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Thurston Joseph Moore (born July 25, 1958) is an American guitarist, singer and songwriter best known as a member of the rock band Sonic Youth. He has also participated in many solo and group collaborations outside Sonic Youth, as well as running the Ecstatic Peace! record label. Moore was ranked 34th in Rolling Stones 2004 edition of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
In 2012, Moore started a new band Chelsea Light Moving, whose eponymous debut was released on March 5, 2013. In 2015, Chelsea Light Moving disbanded after one studio album release. Moore and the other members of the band continue to make music under his solo project and other bands.
He enrolled at Western Connecticut State University in fall 1976, but left after one quarter and moved to East 13th Street between Avenues A and B in New York City to join the burgeoning post-punk and no wave music scenes. It was there that he was able to watch shows by the likes of Patti Smith and spoken-word performances by William S. Burroughs. At that time, the arrival of new groups changed his view on music and all of his records "got kind of put into the basement. And they were supplanted by ... the Sex Pistols and Blondie and Talking Heads and Siouxsie and the Banshees. It was a completely new world, a new identity of music that was an option for youth culture." In 1980, he moved in with Kim Gordon to an apartment at 84 Eldridge St. below artist Dan Graham, eventually befriending him, sometimes using records from Graham's collection for mix tapes.
Once in the city, Moore was briefly a member of the hardcore punk band Even Worse, featuring future The Big Takeover editor (and future Springhouse drummer) Jack Rabid. After exiting the band, Moore and Lee Ranaldo learned experimental guitar techniques in Glenn Branca's "guitar orchestras". Moore has spoken about influences on his music tastes at this time, including British bands Wire, the Pop Group, the Raincoats, the Slits, and Public Image Ltd ("I used to have these fantasies in the 70s about leaving New York and coming to London to hang out with Public Image").
Moore and Ranaldo make extensive use of unusual guitar tunings, often heavily modifying their instruments to provide unusual timbres and drones. They are known for bringing upwards of fifty guitars to every gig, using some guitars for one song only. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked Moore and Ranaldo the 33rd and 34th Greatest Guitarists of All Time.
Thurston Moore has explained the band's decision to sign with DGC Records at a time when many were fiercely dedicated to independent record labels like SST Records, Dischord and Sub Pop:
We noticed Hüsker Dü's music hadn't changed when they signed to Warner. On the independent labels we dealt with, SST Records, Blast First Records and Neutral Records, if there was accounting, it was always somewhat suspect. With Geffen, we would get an advance that would allow us to be able to pay our rents, get health insurance, have a slightly better lifestyle, and maybe, just maybe, not have to work day jobs. We felt like we could negotiate a contract that would make sense.
When Steve Albini accused corporate labels of ripping off artists, Moore wrote in response that a band "getting butt fucked by corporate labels must be really stupid". He defended the band's decision to sign with DGC Records explaining that they knew what they were getting into and viewed it more as "buying in" than "selling out".
In 2011, Moore and his wife, Sonic Youth bassist Kim Gordon, separated; shortly afterward, Sonic Youth went on indefinite hiatus. Though his marriage was ending Moore never claimed that Sonic Youth was finished.
In the early 1990s, Moore formed the side band Dim Stars, with Richard Hell, Don Fleming, Steve Shelley with a guest appearance by Robert Quine. Moore performed solo on the side stage of the 1993 Lollapalooza tour. Additionally, Moore contributed backing vocals to "Crush with Eyeliner", which appeared on R.E.M.'s Monster. He played Fred Cracklin in the Space Ghost Coast to Coast episode dedicated to Sonny Sharrock. In 2000 he contributed improvised guitar pieces for a collaborative project with conceptual artist/guitarist Marco Fusinato. Since 2004, he has recorded and performed with the noise collective To Live and Shave in L.A., the lineup of which also features Andrew W.K. He recorded with the band at Sonic Youth's former studio in Manhattan, and later performed with them at the George W. Bush "anti-inaugural" Noise Against Fascism concert in Washington, D.C., which Moore curated, named in reference to Sonic Youth's 1992 song "Youth Against Fascism". Moore curated the "Nightmare Before Christmas" weekend of the All Tomorrow's Parties music festival in 2006.
In 2007, Moore's label Ecstatic Peace released a solo album titled Trees Outside the Academy. The album was recorded at J Mascis' studio in Amherst, Massachusetts. The album features Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley and violinist Samara Lubelski. The album also features collaborations between Mascis and Charalambides' Christina Carter, who performs a duet with Moore on the track, "Honest James".
In 2008, Moore and former Be Your Own Pet vocalist Jemina Pearl recorded a cover of the Ramones song "Sheena Is a Punk Rocker" for the Gossip Girl episode "There Might Be Blood".
Since 2008, Moore has provided narration for a variety of documentaries on the National Geographic Channel. His work includes Inside: Straight Edge and the Hard Time series about life in prison.
In 2012, Moore and Kim Gordon released a collaborative album with Yoko Ono titled Yokokimthurston. Also that year, Moore joined the black metal super group Twilight. He then started a new band called Chelsea Light Moving. Their first track, "Burroughs", was released as a free download. Their eponymous debut album came out in 2013. The release coincided with the SXSW Festival where they made numerous appearances including a free show at Mellow Johnny's bike shop. He played guitar on "This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us" alongside Ron Mael and Russell Mael in a 2013 Sparks concert at the Union Chapel, Islington, London. In 2014, Moore released The Best Day, a solo album featuring Steve Shelley and My Bloody Valentine's Debbie Googe as rhythm section, and James Sedwards on guitar.
In 2018, Moore presented at London's Barbican Centre his work 'Galaxies', an experimental 12-string guitar ensemble. Among the twelve person orchestra were Deb Googe, Jonah Falco, Ray Aggs, Joseph Coward and others. In 2019, Moore released Spirit Counsel, an avant-garde rock three-disc box set. The first track, "Alice Moki Jayne", is a 63-minute long song named for the spouses of John Coltrane, Don Cherry, and Ornette Coleman. The 28-minute "8 Spring Street" is named for the former address of Glenn Branca. The 55-minute final track, "Galaxies (Sky)", was inspired by a poem by Sun Ra.
In 2020, Moore released a solo album entitled By the Fire which featured guitarist James Sedwards and bassist Debbie Googe as on the earlier The Best Days album. In 2021, Moore surprise-released an instrumental album entitled Screen Time.
Moore is an executive producer of the industrial metal opera "Black Lodge" by David T. Little and Anne Waldman featuring Timur and the Dime Museum, in 2023 on Cantaloupe Music.
His most recent album, Flow Critical Lucidity, was released on September 20, 2024.
Moore scored the 2022 HBO miniseries Irma Vep.
Moore was the editor/overseer of the 2005 book . He published a highly influential list of collectible free jazz records in Grand Royal magazine.
Ecstatic Peace Library is the book publishing company founded by Thurston Moore and visual book editor Eva Prinz in 2010. The company publishes mainly poetry, but also a collection of books about the early Norwegian black metal scene, experimental jazz from the 70s and other niche subjects.
In the fall of 2023, a hardcover memoir written by Moore called was published by Doubleday.[1] Review of Sonic Life: A Memoir at The Guardian
Since the founding of Sonic Youth, Moore and members of the band have been famously critical of the music industry, and what he calls the monopolization of youth culture, with Moore stating in 1991 during filming of The Year Punk Broke,
People see rock and roll as youth culture, and when youth culture becomes monopolized by big business, what are the youth to do? I think we should destroy the bogus capitalist process that is destroying youth culture ...
Since 2004, Moore has participated in a cultural boycott of Israel, likening the country to an apartheid state and criticizing bands like Dinosaur Jr. and Radiohead for performing in the country.
In June 2016, Moore endorsed the candidacy of Bernie Sanders, releasing a track featuring excerpts from Sanders' speeches to coincide along his endorsement.
In November 2019, along with other public figures, Moore signed a letter supporting Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn describing him as "a beacon of hope in the struggle against emergent far-right nationalism, xenophobia and racism in much of the democratic world" and endorsed him in the 2019 UK general election.
In October 2022, Moore expressed support for former president Lula in the 2022 Brazilian general election.
Moore released his memoirs, , in October 2023.
Moore is a key figure in the popularization and resurrection of the Fender Jazzmaster. In 2009, Fender introduced a Lee Ranaldo signature edition of a Sapphire Blue Transparent version featuring two Fender Wide Range humbucking pickups and a Forest Green transparent finish for Moore, equipped with a pair of Seymour Duncan Antiquity II Jazzmaster single-coil pickups.[2]
In 2016, Yuri Landman made a special 10-string drone guitar for Moore at the request of Premier Guitar.
Mirror/Dash
Male Slut
Foot
Dapper
Diskaholics Anonymous Trio
To Live and Shave in L.A.
The Bark Haze
Northampton Wools
Original Silence
Caught on Tape
Chelsea Light Moving
Twilight
Other groups
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