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Yo La Tengo - Electr-O-Pura

Yo La Tengo - Electr-O-Pura

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Matador - LP
US, 1995
Indie Rock, Shoegaze

(Relatively lesser-known?) mid-1990's album by Hoboken's indie kingpins, Yo La Tengo's 1995 LP is a slightly rougher and sleazier collection of songs than their hazy Painful and I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One, respectively released before and after Electr-O-Pura.

It took me a while to take Yo La Tengo seriously. It seemed to me like the bland go-to band of uninspired hipsters, in the record shops of my youth, much like Tame Impala some years later. Another one of the many shortcomings caused by some irrelevant snobbery I'd have to deal with many years later. In fact, Electr-O-Pura contains some nagging guitar-led earthy grooves, definitely not dissimilar to the songs I like the most in Sonic Youth's discography.

But, obviously, Yo La Tengo's sound, even when it explores grittier territories like it does on Electr-O-Pura is infinitely more condensed than anything released by Gordon, Moore & Reynaldo, and can't really depart from the Beatles / Beach Boys / Velvet influence - the "Tom Courtenay" video clip, shot in a very Kevin Smith fashion (the perfect film director equivalent of Yo La Tengo's New Jersey cool indie ennui), actually depicts the Hoboken band opening for the reunited Beatles in 1995 - and a song is called "Paul Is Dead"... It's heavily washed-out 1990's rock, reaching gracious heights with its simplest songs, "Pablo And Andrea" or "Don't Say A Word (Hot Chicken #2)". Definitely the kind of record I didn't really noticed at first, and that grew on me to become one that I'd like to return to the most. (VG+/VG+)

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