[Live MP3s] Spiritualized in Boston 2007
Posted on November 20, 2007 at 1:47 pm | 1 Comment
Even if I hadn’t spent a solid chunk of the last 12 hours editing its audio, the sounds of last night’s Spiritualized set at the Museum of Fine Arts here in Boston would still be echoing inside my head. Easily the most beautiful show I’ve seen this year, maybe in several years, and I’m feeling forced to hit up a thesaurus to try and describe it. Instead, I’ll let others do it for me…
- Rick and Jerad shared their thoughts on last night’s show.
- Frank at Chromewaves wrote up Saturday’s Toronto stop.
- Many, many write-ups for the band’s performance at the Apollo in NYC last Friday night: Brooklynvegan, Vulture, ProductShopNYC, VV’s Sound of the City, Billboard, and the NME.
So how did Jason ‘Spaceman’ Pierce celebrate his 42nd birthday in Boston? By giving us a present in the form of the final U.S. stop on a tour he has dubbed “Acoustic Mainlines“: J. on acoustic guitar, Doggen on electric piano and harmonica, a four piece string section, and a quartet of fantastic backup singers. On paper such a setup might appear pretentious, but in practice it was near-perfection. This gospel gift becomes even more remarkable once you know this bit of info, shared by Case on the Spiritualized message board:
“For those going to the US shows, you’ll be surprised to learn that they threw the whole thing together after only three days of being in the US – that includes hiring the gospel singers and string players because they couldn’t afford to fly them over from the UK. In addition, they had to hire a different set of string players for the east coast dates because they didn’t have the resources to fly the west coast performers over.”
I’ll not weigh this post down with more words, as all that really matters are the files that follow…
Live at the Museum of Fine Arts
in Boston, Massachusetts
on Monday, November 19th, 2007
01. Sitting On Fire
02. Lord Let It Rain On Me
03. True Love Will Find You In The End
(Daniel Johnston cover)
04. Cool Waves
05. Amen
06. Going Down Slow
07. Soul On Fire
08. Walking With Jesus
09. Feel So Sad
10. Stop Your Crying
11. Shine A Light
12. All Of My Tears
13. Baby, I’m Just A Fool
14. Anything More /
Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space
15. Broken Heart
16. I Think I’m In Love
17. Lord Can You Hear Me?
18. Oh Happy Day
Some Spiritualized links…
- Their official site, MySpace page, and Wikipedia entry.
- Additional Audio: A torrent of the recent San Francisco show is up on Dime.
- Video: A Spiritualized YouTube search will offer up some live “Acoustic Mainlines” footage.
- Photos: My Flickr-hosted shots from last night are here, and Drive Blind has a few here. Chromewaves has some great shots from Toronto, and P4K shared some from the NYC show. Also hit up a full Flickr tag search.
- Upcoming dates: Spiritualized plays two more sold-out shows before the year is out, on December 8th and 9th at London’s Union Chapel.
- Purchase: Support the artists that help make your life better. Buy Spiritualized merch here.
- Listen to any and all ‘Nac-hosted Mp3s at the Hype Machine.
And with that, I’m officially taking a long Thanksgiving break from the ‘ol blog, and will return on Monday (what, was three shows shared in three days not enough for ya?). Best wishes to everyone out there, regardless of what your upcoming weekend entails. I’ve certainly got many, many things to be thankful for, this year especially. Hope you can say the same.
the fine print… If anyone has an issue with these Mp3s being made available, just let me know (my contact info in the ‘nac faq). I’m just a fan sharing songs. Live sets are recorded with a Sony ECM-719 mic and a Sony MZ-RH10 minidisc, converted to .wav and then edited to 192kbps Mp3s. Files are made available for a limited time, and are not reposted once removed.
Mp3s: The Freewheeling Yo La Tengo live in Boston
Posted on November 19, 2007 at 12:01 am | No Comments
Let us be very thankful for Yo La Tengo. It would be easy to take them for granted: A 22-year career of releasing consistently solid albums and playing wide-ranging venues, relatively drama-free, hype-free, and falter-free. And for the past 16 years, the same three talented people writing songs that are often shifting in style, shining a light on usually-obscure cover songs, all the while making everything they perform just so perfectly, well, “Yo La Tengo”-sounding.
If a visiting time-traveler had shown me each incredibly-varied setlist from the band’s just finished “The Freewheeling Yo La Tengo” tour, and allowed me to pick just one show to attend, it would have been exactly the one I ended up at: The early installment of their two-show visit to the Museum of Fine Arts here in Boston this past Thursday. So many personal YLT faves were performed, it was as if it was tailor-made for my ears, but really, I owe that mostly to fellow fans and their requests during the free-form Q&A sessions that happened between many of the songs. “Stockholm Syndrome“, “Decora“, “Big Day Coming“, “One PM Again“, “Today Is The Day“, “Pablo and Andrea“, “Deeper Into Movies“, “Detouring American With Horns“: all songs that would end up on my own “best of Yo La Tengo” mix. Throw in both a Bob Dylan and a Neil Young cover, and I honestly couldn’t imagine a better YLT show.
I’m also pretty thankful that I was even able to be there in the first place, after missing out on tickets when I wasn’t sure I’d be free that evening. Unsurprisingly, both shows sold out quickly, and there were more beggars than offerers on craigslist that day. I thought I’d struck a deal for a ticket that afternoon, but the impatient seller sold it out from under me after saying it was available and all mine. So in the end, I owe my attendance to a kind soul with an extra guestlist spot. Had I not made it in after coming so close, and then saw this setlist, well, I’ll just say I’m thankful it worked out…
Live at The Museum of Fine Arts Boston
in Boston, Massachusetts
6:30pm show on Thursday, November 15th, 2007
01. Beanbag Chair
02. Stockholm Syndrome
03. freewheeling banter 1
04. Decora
05. freewheeling banter 2
06. Be Thankful For What You’ve Got (William DeVaughn)
07. freewheeling banter 3
08. You Tore Me Down (Flaming Groovies)
09. freewheeling banter 4
10. Big Day Coming
11. freewheeling banter 5
12. Mr. Tough
13. freewheeling banter 6
14. Gentle Hour (Snapper)
15. freewheeling banter 7
16. One PM Again
17. freewheeling banter 8
18. Today Is The Day
19. freewheeling banter 9
20. No Water
21. freewheeling banter 10
22. 4th Time Around (Dylan)
23. freewheeling banter 11
24. Pablo and Andrea
25. freewheeling banter 12
26. Deeper Into Movies
27. Emulsified (Rex Garvin & the Mighty Cravers)
encore…
28. Don’t Cry No Tears (Neil Young)
29. Detouring America With Horns
Some Yo La linkage…
Their official site, MySpace page, Wikipedia entry, and Matador Records page. Additional Audio: NYCtaper recorded the next (and final) night of the Freewheeling YLT tour, and has offered lossless files over here. Some Mp3s from the Yo La Tengo site…
Mp3: Yo La Tengo – “The Summer“
(live on KEXP 10/15/07)Mp3: Yo La Tengo – “I Feel Like Going Home“
(live on KCMP 10/07/07)Mp3: Yo La Tengo – “Pass the Hatchet, I Think I’m Goodkind“
Mp3: Yo La Tengo – “Beanbag Chair“
(both from their latest album, “IANAOYAIWBYA“)There are more Mp3s to be had at the band’s own audio page.
Hip 2 Be Square was at the show as well, and you can read Kip’s write-up here. Video: Official clips for “Tom Courtenay“ and “Sugarcube“. Many, many live videos can also be found using a YouTube Yo La Tengo search. Photos: My Flickr-hosted shots are here. Check out the full Yo La Tengo Flickr tag search. And as the band mentions above (thanks to an informed audience member), they played on (an unbroadcasted) Saturday Night Live over the weekend, performing “Mr. Tough” and another song. There’s visual confirmation of this happening right here, in the form of a New York Times photo. Upcoming live dates:
Yo La Tengo is once again performing their series of Hanukkah shows this year at Maxwell’s in Hoboken, NJ, starting on December 4th and ending on the 11th. All eight shows feature special surprise openers, and all are already sold out.
Listen to all ‘Nac-hosted Mp3s at the Hype Machine.
the fine print… If anyone has an issue with these Mp3s being made available, just let me know (my contact info in the ‘nac faq). Live sets recorded with a Sony ECM-719 mic and a Sony MZ-RH10 minidisc, converted to .wav, edited for leveling, then converted to 192kbps Mp3s w/Lame. Files are made available for a limited time, and are not reposted once removed.