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Hope to see you there!

Austin City Limits: website | tickets

Back in June, I was awakened by a text message from a very excited friend who read that Sonic Youth was going to be a part of Celebrate St. Louis’ Live on The Levee in which the city provides free live entertainment. Needless to say, I thought this was merely a rumor considering Sonic Youth not exactly striking me as a family-friendly act and for free no less. Talk about too good to be true. To my surprise however, the art-rockers were actually the band scheduled to kick off Live on The Levee which is a month long series following Fair St. Louis over the Fourth of July festivities.

The Arch grounds were packed with punks young and old, the older crowd bringing their kids. It’s not everyday you see toddlers with such good taste in tunes as they dance around to Sonic Youth.  As the band made their way through a set consisting of a huge portion of new material off their new album, The Eternal (which sounds even better live if you ask me), Thurston Moore asked if the weather was always this nice because they were looking to re-locate and out of true rarity, it was not 100 degrees here in St. Louis in July so they lucked out weather wise.

As the sun faded behind the city skyline, the true Sonic Youth concert experience took over as their lighting, rendered unseen in pure sunlight, began to blanket the band in warm red lighting and a series of flashing white backlighting. The band joined by former Pavement bassist, Mark Ibold, continued their 90-minute set until Sonic Youth’s noisy second encore was cut off by Finger Eleven’s “Paralyzer” coming over the loudspeakers  and fireworks display.

Sonic Youth – “Sacred Trickster”

The Live on the Levee series continues through August 1st featuring acts such as Little Feat, Angie Stone, Guster, Gretchen Wilson and Lupe Fiasco. If you’re in the area and looking for an evening of free entertainment, do yourself a favor and head downtown to the Arch, have a seat on the steps, crack open a cold one and enjoy yourself. All proceeds from the vendors on site go to charity so do your part.

Set List:
No Way
Sacred Trickster
Calming The Snake
Stereo Sanctity
Walkin Blue
Poison Arrow
Malibu Gas Station
What We Know
Antenna
Leaky Lifeboat
Hey Joni
Anti-Orgasm
Massage The History
//
The Sprawl
Cross The Breeze
//
Shadow of a Doubt
Death Valley ‘69

Live on The Levee Series Schedule:
Jul 24 – Angie Stone @ 8 p.m.
Jul 25 – Gretchen Wilson @ 8 p.m.
Jul 31 – Guster @ 8 p.m.
Aug 01 – Lupe Fiasco @ 8 p.m.

Sonic Youth: website | myspace | The Eternal review
Live on the Levee: website | tickets