YO LA TENGO
Batschkapp
Frankfurt, Germany
June 11, 1991

Stonecutter Archives #10

AUD > ? > cassette > Tascam 424 Mk II > Sony PCM-M10 (Line In, 24/48) > WAV > SoundStudio > FLAC (16/44)
Recorder unknown, cassette copy provided by Rich B.
Transferred and digitally mastered by neil d

01 Orange Song
02 Misty Water
03 Barnaby, Hardly Working
04 Swing For Life
05 Upside-Down
06 Five-Cornered Drone (Crispy Duck)
07 The Pain of Pain
08 Artificial Heart
09 86-Second Blowout
10 Out The Window
11 Mushroom Cloud of Hiss
12 You Tore Me Down
13 Andalucia
14 Barstool Blues (Neil Young)
15 Rambling Rose (MC5)
16 The Summer
17 A House Is Not A Motel

I'm pulling these tapes out of the box in pretty much random order, and as I don't have a cassette player attached to my stereo, I'm not listening to them until I actually go in to edit the digitized files. That means every once in a while I get a wonderful surprise like this one: a show from the tail end of YLT's 1991 European tour with Eleventh Dream Day, but this one has exceptional sound quality for a tape of that era. In particular, the vocals are incredibly crisp without being mixed too high — for a moment I thought this might even be a soundboard, but you can hear the audience clearly between songs, so it's just an excellent audience tape of a show with outstanding sound.

It's also a great show, with tons of then-new songs that would end up on "May I Sing With Me" the next year, and a terrific encore with Rick Rizzo sitting in. You can really hear Yo La Tengo starting to become Yo La Tengo here, three months into their time with new bass player James McNew.

There was some pitch and volume weirdness with this one in a few places, but I think I've caught and repaired it all. Enjoy!