Customer Reviews

President Yo La Tengo / New Wave Hot Dogs

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I'm not sure I get the previous reviewer's point - other than that this record is really, really great.

This CD puts together YLT's second and third album, for some reason starting with the latter (maybe because "Barnaby" makes a better opener than "Clunk"). The music on both is quite different from what they are doing now; in fact, this album gets its 5 stars from me for entirely different reasons than I'd give 5 stars to their more recent releases.

Nowadays, YLT's music is lush, epic, rich-textured, a beautiful soundscape. Back then in 1987/89 it was instead lean, direct, and relentlessly moving forward. Still, it featured the same degree of musical craftmanship and the same uncanny feeling for melody that have been YLT trademarks since their very beginnings.

I know a number of YLT fans who don't like this. I can't blame them. First, it's still proto-YLT; many of the musical elements they embraced later are here only in their earliest, unrefined form. Second, it's musical understatement - almost too easy to overlook the great melodies behind the almost-too-simple songs.

Still, apart from the ten-minute version of "The Evil That Men Do" (which I find was an evil thing to record), there's some true gems here: an uptempo version of "Barnaby, Hardly Working", an extremely tender version of Bob Dylan's "I Threw It All Away", and from the rest, "Did I Tell You", "Lewis" and "A Shy Dog" seem particularly noteworthy.

If you're prepared to encounter a kind of YLT that's different from "Heart Beating" and "Nothing", then go for this one. It's well worth it.

This is a very different Yo La Tengo (pre- James McNew) and has a very different sound. Ira and Georgia were still working with similar sounds to bands like the Feelies, Phantom Tollbooth and other Hoboken peers. However there are two Yo La Tengo universals here - great song writing and intelligent ecclectic tastes. Lewis and Shy Dog from "New Wave Hot Dogs" along with pretty much all of "President Yo La Tengo" have more than just glimpses of genius in them. I saw YLT when they toured in support of "New Wave Hot Dogs" and the live cuts on "President" definitely capture the energy and love of music possessed by the band. It's a great CD for rounding out your YLT collection, has a LOT of music for the money - of course, it was the first one I ever bought (I have the Coyote records). IMHO, "President Yo La Tengo" is where the light just starts to break through - and like the dawn, it can take your breathe away.

President Yo La Tengo and New Wave Hot Dogs are two of Yo La Tengo's best albums on their own. With both of them together, you get a good mix of what is Yo La Tengo. There are some of the harder Yo La Tengo songs with "Orange Song", and some of the more folksy rock with "Alyda" and "Did I Tell You". Overall, I would recommend them both by themsleves, but together you can't lose.

After their debut recording, Yo La Tengo found themselves in an interesting situation-- half the band left, leaving Ira Kaplan (guitars and vocals) and Georgia Hubley (drums and vocals) on their own. The pair responded by largely reshaping the sound of the band away from the sounds of Ride the Tiger and towards where they'd end up. In a sense, their followup effort, "New Wave Hot Dogs" and its successor EP,"President Yo La Tengo" was a second debut, redefining the band. This CD combines these two along with an early single (although choose oddly to sequence them in inverse order to their release-- being somewhat of a purist, I'll review them chronologically).

As if to say we don't really need another lead guitarist, Kaplan wastes no time on "New Wave Hot Dogs" showing off his chops-- "Clunk" features a rolling rhythm and a highly effective yet somewhat shy vocal. But the killer is the lead guitar, interspersing blazing distorted riffs with the vocals before exploding into a fierce feedback workout. The remainder of the record trades gentler pop songs with noisy workouts, and it goes a long way to define a sound for the band. What's amazing is the consistently high quality of the record-- whether it's a jangly pop song ("Lewis"), a gentle interuluide ("Lost in Bessemer") or a Velvet Underground cover ("It's All Right (The Way That You Live)"). While the album tails off a bit towards the end in terms of maintaining its superb level of quality (the somewhat limp "3 Blocks From Groove St." and "A Shy Dog", somewhat grating "Serpentine"), the first half of the record is so consistently satisfying, it's hard to say anything bad about it.

"President Yo La Tengo" was a real statement for the band and finds them pretty much fully developed, embracing that delicate balance of melody and noise that the Velvet Underground perfected a generation earlier. Opener "Barnaby, Hardly Working" best illustrates this. One of the finest pieces in the band's catalog, it rides a wave of distorted guitars over a chugging, cleantone rhythm guitar part of a distinctly understated vocal from Kaplan. Lacking any of the tentativeness of Ride the Tiger, it's a statement on its own. The rest of the EP seems to be a reflection of bits and pieces of 'Barnaby', from a standout chugging Velvets-inspired rocker ("Drug Test") to delicate male/female harmony feature ("Alyda") and overt feedback workouts ("The Evil That Men Do [Pablo's Version]"). Pretty much start to finish, it's a fantastic record.

Separate, "New Wave Hot Dogs" and "President Yo La Tengo" are good records, well worth the time and investment. Together, they make a statement and find a band avoiding a sophomore slump by defining itself. Highly Recommended.

I sabotaged this album for myself when I heard their later work first. If you know how amazing they got in the mid-90's (see Electr-O-Pura), you're doomed to disappointment if you haven't heard this already. Some impressive guitar work, but... thumbs down.

Yo La Tengo is quickly becoming my favorite band; and for good reason, too--it is comprised of three of the former vocalists for the popular children's t.v. show "the smurfs." When one buys this record, he quickly recognizes the voices of Papa and Brainy, but there's also a girl--I'm assuming that she was the blond smurf (whose name escapes me at this time.)

This cd is great. For those who don't know, Yo La Tengo, when translated into English, means, "you can't drink the water, so have some tobasco sauce." The english version, in my opinion, is a bit more catchy, but hey--I'm not a member of the band.

I wish I was though. Hey, Yo La Tengo, I can sing and play some instruments. Furthermore, I can write good lyrics. Me and my bud have a band called "Big Nine With a Circle Around It," and are really popular in the greater my house area.

The first song on this album is awesome. The next 19 are awesome. I love this cd.

"I can feel the heart beating as one" is also a good cd. In fact, I have yet to hear a BAD Yo La Tengo cd. I've heard rumor that their next cd will be venturing into the shadows of death metal music. I'm interested in finding out how that album turns up.

If you like music, you'll love Yo La Tengo. Too bad you'll never read this review. Maybe I should write this review in the Ricky Martin section. I hear he's pretty popular with the ladies. I, myself, am popular with the ladies--the 100-years-old-plus ladies. Yes, the nursing home crowd really likes "big nine with a circle around it." When we play for very old people, our set list includes "If You're Gonna Play In Texas, You've Gotta Have a Fiddle in the Band," "How Much is That Doggie in the Window?," and "Islands in the Stream." The old people just eat us up. By the way, our version of "Islands in the Stream" is 35 min. long.

So buy this record, you'll be glad you did.