aaamusic | On 21, Feb 2011

YUCK

Debut album released today on Pharmacy Recording Co

Live dates this week

Over this past year, Yuck have emerged as one of the best and brightest new bands around, not to mention one of the most mercurial and unpredictable. Far from following any set patterns, they have instead forged their own path and cultivated a fervently devoted fanbase in the process, from their gorgeously winsome debut single “Georgia”, released on Transparent, to the 4 track, piano-led Yu(c)k EP “Weakend”, on Mirror Universe Tapes, to finally signing with Fat Possum/ Pharmacy Recording Co and releasing their sprawling, epic single “Rubber” in November.

That deliciously maverick streak shows up once again on this, their hotly anticipated debut album. Self-produced, it finally unveils the full breadth and scope of Yuck, showcasing a band capable of sprinting off in pretty much any direction you can think of, so diverse and fully realised is its vision. It also shows that their previous releases were merely skimming the tip of the iceberg in terms of what the quartet of Daniel Blumberg, Max Bloom, Mariko Doi and Jonny Rogoff (not to mention Daniel’s younger sister Ilana, provider of some of the album’s most wistful vocals) are capable of.

This is a confident record, but also one which brims over with a ragged warmth and tenderness, tipping its hat at alt music heroes past such as East River Pipe, Dinosaur Jr and Sparklehorse while at the same time retaining a unique identity entirely its own. From the rousing call to arms of the opener “Get Away”, to the hypnotic sturm und drang of “Rubber”, and the grungy serotonin rush of “Operation”, it is clear that this is a band in full control of their powers when it comes to anthemic and offbeat guitar rock. But they also reveal an achingly fragile side too, as with the gorgeous, heartsick croon on “Suck”, or on “Sunday”, where Bloomberg asks, “Did you take the rhythm from me? Yesterday I had it all” over chiming, jangling guitars.

TRACKLISTING

1. Get Away
2. The Wall
3. Shook Down
4. Holing Out
5. Suicide Policeman
6. Georgia
7. Suck
8. Stutter
9. Operation
10. Sunday
11. Rose Gives a Lily
12. Rubber

UPCOMING LIVE DATES

FEBRUARY

17 //  SOUTHAMPTON, The Joiners
18  // LONDON, Bush Hall w/ Cults
20 // LANCASTER, Library
22 // EDINBURGH, Sneaky Pete’s
23 // YORK, Stereo
24 // BIRMINGHAM, Jug of Ale
25 // MANCHESTER, Night n’ Day
26 // NORWICH, Arts Centre