My Favourite Songs by My Favourite Bands: Sonic Youth

1. Tunic (Song for Karen)

Witty homage, sexy vocals, great guitars – I love Sonic Youth so much.  This song also kind of illustrates how much I want to be Kim Gordon when I grow up.

2. Self-Obsessed and Sexxee

I bought Experimental Jet Set Trash and No Star when I was thirteen, with birthday money, because I knew that Kurt Cobain loved Sonic Youth.  I instantly fell in love, too – especially with this song, which is definitely the pop anthem of the album and appealed to my teen-girl take on grunge.

3. My Friend Goo

She sounds awesome, doesn’t she?  Goo has a real tattoo, wears green pants, all the boys love her and she is just all-round awesomely cool.  For some reason, I have always wanted to have a cat and call it My Friend Goo.

4. Bull In The Heather

It’s a close-run race but I really think this is Kim Gordon at her most sexy, which is – let’s face it – humanity at its most sexy.

5. Dripping Dream

Sonic Nurse – which came out in 2004 and has the awesome Ruichard Prince cover art – is my most-recent favourite SY album.  For me it is up there with the absolute classics.  It’s a surprisingly easy listen, and I often listen to the entire thing repeatedly, but this one is definitely a highlight.

6. Get Into The Groove (Ciccone Youth)

This may well be my favourite cover of all time.  When I first heard it, it blew my mind and basically introduced me to the concept of lo-fi.

7. Kool Thing

Fear of a female planet!  Chuck D!  Could this be any cooler?  I really, really think not.

8. Sunday

Sonic Youth do jangly pop really well sometimes, and this is probably my favourite example of it.

9. Paper Cup Exit

I only realised kind of late in the day that I love Lee Ranaldo just as much as I love Kim and Thurston, if not more.  When his debut solo album came out this year, I finally made the connection – and it is definitely somewhere in my top three albums of the year.

10. Screaming Skull

This seems a fitting close to the list – a pure 90s slab of punked-up angular grunge – back where, for me, it all began.