Am I The Only One?
 

I hate feeling like the only one in a city that loves/knows of sonic youth, Does anyone else feel the same way? I'm in sacramento, California.

Hell yes are you kidding aside from my husband nearly no oneknows, or it is a small group that are very quiet about it. I have no understanding of how I became me growing up here, but then again I stick out everywhere I go not just my home territory.

I play guitar in alternate tunings like Sonic Youth. Try finding like minded musicians. WOW

the only Sonic Youth fans I know in Worcester are my kids. I'm sure there's more I just don't know them.

I've always been able to find whatever few SY fans existed in whatever town I lived in. In HS it was just a few that mainly knew the "grunge years" stuff (goo/dirty), but still....

Sonic Youth aren't always an easy band to get into...I respect any ear that can appreciate 'em....even if SY fans happen to sometimes be the biggest music snobs on the planet.

haha. very true.

I just wish I could find a guitarist who played and wrote songs in alternate tunings. That would be a thrill for me... I have NEVER found such a person.

Standard does feel a little limited, sometimes. It's mainly all I use these days...but then again, my playing has been much more straight forward.

SUPPOSED to be starting a little band with my friend Cameron. He's really into Modern Lovers, SY, the VU....so, I might be getting back into that alternate tuning thing for some stuff, even though jam sessions this far are kinda going in a Junior Kimbrough meets VU type of thing. We'll see what happens. I'm supposed to be playing lead.

Cool. I have been playing in strictly alternate tunings for the last 15 years! I'll never go back.

The best part is handing some douchey guitar player my alternately tuned guitar and them trying to impress but end up sounding like Creed Shreds or whatever. Classic!

I don't even hang out with anyone where i live.

and i cant remember meeting a sonic youth fan in person, ever in my life.

I know ya deal with stuff, but I still think it'll work wonders for ya (in the long run....) if ya get out a bit more, friend.

I've found that most people I've asked about Sonic Youth tend to fall into one of two camps, depending on their age; the "Yeah, I remember those guys! They're still around?" camp and the "I think I might've heard of them...what song do they play?" camp.

But I've also found there are more SY fans in my town than you may think. It's sort of like some kind of secret club that no one talks about except with other members.

i'm always the only person in my area. all of my friends refer to me as "the guy who likes sonic youth". and when that movie Juno came out, almost everyone i know told me that they mentioned sonic youth in it.

I had this exact experience! Weird. I used to be the only guy I knew who was a fan, so I basically kept making my friends listen to them until there were more. At uni now, so obviously I met a few more recently.

to my big surprise, there are many folks in my area who are into Sonic Youth.
what is even better, is that they all view me as the greatest Sonic Youth fan ever.

samesies samesies fr me

"sonic youth????? i thought they finished with about 20 years ago...didnt they rip off nirvana and then broke up??? isnt one of them dead???" true story, true conversation with someone only last week. he is now a dedicated santana fan, i thought or presumed he was dead about 35 years.....go figure!

seriously, i was fortunate that most of my mates are very like minded when it comes to music, we all grew up with indie rock...pixies, sy, babes, nirvana, buttholes etc etc etc and we still all kinda listen to similar things so its great to chew to fat with a guy and discuss face to face the greatness of say the new swans album......

i'm pretty sure there are other posters on this board from sacramento, or there have been in the past?

And I'm pretty sure there's record stores and rock concerts in sacramento where you can go and hang out and possibly meet people.
The thread starter either doesn't know enough people or hangs out with the "wrong" kind of people.

And there's other bands too. Fuck Sonic Youth!

i feel awful...

I was also bombarded by friends and casual aquaintances telling me how Juno had a "funny line" about Sonic Youth.

SONIC YOUTH RULES ALL.

My teacher had a Sonic Youth t-shirt today, from their Sensational Fix art exhibition. That was pretty cool, that doesn't happen every day.

Im that guy among my friends haha.

Its true there are concerts in sacramento, but they are either some shitty local punk/metal band or some hip hop, very rarely does anyone legit come here. The only two i can think of lately was Mike Watt and Frank Black.

I figured I was the only one from my city on this forum but I now see there are at least four of us.

I am lucky in that A LOT of my friends know & love SY. Not as much as I know & love them, but still. I get to share much of my musical exploits with my bff's & Im thankful. :)

HI, btw T! When did you start posting here? Are you stalking me? ;)

I'm in Sacramento too and while talking about SY doesn't really come up much, there are plenty of people and amazing bands in town. Are you familiar with KDVS? If not, start listening to 90.3fm and you'll never bother with any other local staion. The station puts on great shows every week. Check out undietacos.org for a list of small club and house shows that are always going on.

Did you make it to O:RMF X last week? It is the stations twice-a-year festival and there were tons of great bands. If you like SY, you may want to consider checking into it. They were not SY-like bands, but being a SY fan shows you are interested in different sounds and there was plenty of that. There was also the 2-day NoiseFest that happens every year. I've never made it to one myself, but if SY led you to noise bands you can check that out too.

yeah, i think most of us have gone through the "Sonic Youth? Weren't one of their songs in there, or something?"

i then explain that it's a cover of The Carpenters.

but. i too am "the guy who listens to Sonic Youth". But, people find that such a weird thing for some reason. maybe it's because of the really strong animosity towards noise...?