What really worked well in this piece is the author's use of description to make readers really feel the music. His imagery and jarring details actually had me cringing in my seat in both disgust and awe. I think Cam and Jordan are exactly right in saying that the author can effectively describe the music experience in non-music related terms. Specifically, lines such as "The feeling was a little like being held hostage in a room with someone who refuses to turn on the lights," or, "... broken open garbage bags of noise ..." really grabbed my attention and gave me concrete images and sounds to hold onto.
While I think, ultimately, his audience is relatively specific, I don't think he alienates those of us who don't so readily identify with this type of music or music history. He combines music fact with narrative to produce a cohesive, fairly easily-to-navigate piece of text. I enjoyed learning about the history of this particular band, this genre, as well as the author's own experience of attending a Sonic Youth concert.
One of my concerns with this piece, however, is that toward the middle the author seemed to lose his authoritative voice. Specifically, when he places himself into the narrative I felt like the tone of the piece switched from a polished, music savvy reporter writing a profile to more of an amateur, Sonic Youth groupie writing a concert review for a high school newspaper. This switch in voice is really the part that confused me the most. Did anyone else have a similar reaction or did the author seem to have a consistent, grounded voice throughout the entire piece?
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