Nate Patrin

Ten years after Mos Def's solo debut, Black on Both Sides, fans might've looked at his subsequent uneven catalog and started to wonder if their fondest memories of him in the '00s would consist mostly of his Chappelle's Show cameos. But after the 2004's divisive, rock-heavy The New Danger and...

Jim O'Rourke--the producer and fifth member partially responsible for the blissed-out, borderline jam-band approach of Murray Street and Sonic Nurse--is out of the Sonic Youth picture now, and Rather Ripped acknowledges his departure in a bewildering way. The sprawl's been contained, and in the absence of their recent works' breathing...