Hallo bloglings & Sunsquahed readers —
(please to be scrolling down for all the latest YLT dorkery)
This here is my equivalent of a Hanukah present to all my friends.
It’s a 600 MB stuffed file of about 170 mp3s that I think are the bee’s knees — old favorites, new favorites, outtakes, hot jamz, shuffle-play weirdness, Brazilian fun, sound collages, and some field recordings of frogs and Chicago radio preachers thrown in for good measure. I’m sure some stuff will be quite familiar, but hopefully you’ll find abundant new goodies. Enjoy!
(And don’t forget to click “save-as” if you download so it doesn’t come up as a jarbled text file…)
Splendid night in Hoboken, and kinda the reason I keep going back to Maxwell’s. Seeing Tortoise on a tiny stage was a treat, and their additions to Yo La Tengo’s set were exactly what guest appearances should be. Switching off on various basses, guitars, and drums, Messrs. Hendon, McCombs, and Parker strengthened the songs in all kinds of subliminal, unpredictable ways, from McCombs and Parker’s spine-like guitar/bass groove underneath “Autumn Sweater,” to McCombs’ one-chord drone below “Last Days of Disco,” to McCombs putting down his guitar altogether after seemingly deciding that “Barnaby, Hardly Working” was working just fine with the core YLT trio (and it was), to Herndon returning to help guide the song through a magnificent coda.
The appearance of Patti Smith Group mastermind and legendary rock scribe Lenny Kaye (on his 59th birthday, no less) was also glorious. The curator of Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era — the punk-era equivalent of Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music — led by example, running the Tengos through a handful of, er, nuggets with passion and graceful humor. Happy birthday, dude.
Yo La Tengo at Maxwell’s
27 December 2005
*(Hanukah, night 3)*
Tortoise and Demitri Martin opened.
Mix disc by El-P.
(First three-quarters of the set with various members of Tortoise.)
Bad Politics
Green Arrow
Everyday
False Alarm
Autumn Sweater
The Last Days of Disco
Barnaby, Hardly Working
How To Make A Baby Elephant Float
Madeline (false start)
Sugarcube
Artificial Heart
Decora
Tom Courtenay
I Heard You Looking
*(encore)* with Lenny Kaye on guitar and vocals
Night Time (Strangeloves)
No Time Like The Right Time (Blues Project)
Shock Me (Lenny Kaye)
Pushin’ Too Hard (The Seeds)
Moulty (The Barbarians)
Theme from Beverly Hills Teens
Literally nobody I’ve ever mentioned it to has copped to remembering Beverly Hills Teens. It aired (sometimes?) weekday mornings during the half-hour before I boarded the bus to school when I was a kid, when — if I’d finished breakfast and gotten my coat on — my mother would occasionally let me watch cartoons. It was an inane piece of shit, a kiddie forerunner to 90210, and — besides the neon/turquoise color scheme — I remember literally nothing of it. I can’t recall a single character nor recount a single plot (though, I’m sure I could guess and probably be right).
But, for some reason, the melody of the show’s theme lodged itself firmly in my brain, and has stayed there for twenty years (albeit with mostly erroneous words). Hearing it now — because, as we know, everything is available on the internets — returns me somewhat bizarrely to my childhood skin. The melody, I’m happy to report, is exactly as I’ve been humming it for the past two decades, and it still evokes exactly the same exotic images of California that I had as a kid: a land foreign and mysteriously bright.
Word-up to the faceless Hollywood songwriter who penned this.
An effervescent Boxing Day at Maxwell’s. First half of the set was particularly graceful. Precise “Pez Drop” opener (the “bah bah bah bah”s were still in my head waiting for the PATH), purdy-like “Our Way To Fall,” neatly swinging “Tony Orlando,” and delicious Acetone action/two-note riffage on “Big Day Coming.”
Ira is also posting about the run on YoLaTengo.com.
Yo La Tengo at Maxwell’s
26 December 2005
*(Hanukah, night 2)*
PG Six and Todd Barry opened.
Mix disc by Georgia.
Evanescent Psychic Pez Drop
Our Way To Fall
We’re An American Band
Today is the Day (fast version)
Flying Lesson (Hot Chicken #1)
Let’s Save Tony Orlando’s House
Season of the Shark
Little Eyes
The Empty Pool
She’s My Best Friend (Velvet Underground)
Big Day Coming (fast version)
Drug Test
Tom Courtenay
Blue Line Swinger
Flowers of the Forest (Fairport Convention, no drums, with Patrick Gubler and Bob Banister (sp?) of PG Six)
*(encore)*
Jeepster (T-Rex, with PG & BB, Todd Barry on drums)
Time (Richard Hell) (with PG & BB)
Burning For You (Blue Oyster Cult)
(thanks to Sam for plugging the holes in night 1, all help appreciated…)
Back from vacation just in time for Yo La Tengo’s annual Hanukah run at Maxwell’s. I’ll be hitting a bunch of these in the coming week. Setlists to follow when I feel like it. Tonight’s show was a lot of fun, with a little bit of opening night glitchery, and definitely a bitchin’ way to spend Christmas.
Personal highlights included a quiet/shimmering “Crying of Lot G,” a blistering false ending on “Styles of the Times,” and the lovely acoustic campfire “Big Day Coming” (the third different arrangement of the song).
Also, the band is going to be selling limited run CD-R mixes each night of the run, $10 at the merch table. Tonight’s was made by brilliant Motherless Brooklyn/Fortress of Solitude novelist Jonathan Lethem. I bought it, and will post a tracklist when I can decipher the liner card.
Yo La Tengo at Maxwell’s
25 December 2005
*(Hanukah, night 1)*
The Mad Scene (with Georgia on guitar) & Eugene Mirman opened.
Band in costume for show:
Ira – Santa
Georgia – Robin (as in “Batman and…”)
James – Hasidic Jew (James McJew?)
Holiday (Madonna)
Eight Day Weekend (“Seven Day Weekend” by Doc Pomus, covered by Gary “U.S.” Bonds)
Little Eyes
The Crying of Lot G
Double Dare
Shaker
Stockholm Syndrome
Lewis
Don’t Have To Be So Sad (James couldn’t get the synth beat going right, so the guitar tech dude played drums)
Sudden Organ
Autumn Sweater
Styles of the Times
Decora
Deeper Into Movies (Hamish Kilgour from Mad Scene on snare)
I Heard You Looking (Kilgour on Acetone)
*(encore)*
Big Day Coming (acoustic, Georgia lead)
Je T’Aime (Serge Gainsbourg, with Kilgour and Lisa Siegel on vocals)
My Little Corner of the World (Ira’s mother on vocals)
Dear bloglings:
I’m going on vacation. I’ll be back 12/23. See you then.
If you’re bored, might I recommend obsessively clicking the Comrades & Daily Repeck links o’er there on the right column (like I do when I should be working)?
The milk is on the second shelf on the door, and the chocolate syrup is just below that. Clean up when you’re done, or Mayur’ll be pissed.
Love,
Jesse.
While it’s not quite as delicious as last year’s rumor that El Zimmy was gonna guest judge on American Idol, the prospect of the following has me hugely intrigued (to say the least):
Bob Dylan shocked his fans 40 years ago by embracing the electric guitar. Now he’s stunning a few more by embracing another technological innovation: satellite radio. The singer has signed on to serve as host of a weekly one-hour program on XM Satellite Radio, spinning records and offering commentary on new music and other topics, starting in March. The famously reclusive 64-year-old performer said in a statement yesterday that “a lot of my own songs have been played on the radio, but this is the first time I’ve ever been on the other side of the mike.”
“Other topics,” hmm? After doing a Victoria’s Secret ad, I don’t think anybody can possibly spin a Dylan radio show as “shocking.” It kinda makes too much sense. Unless, that is, he starts hawking underwear on the air (and even that would be in the fine tradition of King Biscuit Flour and the like…)
If heads can’t figure out how to get this on BitTorrent, I might have to actually subscribe to XM!
1. Would you like to be invited to a wedding?
2. Walk, human!
3. Rock and roll.
4. Midwood sunset.
The website for David Byrne’s always-hep Luaka Bop Records reports that Brazilian psychedelic legends Os Mutantes are considering a reunion:
We are working on an expanded Os Mutantes record. The band members have been discussing possibly getting back together for a few shows in 2006, hence we are also talking to people who might be excited as all hell to put on an Os Mutantes show. Are you one of those people? Would you mind if we use your basement/rec room for a show or two? When’s the last time you entertained 1,500 people down there? Yeah. You’re gonna have to move the coffee table.
Hot diggity! This is one of the few reunion shows I’d flip over. I’ll post an mp3 sometime.
