If one is to believe the press release that accompanies
the Young Fresh Fellows' album
Tiempo de Lujo (that's "Time Deluxe" for non-Spanish speakers), the venerable Seattle band recorded this set in a mere 12 hours, often making up the songs as the tape rolled. Then again, the one-sheet that came with their 2009 album
I Think This Is declared that
the Fellows had died in a plane crash prior to its release, so perhaps this publicity stuff should be taken with a grain of salt. From the sound of it,
Tiempo de Lujo seems a little too tidy for an album made up in half a day (and far too rollicking to have been recorded by dead folks); the tunes are hooky and well-crafted, the band plays them with a lively good cheer and a genuine degree of competence, the lyrics are far too coherent and thoughtful to have all been made up on the spot, and the harmonies are skillful enough to have been rehearsed. However, while
the Young Fresh Fellows sounded a lot more like
Scott McCaughey's more polished work with
the Minus 5 than the revved-up pranksters of their youth on
I Think This Is,
Tiempo de Lujo is a closer approximation of the vibe of such
YFF classics as Electric Bird Digest and The Men Who Loved Music, even if the tempos are often slower and the lyrics more somber in the 21st century. "Tad's Pad" is a beatnik-infused tribute to drummer Tad Hutchinson (his playing is strong enough that he certainly deserves the shout-out), "Love Luggage" and "Margaret" are '60s-style pop exercises that walk a fine line between parody and homage, "So Many Electric Guitars" celebrates the principle tool of rock & roll, "Another Ten Reasons" and "Death of an Embalmer" show this band can still rock with abandon, and "Broken Monkey," "The Say Goodbye Center," and "Cleflo and Zizmor" confirm that even when they get slower and moodier,
the Fellows have not lost their charm or their cleverness. And close to 30 years after putting out their first album,
the Young Fresh Fellows still sound like they're having fun with rock & roll, and haven't run out of ways to put their own distinctive stamp on the two guitars/bass/drums formula.
The Young Fresh Fellows probably didn't cut
Tiempo de Lujo in 12 hours, but that doesn't make the enduring pop genius of this band any less remarkable. ~ Mark Deming