![\"yo_la_tengo\"](\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/yo_la_tengo.jpg\")
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Hoboken, N.J.-based indie-rock band Yo La Tengo<\/strong> has long been recognized as much for their selection of cover songs as for their original material. Their sonic approach can recall anything from the dark psychedelia of the Velvet Underground<\/strong> to sweet, chiming pop. But on their latest album, 2015’s Stuff Like That There<\/i>, the group chose to showcase songs by other artists in a manner that sometimes approaches folk, or even what used to be called \u201ceasy listening.\u201d<\/p>\n Guitarist Ira Kaplan<\/strong> describes Stuff Like That There<\/i> as \u201ca sequel of sorts\u201d to Yo La Tengo’s 1990 album, Fakebook<\/i>. \u201cThe format of Fakebook<\/i> was essentially a mix of cover songs and a couple of new songs, with a couple of revisions of some of our older songs.\u201d With Stuff Like That There<\/i> , the group \u201cput some of the same ideas to work [to] see how it was similar and how it was different.\u201d The original Fakebook<\/i> project \u201cis why [electric bassist] James<\/strong> [McNew<\/strong>] learned how to play upright bass, because [The Schramms<\/strong>‘] Al Greller<\/strong> played it on that record.\u201d<\/p>\n Stuff Like That There<\/i> gives the Yo La Tengo treatment to classics like Hank Williams<\/strong>‘ \u201cI’m So Lonesome I Could Cry\u201d as well as relative obscurities \u2013 a YLT specialty \u2013 like \u201cButchie’s Tune,\u201d a deep album cut from the Lovin’ Spoonful<\/strong>‘s 1966 LP, Daydream<\/i> . Even when they’re reinventing the songs of others \u2013 and despite album titles like Yo La Tengo is Murdering the Classics<\/i> \u2013 Kaplan insists they’re never making fun of the songs. \u201cI don’t think there’s anything irreverent about the stuff on Murdering the Classics<\/i> ,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are a lot of ways to enjoy something,\u201d Kaplan explains, citing the example of their 2006 cover of Yes<\/strong>‘ \u201cRoundabout.\u201d \u201cWhile we might not enjoy the song in the sense of wanting to listen to it today, we still enjoy the idea of the song that you don\u2019t even particularly like having wormed its way into your brain.\u201d Murdering the Classics<\/i> is a compilation of songs the band performed on a call-in request program on WFMU radio, so the band had to create impromptu versions of songs they hardly knew how to play. \u201cIn some pretentious way,\u201d he chuckles, \u201cthere\u2019s something really serious about those WFMU shows which \u2013 hopefully \u2013 is expressed in a funny way.\u201d<\/p>\n