Going Places is an album by the American experimental music band Yellow Swans, released on March 2, 2010, by Type Records.

Going Places marked a stylistic progression in Yellow Swans' discography, with a more gentle and melodic sound than the band's previous works.

Several publications, including The Village Voice in their Pazz & Jop music critics poll, named Going Places one of the best albums of the year.

[10][11] The duo made a list of tasks they needed to complete before parting ways; making the final album ended up being a top priority.

Swanson originally planned to include vocals, but by the time they finished the album, he was already busy with university and thought the instrumental version was complex enough.

Pete Swanson said that utilizing deteriorated tapes, along with various filters and effects during the recording allowed the band to achieve a "dense and gauzy sound".

Sasha Frere-Jones of The New Yorker wrote that its tracks "have titles but certainly don’t resemble songs", comparing the album's sound to the noises produced by hard drives and a distorted transmission through damaged wires and muffled phones.

[20] Eric Dawson of Tiny Mix Tapes thought Yellow Swans were "exploring textures and tones, [...] weaving sounds in and around each other".

[4] The track is built upon a contrast between a soft melody, resembling a mantra, and what AllMusic's Ned Raggett described as "cascades of feedback and rhythmic, quick-paced sonics",[23] accentuated by percussion.

According to Patrick Masterson of Dusted magazine, this allows it to sustain the climax of "Opt Out", and shows the careful consideration Yellow Swans put into the pacing of Going Places.

[25] Marc Masters believed the prolonged notes of "Sovereign" evoke a feeling of melancholic longing,[20] while Joel Elliott of Cokemachineglow called it "the best approximation of the stillness and melancholy of ruins".

[4] Cain named it the harshest track on the album, adding that it "levels out in a blast of delicately modulated feedback, eloquently articulating a muted yet elegiac farewell".

[6] In 2020, Yellow Swans collaborated with record label and retailer Boomkat to celebrate the album's ten-year anniversary with a vinyl re-release.

Nick Cain of The Wire magazine noted the similarity between the sound on Going Places and the band's previous projects: he felt that Going Places resembles them in its use of the sonic elements, "layered into cavernously thick sound masses, which hang ominously in mid-air, or are slowly expanded into cacophonous crescendos", but differs in its blurring and softening of the harsh noise textures that adds "depth of sonic impact" to the album.

[21] Eric Dawson of Tiny Mix Tapes named Going Places as one of the band's best albums, noting that the duo "offers an exemplar of themselves and noise, at their ecstatic heights".

[22] XLR8R's reviewer Brandon Bussolini thought Going Places encapsulates the duo's creative tension, which, he believed, contributed to Yellow Swans' "sporadic genius" and ultimately led to their dissolution.

Ned Raggett of AllMusic called Going Places the band's "literal swan song", commending them for blending "uncontrolled experimentation" with "serene contemplation".

[23] Pitchfork contributor Marc Masters thought the album "transforms a sense of finality and reflection into often incredible instrumental passages" and that it "gives you space to discover tons of themes and ideas without limiting you to specific ones".

[20] His colleague Grayson Currin published an opinion piece in Pitchfork, in which he critiqued several other music reviewers for comparing the album to the work of Tim Hecker.

He characterized it as "electro-noise" that lacks complexity and doesn't follow conventional melodic patterns, but also noted that the band offers enough diversity in its sonic elements to "elicit some interest".

[38] Tiny Mix Tapes put Going Places at number 21 on their list of 50 best albums of the year, with the critic Joe Davenport calling it "powerful" and "flawless".