Sure there were glimmers executed well, like 'The Shock Of Contact,' 'Louder After 6,' or the entirety of Asylum, but Any Day Now offers none of that, simultaneously lending itself to mockery on my behalf with that sardonic title. After thoroughly enjoying Nemesis Online and A Perfect Mystery enough to embark on unraveling their assiduous discography from the beginning, I've been left with little more than disappointment with their cheeky Dark Cabaret bacchanal. My patience with The Legendary Pink Dots is running thin. "They say, read this, feel this, do this, do that / Eat right, exercise or you'll get fat" is just one example of Williams' jaunty cynicism, made all the better by 'I Don't Care's' sonic similarity to SNL's Christmas parody 'I Wish It Was Christmas Today.'ĭECORATING WITH CHEAP COBWEBS AND A FOUL SCENT The last notable moment on TV Girl is 'I Don't Care,' purely for the angsty, lyric-driven content that's so de facto and candid that you can't help but find it appealing. It sounds like a precursor to Alvvays' conglomeration of Indie, Jangle, and Twee Pop. While Joel Williams' vocals could strain due to their vanilla flair - seen most noticeably on 'If You Want It (You Got It)' - 'On Land's' syrupy melody and ingrained stature reap intoxication. 'On Land,' easily the crowning jewel and one of the best summertime anthems of the 2010's, drives with a rhythmic loop that's inherently euphoric. TV Girl, their four-track debut, wastes no time frolicking in the heat as each of the EP's 651 seconds pummel the listener with saturated bombast. One that's devoured by the sun's unrelenting rays. Right from the get-go, TV Girl came equip with a heavily-defined aesthetic. It's an endless treat that never stops giving. Thank goodness 'Let's Be Still's' ten minutes is likely Yo La Tengo's best mellow drone of their career, taking the dulcet Ambient Pop of Broken Social Scene's 'Passport Radio' and matching it with Jim O'Rourke's American Primitivism. The standouts don't do enough to mitigate such a sluggish saunter, and as such Summer Sun finds itself amongst a sea of Yo La Tengo records that disappointment, only moderately, as they drift further from the potential for greatness. With this somnolent approach though, Summer Sun is bound to have lulls, and those come frequently with tracks like 'Nothing But You & Me,' 'Moonrock Mambo,' and 'Take Care,' amongst others. All the while maintaining that touch of plush homeliness their best material has been known to feature. The latter's stilted percussion, stuck on an icebox loop like a dead car battery, draws comparisons to another 2003 song Outkast's 'Vibrate.' Each using said technique in drastically anomalous ways.ĭuring this cold spell, when Kaplan's at his most bare, Yo La Tengo find themselves cozying up with the composed side of Modest Mouse circa 1997 with Lonesome Crowded West or Broken Social Scene circa 2001 with Feel Good Lost. Elsewhere, on say 'Nothing But You & Me' or 'Don't Have To Be So Sad,' a winter's chill crawls up the paralyzed instrumentation both fatigued and comatose. At times, like 'Little Eyes' or 'Season Of The Shark,' an amicable procession of Jangle Pop - akin to Galaxie 500 or The Clientele - evoke a carefree summer's eve frothing with begot memories. But here, he's left bare to sweat or shiver depending on the pacing Georgia Hubley and James McNew present. On all Yo La Tengo albums previous to this, Kaplan was often matched, or exceeded by, the blistery production. Not Yo La Tengo, who manage, on their 10th LP Summer Sun, to sound both warm and cold, a paradox united unto itself by Ira Kaplan's serene and sedated vocals. Bridging the gap between polar opposites, without sounding disillusioned and incoherent, often proves impossible for musicians.
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