5.26.2006

Tell All Your Friends And Tell All Your Enemies Too

Yeah Yeah Yeahs have announced an opportunity for fans to tear up their leggings and use up the rest of that green eyeshadow that's been lying around their artsy apartments. The band is looking to make a video for their next single, "Cheated Hearts" (easily the "Maps" of their latest and sophomore effort, Show Your Bones), which will most likely feature a Pollock-like splattering of all the over-the-top clips that they're sure to receive with this invite. Click for rules:



Pitchfork says.
Prefix says.
Resonator says.

I say...

Look, I'm not trying to win any points here, but I find this bit of information somewhat useful: Fever To Tell was an album I connected with while myself and every other hipster living in New York City was in need of "a summer album." 2003. That was it. Purchased shortly after its late April release, I remember melting to "Maps" throughout the hot Queens summer, and hearing my Primus, prog-rock loving roommate bash the album's worth for all its existence.

I missed the "Maps" fireworks. Turning my back for moments, I came around and suddenly everyone, everywhere was going yeah yeah for the Yeahs. I quickly brushed off any temptation to pull the "Ugh, I'm over it" bullshit due to their explosive fame because the truth of the matter is...Fever To Tell is a great album. (Not as good as Distiller's Coral Fang, but we can go into this another time...)

So after three years of extensive touring and having the beauty of "Maps" turn their lives inside-out and back again, the Little Band That Could returns with Show Your Bones. Sure, beer-spewing, superwoman frontlady Karen O has already confirmed that it is, indeed, picking up the ball where "Maps" left off, but I believe there's more to the album than the unmistakable pull of "Cheated Hearts."

Upon first hearing "Gold Lion," I was sorely unimpressed, but viewing the album as a whole, it all came together. I'd never understood how a song like "The Sweets" could end up getting stuck in my head, considering I'd never thought my ears would ever reach the song's end. "Way Out" and "Mysteries" are sonically delicious. Also, "Dudley" - the most underrated song on the album. "You'll take it over / and make it mine" is sung with such gentle bite, it screams from the pit of lioness den.

I think the best albums are the ones that make one corner of your mouth tighten upon first listen. Look away. One song grabs you, and the next week...something else. You can take each new fascination as entering the core of an album's content through various doors, trying to see every side of the situation that these three are trying to impose on their listeners. "Turn Into" is the latest track that's working on me, guiding me to that doorknob, and ready to suck on the album's marrow a little more. Ear pressed against the door, "I'll hear it in my head real low...turn into the only thing that ever known."

Bottom Line: It's good to mature with each album. YYYs have done so in a way that Interpol did not with Antics, though they still get an E for effort (hey boys, 3rd x a charm?). Anyone who puts this album down because (a) it's the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and they got too popular too fast or (b) it's the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and nothing can beat the perfection that was Fever To Tell...shove it.

Maybe you should go listen to the album.
Kthnx.

I don't even know what it's like not to go back to you...


4 comments:

Matt Rivera said...

But what if you hate the album without ever even hearing it?

You may think, that's not valid. But, you'd be wrong! Prog Rock Forever!

Onward Charles said...

Everyone, meet my Primus, prog-rock loving ex-roommate.

And then go here:
http://www.moose3.com

robbie dee said...

never cared for any of the YYYs, save for a few songs... believe it or not, it's possible not to like the band!

Anonymous said...

but if you were trying to win points, i'd have to tell you that the first time i saw the yyy's live was at a half-empty show at the mercury lounge, may or june of 2002

right after the first EP was released

and yes, she spat beer all over me