VPRO Radio interview (10 April 96) Transcribed by Ronald Veldhuis.

[Thurston Moore]
I took one guitar lesson when I was thirteen. I had a guitar and
I brought my guitar into this class full of kids with guitars.
And I didn't have a case and I remember like, kids looking at me
like I was some sort of charlatan. May I was. But that was the
only guitar lesson I ever took.

[Thurston Moore]
I think a lot of people after they make some radical kind of
musical statement. A lot of the times they get more involved
with wanting to deal with more traditional aspects, which some
people think is kind of boring. But I think it's kind of
interesting when radical musicians try to get involved with that.
Because I think it's a desire of them to sort of be more in tune
to kind of the common situation in a way.

[Interviewer]
Do you think that you are getting more traditional?

[Thurston Moore]
I think we sort of do get involved with wanting to use more
traditional ideas and people don't like it when we do that.
Because it just sounds like we're not satisfying them as far as
breaking barriers. And to exist solely just to break barriers
for people is not really what Sonic Youth really wants to do.
At this point in time there's always... there's so many people
who are sort of aware of us, that you have a lot of people who
are just like... they want to have the Sonic Youth experience
that they had at a certain point. And so, you have a lot of
people who were there at the beginning, who think maybe it was
all over after Sister. And I remember there were a lot of people
who thought it was all over after Confusion is Sex which was our
second record. And they never really wanted to hear anything
else. So, I mean it's kind of interesting. But then I meet a lot
of young people who... the first thing they ever heard was Goo
and anything else doesn't really mean that much to them. So it's
all very personal.

[Interviewer]
Choose between Sister or Washing Machine.

[Thurston Moore]
I mean I'd have to say Washing Machine because it's more
concurrent with how I'm living now, and I don't really have any
desire to sort of repeat the past. But uhm. I mean Sister is
such an interesting record for me because at the time it was sort
of the kind of record we did and nobody made such a big deal out
of it. But it's the one record that sort of seems to have been
the record that all these kids were kind of listening to as they
were getting into music who are younger than me. And they always
talk about Sister as being this thing that turned them on to
music other than Punk Rock and Hardcore or whatever like that.
And so I feel really good about Sister. So, I mean on one level
maybe I should choose Sister because it has already proven to be
personally successful for me. Whereas Washing Machine is still a
baby. You know. So maybe Sister.