Condo Fucks

Fuckbook

(Matador)

Record Review by Alex Pudlin

If you knew nothing about Condo Fucks, it wouldn’t be absurd to assume that their debut album Fuckbook was recorded by some drunken teenagers in an abandoned pool house. It’s short, sloppy, mixed terribly, and doesn’t contain one original song. Well it just so turns out that Condo Fucks have been around since 1984 and Fuckbook is their 12th album. Their last album reached #66 on the Billboard charts. Confused? Probably because the Condo Fucks are better known as Yo La Tengo. Yep, the tricky Hoboken trio has pulled a fast one.

The natural question to ask is, “Why?” Probably the same reason Joaquin Phoenix dresses up like a hobo. It’s liberating.  Consider this: Yo La Tengo’s last four albums have had an average running time of 70 minutes. Stylistically they’ve included everything from 10-minute ambient numbers, to 2-minute guitar bursts. They’ve had horns, strings, and more. So by changing their name for an album of garage covers, Yo Lo Tango is allowed to play it simple and raw without endangering their brand.  Although Fuckbook lacks the adventurous genre-hopping of I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One or I’m Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass, it makes up for it by being the most concise and consistent album Yo Lo Tengo have produced in recent memory.

Every cover here has been filtered through a filthy garage-rock lens. Their take on the Beach Boys’ “Shut Down “and “Shut Down Pt. 2” may be surf, but it’s dirty surf that reminds you more of hypodermic needles on Coney Island than beautiful babes in Malibu.  Bassist James McNew - always a bit of an odd man out since he’s the only member of the band not married to another member of the band- handles a heavy dose of lead vocals here. McNew has a layman’s voice that’s well-suited for the rough sounds of Fuckbook and it’s a pleasure to hear him take the lead on tracks like “Accident” and “Gudbuy T’Jane.” Georgia’s one vocal, on the Troggs’ “With a Girl Like You,” is the closest the Fucks come to balladry. Yet whereas David Sitek’s recent cover of the song on the Dark Was the Night compilation meanders, the Fucks effectively maintain the spirit of the Troggs’ original by keeping it simple.

Compared to Yo La Tengo’s previous cover projects like 1990’s Fakebook or their annual impromptu covers broadcast for WFMU telethons, Fuckbook feels the most accomplished, mainly because Yo La Tengo strike up the ideal balance between looseness and consistency. Additionally, upon subsequent listens, Fuckbook sounds more and more like a real Yo La Tengo record, rather than a hastily recorded side project. From Georgia’s drum fills on “Shut Down” to Kaplan’s guitar shredding on “Dog Meat,” Fuckbook contains adept musicianship beneath the fuzz. And for anyone missing Yo La Tengo’s unique brand of heart-wrenching indie tearjerkers I say this: it may be hard to hear the vocals, but that doesn’t make a song like the Kinks’ “This is Where I Belong” any less gorgeous.