Thurston Moore
Thurston Moore
Thurston Joseph Moore is an American musician best known as a singer, songwriter and guitarist of Sonic Youth. He has also participated in many solo and group collaborations outside Sonic Youth, as well as running the Ecstatic Peace! record label. Moore was ranked 34th in Rolling Stone's 2004 edition of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time." In May 2012, Spin published a staff-selected top 100 ranking Moore and his Sonic Youth bandmate Lee Ranaldo together on number 1...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionGuitarist
Date of Birth25 July 1958
CityCoral Gables, FL
CountryUnited States of America
Recording tends to restrict too much experimentation, 'cause when you're making a record it's a part of you, for that time it's your whole fabric.
I find it discouraging to see these bands taking this really simplistic element from Nirvana and employing it to their own success.
It's American Alternative radio stations that bug me. We're considered Alternative, but don't expect us to be played next to Blink 182 and Offspring. We're hardly of that generation.
We're like old people now playing music. I'm so glad we stuck it out because it's a lot better. I used to feel kind of anxious. Now our apprenticeship is over.
No one really gets rich doing this. A couple people do, Black Sabbath does. We don't sell any records anymore.
Traditional songwriting, to us, is where the experimental nature comes in. We're all involved with so much outside activity with really hardcore, experimental music-making.
With these reissues, listening to these tapes, it seemed very crude to me. There's no way I'd ever want to play like that again.
Every now and again, the alternative culture is cherished by the mainstream for what it is, rather than how it should be, like the mainstream popular music.
Rock'n'roll saved my soul.
We're playing all these weird festivals, usually outdoors.
Whenever I can afford to do something, I do it
DEVO was like the punk band that non Punk America saw as Punk and so when people who were really into Punk rock would be walking around on the streets the jocks who learned about Punk through Devo would roll down their windows and yell at the Punks: 'HEY, DEVO!!'
I never go back and listen to the recorded document. The thrill comes when the balance can be attained. Everyone in the room can have a shared, communal rock experience.
We've never had a gold record. We make more money from being active, working, publishing, we have a great catalog. We never really had any hits.