junkiesmile

April 2012 will be the 10th anniversary of the official release of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.

I'm wondering if there has been any word of a special anniversary release.

I know there are quite a few outtakes out there, demos, extra footage from I AM TRYING TO BREAK YOUR HEART, live shows recorded.

It probably doesn't need a remix, but there should be plenty of extras floating around.

I would be down for a box set that included official mastered versions of the demos floating around, a couple of soundboard live shows and maybe some live video from that era.

you call your kid "D-Man"?

It's so strange what a good avatar can do for a poster. Every time I read one of your posts I hear Sammuel Jackson's voice and it somehow makes the posts funnier.

What is that giant sucking sound I hear?

I listened to disc 1 last night, and disc 2 this morning. Disc 1 is far and away the best of the two, the 2nd disc is far too patchy imo. Its not crap by any means, just think that they could have added sunken treasure, someday soon, the lonely 1 and maybe dreamer in my dreams and given us a wonderful single disc album.

This sounds like the people who think the White album would have made a great single album. BT is great as it is. I love every single song. Wouldn't change a thing.

Very quiet with tons of detail floating in and out. A great album to lay on the floor and listen to through headphones. Crap. I guess I will have to get BT and AGIB on vinyl next.

Wow. 85 average score on Metacritic. I think YHF only got an 87. Personally I love this album. I'm glad it's getting the critical praise.

http://www.metacritic.com/music/the-whole-love/critic-reviews

You saw the length of the post, decided you didn't want to invest the time to read it -- yet you still dismiss it?

That book sucks. It's to thick.

It's a good tune and one of better tunes on SBS.

 

It doesn't make me anxious in the least bit.

SBS?

Thanks to all.

 

 

Some are still pissing and moaning about no more Uncle Tupelo.

Well I enjoyed your review.

So I checked the mailbox today before I took my son to his soccer game and there was my deluxe cd edition of The Whole Love. After the soccer game I stopped by my local indie record store to pick up an Elvis Costello cd and low and behold there was a vinyl copy of TWL sitting on the self. The owner said they didn't really stick by the release dates. Lucky me. I snagged it.

 

 

 

There is alot of good stuff going on over there. Some of the crusty ones can't handle the change, but I can, as can alot of other people involved with it.

 

Also I don't think you can put it in a box of those guys over at No Depression, because I think you'd find it's more diverse than you realize.

Oh I love No Depression and all of the music that they cover. I just find it odd that certain people who write for them can have great taste in some music and totally disregard other equally good music because it doesn't fit into a certain genre.

Those guys at No Depression crack me up. They're still mad at Wilco for recording pop songs. I remember when Summerteeth came out it was like they had pissed in the Cherrios of alt country music.

I'd heard the name but never gave him a thought before Wilco covered "I love my Label". I went out and bought Jesus of Cool and Labor of Lust today. Pretty good stuff. Great production. It kinda reminds me of Badfinger and the Beatles but cooler. I have a feeling that I'm going to really get into this guy. I know he's still recording. What should I go for next?

I also have a feeling this will lead to an Elvis Costello obsession.

If it's floating around I would love a copy as well. Pm?

I think your assertion is interesting, but could also be interpreted as reading too much into it. I view the lyrics of "I Might" as a bunch of cool-sounding nonsense. To me, it's more about the sound of the words, the syllables and the rhythm of the vocals and the overall texture of them, more so than any inferred meaning.

I meant people are reading to much darkness and angst into it because that's how they like their Wilco.

I think everyone is reading to much into the "you won't set the kids on fire" lyric. To me it's a dad rock reference about wilco's music not exciting the young kids and to that Tweedy responds " oh but I might.". Anyone else read it that way?

 

 

It is a really odd reference point for a song about religion,family relations and regret.

I agree

Whole Love.

agree it needs to rest (hence the "pre-internet"), but not sure that qualified as a misuse:

ep·ic   /ˈɛpɪk/

adjective Also, ep·i·cal.

1. noting or pertaining to a long poetic composition;

2. resembling or suggesting such poetry;

3. heroic; majestic; impressively great.

4. of unusually great size or extent;

 

 

both songs pretty much match all 4 definitions.

Ha ha. It's funny because it's true.

 

 

I thought it was a nice diversion. It took a lot of listens though. It kind of breaks things up, like a palate cleansing slice of lemon during a big dinner. It takes some of th intensity that leads up to and includes Open Mind, gives you a fresh start, and sorts you out for the intensity that is coming at the end. You can't sustain the intensity that starts with Art of Almost through a song like One Sunday Morning. The bizarre noises in the song, the fact the guy can't call with a subway token but it doesnt matter because the phones are all broken, brings on a great turn of the century , World Fair image. HArd to say why I like this, and since I have developed a huge love of this album I digress, but the album to me is like a puzzle and this song is a cool middle piece that ties stuff together.

I instantly liked this song. It reminds me of something McCartney or Nillsson would have done in the late sixties.

I know we're all stuck relating to music as any other art - to paraphrase someone who said something somewhere: if it means something to you, great, if not just look away.

 

I agree with some others that it's fun to talk about a shared love of Wilco, and as I read some good/bad SBS comments it helped me to really see why it was I felt so damn connected to the record at the time...but let me say the album is as unique as any other - and though it may be hard to pin a work on a word I'll drop one on SBS: Reconciliation.

 

To back that slightly - from the get go: Either Way... "Maybe you still love me...maybe you don't - either you will or you won't" The whole record has a tone of being man enough to look a thing in the face and call it what it is...right up through the final track "However short or long our lives are going to be - I will live in you or you will live in me until we disappear together in a dream." Naturally I realize this over-simplification has flaws, but there it is.

 

In any case, I was in total transition, from over a decade of office work to starting some construction business and it took me from the early tides of the humid northeast New England summer out to Berkeley where I began a 6-week project that had me out in that clear blessed breeze and perpetual sun of the early bay area summer. So I had the work in my hands, the pungent smell of redwood sawdust and a burned copy of the SBS stream in my ears. Some might gag to imagine me putting that CD in at the start of the morning, and letting it run until I wrapped (after a 10-12hr day)...day after day...probably logging 3-400 full listens before I left to go back home (and see them perform them just a few weeks after the official SBS release at the Pines in Northampton, MA). The mood of it sank into my bones...the tone of those guitars and the blend of it... I loved that sometimes it let Glen have a moment or two for a brilliant riff, or Nels the chance to demonstrate his extreme and sometimes delicate virtuosity - and it's funny that the posts here about not liking certain songs tended to be the ones where they were featured more prominently. I loved feeling the blend of the band's line-up and how much it felt like a throw-back to something the late 60's or early 70's might have conjured up.

 

I've been a fan of Wilco from YHF (even though an old friend pushed and pushed even pre-Summerteeth for them, I just wasn't feeling it), and will admit that what grabbed me early on was Tweedy and his gloriously fragmented poetic nuggets...the sort that stick to your ribs. It was through those nuggets that I finally stopped in my tracks and let the music in. So I imagine it may be the case with other long-standing fans as well - and I have the same issue with certain songs - we expect a lot of him because we know what he _can_ deliver lyrically. Yet there are moments when he can say a thing and deliver a thing with a matter-of-fact frankness that is shocking (and plain) - but it forces us to fill in the void (emotionally) of the moment instead.

 

Either way, any piece of art will only ever be a glimmer of a reflection that we recognize either in the world or ourselves...for good or bad. And this record resonated in me then and now - it captured a moment for me and I will never be without those soft cool breezes, infected with ancient redwoods and the reflection that reconciliation feels ok whenever I listen to it...

 

Either Way (everything has it's plan), Sky Blue Sky (oh I didn't die, I should be satisfied), Hate it Here (have to keep my mind out of this, try not to pretend), Walken (the more I think about, the more I know it's true), Shake it Off (somewhere there's a war, sometimes there is art) - and even What Light...(just remember what was yours is everyone's from now on, and that's not wrong or right, and you can struggle with it all you like - you'll only get uptight)...it goes On and On and On...

 

Hope this was as fun to read as it was to reflect upon. SBS is worth an honest listen, which the weight of expectations can rarely uphold. And I don't mind saying (personally of course) that if I had a top 25 records (by any band) of all time, this would be in my bag on that desert island.

Nice post. It made me want to listen to SBS with fresh ears.

Correct me if I'm wrong but doesnt the lyric "you wont set the kids on fire" mean the younger generation isn't going to be fired up by his music and Jeffs thinks they might?

"something sad keeps moving so I wander around. "

"Jesus I wouldn't bother. He belongs to me now."

It seems to be about the change of pace from previous albums. When it was first released, I had a really hard time getting into it, but for some reason I felt like trying it again a few months ago and it's been a frequent flyer in my car CD player ever since.

 

Some songs' lyrics are more simple in some of the songs than in previous albums, so that might be a factor too. There isn't quite as much of the poetic essence. Initially maybe that was part of my inability to appreciate it at first--it's hard to say. Now I think it's lovely.

That's it exactly. "it's lovely". Wilco before had been so much more than "lovely". There was weight behind it all. Gravitas. I feel that more in the new album. Some heft.