Sonic Youth was one of the most unlikely success stories of underground American rock in the '80s. Where contemporaries R.E.M. and Husker Du were fairly conventional in terms of song structure and melody, Sonic Youth began their career by abandoning any pretense of traditional rock & roll conventions

Atmospheric, Composed, Contemplative, Cool, Deconstructive, Dissonant, Distorted, Dreamy, Eclectic, Elegant, Expansive, Experimental, Fuzzy, Hallucinatory, Intense, Layered, Lyrical, Pioneering, Political, Pop, Psychedelic, Punk, Quirky, Rhythmic, Rough, Sensual, Slangy, Smart, Sophisticated, Sprawling, Subtle, Tense, Trippy, Urban