Lee Ranaldo's "From Here to Infinity"...
 

is my favorite solo record in the entire SY discography. Yknow what, it's actually one of my favorite records in the entire discography period, I like it as much as any of my favorite records; "Bad Moon Rising", "Evol", "Silver Sessions", "Confusion is Sex", and "Goo". I honestly think it's as good if not better than some of those. Lee's solo records just sound more like legitimate records. I like Thurston's guitar noise albums plain and fine. I remember in Blastitude Larry Dolman remarked the good thing about Thurston's noise releases is they intersperse both essential and non-essential sounds into the same tracks, giving them a very casual sound. The casualness makes them seem less wanky, and sometimes it's real good, and at times real vicious, like some of the tracks on that "Thrash Sabbatical" set with those L.A. noise bads like Kevin Shields and the likes. Lee's experimental records, however, are very well thought out and even sometimes composed. He honestly has an amazing grip on arranging experimental sounds, and this record in particular is fantastically diverse, interesting, and mind-blowing. I've been listening it to a ton this week, and you can tell at the time Lee was getting into some awesome shit. The album has that fractured guitar feedback sound of "Confusion...", some amazing psychedelic noise, excellent concrete cut up techniques and electronic sounds, and a heavy nod to the more fucked up Post-Punk and Industrial bands of the time (to me, very SPK and Throbbing Gristle-influenced). This record sounds like it was made by multiple people, all from different aspects of the experimental scene, but it was just Lee being totally inspired and going off the deep end with fucked up sounds. The tracks are nice and short in comparison with 95 percent of noise music, giving a nice flow to the album with the rapid sucession of different and interesting sounds. I mean you get the track "Slo Drone", and it's exactly that, a thick ominous drone sound, and that only lasts a couple minutes and right after you hear this reppetitive dada clanky noise rhythm that takes you right out of the daze on the track "New Groove Loop". Next track after that is like a fractured No Wave song, reminds me of early Youth being remixed by Kevin Drumm or something. So many noise bands today, and so few of them have come close to what Lee acheived with this record, and this was made in my birth year for christ's sakes, 1987, Highly reccomended.

I love to play this record for ''noise'' kids and let them know it came out twenty years ago. To me its what a noise record should be....interesting and dynamic.

Personally tho, I still like Amarillo Ramp better than this one.

thurston's solo stuff have always been interesting as well. but yea, this album is really good. especially Amarillo. it's a tie between the two. though i did find thurston's blindfold cassette very Lee-like

I've never heard this one, I have East Jesus, which is really fucking good, so I'll have to check this one out for sure.

I think Lee´s "noise-records" are usually better than Thurstons, but he also has great stuff like the Dream Aktion Unit record + the Flaherty/Nace/Moore one.

I will check out this one, I have always confused it w/ Scriptures of the Golden Eternity...

Yeah. This exactly.

I should start looking into more of SY's solo/side stuff in general... there's so much of it though!

I don't see how you can really compare From Here to Infinity with an album like say EVOL or Goo. I mean, what are you actually basing your comparison on? It's like saying strawberry icecream is better than chicken madras.

I think the collaboration with Nels Cline is Thurston's best solo work.

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to batreleaser again.


this is almost exactly what I think about it

well which one would you rather eat right now? or usually? thats how you can compare it. which one do you like more

Lee kicks Thurston's ass, that's all.

i said i liked it as much, didnt compare it in one sentence. nice effort though really.

dream aktion unit and thurston's other stuff with flaherty and bill nace and corsano and the likes isn't noise, at least not by traditional standards. its all skronk-y free rawk and improvisation, i guess you could call it hippie noise if you want, but its along way from scraping metal on metal contact mic'd to oblivion harshness. i like a lot of it though, especially that dream aktion live at no fun disc.

I second that!

and i third it.

I don't fourth it hhaha

look at that

I'll fourth it then dammit.

fucking thining thin thinking fellers

fuck a5th

Hahahaha.

I love this record dearly. Wish I had the real vinyl deal with the looped grooves on every track. It's very similar to Silver Sessions in a lot of ways, but then years ahead. I've always wondered what it must have been like to see Christian Marclay fuck with it live (which he apparently did quite a lot).

Yes Agree on that! Although Sensitive/Lethal is quite good.

I really dig Flipped Out Bride too, myself.

Cool concept does not a good album make.

Lee has done way better, imo.