Month: October 2014

On December 2nd, Yo La Tengo will release Extra Painful, a deluxe 2XLP/2XCD reissue of their classic 1993 Painful LP with a whopping 12 bonus tracks (plus many more via download coupon), in celebration of their 30th anniversary as a band.

Pre-orders via the Matador store that correctly answer a trivia question will be eligible to win tickets to the Town Hall shows and a copy of every in-print YLT vinyl album.

Formats:
1. DoubleLP + 7″ + download coupon with extra tracks
2. Double CD + download coupon with extra tracks
3. Digital release is regular and bonus disc tracks (does NOT include download coupon bonus tracks)

Vinyl:
Disc 1: The original Painful album (not remastered)
Disc 2: Extra Painful – the bonus tracks
7″: “Shaker” / “For Shame Of Doing Wrong” – exact reproduction of original single
Download coupon: all the album tracks + 15 extra bonus tracks
Packaging: Double LP + 7″ (in picture sleeve) with ephemera, photos, reproduction of original ‘band-aid’ sticker, the first ‘YLT Gazette’ in 14 years, liner notes by Gerard Cosloy and the band

CD:
Disc 1: As on vinyl
Disc 2: As on vinyl
Download coupon: includes the 2 tracks from the “Shaker” 7″ as well as the 15 extra bonus tracks
Packaging includes a booklet with all the artwork in the vinyl package

Track listings:

Painful:

1. Big Day Coming
2. From A Motel 6
3. Double Dare
4. Superstar-Watcher
5. Nowhere Near
6. Sudden Organ
7. A Worrying Thing
8. I Was A Fool Beside You For Too Long
9. The Whole Of The Law
10. Big Day Coming
11. I Heard You Looking

Extra Painful:

1. Nowhere Near (demo)
2. From A Motel 6 (live acoustic)
3. Tunnel Vision (unreleased instrumental demo)
4. Sudden Organ (demo)
5. Smart Window (unreleased Painful session)
6. Big Day Coming (live acoustic)
7. Slow Learner (unreleased demo)
8. Double Dare (demo)
9. A Worrying Thing (demo)
10. I Heard You Looking (live)

Shaker 7″:

A: Shaker
B: For Shame Of Doing Wrong [8-Track Version – the CD single contained a different version which is on the download coupon]

Nineteen years ago today, as Yo La Tengo and Run On make our way west across the U.S., Rick Brown and Sue Garner celebrate their sixth wedding anniversary–which if memory serves is traditionally the fabric softener anniversary–at Sudsy Malone’s in Cincinnati.   (Coincidentally, we’d be playing in nearby Newport, Kentucky on Georgia and my anniversary just a few years later.)  Across the street from Sudsy’s was Bogart’s, where we played with Superchunk in 1993, which I mention because that’s the lineup at the El Rey in Los Angeles in 1998, at a party to launch Mr. Show’s fourth season.  The two bands merge, as it were, for Peter Frampton’s “Show Me the Way,” the chorus rewritten as “I want you Mr. Show me the way/ Bob and Dave/ I want you . . . now on Monday.”  There would be no fifth season, so the sound mix must’ve been subpar.  (The day before we recorded the theme from The Simpsons, as heard in the closing credits of “D’oh-in’ in the Wind”–during the session Dan Castellaneta very graciously phoned one of my brothers as Homer to wish him a happy birthday.)

 

Our swing state tour draws to a close 10 years ago today in, dare I say it, spectacular fashion at Philadelphia‘s First Unitarian Church.  Sue Garner and Dave Schramm, who began the tour with us, are back, as is Todd Barry.  David Kilgour is the lone holdover from the previous shows in North Carolina, and joining in for one night only are Danny Ray Thompson and the late Tyrone Hill from the Arkestra, and Calvin Johnson.  In addition to singing four songs (among them Chris Stamey’s “The Summer Sun“), Calvin makes an eloquent speech, putting into words that which we’ve at best implied in the previous four weeks.  Danny Ray and Tyrone are a revelation as always (and yes, that’s something of an oxymoron, but it’s true nonetheless), elevating songs they’ve never heard before and will never hear again.  It’s the last night of tour, so we ask David to sing his Top 20 hit, “Tally Ho!”

 

On tour in the U.S. with David Kilgour in 1997, our crew was traveling by van with the equipment, and Georgia, James and I were following at a safe distance in a car.  It gave us the freedom to take scenic and culinary detours, and on our trip from Athens to Knoxville 17 years ago today we did both.  We lunched at the Dillard House, in Dillard, GA–where if I’m not mistaken, on a previous visit Joe was confused for Kurt Cobain–after which we headed deeper into the Nantahala National Forest, with plenty of time before we were due at Moose’s Music Hall.  Without warning, traffic on the two-lane road slowed to a crawl, and continued crawling–when it was moving at all, that is–for miles.  There were no cars in the oncoming lane, but it seemed a rash combination of dangerous and dickish to pull into it, so we waited.  And waited.  Somehow word reached us that a bear had been spotted near the road.  As interesting a detail as that was, it didn’t entirely explain the tie-up, not until we finally arrived in the greater bear vicinity and saw cars not merely pulled off the road for a sighting, but stopped in the road itself so people could get out to investigate.  We, on the other hand, wouldn’t give the damned bear the satisfaction of actually looking at it, and sped off as fast as we could.  (Had this happened today, when every single person has a camera and an insatiable appetite to share, I think we might have missed the show entirely.)  We finally emerged from the mountains, only to find ourselves once more bumper-to-bumper, this time due to Dollywood and its neighbors.

Adding to the excitement was that this was the only day we were available to play in Knoxville, so the promoter did something he ordinarily avoided, which was book a show on the same day that the University of Tennessee football team had a home game.  Delayed as we were, we arrived in Knoxville just as 106,656 UT fans were hitting downtown to celebrate their victory over Georgia.  It was bedlam.  But a short walk from the club, our car couldn’t have been more stuck if there had been a bear on the streets of Knoxville.  I let Georgia and James out of the car, instructing them to tell Joe I love him, as I couldn’t be sure I’d ever see any of them again.  Of course, none of us thought to warn the David Kilgour group (who loved scenery as much as the next band) about the bear, and they almost did miss their show.

Weddings can be stressful too, I’ve heard, though if there was any on Michelle’s wedding day, she does not mention it in her email:  My husband and I used your song “Our Way to Fall” for our first dance at our wedding.  We got married on October 11, 2003 in Massachusetts.

 

Our U.S. tour with Run On is a little slow out of the gate, 19 years ago today.  New soundman Mick Learn has come highly recommend, though if we’ve ever met, it was only in passing while we were playing his home town of Portland, Oregon.  When he’s late for soundcheck at the Grog Shop in Cleveland,  we call him for his ETA and find out he thinks the tour begins tomorrow.  Fortunately for all concerned, he’s visiting relatives nearby.  We welcome Rick Brown by encoring with “Let’s Compromise,” by one of his old bands, Information.

 

For the last three days of our 2003 tour with the Aislers Set, the Sun Ra Arkestra are added to the lineup, starting on this day in D.C. at the 9:30 Club, and we mark the occasion by adding another Sun Ra song to our repertoire: “Somebody’s in Love.”  The next year, the latest installment of our swing state tour features another world premiere.  Jon Benjamin and Jon Glaser arrive at Asheville’s Orange Peel and teach us the song they wrote en route.  Sung to the tune of “I’m Your Puppet” (which we’d played the night before in Charlotte, Jon and Jon’s opening night), “PT Cruiser” is a touching tribute to their beloved rental car, and maybe I’m biased, but I’d say it’s way stronger than this one or this one.