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Big Ears 2025 kicked off with Darkside, Yo La Tengo, Tortoise, Beth Gibbons, Cass McCombs & more
Knoxville, TN’s one-of-a-kind festival still has performance to come from ANOHNI, Jessica Pratt, Explosions in the Sky, Lankum, Bill Frisell, Arooj Aftab, Waxahatchee, Alabaster DePlume, and lots more
The 2025 edition of Big Ears kicked off on Thursday and though things didn’t really get underway till 6 PM, I still felt a little overwhelmed by all the choices. Usually I try to hop around the many Knoxville, TN locations where shows happen, dipping into sets, but the first night included Portishead’s Beth Gibbons which was a performance I knew I’d stay for all of. That show was also at the Knoxville Civic Auditorium, not really that close to anything else, so it ate up a big chunk of the night. No regrets, Beth was incredible.
I first headed to The Mill & Mine to see Yo La Tengo, one of a few shows they’re playing this weekend. Having attended many Hanukkah shows over the years, I know their love of having other musicians sit in on sets so I assumed that would be the case here, but with so many incredible players at Big Ears it could literally be anyone. They had two musicians with them onstage Thursday night: guitarist William Tyler and Tortoise‘s John McEntire on a second drum kit and marimbas. This was a hit-filled set, including “Autumn Sweater,” “Ohm,” “Moby Octopad,” “Tom Courtenay,” “I Heard You Looking,” and more, and both McEntire and Tyler brought a lot to the performance.
After a quite bit to eat next door, I tried to catch some of NANOCLUSTER, aka the combined forces of ambient country group SUSS and Immersion (Wire‘s Colin Newman & Minimal Compact‘s Malka Spiegel), but they were running a little late and I decided just to hoof it over to the Civic Arena and catch some of Cass McCombs‘ set opening for Beth Gibbons. As a last-minute sub for Bill Ryder-Jones, who had to bow out of this tour, Cass is playing as a duo with bassist Brian Betancourt (Hospitality, Mary Timony) plus a drum machine. With all the reverb Cass likes, they had no problem filling the large room with sound. I thought they were terrific.
After Beth, we headed back to The Mill and Mine to catch a late night set from DARKSIDE which was packed despite an 11:30 start time on a Thursday. Sadly the venue couldn’t rig up the group’s mirror sculpture projection light system that’s a big part of the production of this tour, but there were no shortage of lights onstage, which backlit Nicolás Jaar, Dave Harrington, and drummer Tlacael Esparza though a constant expulsion of thick fog. Trying to describe what kind of music DARKSIDE make is tough — there’s prog, jazz, jam, reggae, and techno all in what they do — but it all makes sense when you see them do it; they flowed between moods and styles, all clearly born of the same hive mind. I watched near the front where people seemed to be having their faces melted off, but it was cooler from the back where the light show and sound came together in the haze. I definitely want to see the full production, though.
Day 1 started off, as usual, at the Knoxville Art Museum for the opening reception, which included welcoming remarks from festival founder Ashley Capps and Knoxville Mayor Indya Kincannon.
I was sad to miss Tortoise, who played at the same time as Beth Gibbons (their new song is good), as well as Marissa Nadler and Alan Sparhawk. So it goes at festivals.
Today (Friday, March 28), Big Ears kicks into high gear with shows already underway as I write this, and performances from ANOHNI & The Johnson, Jessica Pratt, Dawn Richard & Spencer Zahn, Cassandra Jenkins, Meshell Ndgeocello, Sun Ra Arkestra & Yo La Tengo, Swamp Dogg, Still House Plants, Michael Hurley, Les Claypool, Alabaster DePlume, and lots more.
Check out Yo La Tengo’s setlist, a clip of Tortoise’s set that I missed, and a few iPhone pictures from Thursday performances below.
SETLIST: Yo La Tengo @ Big Ears 3/27/2025
Ohm
Sinatra Drive Breakdown
Tonight’s Episode
Damage
Aselestine
The Ballad of Red Buckets
Shades of Blue
Moby Octopad
Autumn Sweater
False Alarm
Tom Courtenay
I Heard You Looking
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