my eyes have seen the fury; so flattered by fate
When I think about it, I realize that I owe Wilco a lot.
When I was seventeen, I desperately wanted to work at the music store in my local mall. (I could feel your judgemental eyes on me as soon as I typed that, so I should point out that I grew up in the suburbs and there were no independent record stores there. In fact, now there are no record stores whatsoever). I killed time there nearly every day after school by chatting up the staff (who we all know are like gods in the eyes of a music obsessed teenager), checking new artists out at the listening booth, and purchasing ridiculously large handfuls of CDs. I never shied away from letting the store manager know that I would do anything to get a job there, and although he knew me well, he was hesitant to hire someone so young. I was disappointed, but sensed that I would win his approval eventually.
It was 2006, and there were a lot of albums that had a profound effect on me that year: The National’s Alligator, Josh Ritter’s The Animal Years, and The Hold Steady’s Boys and Girls in America, to name a few. This was around the time that my tastes in music were starting to truly take shape, but I still had a lot to learn.
One day, I spontaneously decided to buy Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. The album was four years old already, and I didn’t know much about it or the band, but I had studied the album cover so many times when I passed it on the shelves, I figured that it must at least be worth a listen. When I set it down to pay, the clerk behind the front counter (who we will refer to as Hipster Boy) froze and I watched his jaw drop. “You’re buying this?!” he asked, in a way that would make an insecure teenager feel judged. I felt my pale cheeks turning red. What if I had made a terrible mistake? What if Wilco wasn’t so cool after all? I thought that I was surely doomed, but then Hipster Boy called out to the manager that he’d “be crazy not to hire this girl because she’s buying fucking Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.” Naturally, I pretended that I totally knew who Wilco was and just needed to round out my collection.
Aaaand… the next day I had a job. I worked there part-time for four years, got paid to listen to/talk about music all day, was exposed to so many artists and genres that I never would have heard of otherwise, and made some of the best friends of my life. So thanks for that one, Wilco. Oh, and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot turned out to be kind of a life-changer too.
The point of all this reminiscing: Wilco has a new record out called The Whole Love and it’s probably the best thing they have done since Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. The opening track “Art of Almost” is epic in the way that Foxtrot’s “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart” is, although it’s rougher around the edges and sounds unlike anything else Jeff Tweedy has ever written. If not for his unmistakable voice, I probably would have no idea that it was the same band. The remainder of the record is more what you would expect of Wilco, although these songs are sticking with me more than anything on the last album (I do still love the majority of Sky Blue Sky, though). Another favourite track is “Born Alone” — I can’t get enough of that main riff and I really dig the Beatles influence heard during the fade-out.
mp3: Wilco - Art of Almost from The Whole Love (2011)
mp3: Wilco - Born Alone from The Whole Love (2011)
Watch Wilco slay “Art of Almost” live on Letterman here.
And just because these are some of the best songs of all-time:
mp3: Wilco - I Am Trying to Break Your Heart from Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (2002)
mp3: Billy Bragg & Wilco - California Stars from Mermaid Avenue (1998)
