EVOL is the third studio album by the American alternative rock band Sonic Youth. It was released in May 1986 by SST Records, the band's first release on the label. The album is notable for being the first with a new drummer, Steve Shelley, replacing Bob Bert, and for showing signs of the band's transition from their no wave past toward a greater pop sensibility.
You’ve seen that? I told him I’d not only seen it, I loved it, and that I’d listened to Electric Trim nine times already
Sonic Youth was the band's debut record, featuring five songs recorded in late '81 with original drummer Richard Edson. Though considered an EP by some, the band have always referred to it as the first album, and that is the official status appointed to it for the purposes of this site. Though their first gig billed as Sonic Youth was in May 1981, the roots of the band date back to late 1980. Shortly after the Noisefest performance, Ann left the band, which opened up the door for Lee to step in - after one practice, they made their live debut with Lee in July @ the Just Above Midtown/Downtown Gallery. The new line-up was already working on the songs that would end up on the Sonic Youth record when Edson left the band, leaving the remaining trio to play several shows without a drummer.
Lee Ranaldo may be best known as a founding member of Sonic Youth, the generation-defining New York band that have had possibly the biggest influence on alternative music and culture of all time. As impressive a reputation as this is – it would be unjustified to define him solely by it. He is much more a visual artist, writer, producer, experimentalist and solo artist in his own right. Ranaldo has never slowed down the pace of his creative output even after a 35-year career, with this month seeing the release of his twelfth solo album Electric Trim on Mute Records.
Sonic Youth co-founder Lee Ranaldo, legendary filmmaker Jim Jarmusch, producer and engineer Marc Urselli, and drummer Balázs Pándi have all come together for a new collaborative live album due out May 24th via Trost. Dubbed, um, Lee Ranaldo/Jim Jarmusch/ Marc Urselli/Balazs Pandi, the three-track album captures an unlikely performance between the members that went down one night at Urselli’s EastSide Sound studio in downtown New York.
Sonic Youth's Lee Ranaldo has kept himself busy since the band went on a hiatus almost 8 years ago - and he's now experimenting with the Warren Ellis Tenor 2P while working on his 13th solo album. Sonic Youth fans might've felt upset, when the members of the iconic and highly influential alternative band went their different ways in 2011.
Lee Ranaldo discusses how he is exploring brave new territory on 'Electric Trim,' now that Sonic Youth have disbanded. There’s a scene in Hello Hello Hello – a documentary about the making of Lee Ranaldo‘s new LP, Electric Trim – that shows him playing an electric guitar with a violin bow as it hangs from a ceiling, droning strange, amorphous feedback. It’s an extension of a technique that dates back to 1986. While Ranaldo, who made his name as Sonic Youth’s soft-voiced guitar savage, still enjoys these sorts of noise experiments – there’s some light guitar bowing on Electric Trim – he explored a different direction on the album. These days, most of my intense energy is going into songwriting, he says. But what he’s doing on the album is much more than that.
