As mentioned already on NPR’s First Listen, The Best Day is really the first time Sonic Youth mastermind Thurston Moore’s addressed his band-splitting, 27-year-marriage-ending divorce. You know, the one that triggered an onslaught of Jezebel-endorsed, shallow internet misandry with a counterproductive side of slut-shaming masquerading as ‘feminism’? The one where even feminist icon and jilted ex Kim Gordon criticized the tabloids’ witch hunt, as well as the ulterior motive of “reverse sexism” used for the sake of “their editorial?”

Anyway, as mentioned before, he finally tackles the elephant in the room on this drone-heavy solo album. Unfortunately, the Jezzies are somewhat in the right, shown best on what might be the album’s best track, “Vocabularies.” Maybe it’s irony, but the misogynist brat message isn’t even necessary. After over two and a half 12-stringed minutes without lyrics, the listener becomes conditioned for and expectant of a full instrumental. Instead, we get this:

Vocabularies

This is par for the album’s course, as almost every track opens with minutes of winding instrumental work, but after a few minutes, turns into some haphazard lyricism. Some lesser examples include when he pens serenades for the “other woman” of 2011, as seen on “Forevermore:”

Forevermore

As well as the pseudo-political Gen X stream-of-consciousness phrases in “Detonation:”

Detonation

When that’s not happening, the jangly, extended jams (which use noise as a building block, but are in no way noise-dominated) can reach the back corner of your brain itching for both psychedelic expansion and emotional, melancholic draw. Like the constant revelational trip we all experience simply by living and aging. For the older and wiser noise-head or “floppy-haired stoner,” this is a wonderful experience.

For the rest of us, it’s still a wonderful experience, but tainted by what we can glean from Moore’s jagged, 90’s alt-rock mini-phrases. Generally it’s a message of “gee, I love my new, young starfucker of a girlfriend and the new life we have together.” It’s a decent album, but if this sentiment doesn’t overshadow the good, it at least competes.