NEWS: The Images Festival presents the Toronto premiere of Sonic Youth: Sleeping Nights Awake

 Music documentary screening followed by Live Sonic Youth tribute set by Shaking Hell   

Wednesday February 29: The Garrison  

TORONTO, ON - The Images Festival is proud to begin 2012 with a special screening of Sleeping Nights Awake, a documentary on Sonic Youth shot by high school students. The screening takes place on Wednesday, February 29 at The Garrison, 1197 Dundas Street West (19+, licensed) and will be followed by a live performance by Sonic Youth tribute band Shaking Hell - a Toronto indie super-group featuring members of Republic of Safety, Neck and Mean Red Spiders formed especially for this evening - playing a set of SY's "hits." Advance tickets are $10 and are available at Soundscapes at 572 College Street and at Rotate This at 801 Queen Street West as well as via the Images Festival online store.

"Sonic Youth has been documented by a host of filmmakers, but the leading band of the No Wave movement has never been quite as expressively and thoroughly captured as by the high school crew behind 'Sleeping Nights Awake.' This is one of the most engaging and single-minded film studies of a band since 'Instrument,' Jem Cohen's 1999 film on Fugazi. " - Variety.

About Sonic Youth: Sleeping Nights Awake

In the summer of 2006, a group of seven high school students from Reno, NV set out to make a documentary on Sonic Youth. As part of a non-profit organization called Project Moonshine, these teens were given cameras and a few days of training and set loose to record a day in the life of Sonic Youth. Shot on location in Reno, NV on the 4^th of July, this intimate verité documentary is a behind the scenes look at one of the most influential bands of all time and contains insightful and candid concert footage. Shot in glorious black and white, highlights in the set include "Tom Violence," "Shaking Hell," "Mote," "Incinerate" and "Kool Thing." Additionally, the documentary contains rare interviews with Kim Gordon, Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo, as well as their guitar techs and sound engineers. Filled with behind-the-scenes interviews, original performances and a little basketball, this film shares the enveloping experience of a Sonic Youth concert unraveling before our eyes.    

2012 marks the 25^th anniversary of the Images Festival, Toronto's longest-running alternative film festival. Images' first edition took place in 1988, a heady year in underground pop culture, which also saw the release of the acclaimed double album Daydream Nation, by New York avant-rock quartet Sonic Youth. Creating a new language for the guitar through alternate tunings and distorted dissonance, Sonic Youth were the Beatles of the '80s, only without the hits. A singular voice in the landscape of independent music, Sonic Youth have influenced countless bands, yet no one really sounds like them. Despite their underground status, SY have built a 30-year career, with a devoted fanbase, a canon of brilliant albums and an entire younger generation that they have culturally mentored. For more on the images festival, please visit www.imagesfestival.com