C or D : Yo La Tengo

i'm buying that? no la tengo

Love the idea of a seven plus minute album opener from these guys, but since my preorder shipped I’m gonna save it for the first spin.

i'm buying that? no la tengo

― CerebralCaustic, Thursday, January 26, 2023 4:17 PM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

They’ll have the last laugh in 2-5 years, when they title an LP that

It’s like the YLT version of “Schmilco”

I started to listen to the new song but when I realized the new album is coming out Friday I stopped, so I could just take the whole thing in at once. I liked what I heard though!

Well I listened to the whole track and NO SPOILERS or anything but it's good. This album might be exactly what I'm in the mood for this year.

I’ve heard the promo of the full thing, it’s the most Classic YLT album in forever

Well I listened to the whole track and NO SPOILERS or anything but it's good.

Lol I can’t wait to hear how the song ends

I’ve heard the promo of the full thing, it’s the most Classic YLT album in forever

best YLT album since Fade (which is somehow already a decade old) and the most YLT album since I Am Not Afraid of You, at least. it's a good one.

I don't think YLT have released anything less than a very good record since James joined, at least, but hearing those two particular records cited really makes me excited for this one.

Can't wait to listen to this.

starting to think crazy things like 'the new album is better than i can hear the heart beating as one'

I can hear that heart beating as one a weird album as the years go by. A fantastic collection of songs, but it doesn't have that cohesive "great album" feel that "and then nothingess" or "electr-o-pura" has. Maybe sum this up to me inadvertently listening to it 10-times through in alphabetical order rather than its canonical track listing (when I first learnt not to pirate music). Some amazing highs in "the heart beating" (maybe the best high's they ever hit? re: we're an american band), but a few slogs in the middle section which are instant-skips.

Loving this new one so far.

Also co-sign stuff like that there being one of their best. The originals on that album are some of the best they've ever done and the covers replace the normal "yeah it's good but not great" tracks with some very fun blasts from the past.

yeah i can hear the heart has a lot of their very best material but the sprawl doesn't really work in its favour, so that's the caveat

is "Brain Capers" a Mott cover?

this is excellent! i thought 'there's a riot going on' was pretty boring so i'm glad this is hitting me the right way

I’ve never liked YLT but I figured I’d give the new one a fair shot given the hype…the verse of Sinatra Drive Breakdown sounds like another song and it’s been driving me nuts…I got a brief flash of Vitalogy in my head just now and I think it’s the verse of Not For You

the first track is more explicitly VU-indebted than I've heard from'em in years: the unchanging beat, the feedback peel at 4:35, they remind me of "Sister Ray."

I had "Sinatra Drive Breakdown" on in the car yesterday, and my son — unfamiliar with YLT — said offhandedly, "Sounds like they listen to a lot of krautrock." Proud parenting moment.

aw

Your son OTM

It's going to be hard to patient for this one with all the glowing reviews. Turns out my shipping notice was just the label being printed and it hasn't been shipped yet. :/

Seeing them in a week and a half, and it will be the first time ever I'm actually seeing them headline on their own (the show with Robyn Hitchcock pre-pandemic doing Black Snake Diamond Role was top notch but again, a Robyn H show). But keep in mind the last time before that was them opening for MBV...in 1992. (The subsequent music crit uber-worship of them over here for the rest of that decade often had a sense of 'we have an AMERICAN band doing REAL underground music the right way unlike all those shoegaze trendoids here or there' as I sensed it and it honestly put me off the band even casually until the mid-late 2000s, so while I may have some baggage, weirdly it actually means I'm coming in fairly fresh.)

Hard for me to say this is better than any particular album… nor could I say it’s worse. There’s nothing shockingly different—it’s YLT! But the quality level is, as usual, high. (It’s YLT!)

Lol

I feel you

I've only seen them once, on the And Then Nothing ... tour, and thought they were great. After hearing the pre-release tracks from this, I checked the tour schedule and grabbed a ticket to see them next month in Asheville, should be fun.

And Ned, thanks for sharing that early media perspective on YLT, which I (for one) hadn’t been aware of.

That's my impression too. There's a Riot Going On was no drop-off either.

xxxpost

I saw them in D.C. in the late spring of ‘97, and that remains one of the best shows I’ve seen by anyone.

Haven’t seen them since, need to rectify that this year.

I get the critique that Riot was boring but I really enjoyed it. I liked seeing them indulge one facet of their sound for a full album’s length.

This is a good record but I prefer their recent boring albums

oh cool -- consensus!

I know this is a lame/pointless critique, but the cover art of this new one, Painful, and And Then Nothing kind of overwork the same aesthetic. (I do like how it sounds!)

7-and-23-year gaps, respecitvely.

I saw them in D.C. in the late spring of ‘97, and that remains one of the best shows I’ve seen by anyone.

same

Ok listened to the whole album (had to listen to the new Paramore first) and I like it a lot. Its looseness is v appealing.

Fade has a very special place in my heart as far as the new ones go but this is right up there. Nice blend of krautrock inspired tracks, shoegaze-y stuff and genuinely beautiful moments. I love it.

mookieproof, we were at the same show?!?

assuming this was the 9:30 club, yes! i was leaning against the sound booth at the back, which made nice vibrations. iirc 'deeper into movies' was a particular highlight

Nice!

I’m sure it was the 930, where I saw a lot of shows in those days since bands didn’t make it to Baltimore.

I’d just gotten a new car stereo a few days before, and someone stole it during the show, but the show was so good that I wasn’t as angry or scared as I should’ve been.

Incredible live band. Saw them on their Fade tour, and even though the material from that album is not my favourite, their gig still stands out as one of my favourite ever. Was most impressed that these 50/60yo's were rocking harder than any of the 20yo bands I was guzzling up week by week at other shows. Consummate professionals

feels incredibly rude to say it, but -- i could generally, for 35 years, do without the slow songs sung by ira

nah I feel ya

Georgia doing "Ruler Of My Heart" otoh, that slayed me when I (finally) saw them on that tour where they spun the wheel for the first set (I forget which great album that tour was for)

The second half of "Brain Capers" is my favorite thing on the album.

I was reading the lyrics for "Brain Capers" and got curious what the line about Rick Moranis was referring to. Apparently it's this SCTV sketch:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JLbhEUE_5U

(For anyone keeping track, that's [at least] the second Rick Moranis reference in the YLT catalog, if you count namechecking Big Bully in "We're an American Band")

I don't think I was at the Yo La Tengo show at 930 in 1997, but I remember seeing Yo La Tengo doing a bunch of old punk covers at an in-store at Vinyl Ink Records in Silver Spring (store was open from 1986 to 1999). I forget the exact year.

I like it when they shake things up a bit live, like when they play as the Condo Fucks or, a highpoint, when iirc Mac from Superchunk, David Kilgour and Susie Ibarra played with them for the "And then Nothing ..." show I saw in 2000. A personal highlight was Eleventh Dream Day with Ira as second guitarist at Lounge Ax around 1994. Maybe it's just been projection, since the albums haven't clicked with me, but a couple of shows I've seen in the past 20 (!) years seemed less interesting, or at least the band seemed less interested. I was hoping to see them here next month, but it's sold out, and secondary market has priced tickets at $100+ (lol).

finally getting some repeat listens of the new one, and I'm really enjoying it. i can see why it's being compared a bit to their late nineties stuff - the ones which most closely approximate that era are stacked up front in the track order, and at times it seems like they're almost returning to certain melodies from ICHTHBAO and ATNTIIO (these acronyms kick ass to type!). but the album doesn't come off like a nostalgia trip at all. and i'm not sure i've heard them in the mode of "miles away" before, with the heavy synth action reminiscent of some of Adore, which is not a late nineties guitar band comparison i usually think about with yo la tengo!

they carried over there's a riot going on's focus on texture and ambience into a mostly louder and more energetic context