kim-gordon

Photo by Natalia Mantini

The Sonic Youth icon treads new ground with her first solo albumā€”the ā€œaccidentallyā€ created No Home Record.

This has been a year of firsts for Kim Gordon. From Kim Gordon: Lo-Fi Glamour, her first solo art exhibition at a North American museum (the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, no less), to No Home Record, her first-ever solo album, she continues to break new ground, even at age 66. Which is saying something, as sheā€™s already spent 30+ years as a primal force in one of the most influential indie-rock bands on the planet. As bassist, co-songwriter, and sometimes vocalist and guitarist for the legendary Sonic Youth, Gordon logged 16 studio albumsā€”including seminal post-punk/noise-rock works EVOL, Daydream Nation, Goo, and Dirtyā€”six live albums, nine EPs, and a mind-boggling array of experimental/instrumental releases on the bandā€™s Sonic Youth Recordings label, not to mention official bootlegs, tribute performances, and soundtrack contributions. Of course, there were all the attendant world tours, magazine interviews, and television appearances, too.

Viewed in that light, perhaps it should be no surprise Gordon continues to push the envelopeā€”even if her new album wasnā€™t even intentional. At least not at first. ā€œI just really hadnā€™t thought of doing a solo record, but I kind of accidentally did some work with Justin,ā€ she admits with a chuckle.

Sheā€™s referring to Justin Raisen, her primary collaborator and producer on No Home Record. ā€œJustin had another project that he wanted me to sing on and, eventually, he sent me something that I thought, ā€˜Okay, I could make lyrics for this and add to it.ā€™ And that came out pretty good.ā€ That project was singer-songwriter Lawrence Rothmanā€™s 2016 single ā€œDesigner Babies.ā€ Afterward, ā€œJustin was just always, like, ā€˜If you ever want to record some more or whateverā€¦.ā€™ā€

Raisen, however, seemed to have a plan. The producerā€”whoā€™s carved out a name for himself working with notable artists such as Charli XCX , John Cale, Ariel Pink, and Angel Olsenā€”gently coaxed new music out of Gordon by way of the Rothman session. For starters, he took leftover bits of Gordonā€™s vocal performance from ā€œDesigner Babiesā€ and edited them together with what she calls a ā€œtrashy drumbeatā€ and sent it along to see what she thought.

Check out the video for ā€œSketch Artist,ā€ directed by Berlin-based artist and filmmaker Loretta Fahrenholz

ā€œI really liked it,ā€ she recalls. ā€œSo, I went back and did more vocals and added some guitar and that became ā€˜Murdered Out.ā€™ā€ Originally released as a single in 2016 but also the fourth track on No Home Record, this meditation on Los Angeles car cultureā€”which is powered by a hooky, danceable groove by Warpaint drummer Stella Mozgawaā€”was a definite musical departure for Gordon. Itā€™s also the first song ever released solely under her name. Perhaps because it was so different for her, musically speaking, ā€œMurdered Outā€ also functioned as the catalyst for making a full LP. ā€œIt just kind of happened, slowly. It wasnā€™t a really big, premeditated thing, like, ā€˜Ooh, I want to do a solo record,ā€™ you know?ā€

Perhaps the fact that Gordon hadnā€™t been plotting a solo record since the 2011 demise of Sonic Youth shouldnā€™t be too much of a surprise, either. The bandā€™s breakup was monumental in and of itself. That it coincided with, and was admittedly a casualty of, the dissolution of her 27-year marriage to cofounding guitarist Thurston Moore, made it even more so. Sonic Youth wasnā€™t just another band. Sure, Gordon and Moore were the darling couple of indie rock, but they (along with cofounding guitarist Lee Ranaldo) were also musical trendsettersā€”now-iconic pioneers of a sound, attitude, and work ethic that were a pivotal influence on alternative music movements of the 1980s and 1990s. From their earliest albumsā€”including their 1982 debut on Glenn Brancaā€™s Neutral record label, ā€™83ā€™s Confusion Is Sex, and ā€™85ā€™s Bad Moon Risingā€”the bandā€™s sound was an eclectic, electric combination born of the New York experimental no wave art and music scene. The three founding membersā€™ use of alternate tunings, prepared guitars, feedback, and noise, literally transformed the way people listened to rock music. By the time Sonic Youth released 1990ā€™s Goo, the bandā€™s major-label debut on Geffenā€”which included the hit song ā€œKool Thing,ā€ featuring Public Enemyā€™s Chuck Dā€”theyā€™d become theĀ bona fide rock stars of the alt music scene.

To consider that Gordon might need some time to process these shifts in her personal and professional lives is reasonable. In reality, however, Gordon responded by delving into the visual arts. Her She Bites Her Tender MindĀ exhibit showed at the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin until November this year, and Lo-Fi GlamourĀ ran from May to September this year, as well. She also wrote the 2015 memoir Girl in a Band, and cofounded the experimental, improv-based duo Body/HeadĀ with guitarist Bill Nace. Additionally, she moved back to her birthplace, Los Angeles, after several decades on the East Coast.

ā€œI havenā€™t played bass in, I donā€™t know, 10 years. For improvisation, guitar just works so much better for me.ā€

Is No Home Record the cumulative result of all these life changes and subsequent creative pursuits? While it does seem to perfectly reflect the zeitgeist, it also represents a personal evolution, bringing all aspects of Gordonā€™s multidisciplinary creativity together under one roof. Her preferred minimalist aestheticā€”which permeates both her visual art and much of her bass playing in Sonic Youthā€”is adeptly channeled into the sparsely layered songwriting on No Home Record, a title that takes its cue from influential French-Belgian avant-garde director Chantal Akermanā€™s film, No Home Movie. Interestingly, whether itā€™s an intentional connection to the film or not, thereā€™s a visual, cinematic element to the record as much as there is an aural one. Thereā€™s also an interesting collision of past musical influences, contemporary production paradigms, and present-day social observations on No Home Record. Songs like ā€œHungry Babyā€ draw on proto-punk elements of the Stooges, while ā€œCookie Butterā€ comingles with hip-hop, using the insistent nature of the tuneā€™s drum loop to maximum effect. ā€œAir BnBā€ melds Arto Lindsay/DNA-style noise-rock and guitar histrionics with lyrics inspired by a fascination with the bourgeois aesthetic of Airbnb listings. As Elaine Kahn writes in No Home Recordā€™s liner notes:

ā€œDespite the exhaustive nature of her rĆ©sumĆ©, the most reliable aspect of Gordonā€™s music may be its resistance to formula. Songs discover themselves as they unspool, each one performing a test of the mediumā€™s possibilities and limits. Her command is astonishing, but Gordonā€™s artistic curiosity remains the guiding force behind her music.ā€

There are other collaborators on No Home Record, including Shawn Everett (Jim James, Alabama Shakes) and Jake Meginsky (Lā€™appel Du Vide), but Raisen deftly curates it all, creating a continuity between the songs that contributes to the albumā€™s storytelling scope. PGĀ caught up with Gordon while she was on vacation, shortly after an appearance at the Warhol Museum for the conclusion of her Lo-Fi GlamourĀ exhibit. The conversation was candid yet contemplated, sparse but revelatory, and occasionally interrupted by a bit of laughter.


Tidbit: No Home Recordā€™s title is a nod to French-Belgian director Chantal Akermanā€™s No Home Movie, a 2015 documentary about Akermanā€™s mother, who was an Auschwitz survivor.

How did your No Home RecordĀ collaborations with Justin Raisen work? Did you give him material to work with beforehand, or were you crafting the songs together in the studio?
In some instances, I gave him materials to see what he would do, and then, on other songs, we built them in the studio. Before I actually thought I could work with him, I worked with Shawn Everett, another super-busy dude who kind of fit me in on his day off. Then, as it turned out, Justin had some time so we just kind of worked it that way. Iā€™d never worked with a producer that way, so that was kind of interesting to me.

Your songs often sound somewhat improvised. How do you manage to maintain the spontaneity of your style within the structure of what a recording studio offers, or maybe even demands?
Well, a lot of it wasĀ improvised in the studio, but there are some things that are more straightforward. Pretty much every song was different. There are a couple songs where I recorded stuff at another studio and then sent it to Justin, like ā€œSketch Artistā€ and ā€œGet Yr Life Back.ā€

Do the songs ultimately turn out the way you envision them, or do they morph as you navigate your way through the recording process?
I think ā€œSketch Artistā€ is probably the most different from what it started out as. But ā€œAir BnB,ā€ that was something that was an homage to Arto Lindsayā€™s guitar playing. So Iā€™d play Justin different no wave songs to get the sense of rhythm that I was looking for, and he would have somebody play the drums, and then I did the guitar and then the vocalsā€”maybe the bass would be last. They were all different.

ā€œCookie Butterā€ has a really cool groove to it. Did you come up with that?
ā€œCookie Butter,ā€ which I did with Shawn, was based around a ā€™70s drum machine I borrowed from [Beastie Boys engineer] Mario Caldato Jr. Iā€™d been fooling around at my house with that, adding guitar loops and stuff. I took that over to Shawn and we got good sounds for one of the rhythms and laid that down. Then I just had this idea of a two-part structure, and on the second part I just went for it on guitarā€”and maybe I did a second take of it. So it was kind of improvisedā€”it starts out that way, but then gets kind of reined in or structured.

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Although the vision was there, the budget wasn't.

Los Angeles, CA (September 11, 2019) -- Kim Gordon has released ā€œAir BnB,ā€ the new single and its accompanying ā€œvideoā€ from her forthcoming debut solo album, No Home Record, out October 11th on Matador Records. A towering rock track that launches from brittle, noise-bitten verses evoking ā€œblue towels and water bottlesā€ and ā€œ47-inch flat TVā€ into an explosive, defiantly-catchy mantra ā€“ ā€œAir BnBā€ is an exhilarating tour de force and unlikely anthem for the hospitality gig economy.

ā€œAir BnBā€ follows first single ā€œSketch Artistā€, and its accompanying Loretta Fahrenholz-directed video, both of which were met with critical acclaim. In addition, yesterday SXSW announced Gordon as the Keynote Speaker for the 2020 Music Conference.

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