Yo La Tengo

Hoboken, 1984

Ira Kaplan and Georgia Hubley formed Yo La Tengo in Hoboken in 1984; the name is Spanish for I have it, from a 1962 baseball story whose provenance Wikipedia calls dubious. Kaplan had been a critic and record-review editor at New York Rocker. The debut 7-inch "The River of Water" came out in late 1985 with Dave Schramm and Dave Rick. The Coyote years brought Ride the Tiger (1986, produced by Clint Conley), New Wave Hot Dogs (1987) and President Yo La Tengo (March 1989). Roughly 15 bassists passed through before James McNew joined in 1991 or 1992 and Painful (1993, Matador) settled the line-up that remains.

Fakebook (July 1990, Bar/None, produced by Gene Holder) is mostly covers, with an acoustic remake of "Barnaby, Hardly Working". Later albums include Electr-O-Pura (1995), I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One (1997), And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside-Out (2000), Popular Songs (2009, number 58, their highest), Fade (2013, produced by John McEntire), There's a Riot Going On (2018) and This Stupid World (2023). They scored the films Junebug, Old Joy and Shortbus, collected on They Shoot, We Score (2008). McNew also records as Dump, and the band made Fuckbook as Condo Fucks (2009). Jesse Jarnow's Big Day Coming: Yo La Tengo and the Rise of Indie Rock (2012) is the first biography.

Kaplan keeps a database of every setlist, begun in high-school notebooks, and writes sets in advance for multi-night runs, he told The Current. The eight-night Hanukkah residencies at Bowery Ballroom continue, with eight nights announced for December 4 to 11, 2026. Setlist.fm counts 11,034 attendances, with "Autumn Sweater" (588 plays), "Tom Courtenay" and "Stockholm Syndrome" the most played. They played an NPR Tiny Desk Concert on April 15, 2013, and appeared as the cover band Bobby Night Ranger on Parks and Recreation in 2014.