I heard SY were starting their tour in NYC so I figured that show would be them at their freshest while my friends would only go to the closest city which was Philadelphia.Not being able to make up my mind I decided to try to see both. The plan (or lack thereof) was I would spend two days on the road starting with NYC for the first night and would meet my friends in Philly who thought they had an extra ticket for the second. I took the train to NYC without any further plans like a place to stay and very little money to eat. I got to Rosewood and just walked right in without anyone saying anything about my camera. At the time I thought I had gotten away with something by getting a camera in. I fought the crowd to park myself right in front of Thurston for my second Sonic Youth show ever. Bewitched and Julia Crafitz's band STP (not THAT STP) opened up.

After the NYC show the night before I went to Union Station to try to nap on a bench before the next train which didn't come until about 6 in the morning. By the time I got to Philly I was very tired but had to get into the show that night. All I had to do was stay awake, make it through a city I'd hardly been to, find my friends and a ticket, and find a way home. Simple, right? After stealing some food I found some gym that let me pay a couple dollars to let me shower. I called my friends but they ended up not even going so I headed to the Troc to find a scalper when out of the blue someone handed me a flier saying Sonic Youth would be doing an in-store signing at a record store called 3rd Street Jazz that very afternoon. I grew up around Washington DC so had hardly ever been in Philly before but I managed to find my way to the shop just in time.

I got the band to sign a poster and bought a Lee Renaldo album (yes, this was still the vinyl era) and left. I heard tickets were still availble and had just enough money to either buy one or take the Greyhound home, so I headed to the Troc's ticket office thinking it's only an 8 hour walk home. As I'm walking up some guy approaches me and says "they want you in the van". I have no idea who he's talking about and figure he's mistaking me for someone else but figure van=possible ride home and walk over. It was Sonic Youth in the van. I try to recover from my jaw hitting the pavement when someone in the van tells me to get in and we drive off. Someone in the van asks me how to get to South Street and it dawns on me they were looking for a local guide but I had only been to Philly a couple of times and didn't even know how to drive. Luckily we pass a street that gave me a clue and I luck out getting everyone there. I manage to get a few intelligable sentences out like "I don't have a ticket yet" so they let me in to the show with them for soundcheck and tell me I can hang around out of the way until the show starts so I don't have to pay. I think this is when I started sending their fan club copies of everything I shot.

Since I got in before the crowd it wasn't a problem parking in front of Lee. I was quite happy they did a completely different set than the night before.

When they left the stage before the encore I took the set list off the amp I was bracing myself on. I didn't even think Lee might need it for the encore. Ooops. These two thumbs are either from this night or the next at U of M (I pinched lists from every night I could) but are both from the same night. One is Lee's and one is Thurston's but I can't tell which is which. Feel free to correct me. The point is they had pretty much a different guitar for each song with the name/type writen beside the song on the set list. Later on this tour they slowed down on the amount of guitar changes and toured with less guitars.

Two months later and Sonic Youth are coming back up the East Coast with Redd Kross. Since I grew up around College Park, MD and used to hang out literally 2 blocks away from Ritchie Colliseum I had to see that show. I head down early to try the "ticket for pics" arrangement again and waltz in before soundcheck. Thurston needed a ride to a record store again and I still didn't know how to drive but we luck out finding some record company lackey and I act as guide. We get back in time to work out a ticket for that night and the next and I head off to the balcony for another round of soundcheck squatting.

Ritchie Colliseum had a platform between the stage and the crowd that was almost the height of the stage. I sat on it in front of Thurston's monitor for by far my favorite Sonic show.

I had to take the train from MD to NYC the day of the show so I didn't make it up in time to get in for the soundcheck but I ended up making it onto the guest list. Eric Bogosian opened up with a "spoken word" performance which blew me away. I worked my way through the crowd and ended up right up next to the security pit next to some fan that jumped around so much I couldn't really shoot so I gave up fast and just enjoyed the show. After the show I waited around by the outside stage door to see if I could pull off seeing them in Boston the next night and experienced my first glimpse of groupiehood. People just hanging around waiting for a glimpse of the band. It didn't occur to me before this point Sonic Youth were getting as popular as they were. I made the necessary arrangements and headed home.

So I came home after two nights on the road and managed to talk my girlfriend at that time Carl into driving us 8 hours to Boston with no advance notice or a definite way in. She didn't even like Sonic Youth. We suffer some rush hour traffic on the way and show up right as Redd Kross are hitting the stage to find two tickets waiting for us (eternal thanks) but the hall doesn't allow cameras without permission. A security guard had to escort us to the dressing room to get permission and we make it in only to find out it was a pre-seated show. We ended up about half way back on the floor with a bunch of people in front of us who didn't seem to be familiar with the band's catalog but wouldn't sit down either. Taking pictures was like shooting through a forest at sunset. I slowly migrated closer to the stage but never close enough to overcome the low light issue.

After the show we were so strapped for cash we hopped right in the car and drove the 8 hours home, pulling over to take a short nap in the car in some parking lot. And I wonder why I did most of my travelling alone....

Chuck D from Public Enemy had a brief rap on the song "Kool Thing", so when I heard Sonic Youth were going to play one show with Public Enemy I knew this would be the only chance Chuck D might do his part live. Didn't matter I lived in DE and the show was IL, I was going to make it. I hit my Dad up for all his frequent flyer mileage so I had a plane ticket and one night in a hotel. I had no way of getting in touch with the band so I hooked up with a local 'zine and arranged to shoot Megadeth for them on 12/16 in exchange for getting me in to Chicago.

A night or two before I left we had a record breaking snow storm so I almost didn't make it to the airport. I flew into Chicago right as another snow storm was coming in to dump even more snow. I didn't have the foresight to even look at a map or get directions beforehand so it took me most of the night before the show to walk through the snow storm in search of the hotel. The next day I got lost on the local train and hop off to get my bearings only to find out I was literally just accross the street from the hall. Looks like I'm the patron saint for luck, impulse, and brain damage.

The 'zine didn't get me on the list, so I was stranded in the land of Big Black with about $5 to my name and the show was sold out. I was huddled in the back alley trying to stay warm with a local film team who were also trying to work out a way in. Turns out their third guy didn't show up yet so when they were let in they asked me to fill in by using on of their cameras from the side of the stage right beside Lee.

Soon after I got settled the third guy showed up and relieved me so I stayed where I was and shot my film. I was having some problems with the lighting coming from the side but the view was well worth it. First time I saw them play "Brother James" and "Inhuman". Note the change in what guitars play what songs compared with the Philly show from 8/11/90. At least this time I waited till the show was over to grab the set list.

The camera crew worked out last minute permission to shoot Public Enemy so we headed back to the stage and I ended my film. When PE were done and the crowd was leaving some people started an impromptu anti-gulf war demonstration accross the street. The cops tried to break it up, the crowd stood their ground, lots of cop cars were called in, and a riot broke out. I was still inside on the second floor when I got to a window just in time to see a cop twist a young man's arm behind his back and slam him onto the hood of a cop car and arrest him. Too bad I was out of film. ALWAYS leave yourself 5-10 shots or better yet take along an extra roll of film whenever you shoot!