Nearly overlooked amid the buzz surrounding Sonic Youth’s forthcoming, back-to-the-indies album is the band’s hefty new book, which is due to be published next week.
“Sensational Fix” — not to be confused with last year’s excellent “Goodbye 20th Century: A Biography of Sonic Youth,” by David Browne — is a 784-page companion volume to Sonic Youth’s museum exhibit of the same name, a collection of the band’s multidisciplinary activities dating back to 1981.
The pricey book — it lists at $85 — features photos, writings by the band’s members and contributions from the likes of Richard Hell, Alan Licht and Lydia Lunch.
According to the product description on Amazon.com:
The iconic postpunk band Sonic Youth is best known for blurring musical genres and transcending the boundaries of rock guitar. Its members — Kim Gordon, Thurston Moore, Lee Ranaldo and Steve Shelley — have also, over the course of 27 years since they first started playing together, more quietly engaged in multidisciplinary solo efforts and collaborations with visual artists, filmmakers, designers and other musicians. “What we’re doing is always inventing itself. I have no terminology for it,” according to Moore.
Perhaps most intriguing to fans, the book comes with two 7-inch records “with unpublished songs by each member.”
The tracklist:
“Song for Reverse Karaoke”
“Rats” (an acoustic version of Lee Ranaldo’s Rather Ripped cut)
“Ivan”
“Aerosol”
