Youth just sort of "jammed" songs into existence, and then pretty much randomly decide who sang on what. See Disc 2 of the Diry Deluxe. I didn't think it was a McCartney/Lennon/Harrison type thing, where they individually write songs and then take them to the entire group to play.

Lee has not written a bad Sonic Youth song in my eyes. Kim has written some of the best but she is off and on. Thurston is steady eddy.

Plastic Sun was confirmed as a Thurston-penned song in an interview but where is this other information? I'd love to know who wrote what.

NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNO!

Oh yes....waaaay YES!

Lee is better than the others.

Although it is true that Lee is God, keep in mind that Thurston and Kim have way more songs so it is kind of easier for them to have their "weaker songs" come to surface more so than the one good song that Lee gets on the album (if that makes any sense).

???

Chris, they are idiots. The end.

Lee's lyrics seem a little cliche. He writes with too much emotion and just sounds really lame. Thats just my opinion but I just dont like all that symbolic thoughtful stuff. It ruins the whole art filled vibe.

Thurston and Kim however are both great however.

I hate Thurston and Kim's voices for the most part.

Thats why I listen to them. There so bad and atonal (atleast in the earlier days) that its great.

Inhuman has the greatest vocals...


Lee tries to sound serious and I just end up laughing at his songs...

Yeah, I really prefer Kim and Thurston's vocals on older stuff. It fits better. Newer stuff is so much more delicate I think Lee's vocals work better.

with mote lee plays the chord progression-ie the meat of the tune while thurston plays the noise accompaniment.


beauty lies in the eye-lee plays all of the guitar while thurston plays bass

lee #2 - cant remember what thurston plays but pretty sure lees playing the main chord progression

im sure there are more but thats all i can think of right now. oh yeah wish fulfilment-lee plays the main harmony of the song while thurston is more in the accompaniment role-especially in the begining -they both mirror each other for the rest.

so think about it in these terms - if you were to take lees parts out of these songs would the identity of the song still be as intact as it would be if thurstons parts were taken out. think about female mechaninc on duty(mainly the A section). the "meat" of the song is kim's guitar part while thurston and lee augment it. thurston with his noisy stuff and lee with his mirroring of kims part. hers is the more dominant part in the A section

as of late it seems alot of the songs have come from thurston and then the band fleshes them out. you can hear how his parts are the nucleus of the song in these instances while what kim and lee do are the flesh. in this way the lee songs i mentioned above are more his than thurston or kims tho of course they are still sonic youth songs of course.

the last song on murray st is a wonderful example of all of their parts coexisting equally. and that was one of the only songs on that album that was culled from a jam.

matt

They are all very different. I think Lee's are all really great, but he has so few. So maybe if the tables were turned and he did more, and Thurston or Kim did less, we'd say Thurston was better. Thurston or Kim can't always put out as good stuff consistently while Lee only puts out a few. But they are all really great, and we all know that. I'd have to say they all make some really good songs. Lee's are just all good, because he does so few.

i can;t argue with that logic. but it still stands as one of my favorite dirty songs

yea. i think kim doesnt relaly write all of her own songs. i remember reading an interview where thurston had written all the main structure and vocals for pattern recognition, but kim heard it and wrote a better one. they probably ahve a unique way of writing and collaborating. although thats just one example. i like lee the best. but diamond sea is a gem.

skip tracer is Thurston's song?

Hard one! id have to go for Lee! simply because he has written some astonishingly brilliant and affecting pieces over the years. Athough Kim gets a lot of criticism she has been resposable for some of the bands best work ('I love you golden blue' anyone?) Thurston is very consist as a writer. This is what makes sonic youth so good as a band is that they all bring different elements to the mix, and are all equally talented in different ways

Honestly...........this shouldn't even be debated.
All three are very talented musicians and songwriters, and to compare them to each other is like taking a piss while spinning around in a centrifuge..............