| Thurston Moore Throughout
the last two decades, the career paths of Thurston Moore
and the Beastie Boys have run on separate but parallel tracks
with an occasional crossover every hundred miles or so.
For example, Thurston Moore organized Sonic Youth in 1981,
the same year that Adam Yauch,
Mike Diamond, Kate Schellenbach
and John Berry would form the
Beastie Boys. Prior to that, John Berry had been playing
in another New York band called Even Worse. Within three
years, Even Worse would have an entirely new line-up with
Jack Rabid as the only original member and new addition
Thurston Moore. At that point in time, Moore was playing
in both Even Worse as well as Sonic Youth, which in interesting
since Thurston has continued to take part in the occasional
side-project like his work with Mike
D in the super group Puzzled
Panthers.
Throughout the 1980s, Sonic Youth
released six albums and established themselves as workaholic
musicians with a dedicated fan following. However, it was
not until a decade later that mainstream audiences would
discover the genius of Thurston Moore and his wife Kim
Gordon. By the summer of 1994 the label "alternative
music" had become the buzzword for what college radio
stations had been playing for years. Bands like the Beastie
Boys and Sonic Youth, who had both risen from the post-hardcore
scene in New York, were now receiving heavy airplay on MTV.
The Beastie Boys would go on to co-headline that summer's
Lollapalooza tour, and the following year Sonic Youth followed
suit. Even though the two bands sound very different, crossover
fans abound. People who saw both acts live during the Lollapalooza
tours will testify to that fact that both rocked hard and
stole the show from the other bands on the ticket.
Thurston Moore's performances during
the Tibetan Freedom Concerts are rather legendary. Many
of the bands that performed at the first benefit, which
was held in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, were immortalized
in the movie Free Tibet. The movie, which is now
available on DVD, displays Sonic Youth in all of their free-form
greatness. In fact, during Yauch's commentary on the DVD
he revealed that Thurston and Kim had agreed to play at
the benefit the previously winter, when both Sonic Youth
and the Beastie Boys were playing Australia's Summersault
Festival. As a fitting tribute to all that Sonic Youth has
done in support of the Tibetan Freedom Concerts, a guitar
wielding Thurston Moore was pictured on the cover of the
three disc benefit set. |
