STARFIELD ROAD by Sonic Youth Tab by Chris Lawrence (silvercircle@shaw.ca) TUNINGS ------- Thurston: GGDDD#D# Lee: GGCGCD LAYOUT: A - B - A A SECTION 00:00-01:03 Thurston: Thurston starts the song with the shrieking feedback, briefly clicks on a high speed phaser (presumably his MuTron Phasor II, which he used before committing to the MXR Phase 90), then starts doing big whammy bar dives on the open strings. Then he turns on his MuTron Wah-Vol and starts playing random notes with heavy whammy bar aggression. He changes his attack and rhythm as he goes but really, it's all just random until he hits the verse. Lee enters at 0:02 playing high pitched ring mod notes with heavy echo, just skronking around the fretboard for a bit. At 0:07 he starts repeating this motif: D------------------- C------------------- x 30 G------------------- C---------5-5-5-5--- G------------------- G---4b-------------- He does *something* to that second note, probably just heavy ring mod like the rest of the song. He stays pretty consistent then starts to get a little sloppier as it goes. The final rep leads into the spaceship part. B SECTION 01:03-02:04 Thurston: "turbo goes to rocket..." "sinsate your belly..." D#-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D#-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- "...down" "bend down round..." "plow pound down dirty starfield.." D#---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D#---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- "...road" "hot ham slap it..." "blam bam i transplode you..." D#-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D#-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- "...lamb" "jesus is screaming your..." D#-------------------------------------------------------------------- D#-------------------------------------------------------------------- D--------------------------------------------------------------------- D---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- "...name" "violent loving yeh" "kissing golden" "we're going in..." D#------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ D#------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ D------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2--- "...sane" "but where is the shame..." "when the stuck pig is to blame" D#------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ D#------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ D------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-4--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-4--- G---4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-4-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-4--- Lee: Lee uses his ring modulator to raise the pitch really high, and I think uses his Digitech digital delay to slowly raise the speed of the echo, which creates the phaser effect in unison with the ring mod. He seems to get down with one hand on the ring mod and one hand on the delay. In 2011, he uses the Antennabox, an Ibanez AD-80 reconfigured to live inside a box housed halfway up his mic stand, originally used for the song "Antenna". A SECTION 02:04-02:15 Thurston just makes aggressive cable static noise and trebly hand swipes on the fretboard until the end. Lee turns off his digital delay and you can hear his Maestro ring modulator has the notes pitched very high. It sounds like he probably has his Ibanez analog delay on and is just "playing" something that sounds like aliens laughing on a seesaw, until the end. Last updated: 01/30/24 ------------------------------------------------ THE SONIC YOUTH GUITAR/BASS TABLATURE ARCHIVE: http://www.sonicyouth.com/mustang/tab/index.html ------------------------------------------------