Unbest

Erin M. Routson on Sonic Youth
(iTunes, Rdio, Spotify) 

emrgency:

“have i ever told you that i am in love with thurston moore and kim gordon and i want to model my life after theirs?” - march 17th 2003

I still don’t know if this is the right song to encompass my feelings (or their feelings) or anyone’s feelings over what happened last year. Maybe there’s no right song at all; maybe the only right thing is a stream of songs, or maybe the right thing is silence.

For a decade I’ve slept under the watchful eye of a Sonic Youth Goo poster: Raymond Pettibon illustrating “I stole my sister’s boyfriend. It was all whirlwind, heat, and flash. Within a week we killed my parents and hit the road.” No matter what age I got to, what progressive box I checked on any survey, it never occurred to me to take the poster down. Sonic Youth have been a part of my musical identity since I got my hands on a cassette copy of Washing Machine in 1995. I was twelve. I did my homework after being hooked by “No Queen Blues” — Daydream Nation, Dirty, Sister and Goo all fell into heavy rotation as a band and a relationship and a whole world became a part of my musical landscape.

Since 2003, when I was twenty years old and a “relationship” as something more than a prom date or a Friday night amusement became a part of my purview, I have admired Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore. I wanted to be them, to emulate them, to have what they had. When I looked at them, I saw the ultimate creative partnership. They were adults, in a band, doing everything else in addition to that: tape labels, fashion collaborations, fine art projects. On top of that, they supported each other through each person’s individual interest. The band was collective, but their passions diverted. Thurston mocked Kim’s enthusiasm for emo boys in a 2004 issue of SPIN, but I didn’t interpret it as derision; I saw it as love. He didn’t get it, but he knew Kim was super-smart and individually talented regardless.

Fast-forward to summer 2011, I am now living in Brooklyn. I had seen Sonic Youth in the very powerful 2003, but now they were playing a show at the Williamsburg Waterfront in mid-August. I bought my tickets early, fearing a sell-out. I was adamant about my attendance until I bought tickets to go home to Ohio for the same weekend, forgetting that I had committed myself to real-time Thurston/Kim worship (don’t worry Lee & Steve, I don’t overlook you either.) Since SY had been around for, oh, all of my life, I figured there would be myriad opportunities to see them again. I sold my tickets; I went home to Ohio for a weekend I don’t regret, but for what transpired later.

I don’t think I need to remind anyone of this, but in October 2011 Kim and Thurston separated. I was in Cleveland at a bar when my friends began to text and call me. Everyone knew about my admiration for their relationship; everyone knew this would crush me in a way nothing else could. Who else had slept under a Sonic Youth poster for a decade of her life? Not anyone I could think of. I cursed myself for giving up a night with my idols to go home in August. I couldn’t believe it. I thought there would be so much more time.

For at least a week afterward, I made myself listen to Sonic Youth records. I called it my shiva, a mourning period for two people I didn’t even know, but who provided me a model for something I thought I’d never attain. I’m not much for pedestal-placing, but Kim & Thurston were up there. Seeing them separate after so many years didn’t make me angry — they’re human, they’re not perfect, they deserve their privacy — but it did bum me out. I’ll probably be bummed out about it forever. Their relationship, their band, were things I thought would last forever. In a way, I counted on them and needed them so that I could hold onto a dream of a similar partnership.

Despite what’s happened, that dream isn’t dead. They both accomplished so many things individually and together during their relationship that it doesn’t cancel out my desire for that. It’s still a very reasonable goal, but it tarnishes the notion of “true love” that they afforded me. I’m just sad that it had to end, as I’m sure many fans are. I selfishly wanted them to be together for all of my life, to do more than any other partnership I’d see in my lifetime. What’s true, though, is that they have.  I can listen to those records and sleep under that Goo poster and always remember what they’ve done together. I want them both to be happy, to make the work they want. I have no doubt that they’ll both find a way to do it, even apart.

Their separation is by far my worst musical experience of 2011, but I know it will make me cherish what they did together so much more. While this may seem like a complaint, it is meant as a thank you. It sounds wild, but I wouldn’t be who I am or want what I do without Thurston and Kim as distant role models. It may make listening to Sonic Youth a little bittersweet, but I know it’s better than the silence of nothing at all.

Erin M. Routson is a Brooklyn-based writer and designer neck-deep in her masters thesis on the policy and design of public housing. Follow her on Twitter.