Popular Songs is the twelfth full-length album by the American indie rock band Yo La Tengo, released digitally, on CD, and double LP on September 8, 2009, by the Matador record label.^[3]

Four videos were made by the director John McSwain to accompany one song from the album each. In the weeks leading up to the release of the album, a new video was posted on Matador's various "partner sites" and collected on Matador's own website. The first video, for "Here to Fall", was posted on Matador's own "Matablog" on July 28, 2009.^[5]

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Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	79/100[6]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[7]
The A.V. Club	A−[8]
BBC Music	positive[9]
Drowned in Sound	8/10[10]
The Guardian	[11]
musicOMH	[12]
Pitchfork	7.9/10[13]
PopMatters	[14]
Rolling Stone	[15]
Slant	[16]

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Popular Songs was leaked onto the Internet on July 26. In response, Matador began streaming the album to Buy Early Get Now customers on July 28, more than a week before the stream was originally advertised to begin.^[17]

Popular Songs was released on September 8, 2009, by Matador. It was the eighth album to be given Matador's Buy Early Get Now treatment,^[18] in which it was sold with a vinyl LP with Yo La Tengo's original score from the film Adventureland, as well as three bonus tracks as download in MP3 and FLAC. The first two of these downloads were demo versions of two album tracks and became available shortly before the release of the CD. The third download became available on December 15, 2009. The same track is also available in the iTunes Store and on the Japanese CD issue of the album.^[19]

By 2012, it had sold over 43,000 copies in United States.^[20]

All songs written by Georgia Hubley, Ira Kaplan and James McNew.

Bonus tracks

13. "You've Got a Friend" (Carole King) - 4:10 (Japanese CD, Argentine CD, Buy Early Get Now & iTunes bonus track)
14. "Nothing to Hide (Demo)" - 9:47 (Buy Early Get Now bonus track)
15. "Periodically Double or Triple (Demo)" - 7:39 (Buy Early Get Now bonus track)

String arrangements by Richard Evans

• David Angel, Pamela Sixfin - violin
• Monisa Angell, Kristin Wilkingson - viola
• John Catchings - cello
• recorded by John Mark Painter at IHOF in Nashville
• Doug Wieselman - clarinet

Produced by Roger Moutenot Mastered by Greg Calbi at Sterling Sound