new wilco album?

[ChicagoPepper]

hey, at least you agree with me on the fact that, despite all their much-deserved critical acclaim, people won't fully "get" "Love & Theft" or Modern Times for years.

 

-justin

 

I still don't "get" the craze around Love & Theft, but boy, Modern Times hit me upon first hearing!

[caliber66]

I apologize for going off topic, but do you know in what capacity O'Rourke is working in with film? Is he writing, directing, music consultant?

fluffing

[Sir Stewart]

Justin is singlehandedly keeping the flame lit for the bizarre contingent of fans who erroneously believe "The Thanks I Get" will be on the next Wilco album.

 

If it'll help put the speculation/rumour mill to rest, I'll personally stake five thousand dollars on the fact that it won't be.

I'll take that bet!

[you ever seen a ghost?]

sorry, i got all wrapped up in the Dylan.

 

i'll take that bet too. calls Jeff: "hey guy, you wanna make a cool $2,500?"

 

-justin

[ZenLunatic]

If "The Thanks I Get" is a great song but I dont think they should put it on their new album. Should be new songs. That song been out there for awhile now. Shouldve been on SBS if any, but I guess it didnt fit in. I would be suprised if any new album comes out, probably wont be till next spring at earliest.

 

I do think they should start releasing more live albums like Phish and Pearl Jam did. Jeff solo live would do very well I think.

[lamradio]

I'm not in a big hurry for a new Wilco album.. I feel like SBS hasn't soaked in 100% yet for me. I always like it how in between Wilco albums, Jeff will do his solo shows.. I still haven't had a chance to catch one of those yet, but would love to.. And a Jeff solo live album would be awesome.

[froggie]

has anyone pondered the thought of a jeff solo album?

 

i'm not advocating that he should do one, but it sure would be interesting.

 

i hope he'd do an acoustic solo album, with some new tunes and re-recordings of various songs he's done going back to uncle tupelo days

[Guest Alan]

I do think they should start releasing more live albums like Phish and Pearl Jam did. Jeff solo live would do very well I think.

is there any reason for a ton of live Wilco stuff? with Phish, i can understand why you'd need a good deal of their shows, they varied so much and even the songs changed from show to show. Pearl Jam pretty much releases everything now because they hated all the bootlegging that was going on in the late 90's and early this decade. with wilco, what's the point? i think they could justify a live release for every album they put out because that seems to be how often they change up their setlists. but right now i'd just like to get a live DVD from this band.

Justin is singlehandedly keeping the flame lit for the bizarre contingent of fans who erroneously believe "The Thanks I Get" will be on the next Wilco album.If it'll help put the speculation/rumour mill to rest, I'll personally stake five thousand dollars on the fact that it won't be.

i'm with you. it's already been recorded. there is no reason to put it on the next album. as for re-working it, i don't see that happening with this song. i don't know why anyone would even want it on the next album. as much as i love SBS, i never want wilco to get complacent, and so far they really haven't. i love that most about the band.

[you ever seen a ghost?]

i quite like the song and i think it would have fit very comfortably on SBS. i agree that it needs little to no re-working, but i think if the next album were indeed an SBS companion piece, then i'd welcome its appearance as such.

 

-justin

[deron11]

I'm still loving SBS. I could go for a SBS2. Or outtakes or something of the type. I can't get enough. Perfect record.

 

On my Ipod I put One True Vine to open the album and Thanks I Get to close it. Even better.

[DAngerer09]

If I had to place those, I'd put One True Vine after What Light and Thanks I Get after Sky Blue Sky

[W(TF)]

SBS was released three months ago officially. You're gonna have to be patient for a while.

[DAngerer09]

If I was a betting man, I'd say we won't see another LP until early 2009.

[TheMaker]

Nah, there's nothing to "get" on Modern Times. Sorry. The greatest trick the assembled rock critics of America ever pulled was convincing the masses that it is anything other than a lukewarm-at-best Dylan album.

 

The voice? Admittedly jaunty in places, completely shot in others (woe be to any young kid whose first exposure to Bob Dylan is "Thunder on the Mountain"). For the most part, though, the bard sounds consumptive and a little like he swallowed a bug. The last album Dylan really sang his heart out on was Time Out of Mind, which was blessed with any number of attributes, but which was especially impressive in terms of its impressive phrasing. MT's songs, by comparison, are staid and predictable. Minute after minute ticks by in each song, and Dylan never bothers to shake things up. No "strollin' through the lonely graveyard of MY MIIIIIIIIND!", no "jus' like pendulums swingin' on chains," just line after line delivered in the same oh-god-I-can-barely-muster-even-this croak. Blah.

 

The songs? There are three or four of them, I suppose. "Spirit on the Water" has a nice breezy melody in spite of its frankly inconsequential lyric; "Ain't Talkin'" might pass the bar on its third attempt (although that's one mighty "might"); "Workingman's Blues #2" is a fine enough example of Dylan immersing himself in his influences (although a few lines are worthy of a wince or two; "the buyin' power of the proliatarat's [sic] gone down, money's gettin' shallow and weak?" Okay, Randy Newman, if you say so); and "Nettie Moore" is very close indeed to being a truly great Dylan number. The way he barfs out the chorus as if it were a hairball prevents it from achieving its full potential, but one could easily mount a case for Bob's delivery without embarrassing oneself, I should think.

 

The rest of the disc is strictly cannon fodder, very basic and very boring reinterpretations of blues standards that have existed for decades. If I'm being nice, the Chuck Berry-derived "Thunder" is perhaps on par with much, or even most, of the dross found on Under the Red Sky (let's be honest, if MT has a close cousin, it ain't 'Love and Theft') and doesn't exactly improve with repeated listening; "Rollin'" is six minutes of connect-the-dots blues written decades ago by folks who do it better than Dylan; "Someday Baby" is a near-total write-off (not to mention a Muddy Waters song); "Beyond the Horizon" is fine if you like grandfatherly music in general and "Red Sails in the Sunset" in particular; "Levee's Gonna Break" is a song from 1929 that doesn't know when to end.

 

Greil Marcus put it best when he glibly and correctly rejected MT's generous critical reception by sniping, "It's not a strong album." Of course it's not, Greil, we know that. We're Dylan fans, and there are barely any Dylan songs on this thing! And those that are present are more like pastiches, or worse, parodies of Dylan songs. "Ain't Talkin'" is the worst offender, a maundering exercise of a thing that sounds remarkably like the work of an artist who has just finished listening to Time Out of Mind, enjoyed it a great deal, but didn't bother to spend much time soaking in its themes. Rather than encompassing the awe, originality and craftsmanship of a truly classic Dylan closer, it feels conspicuously like Dylan sitting down, scratching his graying head and trying to figure out what fans have come to expect from a classic Dylan closer. He almost hits the mark, but alas, almost doesn't quite cut it.

 

I sometimes bag on L&T, but all things considered, it's at the very least an average Dylan effort - which is to say that it's a very strong album, generally speaking. Shifting tempos, some deft syllable-cramming on tracks like "Po' Boy," and the language is frequently thrilling, especially on "Moonlight" (the "crimson/limbs an'" rhyme is spectacular on paper and on disc) and "Mississippi." To say that MT is slight by comparison is to issue a truly delirious understatement. I spin Dylan's latest when I don't feel like indulging in the expansiveness of Blonde on Blonde, the world-weariness of Time Out of Mind, the astonishing poesy of Blood on the Tracks. It scratches the same itch that Self Portrait takes care of, but criminy and cripes, it ain't even that good!

[badger]

I read an interview with Jeff some time ago, in which he was pretty excited about instrumental music the band was working on. Given this, plus the various indicators suggesting a sooner rather than later release for the next album, here's my SWAG (scientific wild-arse guess) as to what and when it will be:

 

An instrumental album, spring 08, entitled Diamond Claw!

 

Remember, you heard it here first, folks!

[Kalle]

If "The Thanks I Get" is a great song but I dont think they should put it on their new album. Should be new songs. That song been out there for awhile now. Shouldve been on SBS if any, but I guess it didnt fit in. I would be suprised if any new album comes out, probably wont be till next spring at earliest.

 

Like honestly, not any sentence make no sense.

[Szabo]

I read an interview with Jeff some time ago, in which he was pretty excited about instrumental music the band was working on. Given this, plus the various indicators suggesting a sooner rather than later release for the next album, here's my SWAG (scientific wild-arse guess) as to what and when it will be:

 

An instrumental album, spring 08, entitled Diamond Claw!

 

Remember, you heard it here first, folks!

 

I hear they're going to release it under the name Caterpillar Moonshine, you heard it here second.