Tag Archives: Yo La Tengo

The wait’s almost over: First new album from the Schramms in 15 years is finished, awaiting release

Dave Schramm backs up Chris Stamey at Little City Books in Hoboken, New Jersey, on April 20, 2018. (Photo copyright 2018, Steven P. Marsh/willyoumissme.com)The Schramms have finished their first new album in 15 years, the band’s founder and guitarist Dave Schramm tells us, and is slated for release sometime later this year.

It’s the Schramms’ first album since 2003’s live “official bootleg” collection, “2000 Weiss Beers From Home.”

Schramm, a Hoboken, New Jersey, -based guitar wizard who has played with Human Switchboard and Yo La Tengo, and is closely associated with the indie music scene centered on Maxwell’s, revealed the news the other day at Little City Books, co-owned by Kate Jacobs, another Hoboken music icon.

“It’s recorded,” he says, adding that it is slated for release sometime this year on Hoboken’s Bar/None Records, which has been busy this year with a sparkling new release “Everybody’s Insecure” from Elk City and a beautiful rerelease of “Shore Leave,” the debut album by Feelies percussionist Dave Weckerman’s Yung Wu.

Schramm said he has been hoping for a spring release, but indicated that didn’t seem likely now.

Nothing’s listed on the Bar/None website so far.

A post on the band’s website dated Dec. 2, 2009, which appears to be the latest update, said a new album was “nearing completion.” It looks like Schramm was a little optimistic about the timetable back then.

The band’s Facebook page, which appears not to have been updated since 2015, lists a lineup of Schramm on guitar and vocals, Andrew Harris Burton on keys and vocals, Jon Graboff on guitar and vocals, Al Greller on Bass, and Ron Metz on drums.

‘Surface Noise’: A self-effacing title for Jennifer O’Connor’s brilliant new album

The cover of Jennifer O'Connor's album "Surface Noise" (March 4, 2016, Kiam Records) features an ambitious abstract painting, "There 48," by Brooklyn artist Joan LeMay.

The cover of Jennifer O’Connor’s album “Surface Noise” (March 4, 2016, Kiam Records) features an ambitious abstract painting, “There 48,” by Brooklyn artist Joan LeMay.

I’ve never been one to make best-of lists when it comes to music. I enjoy so much of what I hear that it’s difficult to pick favorites.

So I won’t say that Jennifer O’Connor‘s forthcoming album, “Surface Noise,” out March 4, 2016, on Kiam Records, is a sure-fire pick for my best of 2016 list, since I’m not likely to compile one.

I can say it’s the best new album I’ve heard so far in this still-young year — and I fully expect to feel that way about it when this year is winding down.

“Surface Noise” is packed with 12 songs that explore love, loss, and the challenges of life with a casual brilliance about this album that makes it the best work this talented artist has produced so far.

ORDER JENNIFER O’CONNOR’S “SURFACE NOISE” VIA KIAM RECORDS NOW — GO HERE

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Don’t miss Condo Fucks (you know who they are), Antietam and Speed the Plough at Cake Shop – with ticket link

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Don’t risk missing this show: Read through to the jump for a link to advance-sale tickets

Cake Shop is celebrating its 10th anniversary this month by hosting shows featuring artists who have played the tiny but influential underground (literally and figuratively) Lower East Side club during that decade.

While most Cake Shop shows, including the #CS10 anniversary specials, are pay-at-the-door affairs, it seems that management made a wise choice to provide advance sale tickets for the gig on Friday, May 22, featuring Condo Fucks, a “Connecticut” band whose fictional bio offers clues for the uninitiated:

Eschewing such Condo Fucks originals as ‘Fuckin’ Gary Sandy’ and ‘Let’s Get Rid Of New Haven’, the trio – Georgia Condo (drums), Kid Condo (guitar), and James McNew (bass) – instead tear through covers of The Small Faces, Richard Hell, Beach Boys, Electric Eels, Troggs, Flaming Groovies and Slade classics in the style that previously won them so much acclaim from the Nutmeg State’s music journalists and radio programmers all those years ago.

Still not sure who these musicians are? You haven’t been paying attention. So shame on you. Continue reading

Yo La Tengo getting ‘Extra ‘Painful’ at The Town Hall this week

Yo La Tengo: Georgia Hubley, Ira Kaplan, James McNew (Photo by Carlie Armstrong)

Yo La Tengo: Georgia Hubley, Ira Kaplan, James McNew (Photo by Carlie Armstrong)

You can never be sure which Yo La Tengo you’ll see when you go to a show.

The cult-favorite indie rock band is a chameleonic act whose sound can careen from gentle, rhythmic folk rock to noisy guitar freakout to cover-band-style garage rock and back again — sometimes all in the same set.

YLT co-founder Ira Kaplan sat down with me the other day for an interview in advance of the band’s shows at The Town Hall in Manhattan this week — on Wednesday, with Antietam opening, and Thursday with The Feelies.) Tickets to the shows are $32.50 and $42.50, plus fees, and are available by going here to visit Ticketmaster.

We covered a wide range of topics, and Kaplan even dropped a surprising hint about the band’s unique Hannukah shows (eight shows, with multiple guests, over the eight nights of the Festival of Lights) that seemed to come to a screeching halt when Maxwell’s, the revered Hoboken, N.J., rock club that hosted them for more than a decade, closed in 2013.

Read the full interview online now by going here now, or see it in all its print glory by picking up a copy of The Journal News on Tuesday.

Yo La Tengo played The Bell House, a little late for Hanukkah

Yo La Tengo started with a quiet set in front of some tree props. (Photos © 2013, Steven P. Marsh/willyoumissme.com)

Yo La Tengo started with a quiet set in front of some tree props. (Photos © 2013, Steven P. Marsh/willyoumissme.com)

In apparent confirmation of the notion that its annual, eight-night Hanukkah concerts died along with Maxwell’s, the Hoboken music club, Yo La Tengo skipped performing during the Festival of Lights this year. But the Hoboken-based band did manage to pull together a four-night, end-of-year run at The Bell House in Brooklyn over the weekend.

(Photos © 2013, Steven P. Marsh/willyoumissme.com)

Never forget your roots.

Sunday night’s show was all YLT, all the time. It didn’t have the special attraction of guest artists and comedians opening for and playing with YLT’s Georgia Hubley, Ira Kaplan and James McNew. But it was a splendid way to wrap up the year anyway.

On Sunday, YLT opened with a set of quiet versions of songs, largely from this year’s album, “Fade.” For the second set, they cut loose, rocking out on a huge set of songs.

(Photo © 2013, Steven P. Marsh/willyoumissme.com)

Joe Puleo on Farfisa.

Oh, and I’m slightly wrong about the “no guest artists” thing. The band’s longtime tour manager and man-about-town Joe Puleo joined them on Farfisa for one number. I guess that counts.

(Photo © 2013, Steven P. Marsh/willyoumissme.com)

A huge tech and front-of-house sound area kept things running smoothly and quickly.

Enjoy more photos after the jump.

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A foretaste of New Jersey rock without Maxwell’s: Speed the Plough, East of Venus play Mexicali Live

Speed the Plough performs at Mexicali Live in Teaneck, N.J. on July 18, 2013. (Photo © 2013, Steven P. Marsh)

Speed the Plough performs at Mexicali Live in Teaneck, N.J. on July 18, 2013. (Photo © 2013, Steven P. Marsh)

We know what it’s going to be like without Maxwell’s. We learned it pretty clearly at Mexcali Live in Teaneck, N.J., on Thursday, July 18.

Speed the Plough, a very Maxwell’s-identified band, ripped through an excellent headlining set after warmups by Lianne Smith and East of Venus.

Toni (Paruta) Baumgartner and Cindi Merklee of Speed the Plough.  (Photo © 2013, Steven P. Marsh)

Toni (Paruta) Baumgartner and Cindi Merklee of Speed the Plough. (Photo © 2013, Steven P. Marsh)

Nobody in the audience crowded the edge of the stage, which is tradition at Maxwell’s. Not there’s anything wrong with that. It just seemed a little alien. But you had the distinct feeling that if you tried to stand in front of the stage, you’d be shouted away by the audience or escorted away by management. So it seemed better to keep a bit of distance.

Only one person in the crowd stood near the front of a rather cavernous room filled with tables, chairs and stools — and he was far, far from his usual front-and-center spot.

Never mind that the sound at Mexicali is crisp and the raised stage provides sight lines that are, to say the least, more audience-friendly than Maxwell’s. Continue reading

Mission of Burma shows added in Maxwell’s final days

Mission of Burma at The Bell House in Gowanus, Brooklyn. (Photo © 2011, Steven P. Marsh)

Mission of Burma at The Bell House in Gowanus, Brooklyn. (Photo © 2011, Steven P. Marsh)

UPDATE: second, Early show added; ticket links on the jump

Seminal Boston post-punk band Mission of Burma is a late addition to the schedule of shows during the final days of Maxwell’s in Hoboken.

MoB, which comprises founding members Roger Miller, Clint Conley and Peter Prescott, plus Bob Weston who long ago replaced original tape manipulator/sound engineer Martin Swope, has been added in two time slots — 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. — on Sunday, July 28, just days before the club’s last show on July 31.

20130719-123546.jpgWhile bands from Sonic Youth to R.E.M. have cited Mission of Burma as an influence, the band’s strongest Maxwell’s connection is with Yo La Tengo. But don’t expect to see YLT’s Ira Kaplan, Georgia Hubley or James McNew in the crowd or onstage for this one. YLT is playing the Fuji Rock Festival in Niigata Prefecture, Japan, that day.

With a little luck, they’ll be back to New Jersey in time to take part in Maxwell’s closing ceremonies.

Tickets for the 6 p.m. early show (doors at 5 p.m.) are $25 and available by clicking or tapping here. (http://ticketf.ly/18vaHSl)

Tickets for the 9 p.m. late show (doors at 8 p.m.), also $25, are available by clicking or tapping here. (http://ticketf.ly/12P2zYl)

Ticket price for Wilco’s 2013 Solid Sound Festival increases $25 on March 11

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You have less than a week to buy your weekend passes to this great festival before the price goes up

Will You Miss Me When I’m Gone? has told you before, and is taking this opportunity to tell you again: Solid Sound, Wilco’s music and arts festival at MASS MoCA is one of the best music festivals ever. We’ve attended the first two editions and have no intention of missing V3 this year — on June 21-23 at the museum in North Adams, Mass.

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Hanukkah, Night 4, with Yo La Tengo at Maxwell’s in Hoboken (with set list)

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Check out lots of photos from Hanukkah Night 4, with Yo La Tengo, Kid Millions, Todd Barry and Real Estate at Maxwell’s in Hoboken, N.J.

Will You Miss Me When I’m Gone? was pleased to see a relatively young local band, Real Estate, on the bill for Night 4.

We love the old favorites, like The Feelies. But there are more than a few upstarts out there, and some of them are really good. Real Estate qualifies. The band’s singer-guitarist, Martin Courtney, clearly loves many of the same musical influences that Yo La Tengo‘s members revere.

Real Estate did a solid set and gave us our first opportunity ever to see them perform. We already liked their recorded sound. We need to see them again.

Todd Barry gave a perfectly timed, just-long-enough performance. He’s a musician’s comedian whose wry humor fit well with the feel of the evening.

Yo La Tengo.

Yo La Tengo.

We have dozens out more images from last night’s show after the jump, including a gallery of an Ira Kaplan organ freakout!
But before we get there, take a moment to check out the new video from YLT’s upcoming album, Fade, which drops on Jan. 15.

Good stuff, with the ever-wonderful Georgia Hubley on lead vocal, and great animation by her sister, Emily Hubley.

Here’s the set list, courtesy Frank & Earthy:

Spec Bebop
We’re An American Band
The Crying of Lot G
20th Century Boy (T-Rex)
Out the Window
The Point of It
The Summer
Don’t Have To Be So Sad
Double Dare (acoustic)
Big Day Coming (fast)
Nothing To Hide
Decora
Mushroom Cloud of Hiss

*(encore)*
Burnin’ For You (Blue Öyster Cult) (with Todd Barry on drums)
Our Way To Fall (with Martin Courtney of Real Estate on vocals)

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Hanukkah with Yo La Tengo at Maxwell’s in Hoboken — Sunday and Monday

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Yo La Tengo jammed with Fred Armisen on a second drum kit. (Photos © 2012, Steven P. Marsh)

Yo La Tengo continued its massively wonderful holiday tradition, kicking off the first of eight shows — one for each night of Hanukkah — on Saturday night. The proceeds from tickets and most merchandise goes to charity. (This year all the charities support Superstorm Sandy recovery efforts.)_

Will You Miss Me When I’m Gone? managed to score tickets to four of the eight nights — not an easy thing to do the way TicketFly is set up.

Our first night was Night 2, when the amazing Sun Ra Arkestra (imagine a DOZEN musicians on the tiny Maxwell’s stage!) was the opener and Fred Armisen of “Saturday Night Live” and “Portlandia” was both the comedian and a musical guest.

Night 3 featured Hoboken’s hometown heroes The Feelies, which opened with a very strong set, and the members of which sat in at various points of YLT’s set. Guitarist and vocalist Glenn Mercer was absolutely on fire all night. And Brenda Sauter did a great job on vocals for “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere.” “SNL” writer John Mulaney was the comic for Night 3.

We’ll be back tonight, but wanted to share some images of nights 2 and 3 with you now.

This is a tradition that has been going on for 11 years, YLT’s Ira Kaplan pointed out last night. We hope it continues for many years to come.

Click through to the jump for lots of photos from Sunday and Monday nights’ shows.

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