Is such a week necessary? I would say so, considering that I, myself, have not given much thought to eating disorders in some time. There's a lot going on in the world these days, and I bet I'm not the only person who's had her mind on other things. Also, I haven't heard anything about eating disorders in a long time; I haven't seen any magazine or newspaper reports about them, haven't heard about any actresses or athletes suffering from them, haven't so much as seen a Lifetime movie about a girl with an eating disorder.
So here's an important reminder, courtesy of Sonic Youth: eating disorders are deadly. Anorexia killed Karen Carpenter, one of the most famous women of her day. Sonic Youth's ode to Carpenter suggests that Carpenter's illness was related to her unhappiness with fame, and her feeling powerless as a mega-produced pop star.
If someone as successful, popular, and wealthy as Karen Carpenter could feel so miserably out of control, then who isn't at risk? Just something to think about on this snowy hump day.
Warning: this video is really sad...and really weird.
Um. Did you know that Sonic Youth put out a new record yesterday?
Yeah, neither did I. (It's called The Eternal, by the way.) But then, Sonic Youth's ability to be a cultural institution and still be totally underground, low key and genuinely cool is a major part of their appeal.
Whether you're familiar with the band's long and accomplished discography or not, it's almost impossible to not know about Kim Gordon, their one-time bass player, current guitarist, and sometimes vocalist. Gordon's art school cool attitude, pro-woman ideas, and New York City street punk style have been influencing punk artists and musicians since the '80s, just as Sonic Youth has been defining and re-defining the genre known as 'art punk' for almost 30 years now.
Over at AfterEllen, Trish Bendix writes that new track "Sacred Trickster" is "infectious" and arguably one of the band's "best tracks ever". Below is a performance of the new song from last month, along with a performance of "Antenna". So give it a spin (...or a stream?) and celebrate a long and distinguished career, instead of thinking about being stuck at work for at least 4 more hours.
