“Thanks Kim Gordon,” one caption put it, “placing out bangers in ur 70s, now I’m not scared to develop previous.” The previous Sonic Youth singer and bassist has develop into an unlikely TikTok smash because of her dissonant latest single ‘BYE BYE’, a punishing blast of blown-out bass and ice-cold lure beats. Battered by the noise, Gordon sounds unmoved as she coolly recounts the shit that should get finished: “Purchase suitcase, pants to the cleaner… Name the vet, name the groomer / Name the canine sit-terrr.”
It’s a thrillingly avant-grade efficiency that’s additionally fairly accessible and catchy, a trick repeated all through her second solo album, ‘The Collective’, on which it seems. Right here the 70-year-old balances her lower than industrial sensibilities with crunchily on-trend manufacturing and relatable lyrics about rotten capitalism and fragile masculinity – if these sound like themes she explored throughout Sonic Youth’s ‘90s heyday, it solely goes to indicate how little has modified.
The bracing manufacturing comes courtesy of Justin Raisen, who helmed the album’s predecessor, ‘No Residence Report’, and has helped to steer the likes of Lil Yachty into unchartered territory. Gordon’s newest imaginative and prescient is crystallised on ‘I Don’t Miss My Thoughts’, which pairs a muscular beat with insidious synth as she half-raps about “crying on the subway” and “drywall for days”; vignettes of on a regular basis life damaged up like jagged shards of glass.
In her former band, she typically stood at a disdainful take away from American tradition, however now burrows below the pores and skin of her topics. Take second single ‘I’m A Man’, on which she flips Sonic Youth’s ‘Kool Factor’ (“Are you gonna liberate us ladies from white, male, company oppression?”) to play the type of entitled unhappy sack who stormed the Capitol in 2021: “It’s not my fault I used to be born a person… Don’t name me poisonous.” The twist is that he appears to be hiding a extra female aspect, a tragedy mirrored within the oppressive soundscape that crushes Gordon’s lyrics.
Not all of those experiments fairly come off: the commercial clang of ‘It’s Darkish Inside’, on which she drawls, “they don’t train clit at school / Like do Lit”, veers near ‘Yeezus’ parody. It’s notable, although, how up to date her distorted art-punk sounds, given the continued grunge resurgence and the truth that Olivia Rodrigo’s taking The Breeders on tour this yr. Regardless of her new album’s title, right here is an icon who’s spent greater than 4 many years making really particular person artwork.
Particulars
- Launch date: March 8, 2024
- Report label: Matador
