hottuna

I always thought parts of the lyrics are actually pretty ambiguous: the soldier in the song is dying for his country and family etc but at the same time there's a suggestion that he's fighting for the values of wealthier, pious citizens who aren't fysically on the battlefield.

 

Musically, it's one of the least interesting songs on their worst album.

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Yes I agree but, in that setting (almost festival-like in my opinion) with that kind of crowd I totally understand why they'd play a set like that.

 

I'm pretty spoiled having seen about a dozen shows on the extended SBS Tour in just about every possible type of setting. The setlists are getting more hit filled lately but at some point I'm sure they'll go back the other way. And it really does depend on the venue. There was nothing intimate about last night. It was obviously all about the beer and talking to much of the crowd, and that's ok with me. I'm there pretty much for the music only as are most or all of you. But could the bands we love thrive or even survive with just the hardcore fans supporting them? Maybe not.

 

I didn't get any of the songs I particularly wanted to hear last night (Pot Kettle Black, Poor Places, Reservations, Theologians, Too Far Apart, Side w the Seeds) but some stuff just has to get moved out to make room for the new ones, that's just how it works. I'm sure (or at least hope) I'll get a slightly varied set next week at Wappingers.

 

I think they should run with this latest wave of exposure, media attention, whatever and make the most of it.

well said.

You must be crazy lol! A show that includes....

 

Muzzle of Bees

Shot in the Arm

Bull Black Nova

I Am Trying to Break Your Heart

Handshake Drugs

Can't Stand It

Hate It Here

Walken

Hummingbird

Misunderstood

Spiders

Box Full of Letters

I'm Always in Love

Hoodoo Voodoo

 

Bull Black Nova AND Spiders, good times!

Yea it was a fun show but between the venue being to big for wilco and for me a set list which has 2 songs I have not seen live out of the three times I have seen them (discounting of course the new album stuff) i was a little bummed. Some one made a comment on the wolf trapp thread that summed up my feeling pretty well at this point with the setlists. For a band that has such a large repertoire of songs that they demonstrated they can play at the residency shows, you seem to get that 12-15 core songs at every show.

I just wish they would mix it up even more than they do. And no I do not take the fact that they are one of the few acts that consistently mix up the list each and every show for granted. This is one the main reason I go to see them live every chance I get.

In the grand scheme of Wilco it is a small complaint. They really treat their fans great

ALways good to see Wilco. The venue was OK. I think they have trouble with sound in some of the larger spaces. Seemed like they could have moved the stage up around two hundred ft to create a better setting. the bleacher were preety far back on d the sound was a little muddy. Place was maybe half full. Then again i would guess it would take a few thousand more on the floor to fill it. it was a big area.

I was on the field for the first half but it became too annoying with the talking and folks coming and going to whole time. No real comparison to the Opera House and Tower in sound and set lists.

Songs were driven by the larger venue it seemed. I am always more preferential to the mix of slower songs like pp radio cure.... The guys looked like they were in good spirits. Sharp as usual. BBN was a nice rip. SF and the song were OK but have not been all that into the new album anyways.

Enjoy the rest of the tour.

Edit CO put on a great opening set. I do not know much about them but they had some killer energy and were a lot of fun. Looked like they were feeling no pain which is always nice to see rock stars being rock stars lol

Hey nice name there hottuna! Back in the day I must have seen Jorma/Tuna etc... 40-50 times.

 

Anyhow, I'll be there with 5-6 other friends in tow. Can't wait, let's pray this daily thunderstorm pattern takes a break. We're planning on meeting up at Iron Hill Brewery (next to the stadium) preshow for dinner, etc...

 

As far as other shows at Frawley, there have been a few. If you search online you'll get the website of the stadium owners listing a couple of the shows and showing pics of the layout.

I would expect for this show we'd get the stage setup just behind 2nd base facing home plate.

Nice thanks. Yea the Tuna kick ass so much fun. I will take a peak online to see a layout. I think it could be a fun site for a show. Should be a nice crowd pulling from Philly, NJ and MD. They filled the Tower a couple years ago and I would love to see this place full. Made the Opera house show last summer in De and that was just about the best concert I have ever seen. Cannot wait for next week!!!!!!!!

After revisiting SBS last night for a couple turns I have changed my mind. WTA is a stronger record top to bottom. Shake it off, On and On and at least two others were meh. The only song that I will flat out skip on WTA is SF and maybe You n I

Should be great. Hope the weather holds. It has been a rough summer so far on that front. I posted in the other East coast thread about his venue wondering if this is the first live act there? The set up should be interesting. Think anyone will pull over and throw on the hazards on 95 lol

My Being There/Summerteeth theory has more to do with overall perception/reception both on VC and critically rather than individual opinions. I understand there are people that like those two records more than anything the band has put out. But generally YHF is considered to be the band's pinnacle (it did win the greatest album of all time poll on VC last year), and I think that almost anything that came after it might be seen as a slight disappointment by some. So perhaps I should rephrase my question: do you think people would be more appreciative of Sky Blue Sky and Wilco The Album if they were the follow ups to say AM? instead of the BT, ST, YHF, AGIB run?

 

Random notes:

 

I happen to like ELT, but it is one of the few songs on that album-- Can't Stand It and the single re-mix of A Shot In The Arm that's production sounds very "90's Adult-Alternative radio" to my ears, and that's the one I picked as an example of reviewers going after.

 

Being There is an album I like more everytime I listen to it, I've even caught myself not skipping the Sesame Street Outtasite, every now and then.

 

--Mike

an emphatic yes to your question.

But that's the thing - it was antonymically cliched, if that makes sense. He went where every other reviewer goes, and just said the opposite. Tastelessly. He didn't take a stand so much as oppose everything else. Yes, that's one way of taking a stand, but it's not a very creative or original point of view. Worse, it sounded like most of his other reviews, so it's not terribly ground-breaking in that regard either. I guess that means he has a clear 'voice' in his writing, but it's definitely a high-pitched, whiny voice.

I see your point but it was refreshingly new for me nonetheless. Not too mention we don't actually know if this is truly the way he feels about WTA and Wilco in general. Maybe he is not trying to go against the grain?

Has Frawley Stadium ever had a concert before? If so where does the band set up and how was the setting on what is basically I95?

I'd rather read that review by Mike Powell than the average review that (1) falls over itself to mention the ashes of Uncle Tupelo and Jay Farrar, (2) inevitably gives the album 3.5 or 4 stars out of 5 to avoid taking any sort of real stance on the album, and (3) reads as if it were drafted to protect the author 5 yrs down the road just in case time treats the album well (or poorly).

 

In other words, Powell's critique was amusing and entertaining. I don't care what he says mostly because I don't care what he thinks. At least it was different.

Couldn't agree more. At least it was some fresh perspective on things. So many of these reviews are carbon copies of each other almost from start to finish. How bout some effort

At this point SBS but it is close. Both records have nice high points for me however they both have several of Wilco's worst songs as well. Those will not grow on me. A lot of the reviews I have been reading have nicely described what I have felt about this record for what thats worth. Some kind of weird validation I guess.

WOW. Just Wow. That may have been one of the if not the best concert review I have ever read. Bravo Brian. Amazing piece of writing. I felt like I was a part of a era of Wilco I so sadly never saw live. However after reading that I kind of fell like I just saw them.

Taking a break. Listened to BBN live and it sounded good but identical almost to the second compare to the album which I hope changes. There are just a couple too many clunkers on this one for me to really dig it.

i do i just remember the bitter taste i felt from the insults is all, its whatever

 

i dont even care anymore i just wanted to get this off my chest. You're all just hypocrites in your own ways. and i am too

I hear you dude. I don't post much but been reading a lot of JB bashing on this site over the years and especially lately w the lawsuit. Unfortunately this is pretty typical stuff in this day and age.

Yeah, it saves the second half of SBS imo. I'll fight is like a bad version of on and on and on, completely lacks the emotion of the latter. Not a highlight at all.

yep. My thoughts exactly. Recycled but in a bad way. A few of those lines seem really crowbarred in there.

Sirius XM channel The Loft had a very nice tribute to him yesterday. They ran a hour long show from 6-7 in his honor. I was fortunate to be randomly listening and they played a great mix of his solo work and Wilco stuff along with some very very kind words about the man and musician he was.

Man I am really having a hard time with this news. Just yesterday afternoon I checked out JB's Myspace page for any news of the surgery and to listen to a few new songs and now this....I feel really alone with this news and I am glad I have a place like VC to go to where so many feel the same about Wilco and music in general.

Jay always meant so much to me because he was such a great talent and person.I connected with his music in a very special way. There was always a small part of me that held out hope that in some way he and Jeff could reconnect. Those records BT, ST and YHF have helped me get through so many hard times I will be forever grateful for JB contribution to such a wonderful pieces of art. It will live on forever and hopefully inspire many.

God Bless JB. I miss you immensely.

It is a well designed app. Very clean and no crashes(yet). Busting out the roadcase and watching some of AOAF has been sweet.

What an amazing device.it never ceases to amaze me. Easily the best phone I have ever owned and I have had dozens(bit of a tech whore).

Don't post here much, sporadically since Wilco's visit here in Alaska last summer sparked me to join the forum. Long time fan, bought a copy of Being There in 96 (was 16) and it more or less changed my life.

 

I have many thoughts about this album, Wilco's recent output, reactions here, etc., and I can't really cohere them. This will be a ramble.

 

I like The Album better than Sky Blue Sky. Sky Blue Sky was a disappointment. The Album is less of one, but some of it still chaps me.

 

I really like several of the tunes here. I love The Song. I love that 13 years after Being There, in my mind the ultimate album about what being a fan of rock and roll means, Wilco are willing to deliberately tear down the fourth wall and address their fans in a heartfelt manner. I think that is a brave and meaningful gesture in an era that still suffers from the ironic detachment that, for better and worse, has pervaded modern rock.

 

I love One Wing but it was better in its live incarnation - I miss the extended squall of noise at the end and I think the song suffers from the abbreviated, more polite soloing.

 

Bull Black Nova is awesome but not better than spiders, and I don't even know why so many are comparing it to that tune. The middle instrumental section (where the rhythm changes and we get the melodic guitar interlude) is out of place, I feel. It doesn't contribute to the rising tension in the tune that is its main strength. What I really like about it lyrically is that it's Tweedy clearly writing in character (more on this in a bit).

 

You and I, You Never Know, and I'll Fight are really nice tunes, I feel they are on the enjoyable side of the "sunny 70s pop/irritating soft rock" continuum. This is as good as it gets in terms of Wilco exploring this territory, and I don't know that they can continue to mine it without starting to miss more than they hit. Especially since Country Disappeared and Everlasting Everything are the real clunkers on the album to me and represent the bad side of that coin.

 

Last specific song I need to say something about is Sonny Feeling - there's no song that highlights what negative thoughts I have about this era of Wilco better than this one. And the bottom line is that this song is perfect without that lap steel over the verses and chorus. The lap steel damn near wrecks an awesome pop song. If you want to point to one musical moment in the Wilco canon that gives fuel to the "dad rock" nay-sayers (more on this below as well), this is it. This could be somewhat of a can of worms for those who have followed the band for a long time, scars of the war between the alt-country purists that felt the band went wayward after Being There and the ones who aggressively push the band towards avant-garde experimentalism. I've never understood or taken sides in that debate because to me what makes Wilco my favorite band is that they've done so many things so ridiculously well. The Americana/roots/whatever side in Being There (and AM, but I think general consensus is that AM is minor Wilco), the pop perfection in Summerteeth, the sonic experimentation of YHF/AGIB... all of these are among my very favorite albums. So that's not the point of my distaste for that lap steel. It's just so out of place, and recorded in a way and in a context that is reminiscent of some really bad music. It sounds cheesy, and not in a good way. I can't fully describe it, but I have a hunch if you agree with what I'm saying you know exactly what I mean, and if you disagree with me you have no idea what I'm saying.

 

All of which brings me to the big debate about Wilco's direction, etc. Yes, I am one of those who feel that SBS and W(TA) are not up to the standard of the band's 96-04 recorded output. That doesn't make me a bad fan. It just means that they are currently drawing from influences (70s classic rock, non-punk, metal, or glam) who themselves split my opinion. There's territory there that makes for really awesome music (late Beatles/Harrison influences noted by others on this album are obvious) and territory in the same constellation that, frankly, I can't stand. It's this crappy side of that era that drives the "dad-rock" criticisms. I sympathize with the dads on the board who take offense to this epithet and think it's kind of unfair, so call it "soft-rock," call it "lite," call it whatever, but they are just in a section of their record collection that has a lot of good music and a lot of bad music, and some of the bad is seeping into their albums. Simple as that. You could probably make one good album in this vein taking parts from SBS and W(TA) that are on the right side of that coin, make a couple of production tweaks, and you'd have an album that I love every bit as much as the previous four. At any rate, I certainly feel that they've mined this stuff as extensively as they can and its time to move on. This is the closest by far Wilco has come to making the same album twice in a row and they need some new inspiration.

 

Which brings me to my second and probably more important point. I don't get the sense that these last two albums have been driven by the same singular obsession/compulsion to explore a specific theme as the band's peak output was. Each of the four best Wilco albums have a sense of purpose, of trying to get at something that is gnawing away at Tweedy. I don't get that sense with these last two albums. Which is why Bull Black Nova strikes me as such a potentially exciting direction (aside from the fact that musically it is in a somewhat different direction that much of other late model Wilco). I'd love to see Tweedy doing more character study, writing from the perspective of someone who very clearly not him - in past albums there has been so much of himself in the lyrics but I don't get that from BBN. I want more of Tweedy as an observer of the world around him, trying to get inside the heads of others.

 

That's a lot of crap to read. Sorry. Thanks for your attention. Nothing here is meant to antagonize people who love SBS and W(TA) as much as any other Wilco album. Part of being a fan is talking and debating about the music with others who are fans. I also don't presume to dictate to the band what kind of music they should and should not be making. Methinks that a few of the "Wilco can do no wrong" crowd and a few of the "SBS and/or W(TA) blow(s)" crowd could stand to chill.

What a cohesive well thought out analysis. Thanks for verbalizing many of my thoughts about the state of the band and WTA

I like the song a lot and can't wait to hear it live. I do wish that it was longer with jeff screaming pick up at the end a few more times ala misunderstood... maybe theyll do that live but who knows what they'll cook up for us...

my thought exactly. A few more screams on the way home. Either way its a killer jam that should be a highlight this summer

What a lift it gave me in an otherwise very difficult week. Thanks Guys. See you this summer!

Thanks very much for listing these shows. I have downloaded all of them and spent the weekend checking them out. I have to say I agree with everything you posted about the shows and the sound quality. It is a nice contrast to all the 07-08 shows I have been to and downloaded. Not for the season in a couple of those show were amazing. I would love to see that live. The band really sound tight especially for all the transitions they were making in that period w/o Jay/Ken around.

Anyways thanks again for the recommendations!

Thanks, three bucks. Exactly what I needed to know.

Sec 226 which is lower level and not a bad seat but still spending $550 just to get in your looking at a $700 night out at those prices. Not to mention we will get at best 90 mins of the boys?

Got 4 GA floors at 10am sharp, seemed kinda easy.

What a joke! Over 550.00 for a set of tickets and they are not even on the floor if that makes any difference.