Thurston Moore - Demolished Thoughts

Thurston Moore - Demolished Thoughts
Genre: Rock/Indie
Rating: 6.5/10

Sonic Youth have long been a band of choice of the current hipster movement. The bands love of obscure tuning and experimentation appeals to many as it all serves to prevent them becoming mainstream and if theres one thing a hipster loves it's a band that "nobody get's". The bands love of the experimental and noise rock however simply means that the odds of getting a solid album out of them as a whole are always at 50/50. This unfortunately is the same for the myriad of other projects the band works on including solo albums by front man Thurston Moore. Much of Thurston's individual works are noise rock recordings or jazz experiments in which he simply noodles around with various instruments without any clear direction. What we have here however is something entirely different.

If you had to compare Demolished Thoughts to anything else Thurston has produced chances are you would stack it up against 2008's Trees Outside The Academy. Trees Outside The Academy was a stripped back effort that saw Thurston hang up his electric guitar (for the most part at least) in place for an acoustic guitar and some orchestral backing with some "artistic" interludes padding out the release. Demolished Thoughts offers much the same formula but stripped back even further by removing the drums and all the "artistic" interludes for the most part leaving just the raw components. The lack of filler material alone is something rare on any sonic youth based release. The album itself is filled to the brim with sparse mellow compositions where Thurston's signature dreamy guitar sound unfurls gently as his soft hushed vocals are accentuated by subtle string movements. "Benediction" is a perfect example of this with a great melodic summery vibe that sets the tone of the whole record. One of the key strengths is this albums accessibility not only has the simplification of the compositions made for a more coherent and consistent sound but it has also stripped away all the un-necessary "arty" fluff that has plagued previous releases. This simplification does however come at a cost as many of the songs merge and bleed into one another but the standard is high enough that this is indeed forgiveable.

Overall this is one of the better offshoots of Sonic Youth. Filled with summery vibes and peaceful soundscapes it makes for a nice relaxing listen the only thing stopping it being brilliant is the lack of stand out tunes.

Download: "Benediction" "Orchard Street"