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Fuckbook by Condo Fucks reviewed by pitchfork — 8.3/10 | Wavelength | Wavelength

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pitchfork

Fuckbook

Fuckbook

Condo Fucks (2009)

8.3/ 10

“Despite outward appearances, this is the new covers record from indie rock legends Yo La Tengo.”

Though the youthful exuberance that carried their Condo Fucks City Rockers EP and high water mark Straight Outta Connecticut to modern-classic status during their mid-1990s heyday is now noticeably muted, Fuckbook, the latest LP from New London, Conn., trio the Condo Fucks is nevertheless the veteran band's pinnacle... Oh, what the hell am I on about. Fuckbook is, despite outward appearances, the new record by Yo La Tengo. But the bait-and-switch goes a little deeper than pseudonym, itself a (pretty funny!) dozen-year-old joke from the booklet of the band's 1997 effort I Can Hear the Heart Beating As One. See, Fuckbook is a covers record, even more so than 1990's Fakebook (thus concludes the gag portion of our program).

Yo La Tengo touch on about a million things in their music with varying degrees of success; the Condo Fucks, however, only do the one: Fuckbook gathers 11 mostly garage-borne rockers from the likes of the Troggs, Slade, the Kinks, Richard Hell, and others and, from the sound of things, runs 'em all through a shredder. If you've heard a Yo La Tengo record, you've probably heard a Yo La Tengo cover, but rarely if ever like these; so often the band adds its fine-tuned tumble to whatever they interpret, and the results are often reverent and, with some notable exceptions, inessential. But even the least jagged edge of this Fuckbook might give you a papercut. The thing rips-- its closest sonic counterpart is the Stooges' Fun House. You ever think you'd see a sentence like that about a Yo La Tengo record?

This gnarly, live-in-a-room sound isn't unprecedented: You could easily cherrypick a dozen similarly scuzzy rockers from the past four or five Yo La Tengo records proper, albeit with a generally higher production standard. But Fuckbook is leaner than a typical Yo La Tengo record in every way: It halves its predecessor's length and triples its volume, resulting in the most cohesive thing they've released since Painful. But while a singularity of purpose hasn't always worked out for Yo La-- see the sleepy The Sounds of the Sounds of Science or the haphazard live-on-air covers set Yo La Tengo Is Murdering the Classics-- Fuckbook's lazer focus makes it the most immediately enjoyable, endlessly replayable entry in their catalog in some time.

Though not all radio hits, these tunes are clearly familiar favorites to the band-- and, since no Yo La Tengo review would be complete without mentioning Ira's tenure as a rock critic, here's that part; to that end, the song selection's pretty impeccable, too. A false start marks the beginning of their opening take on the Small Faces' "Whatcha Gonna Do About It", and from there it's on; for the next 30 minutes and change, drums pound, guitars spill every which way, and a few voices you might recognize bleat out a tune or two you know by heart. Though they gleefully slop up every song here, quite a few stay close to their source material in tempo and timbre. For most bands, playing it that close to the hip would earn them a mark in the bad column, but even on the most reverent cover here-- the Georgia-sung "With a Girl Like You"-- they sound like they're having a blast, like something like this was just what they needed.

When they start to veer off the beaten path, Fuckbook really gets going. Their take on the Flamin' Groovies' "Dog Meat" actually manages to bring out the surfy central riff even further to the forefront, and James McNew's vocals throughout the disc-- and on their closing cover of Slade's "Gudbuy T'Jane" especially-- are a perfect fit with the material. Ira, a supremely underrated guitarist, gets his best showcase in forever here, and Georgia's as rock solid as ever behind the kit. She and Ira still aren't the most natural singers for this particular stripe of rock'n'roll, but their willingness to go for it adds a lot of Fuckbook's appeal. And, frankly, because the whole thing's so out of character, a lot of the charm of these somewhat unlikely lo-fi heroes-- who, even with Times New Viking, Fucked Up, and Sonic Youth as labelmates might be the single skronkiest band current signed to Matador-- lies in the fact that they just up and did this thing without provocation, and it worked. Sure, it's a covers record and a fairly unambitious one at that, unless "being confusing" and "being loud" are ambitions. And maybe for Yo La Tengo, they oughta be; as much as I'm looking forward to the next one from Ira, Georgia, and James proper, it's gonna have to work awfully hard to match the effortless blast that is Fuckbook.

Though the youthful exuberance that carried their *Condo Fucks City Rocker*s EP and high water mark *Straight Outta Connecticut* to modern-classic status during their mid-1990s heyday is now noticeably muted, *Fuckbook*, the latest LP from New London, Conn., trio the Condo Fucks is nevertheless the veteran band's pinnacle... Oh, what the hell am I on about. *Fuckbook* is, despite outward appearances, the new record by Yo La Tengo. But the bait-and-switch goes a little deeper than pseudonym, itself a (pretty funny!) dozen-year-old joke from the booklet of the band's 1997 effort *I Can Hear the Heart Beating As One*. See, *Fuckbook* is a covers record, even more so than 1990's *Fakebook* (thus concludes the gag portion of our program). Yo La Tengo touch on about a million things in their music with varying degrees of success; the Condo Fucks, however, only do the one: *Fuckbook* gathers 11 mostly garage-borne rockers from the likes of the Troggs, Slade, the Kinks, Richard Hell, and others and, from the sound of things, runs 'em all through a shredder. If you've heard a Yo La Tengo record, you've probably heard a Yo La Tengo cover, but rarely if ever like these; so often the band adds its fine-tuned tumble to whatever they interpret, and the results are often reverent and, with some notable exceptions, inessential. But even the least jagged edge of this *Fuckbook* might give you a papercut. The thing rips-- its closest sonic counterpart is the Stooges' *Fun House*. You ever think you'd see a sentence like that about a Yo La Tengo record? This gnarly, live-in-a-room sound isn't unprecedented: You could easily cherrypick a dozen similarly scuzzy rockers from the past four or five Yo La Tengo records proper, albeit with a generally higher production standard. But *Fuckbook* is leaner than a typical Yo La Tengo record in every way: It halves its predecessor's length and triples its volume, resulting in the most cohesive thing they've released since *Painful*. But while a singularity of purpose hasn't always worked out for Yo La-- see the sleepy *The Sounds of the Sounds of Science* or the haphazard live-on-air covers set *Yo La Tengo Is Murdering the Classics*-- *Fuckbook*'s lazer focus makes it the most immediately enjoyable, endlessly replayable entry in their catalog in some time. Though not all radio hits, these tunes are clearly familiar favorites to the band-- and, since no Yo La Tengo review would be complete without mentioning Ira's tenure as a rock critic, here's that part; to that end, the song selection's pretty impeccable, too. A false start marks the beginning of their opening take on the Small Faces' "Whatcha Gonna Do About It", and from there it's on; for the next 30 minutes and change, drums pound, guitars spill every which way, and a few voices you might recognize bleat out a tune or two you know by heart. Though they gleefully slop up every song here, quite a few stay close to their source material in tempo and timbre. For most bands, playing it that close to the hip would earn them a mark in the bad column, but even on the most reverent cover here-- the Georgia-sung "With a Girl Like You"-- they sound like they're having a blast, like something like this was just what they needed. When they start to veer off the beaten path, *Fuckbook* really gets going. Their take on the Flamin' Groovies' "Dog Meat" actually manages to bring out the surfy central riff even further to the forefront, and James McNew's vocals throughout the disc-- and on their closing cover of Slade's "Gudbuy T'Jane" especially-- are a perfect fit with the material. Ira, a supremely underrated guitarist, gets his best showcase in forever here, and Georgia's as rock solid as ever behind the kit. She and Ira still aren't the most natural singers for this particular stripe of rock'n'roll, but their willingness to go for it adds a lot of *Fuckbook*'s appeal. And, frankly, because the whole thing's so out of character, a lot of the charm of these somewhat unlikely lo-fi heroes-- who, even with Times New Viking, Fucked Up, and Sonic Youth as labelmates might be the single skronkiest band current signed to Matador-- lies in the fact that they just up and did this thing without provocation, and it worked. Sure, it's a covers record and a fairly unambitious one at that, unless "being confusing" and "being loud" are ambitions. And maybe for Yo La Tengo, they oughta be; as much as I'm looking forward to the next one from Ira, Georgia, and James proper, it's gonna have to work awfully hard to match the effortless blast that is *Fuckbook*.