Yo la Tengo released Fakebook in 1990, an album made up of a few
originals and many covers, light years before social media. The album
has a very soft sound, right from the soothing country twang of Can't
Forget. Ira Kaplan sings in a soft, half whisper, bands like Belle and
Sebastian may well have been listening and taking notes. They fare best
on their own material. Barnaby, Hardly Working is revisited from its
origin on President Yo La Tengo and recast as a low key strummer, with
some great guitar work. Elsewhere
versions of Antonia's Griselda, Cat Stevens' Here Comes My Baby and The
Flaming Groovies' You Tore Me Down are dangerously close to cheese.
One
of the strongest tracks is their own The Summer, a Georgia
Hubley/Kaplan duet where they make an attempt at inventing a cool,
alt-country feel. The Hubley sung What Comes Next is in a similar vein
and equally successful. Another old Yo La Yengo song reworked, Did I
Tell You channels the Velvet Underground third album sound pretty well.
So something of a flawed experiment, though it sees the band dial back the noise and invent the stripped down YLT sound.
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