New Solo Kim Gordon

'bye bye' rocks

yup

another new cut, Psychedelic Orgasm. actually has a key change! more importantly, the lyrics don't seem quite so didactic/workshop exercised. No Home Record was my #1 of 2019 so I can't wait for this one.

This Stereogum interview seems like it may have been a somewhat awkward experience for the writer. I know there have been times I've talked to artists and I've been way more interested in their careers than they were, and that's the feeling I get reading this.

I think it’s just a poor interview - maybe overprepared because of anxiety - but many of the questions are both obscure and pretty closed, here’s my thesis about something you did in 1997, do you agree y/n? Doesn’t offer much space for conversation.

I think, also, that some people are compelling artists but not compelling interviewees, you know? Or: if you haven’t been interviewed much in recent times you have to get back in shape for that, so to speak.

One thing that really leapt out at me in the mid-2010s when I started listening to lots of interview podcasts is how people would go on multiple podcasts and say the exact same things - John Carpenter was good for that.

https://open.substack.com/pub/toneglow/p/tone-glow-130-writers-panel-and-recommendations?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Some folks are really critical of new Gordon album here on Joshua Minsoo Kim’s substack ( Kim sometimes writes for Pitchfork, I don’t know about the panelists he asked here)

had to tap out at this point:

Kim Gordon litmus test: Is it mumble crap when the 70-year-old white woman does it?

I've read a lot of stuff I like on Tone Glow before, but c'mon do people outside of the H0ffman forums still use the "rap = crap" thing in 2024?

some ageism and/or just lack of nuance in their critiques from reviewers who appear to be young in that Tone Glow panel

Kim is a high school teacher; I think he finds dumb, naïve but heartfelt opinions about art exciting.

i think the "mumble crap" line is meant to be ironic

Yeah, I guess maybe, after going back to read the whole blurb. But it was hard to take seriously anyway:

I don’t expect Kim to give us fleshed-out nightlife recollections when her bedtime is probably before 10 pm.

I start to question if The Collective was her way of fulfilling a bet she lost.

Performing a poor LARP of OsamaSon is only cute to older white people who are also so displaced from the source.

And the beats suck, too.

I know and like Joshua but yeah, gonna sit this one out

i apologize for my post by the way. not my best week on ilx

i once saw Kim Gordon perform with the Merce Cunningham Dance Co, it was great

I do appreciate having it pointed out to me twice that Kim Gordon is white. Helpful context!

that review is just a young writer trying to do dunks and that's pretty much never a particularly interesting type of review to read.

i'd at least wanna hear about why her attempt at making a rage album sucks (if it even does, i haven't heard the album yet and the singles have at least been interesting) not just that the entire thing is cringe

I can appreciate the industrial/noise aspect of some of the instrumental on this and the pushed to the brink production that kind of reminds me of those last couple Low albums but the vocals/lyrics/overall vibe are not ever going to do it for me here I don’t think (cue six months from now when I’m eating my words).

Going to the store
Gonna cook it up
Passing all the kids
Tik Toking around
Sipping on the smoothies
Wish I knew what
They were cookin'
They were cookin' up

I’m not really a lyrics guy and I like some really dumb shit but sorry…no. Sonic Youth’s lyrics could occasionally ruin the whole thing for me too (obscenely on the nose lyrics in a faux-Beatnik style…not a good combo as far as I’m concerned)

I feel like someone should owe Tommy Wright III some money for the beat on The Candy House (is it Meet Yo Maker it sounds like?)

gotta admit it's been the solo career noone saw coming...

xp - it's just the laziest dunks too, though. is the thing. the album might not be good and there's probably a compelling case someone could make as to why they didn't think so, but accusing Kim Gordon of all people of being an old that goes to bed before 10 just betrays a stunning lack of knowledge of Kim's connections to the downtown and art scenes.

Or is it a legend venturing into new territories as a brash late-career “fuck you!” to the critics who counted her out?

The person who wrote this does not, I think, know who Kim Gordon is

that Joshua guy's twitter vibe is annoying as hell

sub 2000's pitchfork type review--i haven't heard the Kim Gordon but the bedtime joke is pretty corny

The Collective album is available today on streaming sites

4 tracks in and this kinda rules. Kinda reminds me of a more abrasive version of that last Tirzah album.

(Kim Gordon voice over distorted beat):
I'm Substackin'
Substackin' around
Gonna make some dunks
Some lazy dunks
If you like what you see
Please subscribe.

only skimmed but i don't mind those tone glow reviews tbh; the quotes posted above out of context make the review by "Rae-Aila Crumble" seem more meanspirited than the review is--imo it's actually p thoughtful, just written in the impudent rap blogger style (which i like but ymmv)

kim is kind of simultaneously cool-yet-basic, imho.. unlike thurston who is always brandishing his hipster cred, kim strikes me as having a relatively unbothered blasé attitude to it all. it's gated so i can't check the specifics now but there was a new yorker profile of her like a decade ago and iirc she came off as outright cheugy in it. like she is part of the music avant-garde, rubs shoulders with high fashion world, but she dgaf, that's her day job, and she sleeps on a bed with like 34 throw pillows with namaste quilted on them

lolll

In New York Times profile -

Gordon said she doesn’t listen to much contemporary hip-hop — other than what Bill Nace, her bandmate in the improvisational duo Body/Head, sends her —

She's honest

we're actually using "cheugy" in earnest?

Had this for a night and not really got into all the lyrics yet, but this is clearly classic and brilliant.

listening for the first time and this is far and away my fave post-SY thing she has done

what the fuck this is so good

I was fully prepared for this to suck based on some of the reviews mentioned upthread but this is actually good? but also I don't think it's some massive radical departure for her, she's doing the same deadpan talky singing she's been doing for like 40 years, the "btw Kim is rapping now" stuff is mostly bullshit

totally agree

Yeah, if anything musical trends are coming around to her vocal style; or they're at least meeting somewhere in the middle.

“I’m A Man” sounds incredible just a bit too loud, driving in a car at night.

She often sounds unsure of what she's singing and you can really feel a hesitation on whether to commit to it or not. I like this tho, it creates a vibe all of its own.

I was fully prepared for this to suck based on some of the reviews mentioned upthread but this is actually good? but also I don't think it's some massive radical departure for her, she's doing the same deadpan talky singing she's been doing for like 40 years, the "btw Kim is rapping now" stuff is mostly bullshit

― Colonel Poo, Sunday, March 10, 2024 9:36 AM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

this is 100% otm. she's drawing a line between the noisy industrial stuff that was percolating when sonic youth was starting and the abrasive rage rap that's all the (ahem) rage right now.

the execution varies from song to song imo. don't love the drum programming on a lot of these, but i do like "i'm a man," "bye bye," and especially "i don't miss my mind"

2 stars in the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2024/mar/10/kim-gordon-the-collective-review

lol at complaining about there being too much distortion and cacophony, and the last sentence seems horribly patronising - "Hopefully she’ll try again soon though." - fuck off?

Pile of shit review. I prefer the one from my 21yo who walked in and said "what the fuck is this?" then "holy shit, really?"

Annoyingly she's playing London the same night as the Breeders. A clash of Kims

Kim's lyrics have always been 95% abysmal, it's sort of part of what is appealing about her whole thing— they're so bad and forced that the boldness of someone speak-singing them is weirdly magnetic.

I like Body/Head a lot, and am friendly with a lot of people who know KG and say she's the best. I don't doubt it. I'm glad she's still making music and doing weird shit, and as others have said, it's certainly better than Thurston's bad poetry or continued posturing.

when thurston played around the corner from me - 2018? - and did his instrumental guitar thing with deb googe it was pretty cool. plus, DEB GOOGE. also, he was smart enough to have an ilxor open up for him and it was nice to hang out with them. plus, thurston spent money at my store.

i thought body/head was interesting. i really like bill and what he does.

also, thurston can do the instro free skronk thing (especially in duo) as well as any other rock person when he wants to. not to be captain-save-a-thurston or anything.

Yeah, I mean, setting aside (I know, I know) the personal issues with Thurston, he's still done some interesting stuff since SY split. His bad poetry is indeed bad and not needed, but that three disc instrumental thing, Spirit Counsel, was really good.

And I seem to be in the minority, but I actually liked that Chelsea Light Moving band he briefly had with Samara Lubelski and Keith Wood.

Kim's lyrics have always been 95% abysmal, it's sort of part of what is appealing about her whole thing— they're so bad and forced that the boldness of someone speak-singing them is weirdly magnetic.

my only complaint about The Collective (cd) is the bass (kicks & low freqs) are mixed so loud that i can't turn up the volume unless the bass pot is dialed back to 20% on my receiver, making everything else sound thin asF. it's a gnarly sounding album, which is pleasing.

this isn't bad but the idea of it is better than it actually is. like it's cool and exciting she's making something that sounds like this but i'm not really moved by the result