A pre-gig chat with Sandra the sound engineer bodes well: YO LA TENGO are planning to play for about 2 hours and 20 min. Before that however, MATT WARD takes to the stage with furiously plucked acoustic guitar and harp holder. His set consists of about half and half instrumental and sung songs.
His guitar style is a frantic combination of strum and fingerpick, not
dissimilar to Chet Atkins, and which manages to sample elements of a variety of musical styles. For example, I swear during one instrumental he broke into Gershwin's 'Rhapsody In Blue'. The sung songs are rooted reasonably firmly in the country blues singer songwriter tradition, though they appear to ignore any constraints such a steady time-signature.
Tunes such as 'Carolina' (requested from the floor) and 'Sad Song' showcase the impressive range of Ward's emotive voice, from plaintive close-to-falsetto down to a bass in the style of mentor Howe Gelb. He closes this well received support set with an impressive fast paced instrumental version of the Beach Boys'
"Pet Sounds" cut 'You Still Believe In Me' which he segues into a rough take on Scott Joplin's 'The Entertainer' (an Atkins standard).
Audience reaction indicates the Cork crowd would be glad to see more of this particular song and dance man anytime soon.
15 min later, after a road crew which outnumbers the band has run a final check on their impressive collection of gear, Yo La Tengo take to the stage. Ira tapes down a few organ keys, James picks a circular acoustic figure and Georgia joins in on harmonies while tapping the occasional cymbal. True to the spirit of latest release "Summer Sun", the band have chosen to kick off
on the quietest possible note, 4 minute ambient instrumental opener 'Beach Party Tonight'.
Having lulled the crowd with 4 minutes of beauty and restraint, Ira sees fit, while the organ drones continue, to strap on his electric guitar, unleash a squall of feedback and launch into a buzzed up,
noise-out take on 'Today Is The Day'. One of the quietest album cuts, with Georgia on lead vocal, the live version has been transformed into a distorted pop tune that wouldn't have sounded out of place on 1998's "I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One". Which is the next stop.
Without skipping a beat (or leaving a gap for applause) James takes the lead on album highlight 'Stockholm Syndrome', a sing-a-long moment for some of us up the front.
Finally the audience gets a chance to extend its their warm welcome, while Ira takes up keyboard duties for a 1-2 of the new album's poppier moments, 'Season Of The Shark' and 'Winter A Go-Go'. From there the night's only return to 2000's "And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out", the unsparingly honest account of insecurity and love that is 'The Crying Of Lot G'. It takes the audience about 5 seconds to greet it with a loud cheer of recognition, almost unfitting for such an understated and poignant song.
Following this it's back to the new material, another lead vocal for Georgia on 'Little Eyes', which gives Ira the chance to deploy some strange effects on the guitar breaks. 'How To Make A Baby Elephant Float' is described as "a show tune, kind of" by Ira, who also waxes nostalgic about "Fiddler On The Roof", running next door in the Cork Opera House. Georgia has come out front
at this point, co-ordinating bossa-nova-rhythm-producing drum machines and keyboards. She moves on to the noise-making AceTone for 'Georgia Vs Yo La Tengo', assaulting James (drums) and Ira's (piano) skeletal funk instrumental.
The noise makes way for the calmer 'Don't Have To Be So Sad', propelled by a slow scratchy drum machine beat and piano figure supplied by Georgia, with Ira on lead vocal, perhaps the new track closest in feel to "And Then Nothing.". Georgia resumes drums, James sets up an atonal guitar loop and Ira takes organ for 'Moonrock Mambo', a definite set highlight, dedicated to
Rory Gallagher, "whoever he is". Halfway into the live version the rhythm suddenly slows to a standstill to introduce James and Georgia's harmony backing vocal, before picking up with some additional tambourine shaking from Ira.
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'Moonrock Mambo' is followed by a back catalogue raid on three of
Yo La Tengo's most guitar damaging moments, 'Double Dare', 'Deeper Into Movies' and 'I Heard You Looking'. The three tracks segue pretty much seamlessly from one to the other, connected by feedback and the buzz of leads as Ira swaps guitars. For the following 20+ minutes, anyone lulled into a false sense of security by the "Summer Sun" set must think they have
wandered into a different gig.
The first two (from "Painful" and "I Can Hear." respectively) provide several opportunities for atonal virtuosity on Ira's part, always anchored by James and Georgia's solid rhythm section (and occasional backing vocals of course). 'I Heard You Looking' (also a "Painful" track) is this evening's candidate for the traditional Yo La Tengo 10min+ jam session.
This, however, is jamming quite unlike what most of us have seen before. The instrumental is based on a repeating guitar riff, which builds in intensity until Ira embarks on several moments (not sure how many exactly, time stretches a bit at this point) of extended guitar damage. At one stage he swings his guitar at his amps to produce different feedback noises, and even manages to maintain the flow of noise while switching guitars mid song. And just when
you think he's lost all chance of touching back down, all three miraculously lock back into the main riff to the kind of crowd reaction normally reserved for virtuoso jazz soloists.
How do you follow that? With a double drum kit Sun Ra cover of course. James takes second rhythm and lead vocal duties on 'Nuclear War', another set standout. The call and response vocal (sample line: "Kiss your ass goodbye. Goodbye ass.") over organ and percussion backing comes to a dead stop, hits an almighty crescendo, resumes normal transmission and provides the band with an opportunity to exit the stage clapping their hands and chanting "bye-bye".
We win them back eventually, requests flying in from all
areas. Your reviewer is shouting is lungs out for 'Did I Tell You' from both "New Wave Hot Dogs" and "Fakebook". The band duly oblige several requests: 'Big Day Coming' in the form of its Iggy and The Stooges style reprise from "Painful", which ends with the feedback that backgrounds 'Barnaby, Hardly Working', going all the way back to "President Yo La Tengo". To remind us that they write a great pop tune as well as guitar noise epics, Georgia leads 'Tom Courtenay' off "Electr-o-pura". And then.
Well a full circle of sorts. You see legend has it Ira and Georgia were folkies to begin with. And the only guitar audible back at the start (over 2 hours ago) was an acoustic one. So Ira straps on the acoustic, Georgia comes out front (swinging an understandably aching drummer's arm) to sing some harmony and James joins in on harmony and bass. And what do they play? Well, Ira tells us he heard someone shouting for this one, and as 'Did I Tell You' brings the night to a close I'm pretty sure most in the audience would agree that we've just witnessed one of the best bands on the planet.
And when you can swap instruments, styles and songs like Georgia, James and Ira, 3 is definitely the magic number.
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