After ages away, Sonic Youth makes LV return

Spencer Patterson

Friday, July 23, 2004 | 8:58 a.m.

Who: Sonic Youth with Wolf Eyes, XBXRX.

When: 6:30 tonight.

Where: House of Blues at Mandalay Bay.

Tickets: $25-$30.

Information: 632-7600.

That's right. Indie rock's most venerable touring outfit hasn't performed in Southern Nevada since March 1993.

Sonic Youth's last Vegas appearance before that came in August 1990. The opening act that night? Nirvana, pre-"Smells Like Teen Spirit."

But Lee Ranaldo, one of the New York City band's two founding guitarists, insists the group has nothing against Las Vegas.

"We're not big gamblers, but we've always had a lot of fun there," Ranaldo, 48, said in a phone interview from his downtown Manhattan apartment. "I absolutely love Las Vegas. I've been there a bunch of times on my own.

"For some reason, it's just not a town that we've played very often. I'm not exactly sure why."

Local Sonic Youth devotees finally get their wish tonight, when the band touches down at the House of Blues at Mandalay Bay. Doors to the all-ages show open at 6:30 p.m., with Wolf Eyes and XBXRX slated to open.

As you might expect, quite a bit has changed for Sonic Youth in the 11 years since their last Vegas stopover.

For one, the band was forced to alter its signature sound after the 1999 theft of a truck holding all of its gear. Of the entire load, only one guitar was ever recovered.

"We spent most of the '90s building up that array of gear to the point where we were really comfortable with it," Ranaldo said. "When it got pulled away, it forced us to rethink some things."

Ranaldo said ultimately, the sad incident had a positive impact.

"We were at the mercy of new gear, so we were trying different things, different situations with amps and pedals and stuff," he said.

"It was sort of a violation and tragic at the time, but we rolled with it. We survived, and the sound of Sonic Youth is as identifiable as it ever was."

Another key adjustment came in 2001, when the longtime quartet -- Ranaldo, drummer Steve Shelley, guitarist Thurston Moore and bassist Kim Gordon (the last two a married couple) -- added a fifth member, multi-instrumentalist Jim O'Rourke, a mainstay on Chicago's experimental music scene.

"It was such a natural thing," Ranaldo said. "We weren't looking to add a person, and he wasn't looking to join a band. Our lives just kind of gravitated to each other.

"It means having one more person in the soup, another person to bounce ideas off of, another person onstage to contribute ideas. So that's kind of fun."

And of course, Sonic Youth has continued to record music at a steady pace. Releases have come both in the form of albums for longtime label Geffen Records and avant-garde projects for in-house imprint SYR.

The band's latest Geffen offering, "Sonic Nurse," hit stores last month. The disc builds on 2002's critically acclaimed "Murray Street," combining haunting melodies, textured instrumental passages and trademark blasts of feedback.

As always, Gordon, Moore and Ranaldo share vocal duties, with Gordon contributing more in that area than she has in several years. Ranaldo said that wasn't necessarily by design.

"It's almost always about music until the end of the process. Nobody's writing words or thinking about words," Ranaldo said. "And often times it's only then that we sort of deal them out like cards, and then people go home and write lyrics.

"It allows us to focus more on the music, so our songs aren't built in that really simplistic song-like way, verse-chorus, verse-chorus. I think it's one of the things that keeps our music interesting."

One cut on "Sonic Nurse" was originally titled "Mariah Carey and the Arthur Doyle Hand Cream," going out that way on early promo copies and on a split 7-inch record last year.

When the final package was finalized, however, the track featured a new name: "Kim Gordon and the Arthur Doyle Hand Cream."

The reason for the switch?

"The title got changed because Geffen was worried about libel and slander and all that kind of stuff," Ranaldo said. "To them it was easier to request from us that it be changed so that there wouldn't be any hassles.

"We thought that was funny. But it's just as valid putting Kim's name in the title as it is with Mariah's, so it was fine with us."

A sample of the song's lyrics: "What's your gut feeling about the new deal? / How's the label gonna remake you? / How was your date with Eminem? / Did he bake you and then forsake you?"

"We wrote it at that time when Mariah was going through that very publicized break with her label and with her lover/manager or whatever," Ranaldo said. "You know, they signed her for some ungodly figure and then when her record didn't do well they thought she was a failure and dropped her.

"So we thought it was a good moment to examine this one individual pop star and to comment on the business as a whole."

On the same day they released "Sonic Nurse," Sonic Youth also unveiled their first DVD, "Corporate Ghost -- The Videos: 1990-2002." The set covers roughly half the band's 23 years together, longevity that nearly qualifies them for a significant musical honor, albeit a rather unlikely one.

"The funny thing that our management keeps reminding us about is that it has to be 25 years from the inception of a group before they're eligible for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame," Ranaldo said.

"None of us would have even known that we were getting close to eligibility if someone hadn't told us. We just don't operate in that world, but it's funny to imagine in a way."