Month: September 2014

On tour with the Aislers Set, we arrived on this date in 2003 at Tipitina’s in New Orleans to find the Arkestra’s Michael Ray offering to sit in.  We had recently played with Michael for the first time at the previous summer’s Fuji Rock, and I’m pretty sure none of us realized he was living in New Orleans.  Naturally, our answer was yes–he ended up playing  a bunch during our set, as well as the entire three-song second encore (I’m confident we performed the strangest version of “It Ain’t My Fault” heard in the city that night), and it’s possible that one or more members of the Aislers Set have yet to stop blushing from his backstage repartee.

 

On September 16, 1990 we opened for the Sundays in Cleveland, and for a while it was like any other show.  And then late in the set, “What Can I Say” started–when Georgia opened her mouth to sing, nothing came out, forcing me to jump in for an impromptu lead vocal.  By the next day, she had completely lost her voice, to an extent I thought only possible in cartoons.  As anyone familiar with the Fakebook lp can imagine, this put quite the crimp in our performance 24 years ago today in Ann Arbor.  Mary Lorson sang harmony on “Tried So Hard,” but otherwise it was the Me Show.  Very strange.  Eight years later, Georgia is in fine fettle at Maxwell’s.  In retrospect it looks like a rehearsal for Hanukkah: four nights in a row, with lots of interaction with the other bands on the bill.  Playing with the Mad Scene on this, the final night of the run, our set opens with a verse of “I Got You Babe,” referencing the five-years-old-but-still-topical Groundhog Day, and features an encore of “A Day in the Life of a Tree,” which despite Scott Schinder’s kibitzing will not be heard from again until we record it in 2013 for the “Super Kiwi” 45.

 

On this date in 1994, we were in the latter stages of preparing to record Electr-o-pura, our second album with Roger Moutenot and the first to be made in Nashville.  Before leaving, we shared a bill with Stereolab at Tramps in New York, opening the show with the one and only live rendition of “Superstar-Watcher” and closing the set with the premiere of “Blue Line Swinger.”  Two years later, we’re finishing up a different session in Nashville with Roger, the one that yielded I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One.  Determining that the only way we will get to see Lambchop perform during our monthlong stay is by scheduling a date with them, we do just that.  Both bands appear together at Lucy‘s Record Shop.  Our set includes barely a hint of what we’ve been working on (we’d yet to figure out how to make those multitracked recordings work with only six hands), but hopefully those in attendance enjoyed the septet version of “I Heard You Looking.”  All that’s left to do before I sign off today is come up with a way to justify that headline.

 

We’ve played the Cabaret Metro in Chicago countless times over the years (not technically true–they could be counted, but I am not going to), including twice on this day.  In 1990, our show is amidst a six-day run (but only a five-day run of Georgia’s voice–that’s what we call a teaser).  Seven years later, our tour with David Kilgour stops by, and it’s an especially fun night.  Hamish plays four songs with us during our set, and then he and David come up during the encore to sing their Top 10 hit “Tally Ho!”  Understandably, the audience requests more after that, so Mark Greenberg joins us for “Speeding Motorcycle,” which elicits the response most Mark Greenberg appearances do, and calling for a third encore.  David claims the organ from Mark for his countrymen Dead C’s “Bad Politics,” next it’s Georgia’s turn, as we close the night with an instrumental reprise of our opening number, “What Can I Say.”  (Alright, I counted . . . it’s 12.)

 

 

 

 

In the weeks prior to the release of Painful in 1993, we were offered eight shows opening for the Breeders.  Last Splash was a sensation, and the Breeders were playing clubs smaller than they could have.  Space on stage was at a premium, and as good as a mix as it may have been musically–we were aware of Kim Deal watching more than one of our sets–that’s how awkward it was personally.  I wish I could say none of it was our fault.  The second date was in New York, and we contemplated bailing on the remaining six, which included full-day drives to get from Providence to Chicago, and then again from Chicago to Portland (where we had our lone show without the Breeders).  We were convinced to press on.   After playing in Chicago, 21 years ago today, we left early, getting a head start on the trip west, sleeping somewhere in Iowa.  We felt pretty good–soundman Terry Pearson, who knew the Breeders a bit dating from their dates opening for Sonic Youth, spoke for us all when he declared we had “turned the corner.”  He was right: As Georgia, James, Terry and Joe ate breakfast, I got the call from Bob Lawton that we’d been kicked off the tour.  What to do?  Convinced that it was all a misunderstanding–the communication between the two bands was that inept–we were reluctant to give up and drive home.  But the Breeders were flying to the west coast, and no appeal could be heard until they landed.  Our timetable to get to Portland did not allow us the freedom to wait for them to be accessible again; we continued driving and hoped that we weren’t adding eight hours to a frustrating backtrack.  If you saw us in Seattle, Los Angeles or San Francisco, you already know how this story ends.  At a post-show soiree the final night at the Troubadour in L.A., I managed to call Kelly Deal Kim.

Before leaving Los Angeles, we turn to the mailbag.  Justin writes: In December of 2008, the day after Christmas, Sarah and I went on our first date, at the Tiga Bar in Portland, OR.  She was sick and nursing hot toddies, and outside, it was pouring rain.  Your song, “Our Way to Fall,” came on over the speakers, and we talked about how fond of it we both were.  It was around that time I told her I was moving to Los Angeles in a month.   “Okay . . .” she thought.  “Well so much for this. But maybe we can still make out or whatever.”  Five years, two cats and one big move later, we got married in Joshua Tree, California on September 14, 2013.  “Our Way to Fall” was our first dance at the wedding.

Jetting our way up the coast to Sebastopol, we hear from Miles: September 14, 1997 is the day I was born.  The first two days of my life were filled with what my father called “goddess music.”  On the third day the women having absented themselves, my father picked me up and held me so close as we danced to “Moby Octopad.”  Thus my introduction to Yo La Tengo and rock ‘n’ roll.  I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One became my rhythmic lullaby for the next three years.

 

 

 

Two years ago today, we were having our picture taken in Portland by Carlie Armstrong.  One of the locations she chose was so striking, we ended up using it for the cover of Fade.  Thanks, Carlie!  More set decoration, courtesy of David of Belleville IL: How could I leave out the overexcited effort to give Georgia her Mr. Magoo papier-mâché head at the Blue Note Columbia MO on the ‘And Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out tour’ September 13, 1999.  Now that’s a Mastercard commercial my friend!  His email includes all sorts of misinformation.  The year was 1997 and we were on tour (with David Kilgour) supporting I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One.  But in David’s defense, as I learned on numerous subsequent occasions (though not the ones pictured below), it’s hard to keep your thoughts straight when your brains are encased in Magoo.

If there’s a smooth segue to this note from Ryan of Calgary, I haven’t found it: I selected “Nowhere Near,” well, the first half anyhow, as our wedding song.  My wife, Karen, and I got married on 13 September 2008 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.  It was a beautiful moment, especially as we were the only ones at the wedding who knew who Yo La Tengo are.  When I first played it for my wife, she cried.  I would love to hear that song played live someday.