Category: News

Today’s the 23rd anniversary of James’s first show, at Maxwell’s, of course.  Taking the advice of Glinda the Good Witch that it’s always best to start at the beginning, we open with “The River of Water,” but before the evening’s through we’ve premiered “Satellite” and “Artificial Heart.”   Not part of the set: “Drug Test,” but President Yo La Tengo fans don’t go home disappointed, as openers, Sleepyhead, cover it.  Fast forward: If you bought a copy of Prisoners of Love the day it came out, your record is nine years old today.  One more: Last year in Glasgow, Stephen McRobbie joins us during our encore and sings a heart-tugging “Different Drum.”

 

Twenty-seven years ago today, we take another step towards becoming a full-time trio, opening for the Neats at T.T. the Bear in Cambridge.  We play nearly the same set we did earlier in the month.  Come April, kinda like Vince Guaraldi before us, we will cast our fate to the (trio) wind.

Elsewhere, we recently heard from Rich Barnes of Wild Carnation: I’m hoping you have a record of the date of a show you did at Maxwell’s sometime in March or very early April of 1992.

Chris [O’Donovan] and I went to that show, and Brenda [Sauter, of the Feelies, Trypes, and Speed the Plough] was there too – I was standing on one side of the red pole, and she was on the other.  We didn’t know her but Chris approached her and asked if she would be interested in playing bass with us, gave her a cassette of some demos I had made, and the rest, as they say, is history.  It’s an important date for us and I have been meaning to ask for a while – we may have never met if it wasn’t for that show.

I’m pretty sure it would have been mid to late March ’92. We didn’t hear from her right away – I was sure that she had listened to the tape on the way home in the car and threw it out the window – but she called on April 8.  She didn’t even have a cassette player in the car!

We’re on it, Chris: The date was March 21, 1992 (we were preceded by God Is My Co-Pilot).   The debut of “I Heard You Looking” ended our set.  Incidentally, Wild Carnation were playing at Maxwell’s with the Bats–revisiting the location and bill of their very first show–on the night last year when the club announced its closing.

 

Twenty-two years ago today, we performed at the original Nightclub 9:30 in Washington, D.C., sharing the bill for the first time with our pals (and then labelmates) Hypnolovewheel.    We always had mixed feelings about the old 9:30.  We played there often, frequently to an unusually good reception (like the time we got an encore as the Feelies’ opening act).  But its well-earned legendary status cut both ways.  If you were prone to feeling overlooked (and boy were we ever), the collective club could appear to live up to Moe Szyslak‘s self-description of a well-wisher, in that they wished no specific harm.  Sitting in the slightly terrifying basement / dressing room after Hypnolovewheel’s set, we were wondering why we had to wait an hour before we went on.  Correction: We knew that the club wanted to sell drinks, but the more we listened to the dj whose job description did not include appealing to those specifically drawn by the bands, the more we questioned the term “headliner.”  Until a lightbulb went off over someone’s head–why don’t we go on and play a short, acoustic teaser set.  I have a memory of just showing up on stage and making them let us play, but that can’t be right.  We must’ve gotten permission.  (The set: “Alyda,” “The Cone of Silence” and “Scissors.”)

 

 

 

Our Spanish tour of 2010 ends on this day, in Barcelona.  First encore: more songs for Alex Chilton–“My Baby Just Cares for Me,” “Government Center” and “Thirteen” (“Take Care” during the set).   We jump into our idling limos after a second encore, only to be persuaded to return for one more number.  We choose “My Little Corner of the World,” featuring, as you may know, our soundman Mark Luecke whistling the instrumental break.  And if you in fact don’t know that, the audience at Sala Apolo most certainly do.  Impatient with how long it took for Mark to get to the stage while we vamped on an Eb chord, they whistle the entire chorus en masse.   One year earlier, we played two shows, neither as Yo La Tengo.  In the afternoon, the Condo Fucks recorded a session for Joe Belock’s Three Chord Monte program on WFMU.  Then, sporting the impenetrable disguise of ski masks and the name Bo Ra Flengo, we did three songs at “Jon”‘s Delocated show at the downtown 92Y.  And none of the above provides Justin with his memory of the day:

The first dance at my wedding was “Did I Tell You” (Fakebook version) played by our wedding band Big Fish Ensemble – who were a bunch of friends of ours – who actually warmed up for YLT somewhere in Florida in 1994 (with the Grifters too I believe, sadly I was not there).

Anyway, the wedding was in Atlanta on March 19, 1994.  

(Belated congratulations, Justin, and you’re right, the Grifters were on that show, March 3 in Gainesville.)

 

One show after paying tribute to Joe Puleo on his birthday in 2010, we’ve got a eulogy to perform.  Trying to process a world without Alex Chilton, our March 18 encore in Bilbao consists of “Can’t Seem to Make You Mine,” “Till the End of the Day” and a just-learned “Thirteen.”

We’ve played a mere three times on St. Patrick’s Day, and thanks to our booking agents past and present for keeping us out of harm’s way.  In 1989, we appeared at Providence’s Rocket nightspot (soon to rename themselves Club Babyhead) and commemorated the holiday by encoring with “Gloria.”  In Tokyo, nine years later, near as I can tell, we paid it no mind, though I think we all have fond memories of our post-show green sushi.  Last year, we found ourselves in the holiday spirit at the Paradiso in Amsterdam, and consequently pulled out  . . . “Halloween.”