Sonic Youth: the Notorious Rockin' Lee megamix
Disc 1:
1. Skip Tracer
2. Eric's Trip
3. Genetic (mp3)
4. Paper Cup Exit
5. Pipeline/Kill Time
6. Bookstore [Mote demo] (mp3)
7. Unwind
8. Lee #2 (mp3)
9. Wish Fulfillment
10. Karen Koltrane
11. Karen Revisited
Disc 2:
1. Mote
2. Hoarfrost
3. Hey Joni
4. Saucer-Like
5. Rats (mp3)
6. In The Kingdom #19
7. Rain King
8. I Dreamed I Dream
9. NYC Ghosts & Flowers
10. Wish Fulfillment [Rehearsal Tapes Version]
11. Guido [Rehearsal Tapes Version]
12. Lee #2 [Instrumental Version]
13. Lee Is Free
I know I'm not alone in thinking that Lee Ranaldo is arguably SY's best vocalist and songwriter (nothing against Thurston and Kim, who of course are a huge part of the band's appeal and creative core, but aren't as traditionally talented in terms of lyrics and melody), although I wouldn't go so far as to say that he should sing all the time or significantly more often. In a way, the rarity of his songs makes them more precious, the fact that there's less than two dozen among the band's catalog of hundreds of songs. I originally did a cassette version of this mix a couple years ago. But since then, I've gotten a CD burner, and SY released a new Lee song, "Rats," on Rather Ripped as well as previously unreleased demo versions of some of his songs on the Goo and Dirty reissues (and hopefully the forthcoming Daydream Nation reish will contain some alternate versions of Lee's 3 songs from that album), so it seemed like time for a revision. After having just the instrumental version of "Lee #2" on a bootleg of the Goo demos for over a decade, it was kind of anticlimactic to finally hear the vocal version, so I can see why it was left off the album. But I still maintain that "Genetic" is one of the band's best songs ever, and the rumor that its exclusion from Dirty was the main reason Lee almost left the band around that time seems totally justified to me.
There were a few gray areas that I had to make judgement calls for inclusion. For instance, Lee and Kim both sing lead on "I Dreamed I Dream," and Lee and Thurston kind of harmonize on "Unwind," but Lee's voice is pretty audible on both, so they're in. But there are a number of songs in the band's catalog where all three of them sing/shout in unison ("Death Valley '69," "Renegade Princess," etc.), and I decided not to count those. And since I had to use 2 discs anyway, I tacked on Lee's solo demo of "Wish Fulfillment" and three Lee-related instrumentals ("Guido" is another version of "Wish Fulfillment"), kind of as bonus tracks, although you could kind of say the mix ends with "NYC Ghosts & Flowers." "Bookstore" has some different lyrics from the final version of "Mote," so I kind of count it as its own entity. Of course, there are numerous other official and unofficial live and alternate versions of Lee songs out there, so it's kind of arbitrary what I included there. I'm pretty happy with the sequence I put together, though, I think it flows a lot better than if I just put it all in chronological order.
Disc 1:
1. Skip Tracer
2. Eric's Trip
3. Genetic (mp3)
4. Paper Cup Exit
5. Pipeline/Kill Time
6. Bookstore [Mote demo] (mp3)
7. Unwind
8. Lee #2 (mp3)
9. Wish Fulfillment
10. Karen Koltrane
11. Karen Revisited
Disc 2:
1. Mote
2. Hoarfrost
3. Hey Joni
4. Saucer-Like
5. Rats (mp3)
6. In The Kingdom #19
7. Rain King
8. I Dreamed I Dream
9. NYC Ghosts & Flowers
10. Wish Fulfillment [Rehearsal Tapes Version]
11. Guido [Rehearsal Tapes Version]
12. Lee #2 [Instrumental Version]
13. Lee Is Free
I know I'm not alone in thinking that Lee Ranaldo is arguably SY's best vocalist and songwriter (nothing against Thurston and Kim, who of course are a huge part of the band's appeal and creative core, but aren't as traditionally talented in terms of lyrics and melody), although I wouldn't go so far as to say that he should sing all the time or significantly more often. In a way, the rarity of his songs makes them more precious, the fact that there's less than two dozen among the band's catalog of hundreds of songs. I originally did a cassette version of this mix a couple years ago. But since then, I've gotten a CD burner, and SY released a new Lee song, "Rats," on Rather Ripped as well as previously unreleased demo versions of some of his songs on the Goo and Dirty reissues (and hopefully the forthcoming Daydream Nation reish will contain some alternate versions of Lee's 3 songs from that album), so it seemed like time for a revision. After having just the instrumental version of "Lee #2" on a bootleg of the Goo demos for over a decade, it was kind of anticlimactic to finally hear the vocal version, so I can see why it was left off the album. But I still maintain that "Genetic" is one of the band's best songs ever, and the rumor that its exclusion from Dirty was the main reason Lee almost left the band around that time seems totally justified to me.
There were a few gray areas that I had to make judgement calls for inclusion. For instance, Lee and Kim both sing lead on "I Dreamed I Dream," and Lee and Thurston kind of harmonize on "Unwind," but Lee's voice is pretty audible on both, so they're in. But there are a number of songs in the band's catalog where all three of them sing/shout in unison ("Death Valley '69," "Renegade Princess," etc.), and I decided not to count those. And since I had to use 2 discs anyway, I tacked on Lee's solo demo of "Wish Fulfillment" and three Lee-related instrumentals ("Guido" is another version of "Wish Fulfillment"), kind of as bonus tracks, although you could kind of say the mix ends with "NYC Ghosts & Flowers." "Bookstore" has some different lyrics from the final version of "Mote," so I kind of count it as its own entity. Of course, there are numerous other official and unofficial live and alternate versions of Lee songs out there, so it's kind of arbitrary what I included there. I'm pretty happy with the sequence I put together, though, I think it flows a lot better than if I just put it all in chronological order.
This entry was posted
on Wednesday, August 23, 2006 at 12:54 PM.
You can skip to the end and leave a response.
"Hoarfrost" is my favorite SY song. Well, sometimes it's "Mote," or the demo version of "Wish Fulfillment."
Outstanding sequencing as well. I couldn't agree more with every word. Great post!