Electr-O-Pura
Yo La Tengo
Matador,
1995
Reviewed by
Piero Scaruffi
The splendid, mystical aura of Painful, Yo La Tengo's previous
album, also extends its to follow-up, Electr-O-Pura. Articulated from beginning
to end by hypnotic guitar reverberations, "Decora" opens the album exquisitely,
dancing in tune to Georgia Hubley's low voice. That angelic sound returns every now and
then to calm the flood waters, first in the happy-go-lucky pop of "Tom
Courtenay" and then in the swampy, ethereal distortion of "The Ballad Of Red
Buckets."
But it pushes soon enough toward darker shores, from the dilated gospel of "Hour
Grows Late" and the fragile blues of "My Heart's Reflection" to the
languid, atmospheric country of "Pablo And Andrea." Elsewhere, ecstatic
harmonies are affixed to angular songs, but with no major disruption of a sensible flow.
With "Flying Lesson," we find Yo La Tengo singing about the thrill of living,
instead of alienation. The low refrain hummed by Ira Kaplan (freely inspired by Joy
Division) is backed by hypnotic guitar strums. It's enriched by a parade of collateral
sounds and sonic complications, including splinters of dub and twang, but is then crushed
by an incandescent crescendo, reminiscent of the Velvet Underground's way with a drone.
In a weird nod to industrial music, "False Alarm" begins with a hiccup of
dissonance before proceeding to a rhythmic boogie. The long final jam, "Blue Line
Swinger," instigates a downpour of vocal counterpoints and discordance, providing a
good blueprint to the Yo La Tengo sound. On Electr-O-Pura, the trio composes
songs that are extremely refined and complex, compressed with guitar eccentricites and
austere textures, but both melodic and accessible at the same time.
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