Glenn Branca, Thurston Moore, Lee Renaldo
The Guitarists who put “Avant Garde Noise” into Alternative
Rock of the 1990s
Glenn Branca – using Volume as a compositional tool
The pioneer was probably Glenn Branca, the first guitarist who used “volume” as a composition tool– an accomplished musician, throughout his career he would toggle between “Guitar Orchestra” music – using sometimes up to 100 guitars to create his avant garde sonic landscape – and other times using other orchestral instruments.
Here’s a clip of Glenn Branca doing a solo in 1978 – the middle of the Punk Era – it would be around 10 to 14 years before “noise” took off :-
One incarnation of Glenn Branca’s band had guitarists Thurston Moore and Lee Renaldo,
who in the early 1980s would leave Branca and go onto form key influential band, Sonic Youth who alongside the Pixies would influence the grunge generation of bands like Nirvana and MudHoney and many others.
Sonic Youth DIY, Alternate tunings, Volume
Although they formed after the first wave of Punk, taking forward their influence of playing with Glenn Branca, Both Lee and Thurston would continue pushing their experimental art/noise starting in 1981.
By 1990, just before Nirvana hit the mainstream – Sonic Youth signed to major label Geffen records and released their most commercial CD called Goo – Geffen were hoping that Sonic Youth’s “Goo” Album would be a big mainstream hit – However it was “Nirvana’s album NeverMind that wouldaccomplish that feat one year later in 1991.
Goo still had noise elements, alternative tuning, but also had tunes which would then descend into noise and chaos. Here’s the link to Dirty Boots from the Goo album :-
listening to the first strains of the solo, you can hear the feedback squeals that Nirvana would use in their career And their most well known track, Kool Thing which made it to the games Guitar Hero and also RockBand :-
With the Goo album, a lot of fans thought that their sound was too melodic and commercial, however there was a nod to their white noise influence – the track Mildred Pierce starts off with an alternative tune until part way through descends into pure noise
– a nod to their Noise and Glenn Branca influences; here’s the track — which gets really loud at the end :-
Documentary of Sonic Youth with Glenn Branca
However flashy guitar solos were in the main out during this time, shred guitar would be in the wilderness for around ten years.
It was through their work that Sonic Youth became labelled as the world’s best known Underground Band, and during that time Lee Renaldo and Thurston Moore kept their links with Glenn Branca .. the early pioneer of noise in Rock.
Noise pioneer Glenn Branca, along with Sonic Youth and the Pixies would help shape the alternative rock sound that would sweep the world during the 1990s, and help re-establish guitar as the main instrument of popular music.
Til Next Time…
Andre
www.CoventryGuitarTuition.co.uk
AndresGuitarAcademy's Blog 