After singing a tune apiece on EVOL and Sister, Lee expanded his vocal footprint to an unprecedented (and unrepeated) three songs on Daydream Nation. "Hey Joni" and "Rain King" were debuted in June '88 at a series of warm-up gigs, but Lee brought "Eric's Trip" in as a last-minute demo before the summer recording sessions. As such, it didn't see the stage until a quick European run leading up to the release of the album. Debuted on September 29th in Eindhoven, it appears in most of the available set lists from this tour (the first night even includes all three of Lee's Daydream tunes, before "Rain King" was unceremoniously dethroned).

Once it staked its spot in set lists, it became the Lee song. "Joni" was left behind in the 80s, but "Eric" pushed forward, its match met only by "Mote". The Goo tune was often displaced and replaced by "Eric", and both were held in equal reserve for future tours, knocking "Genetic" from many a Dirty gig, and supplementing both "Saucer-Like" and "Skip Tracer" in the Washing Machine era. Most Lee songs did not last beyond the touring cycle for their album, though some would be resurrected years later when "Eric" and "Mote" needed a rest, like "Skip Tracer" in 2002 or "Hey Joni" in 2007, both of which received regular play among the new material. I made a list of the top 10 most frequently played Sonic Youth songs, and the only Lee song to crack the top 10, coming in at a staggering #7 with 322 currently known performances is "Eric's Trip" ("Mote" falls just short at #12, with 230 plays).

Perhaps the most notable element of "Eric's Trip" - aside from the fact that it's a kick ass high energy super melodic Lee vocal very different from his previous offerings - is the return of the Drifter. If you read last week's "Marilyn Moore" feature, you'll recall that Thurston used one of the band's original guitars, the Drifter. It had its frets removed and was fixed with four bass strings, tuned to C C D# D# (with the D#s an octave apart). Most of Thurston's part consisted of harmonic clusters chopping up and down the fretboard. For "Eric's Trip", he adopted a new tuning and a new approach. The Cs went down a half step to B, and are in unison. The D# strings are now both tuned to F# - in unison - but the F# is below the Bs (equal to the 2nd fret of a regular low E string, or the low strings in the F#F#F#F#EB tuning). Considering the guitar's cosmetic adjustments, it's still not really "playable" in the conventional sense, but rather than jagged harmonics Thurston returned to an old trusty standby - the drumstick. Using a drumstick in his left hand and picking with his right, he utilizes a number of tactics, from deliberate "slide" guitar melody, open strings as root notes, hammering the stick against the fretboard without picking, and just general stick-to-string chaos. Each section encourages a different approach, and he makes the most of the unorthodox instrument and method of attack.

So, what a shame when it was stolen in July 1999! Goodbye Drifter, and goodbye "Eric's Trip", one of few songs that seemed to actually be rendered unplayable by the theft. "Mote" continued to do the heavy lifting, while "Hoarfrost" got a bit of an extension, serving as the new "Eric" on the NYC Ghosts & Flowers tour in 2000 and 2001. The idea that we may never hear "Eric's Trip" again was genuinely distressing (on a small scale), but an ironically named hero emerged in 2002...While the band was preparing for the Murray Street tour, they dug deep to teach Jim some less traveled material. Kim and Thurston's guitar tech Eric Baecht offered up a project he'd been working on, a Gibson Sonex refitted with bass strings, frets removed. Yes, he'd created a NEW Drifter! And yes, they introduced "Eric's Trip" back into the set on June 15th, in Salzburg, Austria. It remained as popular as it ever was, appearing in set lists every year until the band's penultimate gig in Santiago, Chile.

the original drifter in 1996 / the new drifter in 2003

Every side of the original double vinyl Daydream Nation was represented by a symbol for each band member, a la Led Zeppelin et al. Lee's infinity symbol oddly appears on side one, which is one of two sides that don't have one of his three (!) songs. No big deal, just curious, whatever. The album version was later collected on the endlessly inspirational Screaming Fields of Sonic Love compilation in 1995. Also noteworthy is the live version that appeared on the Dirty Boots EP, which we've discussed at length. Recorded in Irvine, California deep into the Goo tour on November 3rd, 1990, they opened with "White Kross" "Eric's Trip" and "Cinderella's Big Score", all of which appear verbatim on the single. "Eric" is a manic take, with Lee losing track of both his guitar part and his lyric, calling back to the "Pipeline" disaster of Hold That Tiger. Still, fucking sonic, and a killer example of the band at their chaotic best. Later, a version recorded on September 12th, 1995 in Paris was among four songs included with a limited edition of Washing Machine. Each Daydream track received live representation on the deluxe edition in 2007, including "Eric's Trip" and three other selections from March 27th, 1989 in Dusseldorf. The reissue was accompanied by special shows where the band played the album from front to back - bringing "Joni" and "Rain King" back to life from a 17 year slumber!

Although it sucked for other reasons, 2011 fiiiinnnaallllyyyy delivered everyone's dream come true, the DVD release of 1991: The Year Punk Broke. Tacked as a bonus feature was a 40+ minute film that Dave Markey constructed from leftover footage, titled (This Is Known As) The Blues Scale. With "Mote" getting an all too brief "showcase" in the longform proper, the bonus joint had to have "Eric", which is drawn from the final gig of the tour, September 1st in Rotterdam, Holland. It's one of only two official videos of the song released (and the 2007 Lance Bangs concert film has dubious availability), but the digital age did bring no fewer than EIGHT shows on bandcamp ranging from 1988 to 2011, all of which contain "Eric's Trip". There's a reason it's the 7th most popular song in Sonic Youth set lists!

Lee's original demo appears as the final track on the first disc of the Daydream Nation deluxe reissue. It stands on its own after the entire album plays, the sole bonus track. It was recorded at his apartment in June 1988, presumably on a four-track cassette, and is a reasonable sketch of the eventual song, focused just on the verse/pre-chorus/chorus bits, ending after one repeat. The lyrics are still rough, but many of the final lines are already in wet cement at least. He tosses in additional notes to the chords in the "B" section, creating a more dissonant overtone than the straight ahead rock glory on the record. As discussed in the Karen x 2 piece, it wasn't typical for anyone to bring in a pre-recorded demo presentation - but I maintain that Lee's occasional attempts led to some of their strongest material.

As for the lyric, to quote Lee: "I saw Warhol's Chelsea Girls around then for the first time, and just copied Eric's words down verbatim in the darkened theatre; constructed first verse and general concept of the song from there." He's referring to a long section of extemporaneous speech delivered by Eric Emerson roughly two hours into the film. As with many of his lead vocals, he would often make slight changes to the lyric during live performances. In addition to general hyper-additions like excitedly repeating "hear it!" while approaching the bridge, he also began incorporating an unused portion of the lyric, teasing "the sky is blue" over the arpeggiated break chord before the third verse. The first record of this I can find is September 2nd, 1990 in Dublin, the first date of the European Goo tour. He brings it back at a few shows in late October, but goes many shows without. On October 11th in NYC, he introduces another lyrical variation (rooted in the original demo) which would stick with some frequency for the next year: "I see with a glass eye telescope, the pavement view". He repeats it on the 13th in Montreal, then drops it til mid-November, leaving the Irvine version notable only for Lee's trips. On the Neil Young tour beginning in January 1991, he often adds "Eric says the sky is blue" over the arpeggiated break and usually includes the telescope too. Later in the tour he drops the "sky is blue" tag, but it returns in April, along with another adlib ("he's slippin' just like me!") coming out of the bridge.

The Reading Festival performance on August 23rd seems to mark the final inclusion of both the "just like me" rap and "Eric says the sky is blue". The final show of this tour, September 1st in Rotterdam, might be the last use of "telescope". In its rare appearances in '92 and '93, it seems to be played "standard" with only basic adjustments for hype. Jumping ahead to September 12th, 1995 (the Paris Washing Machine bonus gig), he makes a change that comes with some permanency, singing "He's slipping all the way to Texas, and the Bahamas" instead of "Can you dig it?". Occasionally he would substitute "Bermuda" or "Oklahoma", but "Bahamas" was the most popular, even when the song resurfaced in 2002. He briefly changed it at a few August 2002 gigs to "all the way to Texas and points west".

The next big change happened in 2007 when the band played their first of twenty-four Daydream Nation front-to-back shows. For these gigs, and from then on, Lee added the bulk of the unused original lyric: "the sky is blue, the sky is the deepest truest blue that I have ever seen, and points on the globe are just...points on the globe". On June 2nd it was the truest, on June 21st it was the clearest, and on June 6th it was the purest (the lyric sheet identifies it as "the deepest purest clear blue"). He's still using the Bahamas line, and while I have fewer recordings of the song from this era, I could only find the occasional change to "Costa Rica" or "Bolzano". The Brooklyn 2011 gig uses "Oklahoma", then the final South American sweep uses "Bahamas".

(As a side note, lyric sheets from the early days of the internet usually identified the opening whispers in the studio version as "Achoo...Brancafest", which I foolishly accepted for far too long. To be honest I'm not entirely sure what he's saying - it sounds more like "I hate the past", but who knows...)

While Lee plays fairly straightforward chords in a new tuning he developed (EBEEAB) and Thurston applies drumstick directly to Drifter, Kim took a curious approach. She was particularly fond of running her bass through a Crybaby wah from 1987 through 1991 or so, and it became a prominent feature on a number of Sonic Youth tunes from this era. Look no further than "Eric's Trip", where she wah wah wahs through the entire song, leaving you to train your ear to pick out the precise notes she's playing from somewhere in the mix - no thank you! As an alternative, I consulted the officially released December 13th, 1988 CBGB version - close enough to the original that I don't worry about too much road-weary deviation. Here, her bass is a clearly discernable humming cloud, with the wah used only on certain "special" occasions. I based her bassline mostly off of this performance, using the limited 1988 and 1989 footage for hand placement guidance. It's a weird part - she just rocks F# and B, mirroring Thurston's tuning - but Lee never really plays F#? It's notably atonal, but without the wah crying you can kinda hear what she was going for. Many years later, Jim O'Rourke added a third guitar to the live presentation, having finely tuned a slick part that weaves its way between Thurston's drumstick squeal and Lee's vocal. The only version released from this era has Jim's licks too low in the mix, but you can still dig it.

1988 tour poster / 2007 tour poster

The Drifter guitar was practically a mascot for the Daydream Nation album. The band posed with it in promo shots, and it served as a centerfold worthy model in a poster used to advertise the album and tour, complete with a Steve Shelley branded drumstick and Daydream Nation LP under the strings. They reprinted an updated version to promote the 2007 North American Daydream Nation dates (all four of them), and aside from the comically oversized deluxe CD that had to lay over the original LP, it still has remarkable clarity. In particular, the poster left me no doubt that I'd correctly determined the "Marilyn Moore" tuning, you can see "C D sharp" scrawled on the large white Nipdrivers sticker. You can also see "B F#" for "Eric" and, most curiously, "Lee F# A". So, what exactly did Lee use this guitar for, after it had been converted to four strings? Possibly a solo idea between "Marilyn" and "Eric", or before either one? I can't think of anything within the Sonic Youth canon that it might apply to, but I'd totally love to hear ideas!

I suppose I should mention Eric's Trip, the band - probably the most notorious act to ever shamelessly name themselves after a Sonic Youth song. Speaking of shameless, allow me to plug an incredibly well-researched Eric's Trip concert chronology maintained by Osty Gale, historian/sleuth/fellow Canadian superfan. If you have any Eric's Trip info, please consider dropping him a line!

You know what? This song is awesome. I always knew that, it seems obvious, but having to slowly scan dozens of live versions for lyrical adjustments never felt tedious, even just listening to the bridge over and over. I love following Lee's big ringing chords, Thurston's drumstick blues, and Kim's crybaby twang. And Steve! His beat is simple yet drives the whole song, with a surprisingly effective use of tambourine (live, too!). The cherry on top is Lee's vocal and lyric, bursting with energy and intrigue. Back in the lockdown, I knocked out a tab based off of the Daydream Nation tourfilm version, from Glasgow 2007. For the sake of these pieces, I prefer to present a transcription of the earliest, most true to the album version. So this tab refers mostly to the studio take, with Kim's bassline coming from the 12/13/88 CBGB set. For Thurston's part, you don't need to build your own Drifter, you can probably fake it on a guitar tuned F#BBxxx (with the 3 high strings being unimportant). Just flip the B and F# strings around in the tab. If you have any comments or corrections, please let me know!

A SECTION				00:04-00:29

Lee:

B-------------------------------
A-----9--9-9-9------------------
E-----9--9-9-9---5--7---2-------  he varies the first chord, not always strumming it as much
E---7-7--7-7-7---5--7---2-------     and not always adding the 9th fret notes
B---7-7--7-7-7---5--5---0-------
E---7-7--7-7-7---5--------------

Thurston uses a drumstick as a slide, and basically slides into the notes while picking them.
Each slide indicated in the tab is noteworthy (and some are more gradual than others), but he
is also not extremely precise with the intonation of every single note.

F#------------------\\10\\12-------------------------------	(play twice)
F#------------------\\10\\12------------------------------
B----\12----\12-----------------\12----\12----\17---\19---   when he goes an octave up, he does
B----\12----\12-----------------\12----\12----\17---\19---    a lot more random drumstick slidin'

During later live versions, he does the entire riff on the B strings, going down to the 7th fret.
    
Kim uses a wah pedal (and moderate drive) for her whole part. Just the notes are shown, no picking:

G--------------------------------
D----9-------------9-------------
A-------------------------------- x 2
E-----------2-------------14-----

B SECTION				00:29-00:42

Lee casually strums these chords:

B---------------
A---2-----------
E---2-----0-----   his center overdub guitar just slides up the fretboard making noise
E---2-----0-----                                                 over the second chord
B---0-----0-----   x 4
E---------0-----

Thurston:

F#---0----
F#---0---- slide drumstick up to pickups and pick furiously over 2nd chord
B----0----
B----0----

Kim:

G------------------------------------------------
D------------------------------------------------ x 4
A------------------------------------------------
E---14-14-14-14-14-14--12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12---

C SECTION				00:42-00:54

Lee:

B-------12-12-12--0---
A-------12-12-12-11---
E---10--12-12-12-12---  x 4
E---10--10-10-10--0---
B---10----------------
E---10----------------

Thurston:

F#-------------------------------------------
F#-------------------------------------------  mute the strings with your palm at the bridge
B---12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12---    and just smash the 12th fret w/ the drumstick
B---12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12---      over and over...   no picking!
                 
Kim plays these notes:

G-----------------
D---12------------
A----------------- x 4 
E----------12-----

A SECTION				00:54-01:19

B SECTION				01:19-01:32

C SECTION				01:32-01:44

D SECTION				01:45-01:57

Lee's main guitar stabs this chord with every snare hit:

B-------
A-------
E---7---
E---7---
B---0---
E-------

His center overdub strikes the chord in aggressive staccato chops at the start of each bar (?)

Thurston continues his previous motif:

F#------------------------------------------
F#------------------------------------------  mute the strings with your palm at the bridge
B---12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12--    and just smash the 12th fret w/ the drumstick
B---12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12-12--      over and over...
                 
Kim holds this note:

G--------
D--------
A--------
E---12--- 

E SECTION				01:58-02:35

Lee:

B------------------------------
A------------------------0-0---
E---7--7--7-7-7-9--9-9-9-9-9--- x 12
E---7--7--7-7-7-9--9-9-9-9-9---
B---0--0--0-0-0-0--------------
E------------------------------

On the album, his center guitar starts playing something similar, maybe shapes like this?

B-------------
A---7----9----
E---7----9----
E---5----7----
B-------------
E-------------

There's so much panning of multiple tracks of "guitar played in wild fashion", it's a little tough to
zero in directly on that middle part. Lee may be one of the noise guitars. During live versions, they 
cut this section from 12 to 8, making it a bit more focused moving into the next part.

Thurston just goes wild with the drumstick while Lee is singing "This is Eric's trip...". At this point 
his guitar is panned from the left and zips all over between speakers, and it sounds like he may have 
added another guitar doing the same wild drumstick workout (this could be a Lee overdub, though).

On the record he plays this at 2:22, but live versions would go straight to it after "can you dig it?":

F#-----------0--------
F#-----------0--------  play four times
B---0-----------------
B---0-----------------
                 
Kim goes between F# notes an octave apart:

G--------------
D--------------
A-------------- x 12
E---2----14----

F SECTION				02:35-02:48

Lee arpeggiates this chord:

B---7---
A---7---  his center guitar plays the same shape
E---7---
E---7---   there may be a third guitar in the mix
B-------
E-------

Thurston holds the drumstick over the pick ups and just picks high whirring noises while
Lee arpeggiates his chord. At the very end, he slides back to go back into the verse.

During live versions, he seems to mostly play the 17th fret of the B, dipping down to the 14th.
                 
Kim:

G--------
D--------
A--------
E---14--- sustain from previous

A SECTION				02:48-03:14

B SECTION				03:14-03:27

C SECTION				03:28-03:48

text + tab by Chris Lawrence