Sonic Youth, an alternative rock band from NYC is known for their custom tweaking of their instruments. While on tour in Orange County, CA in 1999, the truck holding all of their gear was stolen. The truck was discovered several days later….completely empty. All of their guitars, amps, and pedals were gone for good….or they thought.
The band has some incredible fans. These diligent fans have been on the lookout for the stolen gear ever since their disappearance. The fans have been scouring the web and pawn shops to let Sonic Youth know about any of their equipment. This week the sixth and seventh guitars to be recovered appeared only days apart. Thurston Moore’s white jazzmaster was discovered on ebay by a great fan in Belgium. Lee Ralaldo commented about the fan, “He wrote saying, ‘Check out this auction. The color’s different, but it definitely looks like your guitar. The serial number matches,'”. The other guitar was Lee’s Jazzmaster and it was discovered at a pawn shop. Fans were commenting online about the guitar at the pawn shop and said that it looked like one of the stolen guitars.
Ranaldo discussed some of the other equipment recovery stories on their website:
These two scruffy teenage boys came up. They told us they knew about our stolen guitars. One claimed his uncle was involved with stealing the van. We were like, ‘yeah, sure kid.’ But he sent us these anonymous pictures of our gear in basements– foot pedals where you could see our crew guys’ writing on the sides, and somebody’s sneaker on top. These kids were destitute. They’d been kicked out of their homes, living in a car in L.A. We said, ‘we’ll give you a few hundred dollars each for them.’ It did happen.
Sonic Youth has some great fans! Ranaldo states his appreciation, “It’s kind of wild. After all this time, things are still surfacing thanks to the diligence of fans.”
Great story. Here at Good World News, we are glad that the fans have shown their support and appreciation for the group!
Peace & Love,
Jon