After 35 years in the music business, Kim Gordon has finally gotten around to releasing her first single. That is, if we don’t count any of the hours and hours of music she created with Sonic Youth, Free Kitten, Body/Head, or Glitterbust. All that stuff is just a prelude to “Murdered Out,” the first song to ever have her name up top, despite the fact that she was more of a passive player in its creation.
She explained to NPR that the track—which features drumming from Warpaint’s Stella Mozgawa—“just kind of happened randomly” after she met music producer Justin Raisen (Sky Ferreira, Charli XCX). “He wanted me to sing on this project he had been working on,” she said. “After a year, I finally went over and we made up some lyrics. He took what I didn’t use, vocal wise, and made a loop, a rhythm thing. He put my vocals to it, extended it. I went back and did more vocals. … Justin did the rhythm. I just overdubbed guitars. He did the bass and the main body of the track.”
The 63-year-old musician—who came to prominence as the bassist-vocalist for Sonic Youth and was never bitten by a coyote—explained the title “Murdered Out” in a statement:
When I moved back to LA I noticed more and more cars painted with black matte spray, tinted windows, blackened logos, and black wheels. This was something I had occasionally seen in the past, part of lowrider car culture. A reclaiming of a corporate symbol of American success, The Car, from an outsider’s point of view. A statement-making rejection of the shiny brand new look, the idea of a new start, the promise of power, and the freedom on the open road. Like an option on a voting ballot, “none of the above.”
“Murdered Out,” as a look, is now creeping into mainstream culture as a design trend. A coffee brand. A clothing line. A nailpolish color.
Black-on-black matte is the ultimate expression in digging out, getting rid of, purging the soul. Like a black hole, the supreme inward look, a culture collapsing in on itself, the outsider as an unwilling participant as the “It” look.
Also, the track is pretty danceable. Nice groove.
[via NPR]