Green River

Orkie would fit in quite well at Atease, actually.

Tugboat Shelia is into memorabilia

Who says three is a crowd?

So i have a confession to make: I have had access to an advance copy of the album for close to a month now. It has been extraordinarily difficult to not post about it when everybody was speculating about the album, and i feel as though i can finally share my thoughts from the perspective of somebody who has had time to have the album grow on them.

 

First of all, I have to agree with the sentiment that TWL is easily the best album that Wilco has made with their current lineup. I feel as though that whereas SBS and WTA sounded like six guys in a studio playing together, even the simpler songs on this album feel a little bit more harder to pin down. There are way more subtleties to the songs that took many many many listens to discover, and i think that has been one of the most rewarding things about the album. Lyrically, i think i was worried about how the album would turn out, but i think there are some very memorable Tweedy lyrics on the album.

 

I can guarantee that lot of the tracks that people aren't crazy about right now are huge growers, especially Black Moon. I always thought it sounded sort of like "Ecstasy of Gold" from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, but that might just be me. But this was probably the most forgettable song on the album the first couple of listens through. However, the string arrangement is absolutely gorgeous, and the production on that track is really something special. I think it's sort of funny how it starts off almost sounding like Black Eye too, even if just for a few seconds (starts on the same A minor chord). I could also tell that Capital City would be sort of divisive, but it has been one of my favorite TWL tracks from the first listen. It's lighthearted, jaunty, has some great chord changes and progressions. Just a feel good song overall.

 

One last thing i have to say is that I have listened to One Sunday Morning at least once a day for the 3 or 4 weeks i've had access to the album. I honestly think it's one of the most sincere, beautiful songs Jeff Tweedy has ever written and Wilco has ever recorded. I've been playing it nonstop on my guitar, and it is just so simple and beautiful in that classic Wilco way.

 

Even after a whole month of whole love, in my opinion this is one of the strongest Wilco efforts in a while, and i think that it has the potential to be as classic, memorable, and groundbreaking of a Wilco album as YHF, AGIB (still can't say for sure if it will be, but can't rule it out either)

How much better does the album sound on the cd compared to the stream from their website. It sounds pretty good for 128 kbps so I can't imagine how good the real thing sounds.

somebody post this shit.

 

the leak or the Mojo feature.

either or.

or both

yeah both.

yeah what this guy said.

that chorus is killer

I might be better off not reading any music forums for awhile because all I can think about now is when I'm going to hear this album.

No pun intended.

Right now it's probably:

A Ghost is Born

Summerteeth

Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

Being There

Sky Blue Sky

Wilco (The Album)

A.M.

Kinda thought that too. Thanks!

Gotta be careful. Lots of virus-filled blog downloads these days haha.

It looks fake.

Some people have the album now. A leak will probably happen sometime soon.

Does anybody else not like extra tracks tacked on at the end of an album? When the album ends I don't want it rolling over to some bonus track no matter how good it might be.

Yeah, when I listen to an album, I like to listen to the finished product, exactly as the artist intended it to be. I usually put the bonus tracks in some other music folder on my computer. Likewise, I wouldn't want to watch a movie, and then have the deleted scenes start playing right after the final scene of the finished film, ya know?

The From the Basement version of "Bloom" is outstanding. Channeling Remain in Light-era Talking Heads on that one.

I think I enjoyed "Staircase" more when it was just a solo Thom song. The vocal melody worked better with the guitar part he was playing rather than the dance groove they have going on in this version, much like how I prefer the original Ether festival version of "Weird Fishes/Arpeggi" to the In Rainbows version. Sometimes when you change the arrangement of a song, you risk losing the spirit of it.

Why? Under the right circumstances some airing out of the band's chops could be really great. In fact proggy or not, I hope they do air it out really good. I think the band deserves this attention.

 

LouieB

It was a joke man. I'd love to hear them just go nuts on this album, but I mean they're obviously not going to write something like '2112'. Wilco (The Album) was such a tight and compact album (and likewise, so were its songs) that I'd love to hear them let loose on this one, especially if it can capture the energy they bring to their live shows, ya know?

I just hope they aren't composing 15-20 minute prog-rock suites.

Knives Out has some of my favorite layered guitar playing.

Yeah.

It sounds like they've really mastered the ability to blend their influences together. Whereas past albums had 'electronic' songs and 'rock' songs, the first half of this album really combines it all together so effectively that the songs can't be pinned down with ease. For example, "Morning Mr. Magpie" gives off the first impression of being just another computer-based Thom dance song, but after you gain some familiarity with it, it reveals itself to be a carefully constructed arrangement, complete with two to three separate guitar parts playing simultaneously.

Can't wait for this.