Yo La Tengo live at the 930 Club

Yo La Tengo is one of my favorite bands, and while it doesn't look like I'll wind up stranded on a desert island anytime soon, I'm thinking I should keep a few of their CDs on me at all times just in case. Wouldn't want to be unprepared in the event of an emergency. YLT put on a truly incredible show last week, kicking off the proceedings with the darkly psychedelic Here to Fall off their newest album (and second full-length release of the year) Popular Songs. They also threw in a few aptly-chosen semi-obscure covers as per usual, revealing their encyclopedic knowledge of rock music and giving the show a D.C. theme: Black Flag, Half Japanese, and former All-American Reagan-era live-from-the-Capitol Fourth of July faves the Beach Boys. My knowledge of Black Flag and the Beach Boys is rather limited, I have to admit, but I discovered Half Japanese during my sophomore year in college, when a girl I was semi-pursuing made me a cassette copy of Shimmy Disc's 20th Anniversary of the Summer of Love compilation, complete with handmade tape cover. We never did get together, but I found out about an entire music scene thanks to that tape. So, it kind of worked out.

The audience was...well, not quite what I expected. What I expected was the same type of crowd that enthusiastically turns out for the band's Hanukkah shows at Maxwell's every year. In other words, a large enthusiastic crowd full of punk rock intellectuals, sub-hipsters, and Jewish music nerds, liberally sprinkled with overweight middle aged guys seemingly cloned from the DNA of The Simpsons' Comic Book Guy.

What I found was a large crowd that seemed to be composed primarily of the young and well-heeled. At one point, I was surrounded by couples being "romantic" with one another (i.e., making out like crazy) and for a while, it seemed like everyone was under the collective delusion that they were at a Chris Isaac concert. Towards the end, two young ladies hopped onstage, much to the band's reluctance, and did an extremely cringe-worthy dance. This occurred during a slow, ponderous, achingly melancholy number. Immediately after the song ended, the band's Hebrew-tatted roadie (whose look I was finding more and more worthy of emulating as the night wore on) politely ushered them offstage. But I shouldn't be too hard on the audience. After all, they succeeded in bringing the band out for two long encores. And the band really shined, feeding off of the crowd's energy. You can--and should--download the entire concert on NPR's All Songs Considered.

Yo La Tengo - Here to Fall