Staying Power

YO La Tengo’s Ira Kaplan has no idea how he got here.

“People ask us, ‘Why has your band kept going so long?’,” says the singer and guitarist. “We don’t have a straight answer. It’s organic. I don’t think about it. It isn’t as if we get up every morning and have a board meeting, ‘Yep, we’re going to stay together another day’. That isn’t how it works.”

He may demur. Nonetheless, there is something extraordinary about the group’s longevity. Formed in Hoboken, New Jersey, in 1984, the indie three-piece have outlived almost all their peers. What’s more, they’ve done so without ever slipping into pastiche or repeating themselves. This is made clear on new album Fade, among the best they’ve released.

“It did occur to me the other day ‘Wow, most of the bands we started out with aren’t around any more’,” Kaplan admits after further prodding. “It is pretty rare for a bunch of musicians to stay together this long.”

Then again, Yo La Tengo aren’t just any band. Kaplan and drummer Georgia Hubley are husband and wife, a fact which, the singer will allow, has given the outfit greater staying power.

“I’m quizzed about this constantly and my take on it is ‘Yes, of course it’s different when two members of a line-up are married’. It’s not normal being in a band so long. The fact we are married is absolutely a contributing factor.”

Like any couple, they have their disagreements but not to the point where Yo La Tengo suffers. “Marriage makes life more complex, without a doubt. Is that necessarily a bad thing? Complexity isn’t something to run from all the time.”

A compelling mix of garage rock and retro psychedelia, Fade is the band’s 13th full length LP. It is also the first the first they have made since the mid 1990s without long-time producer Roger Moutenot. Seeking a change of scenery, Kaplan, Hubley and bassist James McNew swapped New Jersey for Chicago and a hook-up with famous studio boffin John McEntire.

“We knew John a long time. We did a tour with his band Sea and the Cake over 10 years ago. We spent a lot of time together criss-crossing Europe. You get to know someone pretty well after that.

“It didn’t have much to do with the fact that he would be fantastic at vocal miking or anything like that. We were confident that there was a good rapport and that interesting things would happen.”

Yo La Tengo have had a curious career. For the first decade they seemed condemned to obscurity. In 1997, however, they released the greatly beloved I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One. The record attracted a number of influential admirers, most notably Simpsons creator Matt Groening. He was such a devotee that, a year later, he invited the group to cover the show’s theme tune for a special ‘indie rock’ episode (other guests included Sonic Youth and Smashing Pumpkins).

Kaplan isn’t sure the exposure won Yo La Tengo many new fans. It may have raised their profile. But how many people rushed out to buy one of their albums afterwards? If the experience was useful it was because it opened their eyes to how differently things work in television. On the day of the recording session they turned up at the appointed hour and started to jam. The people from Fox TV cleared their throats and asked how long did they think it would take to cover the Simpsons tune? One hour, two hours? Yo La Tengo didn’t have an answer — their usual strategy was to muck around and wait for the magic to happen.

Generally, the band are happy to stay out of the spotlight. Kaplan certainly doesn’t place any store in critics, even when the response is positive, as is the case with Fade. The consensus is that the LP recaptures the glories of Yo La Tengo’s ‘golden’ 1990s period. If you’ve been waiting for a true follow-up to I Can Hear The Heart, then Fade may be it. Kaplan could care less what the reviews say.

“I pay very little attention to that stuff. In their own way all of our records remind me of things we have done before. And they all sound different as well. To that extent, I don’t think the new one differs very much.”

The last time they toured Europe, Yo La Tengo brought a huge spinning wheel. At most of their shows (Dublin being an exception), they would twirl the wheel and perform whatever song the arrow pointed to. It was a major undertaking and goes toward explaining the four year delay between Fade and their previous long player, Popular Songs (until now, a new Yo La Tengo LP has arrived, like clockwork, every three years).

“The wheel thing was not a way of keeping it interesting for us,” he says. “It was a way of surprising the audience. We don’t like letting the audience know what is going to happen at a concert. It’s nice to keep them on their toes. With the wheel, whatever we performed was going to be a surprise to us — so it was guaranteed to surprise everyone else as well.”

The group was recently the subject of a lavish biography, Big Day Coming by Village Voice writer Jesse Jarnow. In addition to chronicling their story, Jarnow argued that Yo La Tengo are one of the most influential independent acts of the past three decades. It is a claim Kaplan is reluctant to take seriously.

“We were flattered, of course, that someone would write a book about us. As for all that other stuff, well we never started a band to influence people or make money. We started the band because we wanted to be in a band. That’s always remained the focus.”

* Fade is released Friday. Yo La Tengo play Vicar Street on Mar 23