In 2011 Thurston Moore released what was probably the finest solo album by any member of Sonic Youth in that band’s 30-year history. The Beck-produced Demolished Thoughts showed yet another side to Moore’s work presenting silken string-led folk ballads. Then five months after its release the bomb dropped: Moore and his wife Kim Gordon were splitting up and consequently so was Sonic Youth.
Considering that album’s plaintive sound and sincerity not to mention the end of his 27-year marriage I was half-expecting The Best Day to be some kind of Blood on the Tracks-style admission. But as he did with Chelsea Light Moving’s debut album last year Moore is really just looking to remain vital and knock out guitar jams.
For The Best Day he assembled an all-star lineup of SY’s Steve Shelley My Bloody Valentine’s Deb Googe and Nøught’s James Sedwards. And the band certainly holds up their end of the bargain.
On tracks like “Germs Burn” and “Detonation” Moore and Sedwards interlace their guitars with the same kind of elation we’ve heard from Sonic Youth countless times at their peak. And really with the exception of acoustic write-offs like “Tape” and “Vocabularies” which would’ve added to Demolished Thoughts nicely it feels very much like a concentrated band effort.
While it might not be the album gossipmongers were hoping for it should serve the needs of Sonic Youth fans rather nicely.
