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A review by hernamewaslily
Girl in a Band by Kim Gordon
4.0
Girl in a Band is an autobiography/memoir by Kim Gordon that chronicles her time in the band, Sonic Youth.
Gordon uses her divorce from her husband and band mate Thurston Moore as a way to structure the narrative, with the divorce bookended the novel and the rest filling in the gaps. Clearly, the book was written as a way to process his betrayal (he cheated on her) and occasionally it does veer into rant territory. But when you compare that to other books about similar things by similar people (pick any male rock musicians memoir), this is relatively tame.
In the middle section of the novel, Gordon organises ten chapters about ten different Sonic Youth songs which she uses to explain her time in the band and what she was doing at the time, which works very well.
What I liked a lot about this book is that it doesn’t go from her childhood to adulthood in a straightforward way, rather it skips back and forth. It also doesn’t assume the reader is living under a rock the way a a lot of biographies do in terms of explaining historical context or bands. Having said this, I think even if you aren’t that knowledgeable about Gordon or Sonic Youth, you can still get a lot out of this book as it covers a myriad of themes from family and marriage, to music and art. The book is also filled with some very cool photographs.
Gordon uses her divorce from her husband and band mate Thurston Moore as a way to structure the narrative, with the divorce bookended the novel and the rest filling in the gaps. Clearly, the book was written as a way to process his betrayal (he cheated on her) and occasionally it does veer into rant territory. But when you compare that to other books about similar things by similar people (pick any male rock musicians memoir), this is relatively tame.
In the middle section of the novel, Gordon organises ten chapters about ten different Sonic Youth songs which she uses to explain her time in the band and what she was doing at the time, which works very well.
What I liked a lot about this book is that it doesn’t go from her childhood to adulthood in a straightforward way, rather it skips back and forth. It also doesn’t assume the reader is living under a rock the way a a lot of biographies do in terms of explaining historical context or bands. Having said this, I think even if you aren’t that knowledgeable about Gordon or Sonic Youth, you can still get a lot out of this book as it covers a myriad of themes from family and marriage, to music and art. The book is also filled with some very cool photographs.