Yo La Tengo’s latest slow burner “Summer Sun”
coasts along with the same leisurely veneer that has made this
Hoboken-based trio one of the most endearing musical acts to
continue on after their 15-year mark. Capturing the romance of
their inner world and only disclosing its smoky autumnal wisps,
their live show is a permit for voyeurism.
But there they were Saturday night, in trademark style ““
pop culture guru James McNew was showing off an Aesop Rock shirt
““ singing sweet lullabies to each other in front of the Henry
Fonda Theater crowd. The first half of the set was mostly material
from their latest LP, which continues to explore the vistas of free
jazz, bossanova, even lounge, without the slightest trace of irony.
Frontman Ira Kaplan’s yearning voice has wrapped inside it
the essence of the group’s charm, its gentle melodicism and
enigmatic emotional undertones amid such lyrical directness.
“Just look around/ if it’s not me then someone else you
know,” Kaplan sings in “Season of the Shark.”
“You’re not alone at all/ ignore the shadows on the
wall/ they don’t mean a thing.” You could hear
Kaplan’s wife Georgia Hubley gently intoning the same words
of reassurance from behind the drumset.
The live setting highlights the fragility of the group’s
arrangements since the 1997 album “I Can Hear the Heart
Beating As One,” since rarely was one member leading the
songs. The three take on such understated roles that entire numbers
float up into the air with a nearly ambient delicacy.
Then the amps turned up to 11 and it was the old Yo La Tengo all
over again, complete with the Velvet Underground-inspired distorted
freakouts. The jazzy and bongo-laden cover of Sun Ra’s
“Nuclear War” was a tongue-in-cheek tribute to
impending holocaust, with all the fun that the trio and their
backing cast could muster from the grim subject matter.
McNew’s serpentine bassline creeped underneath Kaplan’s
chugging power chords on an inspired version of “Big Day
Coming,” but the biggest highlight was the group’s
glorious classic rock jam “I Heard You Looking,” during
which Kaplan keeled over to extract wailing screams from his
guitar, and at one point flailing it around like a toy plane in
front of his amp.
Before the song ended, Kaplan would break a string and leisurely
stride to the stage’s edge, picking up another axe and
assaulting the new victim. Soft or loud, Georgia and Ira would keep
the rhythm, he knew.