A review by The 941 and Tampa Calling blogger and Creative Loafing Sarasota editor Cooper Levy-Baker.
Sign o’ the times: Band records album, band plots April 13 release date, album leaks, band quickly unleashes album digitally, band moves physical release date up to March 31. Such is life for a hot young rock group these days, and even the artists can’t get too worked up about it.
“We wanted to build toward a date, get excitement up and release it so everyone had it at once,” Yeah Yeah Yeahs lead singer Karen O told Pitchfork two weeks ago, discussing the file-sharing-induced rush release of her band’s third LP, It’s Blitz! ”But I guess that doesn’t really happen anymore. We’re still kinda stuck in 2003. I mean, even 2006 was a totally different time to release a record than 2009. It’s insane how quickly everything’s changed.”
The YYYs have, in a sense, been lapped. After all, the band was one of the first Internet-darling indie groups. They earned their early rep thanks to a mere 13 minutes of music on their 2001 self-titled debut EP. (A reputation for hellacious live shows, punctuated by O pouring beer all over herself certainly didn’t hurt.) By the time they released their first full-length, they’d already made the jump to a major label, Interscope, and ran into a distinctly ’00s trend: backlash that emerges even before a band has broken out. (For the most virulent example of this trend yet, please “read” these two Black Kids reviews, both from the same outlet.)
This article appears in Mar 25-31, 2009.