Yo La Tengo

by Edmund LeStrange
1.10.2003

Yo La Tengo decides to throw us another bone with a new EP as we await their next full length, which is due in early 2003. This latest EP, their first with vocals since 2000, features four versions of Sun Ra’s twenty year old "Nuclear War". YLT is known for working covers into their live sets and while they’ve been playing it live for a couple years it seems quite appropriate that they would release such an anthemic song, dealing with the inevitable loss that jockeying for weapons of mass destruction will bring, amidst such an unstable geopolitical atmosphere.

The first version is strictly vocals and percussion with Ira leading the call and Georgia and James bringing up the response. Each of their voices comes through laced with attitude and the lack of any additional instrumentation lets us hear the earnestness of the lyrics. The second track brings in some background undulations along with a chorus of children responding to Ira. It comes off as comical at first hearing the kids utter lines like “it’s a motherfucker… you got no ass… you lost your ass…you can kiss your ass goodbye… goodbye ass” and it’s great in that sense. However, when you realize the kids probably have no conception of the impending doom of which they are singing the song becomes all that more powerful. The third version is the jam. It spans the better portion of 15 minutes. Unfortunately it starts out without a piano part that sounds like the hotel lobby pianist had to stop playing the “fun stuff” cause he sees his boss coming back from the can. It goes through the same routine as the other two tracks before transitioning into some impassioned horn playing and finishes with some great vocal additions by some of the guest musicians. The fourth track is a Mike Ladd remix that trivializes the good in the previous tracks. It just seems inappropriate in context and is just a plain weak remix. The EP on a whole is definitely worth picking up especially at such a low price.