As Ira Kaplan warbled the words to “Our Way to Fall,” ’s set closer, the audience in the Boulder Theater fell into a hypnotic hush. The night had been quiet overall, but a more sacred feeling accompanied the calm tones of this song. Everyone was caught in its spell until the band dropped their instruments and walked off the stage.
Before that, there had been two solid hours of music from one of indie’s most influential bands and one of the genre’s quietest. This is Yo La Tengo’s lot, and they seem to relish it. The two sets helped to testify to this fact. Kaplan, wife/percussionist Georgia Hubley, and bassist James McNew laid the groundwork, joined by past member (and hugely influential indie guitar hero) Dave Schramm. In fact, Schramm was a saving grace for this show, negating the often heavy noise that Kaplan has been known to wend into performances. His jangled echo had enough no-wave instinct to make it sound what you might call indie-legit.
The performance in front of a modest crowd was understated and solid. Besides covering themselves from records past, Yo La Tengo payed homage to a few heavyweights that likely made their way into their own record stacks and into the band’s sound as well. Tunes like The Kinks’ “Oklahoma U.S.A.,” and The Minutemen’s “Corona” were covered brilliantly, as well as The Cure’s “Friday I’m in Love.” They reworked some their own best pieces like “From Black to Blue,” “Decora,” “All Your Secrets,” “Deeper Into Movies,” and others, into acoustic brilliance.
Schramm’s echo-laden guitar work not only carried the night, it also enlivened the band’s demeanor, which made this show that much more exciting.
Setlist: Yo La Tengo at Boulder Theater
“Automatic Doom (Special Pillow cover)”
“Oklahoma U.S.A. (Kinks cover)”
“Rickety”
“My Heart’s Not In It (Darlene McCrea cover)”
“From Black To Blue”
“I Can Feel the Ice Melting (Parliament cover)”
“All Your Secrets”
“Deeper Into Movies”
“Corona (Minutemen cover)”
“Friday I’m In Love (The Cure cover)”
Intermission
“I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry (Hank Williams cover)”
“Season of the Shark”
“I’m Your Puppet”
“I’m On My Way”
“Awhileaway”
“Decora”
“Pass the Hatchet, I Think I’m Goodkind”
“Can’t Forget”
“Griselda (Holy Modal Rounders cover)”
“Ohm”
‘Our Way to Fall”
Encore
“The Ballad of Red Buckets”
“Tom Courtenay”
“I Found A Reason (Velvet Underground cover)”
