Daydream Nation 33 1/3
 

Have any of you guys read this little book?

http://www.amazon.com/Sonic-Youths-D.../dp/B001UFP63A

I bought it at the records tent at Coachella and read it on the plane ride home, it's basically just a song-by-song analysis of DDN with some other sections with interviews and stuff. it's got a cool intro by Lee and some really great passages. My only beef is that it focused way too much on the lyrics. The dude had some pretty good insights about the music and structure here and there, but too often he's just discussing about the significance of lines like "gun yr sled close your peeping toms" and "last night's dream was a talking baby wizard."

but yeah. check it out if you haven't already.

I read it and wasn't that into it. From what i remember the author was trying to make some quite grandiose political claims (with lots of attempts to link SY with Public Enemy) which I didn't think worked particularly well. It's a shame because I've read some other books in the 33 1/3 series that I thought were really good.

Thurston was not impressed with some of the claims he made about the lyrical content - particularly Silver Rocket being about cocaine or whatever. He left a bitchy comment on the associated blog. I'll try find it.

http://33third.blogspot.com/2007/03/...am-nation.html

Here we go.

I read that book about a month ago. I figured some of it was a bit of a stretch but I still liked it. His passion for the album came through if nothing else.

Wow I can't believe it got published with those lyrics, he had 'em really wrong. Whatever, I thought all his attempts to interpret Thurston's lyrics were actually painful to read and I don't think anyone would really subscribe to any of his ideas though.


I just reread some of the sections, looking back I think I enjoyed this book because I was blasting DDN while reading it.

I read it, but it was a bit of a chore to complete it. I really couldn't care less about all the different interpretations of the lyrics (probably because I don't care for SY's lyrics). Other bits annoyed me too: "In between the tracks, in those spaces, you can hear: the sound of NYC; the sound of disoriented youths etc."

Jesus Christ! Is that an actual quote?!?!?!

No, but he did say something along those lines.

"Just before the opening guitar strains... in the space of those first few seconds... I swear you can hear the following:
1. New York City
2. An overboiling frustration...
3. The neccessary culmination and...
4. Walls closing in around four people...
etc"

sounds like a cheesy fanboy interpretation of a great album...