More Hanukkah Miracles

Hanukkah at Maxwell's is kind of an amazing time. Kind of really amazing. This is due, of course, to the annual residency of Yo La Tengo, musicians extraordinaire, and the volunteered time of a panoply of guest musicians and comedians, in a series of shows for the benefit of various worthy recipients of their largess. That's a long-winded way of saying that in most Decembers there are 8 incredible nights of music at Maxwell's courtesy of Hoboken's own.

I've written about these events here before. This year, we were fortunate enough to catch two of those shows. The first one for us - joined for the show and a Sunday Soul Food dinner by Sherin and Megan - was on the 5th night of Hanukkah, Sunday, Dec.5th - it was a loud one, with Mission of Burma and Wyatt Cenac as the special guests. MoB also loaned the soundboard skills of Bob Weston to the band for some rad loopage during the YLT set. It was a great show, and an education for me on what I thought I knew and should have known. Unfortunately, Ira cut himself above his eye at one point late in the evening, but he brushed it off as a bit of punk rock that he was willing to spill for the sake of the International Rescue Committee and Partners in Health.

As good as that show was (and it was) the one we saw two nights later after Hanukkah latkes was, if anything, even better: Bonnie Prince Billy, eyeliner and all, brought us home to our roots; and Kristen Schaal and Kurt Braunohler provided a lively dose of anarchic hilarity (including a spasmodic horse ride through the wilderness of children's theater and a mixed-media extravaganza called The Taintalogues that defies description). We were so excited that at the break we went and got the night's mix CD, an instrumental journey put together by Georgia.

And then, as foretold in the prophesy, Nels Cline joined the dance for a set that was beyond the beyond.

Ok. So maybe it wasn't fulfillment of prophesy. But I think that we may have conjured this conjoining. Remember Solid Sound, from back in August? Well, I know I didn't write about it much, but on that weekend, as we reveled in Nels' work with Wilco, the Nels Cline Singers, and at his effects-pedal installation up in the galleries, we commented on how earth-shatteringly-awesome it would be if he and Ira were on stage together, how the resulting dueling guitar orgasms would result in unspeakable brilliance. Or madness. Or both. Well, some deity somewhere seems to have heard our call, because there they were, working together onstage a few feet in front of us. We may not deserve actual credit for the collaboration, but I'm ecstatic that we were there to reap the rewards.

It was one of those shows that started great, and just got better as it went along. Not only that, but the crowd somehow peeled away little by little until we were almost at the lip of the stage. And after a crazy good set with none of the bloodletting of Night 5, they played some Ramones songs for the encore and brought everybody back up to close things out with some Lou Reed. And, as if that weren't enough, Cory must have made some pretty substantial eye contact with Gil (YLT's indefatigable guitar tech), because he brought Nels Cline's setlist right over to her after the show.

A-MAZ-ING night. Ira and Georgia, if you're reading this for some reason, we want to have you over for dinner.

Holly Daze

Well, I've been fairly lousy at keeping up with this particular outlet recently. I didn't even bother to celebrate (or even notice) that my last post before this one was my 500th post. And I am NOT one to miss out on an opportunity to celebrate something.

That said, I have my excuses (there are always excuses). The holidays were busy as all get out; I had out of town guests of various shapes and sizes; there were social engagements at every turn; we had to go to Paramus; we had a blizzard; I was short-listed for a Nobel Prize; it was chaos!

I'll fill in some of the blanks in the coming days, but for now, here are some headlines:

• Yo La Hanukkah - the annual Maxwell's 8-night orgasm of music and fun. We caught two of the shows: one was great, the other was unbelievably awesome
• Real Hanukkah - fewer latkes this year, but we still brought out the celebration for the Festival of Lights
• Alvin Ailey - I got to go to a few shows this City Center season, including by great good fortune both opening and closing night. Both were great, although Judith Jamison's farewell show was really over the top special and wonderful
• Julie! And her family. We had pizza and saw Lombardi. Nice.
• Davin! In town on a mission or three
• Wedding in Westchester
• Holiday music and movies - in both live and recorded form, it's an annual tradition and a half. This year's highlights included: the choral group Angelica on the UES; a Renegade Cabaret performance on 14th Street; Oy to the World, volume 13; The Bishop's Wife at Chome on Christmas Eve; Christmas in Connecticut with Kelly (at the beginning of the Blizzard!)
• True Grit in Bkln w/Dominic
• The Big Christmas Gathering
• Black Swan with Susan & Daniel
• The Big Parental Visit - delayed along with several thousand of our closest friends by the same Blizzard, but still very fun
• New Year's Eve - Ailey for the folks, Patti Smith for us (along with Sue and Steve and Beth B.) A splendid time was had by all, in spite of some in-crowd obnoxiousness (did they forget what show they were at?)

So - there that is. I'm sure I'm forgetting some really important stuff. More to come...

Holiday Music News

Yes, I'm back from New England. And I'll have more to share once I'm a little more caught up, but for now - this post is for everyone, but especially for those near and dear to the 'boken.

Firstly, it has been reported in American and British music press that Bob Dylan may be releasing a Christmas Album. Consider the subject open for discussion.

Secondly, and this is the part for Hobokenites, and those who love them, Yo La Tengo will not be doing Hanukkah shows this year, because they'll be in Japan. Very sad news for us who aren't, you know, actually in the band, but a pretty cool reason for it, I must say. Their ONE show this fall/winter in the greater Big Apple Metropolitan Area will be at Roseland on Sept. 25, and all but general admission is already sold out.

Don't say nobody warned you.

Re. the one-night-only aspect of it all, Ira writes: "We'll do our best to cram eight nights of nonsense into one evening. After all, Anson Williams only turns 60 once, so you know we're going to pull out all the stops."

Yo La Awesome

Yo La Tengo finally took the stage in a blaze of holiday fury. Well, ok, it was more of a good natured shuffle, including commentary on the Menorah (sitting proudly on the piano) which had the wrong candle lit the night before, according to them. Then as they picked up instruments there was a quip that non-earplug portion of the evening had about 3 minutes to go. Which minutes were spent on a loverly version of The Weakest Part, and then, true to their word they launched loudly into a fiery fast version of Big Day Coming.





That photo looks like total crap, but I actually love it because it represents how impossible it was to capture Ira in action on keys, vocals and maraccas on that song. Total action, as Steve would say.


The show was wholly rocking throughout - vintage YLT, with a Velvet Underground cover (Guess I'm Falling in Love), cashmere "hits" (does Yo La Tengo have "hits"? Anyway, they did Autumn Sweater), relative rarities old (Five Cornered Drone) and new (Watch Out for me Ronnie), and collaborations with their guests.

Gotta love that pink sparkly 12-string, right??

They brought it all home with an orgasmic Story of Yo La Tengo and then brought Stephin back up to do some Irving Berlin (Be Careful, It's My Heart - thank you Yo La Blog)

Then came Super Secret Guest #3: Doug Gillard, of the later years of Death of Samantha and some of the highest peak moments of Guided by Voices. They started with George Gershwin's Foggy Day in London Town - this being Hanukkah, a premium was placed on the Jewish American Songbook, to universal acclaim (the universe for the purposes of this discussion consisting of the collected contents of Maxwell's)



The encore set was low-key amazing - more covers, natch. Culminated in "Next Big Thing" which was a perfect lead in for the Super Secretest Guest of them all...

...Ira's mom, who sang "My Little Corner of the World" Fun was had, tears of joy were shed. My understanding is that she comes to sing this at one show every year, but I've never had the fortune to be there before.

Did someone say Hanukkah Miracle? Remember, we were this close to missing not only this show, but the whole series of benefits at Maxwell's (this is a good place to mention that the worthwhile causes for this night's show were Burma Border Projects, and Burmese Refugee Project) Maybe I need to bring a representative of the 12 Tribes to all their shows...

A Hanukkah Miracle!

SO - it won't come as a surprise to most of you that I can be, well, kind of dumb sometimes. That came up recently as I made plans to take Cory to the Big Opening Night of Hanukkah concert by one of my fave bands, Hoboken's own Yo La Tengo (I've written about these shows before. In fact, it occurs to me that word for word, this may well be every bit as much a Yo La Tengo blog as a Dylan blog). Rather, I thought I'd made plans to see the show on the first night of Hanukkah - what I'd actually done was buy tickets for the 3rd night of Hanukkah, and then somehow convince my reliably unreliable memory otherwise to the extent that I made other, unchangeable plans for that same night.

D'oh! YLT would have to go...

Or would they? Out of nowhere, Cory came up with a pair of tickets for the 2nd night of the Legendary Yo La Tengo Hanukkah Benefit Shows at Maxwells, 2008 Version. (well, it seemed like it was out of nowhere... On the other hand, Cory is one of the Chosen People. Coincidence? You tell me.)

So we were off to Maxwell's for what promised to be a night of good rockin'.

And, ladies and gentlemen, that's what we got, with a lot more thrown in for good measure.

The opening band was The Magnetic Fields, rock artistes extraordinaire. Literate, textured, adventurous, funny, sexy, savvy, hip: what more do you want from four people wielding a guitar, a piano (a real piano, people!) a cello and a bouzouki. Think Leonard Cohen meets the Moldy Peaches, but better.



Ok, it's true. These photos were taken with my cell phone. SO - they kind of suck. But I didn't want to be lugging a camera around for this: can you blame me?

Anyway, they were a great way to open the evening. Universal rejoicing.

Next was the comedy portion of the evening, brought to us by everyone's favorite PC, Johnathan Hodgman.

Yes, that's a martini in his hand, and I think it's only fair. He was, after all, the evening's resident Lapsed Catholic, and I daresay he needed some fortification. Later on, he rocked the ukelele for the sultry Santa Baby. This after a diatribe on the tawdry sexuality that you perhaps didn't realize lurked within Christmas Carols. Beyond I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus, beyond Earth Kitt growling Santa Baby, beyond Christmas is Coming (the goose is getting fat), beyond the Valley of the Dolls, there's the inescapable nastiness of When Santa Got Stuck Up the Chimney.
Or at least that's Johnathan's story, and he's sticking to it.

That's it for the opening act. The main event comes later.

President Yo La Tengo

Ok, without wanting to go too deep into nose-rubbing territory, I'd like to rewrite for your amusement a missive I sent some friends up in Boston, regarding one of the best shows I've seen in a long time, courtesy of Hoboken's own...

First of all, let me just say that when I offer you guys tickets to a yo show in the 'boken, don't say no. Especially if it's one of the Hanukkah shows! Unless your own band is booked to play the Garden, you are performing on Broadway, or you're getting married that night, change what plans you have and get your ass over to Jersey. It is so worth it I can barely put it into words...

The opening band on Saturday, Dew Claw, was maybe a little on the 'eh' side, but it was still pretty neat that they featured the original YLT bass player, and also the guy who currently does many of the graphics for Tengo's t-shirts and such. And their own shirts-for-sale were designed by that guy's 9-year old daughter. Which is nice. Plus, they wore flannel pyjamas on stage.

Sarah Vowell was the evening's comedy act, and she was superfun indeed; I have to say, though, she was upstaged by Amy Poehler, who came on in the guise of Ira's Aunt Judith to tell us all about the Kabbalah in the light of a broken Menorah.

The set was amazing. Started in mellow, moody mode. I mean, very very good, just chill. Until... they did 'Mr. Tough', which not only completely rocked, but kick-started the rest of the set, which from then on was a non-stop mess-you-up powerhouse. Included a completely incendiary 'Big Day Coming,' (the raucus 'reprise' vesion, of course) and an orgasmic 'Story of Yo La Tengo.'

And then for the encore, out came Alex Chilton. Yup. Among other songs, they did: Hey! Little Child, the Modern Lovers' Government Center, Velvet Underground's Femme Fatale. I am not even kidding.

This was the kind of show that reminds you why you like music.

And I haven't even mentioned last night's show yet... :-)

Hopefully I can get some photos of that gig from Sherin for the next entry. Whew. My ears are ringing in all the right ways.