NYC Ghosts + Flowers (the song)
 

Doing some research:

In the lyric sheet, "NYC Ghosts + Flowers" is dedicated to NMR, CLR & SLR... anybody know for sure who these initials are?

Anybody have some sort of proof of these people?

--Brad.

no
but i fuckin love that song

Hello 20 15

what does that meen?

My only educated guess is that since each name ends with "R", that they are Ranaldo's...family members? I'd love if someone had some concrete answer. Chris Lawrence, I'm looking at you.

I love that song too.

edit: post 1,400 !!!

cody lee ranaldo , singer leah ranaldo and nanny and mummy ranaldo maybe?

yeh... i had thought of Cody Lee Ranaldo myself... and then naturally thought of Leah Singer... but why would it be Singer Leah, y'know?

good a guess as any tho.

Who knows... my favoute NYCG+F song, though.

yeh man, the day they reviewed it, was the day i stopped paying serious attention to their reviews.

i don't think it's a good album; i think it's an amazing album.

--brad.

I agree totally. I think it's one of their best in recent years even, but the reviews in general dissed it. It even has Thurston and Kim singing together at points which is super rare. And the song is Lee's best song ever. I'm sure it must freak him out to have written that song before 9/11 though. I've noticed they stopped playing it afterwards.

well if anyone is still interested, i think i figured it out. in the recent wire interview, Lee said something about his "kids," (plural). so it's probably Cody & his other kids. maybe.

NYC Ghosts & Flowers is my favorite Sonic Youth song with Trilogy. And the album is also one of my favorites.

They played it at the post-9/11 benefit that they hosted at the Bowery Ballroom in October 2001 less than a month after it hapenned. It was the first show they played after the attacks, and they were just allowed a couple days before back into the Murray Street Studios. It was the first time I saw them play, and still the best, NYC Ghost and Flowers being the most intense song I've ever seen them play live. Cat Power also played that gig, as well, as Tom Verlaine, and Flaherty/Corsano... Which was the first time I saw either of them play and it blew my mind. Might be the single greatest multi-act show I ever went to.

Given the nature of the song, I would guess it's dedicated to some deceased people. It seems like an odd song to dedicate to your children. But who knows?

As for not playing it much after 9/11, 9/11 was more than a year after the NYCG&F tour, so they probably had stopped playing it anyway.

awesome song. awesome song.

always wondered about those initals tho.

Well, if they were going to play it post-9/11, I suppose that would be the time, eh? I remember Lee's description of Echo Canyon and the neighborhood after the attacks from the SY website, he was obviously pretty personally devastated by the experience. But then, who wouldn't be?

I think you're probably right about the initials. The song seems to be about people from his distant past, many who are now gone. I would think the initials are likely of those people, but only he will ever know for sure.

As for dropping the song, that's just supposition on my part, but they were still playing several NYC Ghost & Flowers songs on the Murray Street tour, and in all the playlists I've seen they weren't playing that song in particular.