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President Yo La Tengo/New Wave Hot Dogs

Yo La Tengo - President Yo La Tengo/New Wave Hot Dogs Audio CD

A fair review of the Yo La Tengo "President Yo La Tengo/New Wave Hot Dogs" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Yo La Tengo reviews here, or go back to the Yo La Tengo tabs.

Band: Yo La Tengo
Title: President Yo La Tengo/New Wave Hot Dogs
Rating:

Release Date: 1996-06-18
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Barnaby, Hardly Working 2: Drug Test 3: Evil That Men Do [Craig's Version] 4: Orange Song 5: Alyda 6: Evil That Men Do [Pablo's Version] 7: I Threw It All Away 8: Clunk 9: Did I Tell You 10: House Fall Down 11: Lewis 12: Lost in Bessemer 13: It's All Right (The Way That You Live) 14: 3 Blocks from Groove St. 15: Let's Compromise 16: Serpentine 17: Shy Dog 18: No Water 19: Story of Jazz 20: Asparagus Song

Reinvigoration through reinvention.
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. 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. 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.

you can't go back in time
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. I sabotaged this album for myself when I heard their later work first. Some impressive guitar work, but. . . thumbs down.

Two greats in one!
With both of them together, you get a good mix of what is Yo La Tengo. President Yo La Tengo and New Wave Hot Dogs are two of Yo La Tengo's best albums on their own. 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.

Yo La Tengo's Come a Long Way
Ira and Georgia were still working with similar sounds to bands like the Feelies, Phantom Tollbooth and other Hoboken peers. This is a very different Yo La Tengo (pre- James McNew) and has a very different sound. 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.

Good stuff.

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

You can see a complete list of all Yo La Tengo discography, or go back to the Yo La Tengo tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.