Happy 50th Birthday Thurston Moore

Today is Sonic Youth founding member Thurston Moore’s 50th birthday.

I don’t know Moore. I don’t know Sonic Youth. I know the name, am sure I’ve heard a few greatest hits but I didn’t grow up with them nor was influenced by their 1960s punk rock influences.

Of my nearly 4,000 songs on iTunes, I own one title by Sonic Youth: “Superstar,” a 1994 cover of The Carpenters’ hit. I like the song; they put on a great performance.

I’m catching up on lost time. I’m reading about the band and Moore’s subsequent solo career.

In a 2003 Impose interview with Evan Dashevsky, Moore spoke about the current musical scene coming out of Seattle and Brooklyn and predicted that neither Hip Hop nor Rock ‘n Roll would leave pop culture. He said that unlike the displacement of Jazz in the 1950s, Rock ‘n Roll will never die.

I don’t think Rock ‘n Roll will ever remotely be displaced by any other genre of music. Plus, Rock ’n Roll is more of a cultural phenomenon than just a genre of music anyway, and it already has a history that is in to its third generation now. I think it can only be sub-genrized, in a way. I mean Hip-Hop is really interesting because it is such a successful music coming out of Black culture and it’s become so successful by it’s co-modification into rock culture. It’s kind of just like Rock ’n Roll in a way. I see them as equals.

Amen! I like this quote. I dig it.

In celebration of Moore’s birthday and because he told Dashevsky his favorite song by The Who was “Happy Jack,” here’s a live video from the British rockers shot in London in 1969:

Happy birthday, Thurston!

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