Sonic Youth - Goo

"Goo" is universally considered a first "sell-out" album by Sonics. What it really means is that they cut on noise and added more melody, which resulted in a slew of major and minor hits (the biggest being Kool Thing, followed by 100%, Dirty Boots and Drunken Butterfly). So, all in all, it was a major success for a band, whether it was due to success/explosion of bands like Nirvana or move to a major label. Lyrically, much of it deals with violence and abuse (if it its still not clear, one should take a look at the words written on the cover). There's weird Carpenters obsession theme (Tunic), referral to the murder of Joe Cole, Henry Rollins roadie (100%), protest against male hegemony (Kool Thing, Swimsuit Issue) and many other less clear subjects (Dirty Boots, Mildred Pierce, Titanium Expose, Drunken Butterfly). One should also note that not all songs feature typical verse-chorus verse form - in fact, Mildred Pierce is ending abruptly with heavily distorted voice of Thurston Moore screaming out the name of the song for a minute or so. So there you have it - a very diverse work, probably one of the best that they done in the 90s.