Painful is the sixth studio album

Studio album

A studio album is an album made up of tracks recorded in the controlled environment of a recording studio. A studio album contains newly written and recorded or previously unreleased or remixed material, distinguishing itself from a compilation or reissue album of previously recorded material, or...

 released in 1993

1993 in music

This is a summary of significant events in music in 1993.-January–February:*January 8 – The U.S. Postal Service issues an Elvis Presley stamp. The design was voted on in February 1992....

 by alternative rock

Alternative rock

Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...

 band Yo La Tengo

Yo La Tengo

Yo La Tengo, sometimes abbreviated as YLT, is an American alternative rock band formed in Hoboken, New Jersey in 1984. Since 1992, the lineup has consisted of Ira Kaplan , Georgia Hubley , and James McNew .Despite achieving limited mainstream success, Yo La Tengo has been called "the quintessential...

.
The album marked a creative shift from Yo La Tengo's previous work in that it blends atmospheric and ambient sounds with their famous noise jams.


Painful features a much more melodic-driven Yo La Tengo in its hazy, drugged-out songwriting.
Two versions of the track "Big Day Coming" are present on the album and display the range of musical stylings Yo La Tengo works with; the first version features a simple organ melody accompanied by a soft bass counterpoint and Kaplan's guitar chimes echoing in the background, while the second version is a much more straightforward, shoegaze style with a vicious organ solo towards the end.

Track listing

1. "Big Day Coming" – 7:04
2. "From a Motel 6" – 4:08
3. "Double Dare" – 3:28
4. "Superstar-Watcher" – 1:42
5. "Nowhere Near" – 6:01
6. "Sudden Organ" – 4:42
7. "A Worrying Thing" – 2:53
8. "I Was the Fool Beside You for Too Long" – 5:04
9. "The Whole of the Law" (The Only Ones
   The Only Ones
   The Only Ones are an English rock band. They were initially active in the late 1970s and were associated with punk rock, yet straddled the musical territory in between punk, power pop and hard rock, with noticeable influences from psychedelia...
   
   ) – 2:19
10. "Big Day Coming" – 4:14
11. "I Heard You Looking" – 7:01