Review Summary: The red-headed stepchild of Yo La Tengo’s golden era
Released in 1995, right in the midst of Yo La Tengo’s peak artistic run,
Electr-O-Pura feels remarkably overlooked. In some ways, its lack of a spotlight is understandable, with the album standing a bit like an underdeveloped version of what
I Can Feel The Heart Beating As One would later become, while simultaneously lacking the greater cohesion provided by
Painful or
And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out. Nonetheless, though,
Electr-O-Pura is easily one of the band’s strongest releases and features a number of all-timers. Notable weaknesses aside (more of a feature than a bug with this group), any indie aficionado deserves to become acquainted with this record.
Electr-O-Pura skitters from one style to another without fear or second thought. There are roaring guitar jams (“Flying Lessons (Hot Chicken #1”), portraits of fuzzy melancholy (“The Hour Grows Late”), indie rock numbers as catchy as anything you’ll ever hear ("Tom Courtenay”), and a whole lot more, and that’s just in the album’s first half. Things seem to stretch out into languid climes on the back half, with “The Ballad Of Red Buckets” setting the tone with its lazily moody atmosphere. It wouldn’t be Yo La Tengo, though, without some twists. Late in the tracklist, "Attack On Love" is a bafflingly unlistenable interlude, although mercifully short, immediately followed up by one of the band’s most incredible achievements in the sprawling closer “Blue Line Swinger”.
As mentioned in the introduction, it’s not entirely unmerited that
Electr-O-Pura is the least mentioned of the four album stretch which marked Yo La Tengo’s high-water mark. Frankly, it’s not quite as good on a whole as the one record which came before it or the two which would follow.
But, it’s still a release full of wonderful moments and absolutely classic tunes, and one that shouldn’t be missed by anyone who has already devoured the band’s most widely-praised offerings. In true Yo La Tengo fashion,
Electr-O-Pura is a flawed jewel, but it shines nonetheless.
