Customer Reviews

Today Is the Day

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(5)
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If you were under-whelmed by the slow-burning Summer Sun then this EP should delight. The three tracks on side one crack at a fiery pace that would have upset the apple cart of that lolling long-player. `Today is the Day', one of most delicate tracks from `Summer Sun', has its veins spiked with power poppers. It's still as sweet and affective as ever of course. They could roll out their songs with a steel pin, hammer them into a new shape and they'd still sound great. When the epic cacophony `Cherry Chapstick' is gutted of its sonic assault, a gorgeous yearning ballad emerges. Good songs can withstand a little maltreatment. And Yo La Tengo write lots. So much so that even though their albums are consistently `portly' they still have rip-roaring material to stuff into superb EPs. So get it, and get it on 12", as the artwork is particularly sharp and striking and would look good leaning against the white washed living room wall of an empty flat. I think it's some sort of homage to those pioneering jazz LPs of the 1950/60s, particularly Ornette Coleman's Tomorrow is the Question! Quite why it is is anybody's guess...

First I should let the truth be known about me: I'm not a big fan of pre-Painful YLT, nor have I learned to truly appreciate the quiet majesty that is And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out and Summer Sun for the most part. That's not to say I don't listen to and enjoy the other stuff, but I happen to prefer feedback and rockin' out.

So on to this E.P. At first I thought, "yay, they made a slightly rockin' version of Today is the Day" and then I looked at the bottom of the tracklisting. It's Cherry Chapstick, one of their most rocking songs. "Ah," I thought, "This will be a quiet acoustic number." And indeed it is. It's like how they did two versions (one quiet and one fast, though more boring) of Big Day Coming. Too predictable.

The songs in between are great feedback-y tunes. I especially like track 3. Ira sings really low and you can barely understand the words, but it's so haunting.

So get it. It's $5 or $6. Just go buy it for heaven's sake and write your own review. Sorry I ruined the "surprise" of Cherry Chapstick though.

odd, isnt it that someone hasn't listened to yo la tengo nearly 20 years into their existance. I wish I started listening early, judging by the strength of this ep. From the first tender notes sung from today is the day, I knew this would be quite the experience. This style of music just blew me away. To me, the wall of noise of the first three tracks isnt disgusting, but more along the lines of hypnotic. I have already fallen in love with both georgia and ira's voices, and Ive only heard this album and 2001's ...and then nothing turned itself inside-out. The mellow songs are also very good as well. this is a short album that you can listen to in almost any mood. highly recommended, especially to people new to YLT like me.

Yo La Tengo's most recent release, "Summer Sun," is a smooth and mellow swirl of polished soundscapes. But for those who want something a little rockier and grittier, "Today is the Day!" is the answer. Call it "Summer Sun's" shadow side.

The influence of this EP's parent album ends before it begins, with a blasting bass line underlying the formerly mellow "Today is the Day." The remaining five songs are a mix of vaguely fuzzy rock (the murmury "Styles of the Times"), straightforward pop where the ante is upped ("Outsmartener"), and just pretty, experimental sounds (the pretty "Needle of Death" and gently catchy "Dr. Crash"). It ends with a murmur rather than a bang, with a slow acoustic cover of 2000's "Cherry Chapstick."

There's an experimental feel to "Today is the Day!", a mixture of different musical styles. It's like Yo La Tengo is trying on several pairs of shoes to see what fits them best. The first few songs are the weakest on this EP; they crackle with energy, but sometimes get lost in their own instrumentation. By the third song, "Today is the Day!" has found its footing.

Generally the musical difference here is when a loud song is made soft, or a soft song made loud. In "Today is the Day," there's just a heavy guitar/bass line that separates it from its more mellow "Summer Sun" version (not to mention the "crazy double-reed horn"). And strange as it sounds, one of the riffs in "Outsmartener" sounds just like the Batman theme song.

"Today is the Day!" is a nice addition for fans of Yo La Tengo. For newcomers, it's a good illustration of their musical versatility, and just how rocking or pretty their music can be.

I was going to give Yo La Tengo's latest release a full review, but, because it's only an EP, and because they're Yo La Tengo, I've decided to write a Haiku in Spanish:

Yo La Tengo son
Mejor que un Chihuahua
Con tres piernas.

"Today is the Day!" is a collection of leftovers-- two cuts left off of Summer Sun (including a new version of the title track) and a pair left in the can from And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out, along with a live performance of "Cherry Chapstick" from the latter. My biggest complaint of those two records was that they sounded like Yo La Tengo getting old-- sure, the band always had a mellow, melodic side, but at their best, they balanced these traits with explosiveness and great alt-rock tunes. Largely lacking from And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out and Summer Sun, "Today is a Day!" goes a long way to remedying that, and both albums could have been stronger for the material on here.

The title cut is presented in a dramatically different mix-- instead of the laid back swirling sound that was so prevalent on Summer Sun, the piece gets aired out behind a fierce guitar riff, and while Georgia Hubley's vocal maintains its low-key approach, it works. As an added bonus, it features the sort of noisy guitar solo from Ira Kaplan that was so missing from Summer Sun. "Outsmartener" is intriguing, it's a low key riff monster, with a harmonized lead vocal and a counterpoint offered by a double reed performance from William Parker-- it has the distinct honor of being quite unlike anything else, in Yo La Tengo's catalog or elsewhere. "Styles of the Times" is a bit more dispensible-- a straightahead alt-rock riff piece, it's not a bad track, but its exclusion from Summer Sun is understandable.

From the And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out sessions, "Bert Jansch cover Needle of Death" presents another somewhat lost side of the band, their folk side. Presented in a straight folk arrangement with finger-picked steel-string guitars and a gentle vocal from Georgia Hubley, it's an effecting and yet remarkably detached performance. Brief instrumental "Dr. Crash" is something completely different, embracing a '60s mentality-- the Fender bass sound, cleantone electric guitars and a swelling lead organ. Like the other material on the EP, its presence on the album would have helped shake up the sound of the record.

Twisting the whole presentation around is the performance of "Cherry Chapstick"-- a real blazer on And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out, here it gets a just fantastic acoustic performance.

I think I'm in the minority in my assessment of Summer Sun and And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out, but I felt they were missing the Yo La Tengo energy. The performances on "Today is the Day!" would have gone a long way to remedy that. Highly recomemnded.

This is cool. It's the coolest thing they've put out since Electro-Pura and tracks 1-3 have that nice loud May I Sing With Me sound that got me hooked in the first place. These were recorded in 2002 so maybe there's still hope.

Needle of Death is a beauty. Reminds me of the Big Star cover that closes Summer Sun which is (unfortunately) my favorite track on that album. I'll be looking for Dr. Crash on the next Quentin Tarentino movie (it's too late for Pulp Fiction).

Maybe the pendulum is swinging away from the more recent experimental stuff and back to skronk. Yes, we want more!

This EP is a good introduction to YLT's musical diversity (for people who are not familiar with the band) while providing longtime fans with three things at which these musicians are incredibly skilled -- beautiful originals, solid covers and reinventions of their own songs.

YLT's catchy pop melodies are solid, whether they redo them by bumping them up a notch (the EP's title song, from this year's Summer Sun) or stripping them way down ("Cherry Chapstick", from 2000's And then nothing turned itself inside-out). Beyond YLT's original tunes, the most beautiful and touching song on this EP is the lullaby-like cover of Bert Jansch's "Needle of Death."

Overall, this EP might be short, but it shows a breadth of musical styles and is a cheap introduction to the music if you've never heard them before, or an interesting take on some previously-released songs for those who have.