{"id":902140,"date":"2026-04-28T03:36:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T08:36:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/28\/the-first-time-sonic-youth-went-to-england-people-hated-us-oh-youre-playing-guitar-thats-so-old-fashioned-alt-rock-icon-kim-gordon-on-the-sec\/"},"modified":"2026-04-28T03:36:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T08:36:20","slug":"the-first-time-sonic-youth-went-to-england-people-hated-us-oh-youre-playing-guitar-thats-so-old-fashioned-alt-rock-icon-kim-gordon-on-the-sec","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/28\/the-first-time-sonic-youth-went-to-england-people-hated-us-oh-youre-playing-guitar-thats-so-old-fashioned-alt-rock-icon-kim-gordon-on-the-sec\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cThe first time Sonic Youth went to England, people hated us: \u2018Oh, you\u2019re playing guitar? That\u2019s so old-fashioned\u2019\u201d: Alt-rock icon Kim Gordon on the secret to making great music on bad guitars and why she never saw herself as a bassist"},"content":{"rendered":"

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A certain trepidation is natural before an interview with Kim Gordon. Despite all evidence to the contrary \u2013 the reams of historic shots of her killing it on a Thunderbird and Jazzmaster with alt-rock pioneers Sonic Youth \u2013 the 72-year-old famously doesn\u2019t consider herself a musician.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more, it\u2019s dangerously feasible that she didn\u2019t fret a note on her new solo album, Play Me<\/em>, which would leave us with 40 minutes to talk about the weather. Add to that Gordon\u2019s slightly icy reputation among journalists back in Sonic Youth\u2019s early \u201990s heyday (to be clear, she was never nasty, just too damn cool to do the promotional dance, and desperate to get away).<\/p>\n

Luckily, neither doomsday scenario comes to pass. Joining the video call from New York, Gordon is friendly, witty, thoughtful and proud of Play Me<\/em>\u2019s socio-political battlecries (on which she did play, thank God). And if she\u2019s bemused to learn the name of this publication \u2013 \u201cI\u2019m really an artist that plays music, that\u2019s what\u2019s so funny about doing interviews for guitar magazines\u201d \u2013 then she\u2019s happy to humour us.<\/p>\n

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Yeah, it felt pretty free. I was like, \u2018Oh, I love krautrock, let\u2019s have a krautrock beat.\u2019 Sometimes I\u2019d come in with lyrics, like, a page with things scribbled all over it, but I didn\u2019t know exactly how it was gonna fit. I guess I really trust Justin [Raisen, producer].<\/p>\n

This is our third record now and he just wants to keep going. It\u2019s not the way I grew up playing music, y\u2019know? In Sonic Youth, eventually, we did have friends who we let in to work on fixing our records, but it was such a different process.<\/p>\n

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Kim Gordon – \u201cPLAY ME\u201d (Official Video) – YouTube<\/span>
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It sounds like you\u2019re looking around at the world on songs like <\/strong>Post Empire<\/strong><\/em> or <\/strong>Dirty Tech<\/strong><\/em>. What\u2019s keeping you awake at night?<\/strong><\/p>\n

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All the latest guitar news, interviews, lessons, reviews, deals and more, direct to your inbox!<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

Everything is so fucked up right now. The whole AI thing is just such a nightmare. People are so seduced by technology. It\u2019s being rammed down our throats and even the people making it don\u2019t even know what it is, y\u2019know?<\/p>\n

People don\u2019t realise it takes enormous water resources and it\u2019s going to make everyone\u2019s electricity more expensive. It\u2019s just crazy that people are so greedy they don\u2019t care about destroying the world.<\/p>\n

The album ends with the vitriolic <\/strong>ByeBye25!<\/strong><\/em> and you sound pleased to be rid of it. But what are your hopes and fears for 2026?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I guess I hope the Democrats kill in the midterms and we regain the House and Senate. I just hope there\u2019s some good news. Can music still be a vehicle for social change? I don\u2019t want to say \u2018no\u2019. I think it can bring people together.<\/p>\n

You never know what can happen. It\u2019s so funny how Trump keeps using music by different artists, then they end up suing him. What is he thinking? Like, does someone else just pick the music?<\/p>\n

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Kim Gordon – “GIRL WITH A LOOK” (Official Lyric Video) – YouTube<\/span>
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The instrumentation on this new record doesn\u2019t sound like standard bass and guitar. How did you approach it? <\/strong><\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t play any of the bass, actually \u2013 Justin played that. He also played whatever melodic guitar there is and then I played all the kind of dissonant guitar stuff. Basically, I just improvised with a bunch of different pedals and a little Fender tweed amp.<\/p>\n

On Dirty Tech<\/em>, the guitar is super-minimal and I\u2019m unplugging the lead from a distortion box and plugging it back in, that kind of trick. There was one pedal I used a lot on Not Today<\/em>. I can\u2019t remember the name of the company \u2013 I\u2019m so bad at tech stuff \u2013 but it\u2019s like a double Memory Man, this weird, swirly circular delay. And it\u2019s way fucked-up.<\/p>\n

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You\u2019re such an iconic bassist, though. How come you didn\u2019t want to play on this album?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I mean, I haven\u2019t played bass since the last Sonic Youth gig [2011]. I have this improv guitar duo with Bill Nace called Body\/Head, and it\u2019s just much more satisfying to improvise on a guitar. You can just get so many more textures and sounds.<\/p>\n

I never really saw myself as a bassist. I always played with the pick, punk-rock style. And when I first started playing music, I played guitar. But then I would play basslines<\/a> on the guitar, so it made sense to just play the bass. But I don\u2019t have any sense of identity as a bass player, strangely enough.<\/p>\n

I mean, I\u2019ll give Justin some direction. For one song I put out last year, Bangin\u2019 On The Freeway<\/em>, I played a bassline and sent it to him, and then he had his sister-in-law \u2013 [Eva Gardner of The Mars Volta, who has toured with P!nk, Gwen Stefani and Cher] who\u2019s also a bassist \u2013 record it on eight different basses or something.<\/p>\n

Then we cut all of that up and it was just the most fucked-up rhythmic thing. So I\u2019m more interested in ideas than actually having to play the bass, y\u2019know?<\/p>\n

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Kim Gordon – “NO HANDS” (Official Lyric Video) – YouTube<\/span>
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You\u2019ve long been associated with Jazzmasters. Is that what you used on <\/strong>Play Me<\/strong><\/em>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

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I\u2019m actually doing a signature guitar for Fender and it\u2019s based on that Jazzmaster… The signature model took a really long time. We finally got Fender to use Seymour Duncan pickups<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n

Yeah, it\u2019s the same one I always use. I forget the year \u2013 it might be 2009 or 2010 \u2013 but it\u2019s one of the Mexican Jazzmasters. I have other guitars, but that\u2019s really the only one I play.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m actually doing a signature guitar<\/a> for Fender and it\u2019s based on that Jazzmaster. My amazing guitar tech, Salar Rajabnik, he helped me through the process and did a lot of research. The signature model took a really long time. We finally got Fender to use Seymour Duncan<\/a> pickups<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s said you hadn\u2019t actually played an instrument until you were 27?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yeah, that\u2019s true. I mean, I was in this kind of \u2018noise\u2019 garage band in school in Toronto when I was younger. But basically, yeah, not really. I mean, my brother and I would improvise in the living room with an African drum and a gong and this upright piano, and just kinda jump around. But no musical training.<\/p>\n

But Patti Smith and Debbie Harry didn\u2019t start playing music til they were, like, 28. So I always felt older than everyone else, but because of that, I actually didn\u2019t feel like it was a big deal. I really moved to New York to do art. I kind of accidentally fell into playing music, like a lot of people in the post-punk era. I really just aspired to be an artist.<\/p>\n

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When Sonic Youth started out in the early \u201980s, did you have a vision for the band?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Without sounding pretentious, we did want to make something that was different. But it\u2019s not like we really talked about it. We just took our influences. The music was forged from each of our personalities. There was such a high bar set by No Wave music, which was also kind of nihilistic.<\/p>\n

So we were influenced by Glenn Branca and Rhys Chatham. Rhys had worked with La Monte Young, and so he knew about alternate tunings<\/a> and putting all the instruments in \u2018E\u2019, things like that.<\/p>\n

Same with Glenn. And both Thurston [Moore] and Lee [Ranaldo, Sonic Youth guitarists] had played with Glenn. So we definitely knew the power of that, and that was part of our vocabulary.<\/p>\n

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Sonic Youth – Kool Thing (Hangin’ with MTV 1992) – YouTube<\/span>
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Sonic Youth were pioneers of alternate tunings\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think, in the beginning, we just had shitty guitars and so they didn\u2019t sound good in regular tunings doing powerchords anyway. Then Thurston stuck a drum stick under his guitar strings, for the song that became The Burning Spear<\/em>, and he was using it to almost make a percussive sound.<\/p>\n

The funny thing about guitar is the electricity, and how it\u2019s affected by how you move with it. It\u2019s almost like a dance to me. It\u2019s very visceral.<\/p>\n

How was your musical headspace different working on <\/strong>Play Me<\/strong><\/em>, relative to Sonic Youth? <\/strong><\/p>\n

In Sonic Youth, there was a lot of sitting around jamming until things start getting arranged. Even if Thurston came in with the riff, we\u2019d then all make up parts and work through the structure.<\/p>\n

It was almost like songwriting by committee, but as a band, as opposed to [manufactured pop]. Play Me<\/em> is just me and Justin. No-one else has to agree. It\u2019s much simpler with just one other person, y\u2019know?<\/p>\n

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Body\/Head perform at Saint Vitus +1 – YouTube<\/span>
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How did you approach your bass parts when you were in Sonic Youth? <\/strong><\/p>\n

Because Lee and Thurston played in alternate tunings, I was really making up stuff by listening. Sometimes I would have to play a root note for a song, and that was always the least interesting part to me because I\u2019m a creative person. I used a lot of open strings. I like minimal bass parts, so that\u2019s mostly what I played.<\/p>\n

Do you still have your old \u201976 Thunderbird IV from back in the day? And why that <\/strong>bass guitar<\/strong><\/a>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have it somewhere. Why the Thunderbird? Didn\u2019t The Runaways use it? And I think the bass player in Alice Cooper<\/a> had one. It was incredibly hard to play. The neck is really thin, which makes it easier, but the balancing is a little bit awkward. But it really does feel like it\u2019s kind of a weapon or something because the neck is so long.<\/p>\n

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Sonic Youth – Drunken Butterfly (Official Music Video) – YouTube<\/span>
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Do you still feel the guitar has some juice left in it?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yeah, sure. I mean, I like working with limitations. I remember in Sonic Youth, as a band first going to England, people hated us. It was that idea of, like [disgusted], \u2018Oh, you\u2019re playing guitar?\u2019 Because everything was about synthesisers: \u2018That\u2019s so old-fashioned.\u2019 It\u2019s just kind of funny how everything changes.<\/p>\n

I do have a vocabulary of technique, I guess, that I built up from playing for so long. But the fun of it for me is that I don\u2019t know [much] about music. J Mascis from Dinosaur Jr and I did a gig together once. It was just the two of us, and it was a party for Marc Jacobs or something.<\/p>\n

I was in some kind of open D tuning. And I said, \u2018Okay, I\u2019m just gonna drone on this and you do what you do.\u2019 And I guess I also did some vocalising of some sort. But my friends were there and they said, \u2018Actually, that really worked.\u2019 So it\u2019s kind of interesting.<\/p>\n

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What is the guitar to you now? A magic wand? A paintbrush? Just a tool to get the job done?<\/strong><\/p>\n

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I guess I see the guitar as an extension of the body, in a certain way<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n

It\u2019s kind of a paintbrush. I mean, I\u2019ve made a few art films with a guitar. I did one in downtown LA, kind of rubbing it on corporate buildings. And then I did one in my house that was based on a Chantal Akerman film, where I have the guitar and it\u2019s plugged into a small amp<\/a> that you can\u2019t see.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m doing domestic chores like cooking and washing the bathtub and eating with my daughter, with the guitar just banging around, but I\u2019m sort of ignoring it. I guess I see the guitar as an extension of the body, in a certain way.<\/p>\n

Are you more inspired by visual artists than musicians? <\/strong><\/p>\n

I still hang out more with art people and I\u2019m more aligned with the art world than the bass-playing world. I guess I think about art \u2013 or movies \u2013 more than I think about music. Music is something that\u2019s fun to do.<\/p>\n

Does it ever amuse you that you\u2019ve made such an impact on rock \u2019n\u2019 roll, without necessarily meaning to?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have a little bit of imposter syndrome about it, actually. I enjoy it. But I don\u2019t want to think about it or all the stuff around it. What people think of me, I don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n