Consumer Guide Album

Sonic Youth: Washing Machine [DGC, 1995]
With nothing to prove except that they can do it forever without going gold, they do it again. Recalling their roots, they stretch the title cut past its songful limits and build the finale into a 20-minute improvisation not altogether unreminiscent of the Grateful Dead. But at the same time they stick to the theoretically radio-ready songwriting that is now an aesthetic commitment, even trying their hand at a folk tune and a Shangri-Las tribute. As it happens, the latter owes the Fleetwoods. But needless to say, both ultimately sound like Sonic Youth, an institution whose guitars are often emulated and never replicated. As does everything else on a record that will startle no one and sound fresh in 2002. A−