The last CD I bought during the short two months (May to July 2000) when Yo La Tengo were my new favourite band (see also 1, 2, ). It was just three weeks after I got Electr-O-pura that YLT lost that status to The Magnetic Fields.
Consequently I don't know the album very well. Reacquainting myself with it ten years on, Robert Christgau's remark, that Yo La Tengo is "always friendly. This is not the forbidding experimentation of an aspiring vanguard. This is the fooling around of folks who like to go out on Saturday night and make some noise — and then go home humming it" (quoted in Wikipedia) seems pretty much on the money.
Always likeable, Yo La Tengo — I download some or all of each new album from emusic these days — but there does come a point where you wonder how much more of this enjoyable mix of experimental noise, soft rock and folky doo-wop pop you actually need.
MusicBrainz entry for this album
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