Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

He does sound a lot like Jerry Garcia sometimes. Especially on Jesus, etc.

Scott P.:

No, no, no. Sorry! Didn't mean to grumble -- I rarely have time to post as it is. No worries.

Check this out! From Dotmusic - this guy is ruthless:

"The fact that Wilco had to buy back their new album from an unimpressed record label - Reprise - only to then sell it back to, effectively, the same company, says it all.

The laughable lack of vision or interest in invention coruscating through towering leper colonies the world over cocoons these industry idiots, whose only concession to complexity is an expenses bill or a tax return.

'War On War' is the first single from that very spurned album, the rather brilliant and universally lauded 'Yankee Hotel Foxtrot', which, remarkably, runs predecessor 'Summerteeth' pretty close on the wonderful barometer.

Naturally more accessible than sections of the album, 'War On War' is still full of atmospheric static, far-off melodic passages and juddering radio-wave distortion, yet retains a precise pop element that was clearly just too damn 'out-there' for a bunch of executives who should be shot."

- Ben Gilbert

But an interesting postscript is that Gilbert later (just today) reviewed Wilco's show at the Astoria - and was largely disappointed. It's too bad.. I think they are having trouble with the new material in a live format, and without Jay Bennett. And Tweedy supposedly gets gripped with intense stagefright before various shows.

me = stupid. My comment above should have read "I could've played that" not "I couldn't played that." Sheesh.

I did wind up getting this and it's a good album. BUT -- this is the first I've heard of Wilco and I'm kind of surprised how bland and dull the lyrics are. I really can't recall a memorable line, and I really don't get a sense of what the songs are "about" (even emotionally, really) except for "Heavy Metal Drummer". Still, I like the sound & there are some good melodies.

mark, I think these are his worst lyrics yet. if that helps any.

I love the song with the violin, I wish more of the record sounded that vital.

Mark, the lyrics on YHF are truly awful. The snotty Wire kiss-off has a bit of relevancy in light of that, it's easy to imagine Tweedy having no greater lyrical ambition than setting weird phrases against each other (and no doubt trying to seem willfully obscurantist about Great Ideas). On the other hand, the Wire's overly effortful Coil concert review in the same issue is pretty laughable.

ha the random phrases thing might come off better but it doesn't sound like that most of the time, it sounds like he wants to be MEANINGFUL and articulate DEEP AND REAL FEELINGS

I'm liking this record more and more, but my original opinion of it not being overwhelming still stands

I can't say anything about the lyrics, they seem to be deep, but I don't get them. A couple of days ago I bought "Summerteeth" which is at least as impressive as YHF, which I still love. Tweedy's voice sounds like Lennon's there in several songs. Wilco truly seem to be the American Beatles for me. Like the Beatles would have sounded after they broke up and if they would have been American. Amazing pop music. The tunes are very subtle and it always takes several listens to grasp them. And they seem so light. I guess Tweedy must have real problems to perform those intricate harmonies live.

''I can't say anything about the lyrics, they seem to be deep, but I don't get them.''

HA HA HA HA HA HA!!! I am very 'deep' too. With my feelings of hetred towards Wico. What do you think is deep, then?

''Tweedy's voice sounds like Lennon's there in several songs. Wilco truly seem to be the American Beatles for me. Like the Beatles would have sounded after they broke up and if they would have been American. Amazing pop music. The tunes are very subtle and it always takes several listens to grasp them. And they seem so light.''

this is not good is it? They will beremembered by you as the 'American Beatles' but not as 'Wilco'. Nice!

Take this:

I would like to salute
The ashes of American flags
And all the fallen leaves
Filling up shopping bags

I like it. But I don't understand what it means. Is it anti-American? Is it just trying to be clever? Or is it ironic, or a joke? Or is it pro-American in a subtle different way?

'The ashes of american flags.' well, that is anti-american. 'Shooping bags' reference= commercialism.

It's anti-american but that's so easy really to attack america. What's the big deal?

the american beatles? hahaha. cf. simon reynolds on the giant corpse of rock n roll. rather than just fucking that corpse, wilco are trying to look tough and real and pretty and cool and meaningful all at once so that the corpse will come over and fuck THEM

only the corpse isn't going for it

Josh, when did you join my cult?

What are you on about, Josh? Compared to your last post Tweedy's lyrics are lucid as the light of the morning sun. If Wilco were not the Beatles reborn on American ground who would be the American Beatles then, according to you? Don't say Big Star. Their music has aged so badly. The quality of the tunes of Wilco makes the Beatles comparison inevitable. Especially on Summerteeth.

it's quite lucid, you just didn't get it.

'if they aren't the american beatles, then who would be?' is a v. v. poor reason to think that there is an american beatles anyway. if you think about it you'll see that my comment had something to do with wilco's relationship with tradition, a tortured and overly self-conscious one that I just don't hear in the beatles (until the white album ha but it's a different matter there). this relationship comes through in the way tweedy's songs are written, too - I don't think I would think he had such a troubled relationship with tradition if he was a better songwriter, but he's not. (which sort of blows a lennon/mccartney - tweedy songwriting comparison, so, like, american beatles, what the fuck?)

mel, I just got sick of wincing at every lyric I heard.

also if he keeps kicking out people who can write better melodies than him...

so, like, american beatles, what the fuck?

Quite. The question as a larger one is a bit strange anyway. Who the hell cares if there is an American Beatles or not? Why bother? Leave that for the fetishists.

''Leave that for the fetishists.''

Or music journalists.

Woohoo!

wilco's relationship with tradition, a tortured and overly self- conscious one that I just don't hear in the beatles
The early Beatles were just quite an average rock n roll band rooted deeply in tradition with some nice tunes. If you look at the early Wilco which was very country there is another parallel actually. Both the Beatles and Wilco then developed their own style. The Beatles style was probably more original but the "corpse of rock" was much smaller at their time so they had more freedom and could shape the things to come. The main difference between the two I can see is that the Wilco tunes are more difficult to remember, they are not as universal, but I wouldn't hold that against them. Almost on the contrary as their music takes more time to sink into the ear of the listener which I find a good thing. And you are absolutely right that they are eclectic but in their eclecticism they create something refreshingly new. Like Ryan Adams and probably even more so. Tell me one band of today with a similarly strong songwriting (I mean the musical part here). Of course there doesn't need to be an American Beatles but I'd guess the question which band would come closest is legitimate.

'similarly strong songwriting': most of the bands I like much that write 'songs' are better songwriters than jeff tweedy haha

Yikes!

I've been thinking about the lame lyrics on YHF for a while, so I'll try to write something about them soon. just for you.
Thank you Josh. But you know Wilco is not only about the lyrics. When I like music I usually like it for the music and not for the lyrics in the beginning. I only start listening to the lyrics when I really dig the music. With Wilco I have started trying to understand what Tweedy sings about but I didn't go very far yet. My feeling is that his lyrics are rather vague and allow many different interpretations. But even if the lyrics were utter shite I would still love Wilco.

Just a note, Julio:

I'm not sure that that is an anti-American lyric. He's paying homage to all the felled patriots, those who have burned up for the Flag; supposedly its a tetchy subject with Patriot Americans (the Burning of the Flag). He's taking this tetchyness, and saying Fuck You! to the burners. I'll salute the flag anyway. Even more so than that, I'm gonna come out an explicitly say it here, right now - not just think it.

It's also a kinda Wonder Years Nostalgia lyric, you can just imagine a bag full of leaves, ashed flag, jolly ranchers wrapper, lying at the bottom of Kevin's drive, Super 8 all over you *boink*.

The shopping bags ref. could also be a passing hint at American Beauty shopping bag/American Dream, dissolution of theme. Just a nod.

But I don't think it is Anti-American. It doesn't fit with what the Josh is saying, with whom I agree to an extent (though I like the album).

Thank you David, that makes a lot of sense to me. When reading your post I immediately thought that saluting the fallen leaves in shopping bags could also mean saluting the American soldiers who died in a war (no specific one) whose corpses are then flown back to the States in these huge plastic bags. How are they called again?

Alex- body bags.
Having seen American Beauty, the shopping bag lyrics just remind me of the boy's video in the movie. Regardless of whether Jeff Tweedy was just tossing together words (which personally I suspect he was), this lyric from I Am Trying to Break Your Heart makes so little sense that I love it: You're quite a quiet domino bury me now Take off your band-aid cuz I don't believe in touchdowns.

My favourite line from Ashes of American Flags definitely is:

I shake like a toothache
When i hear myself sing

Tweedy can laugh about himself!

I know this is far-fetched craziness but continuing my "fallen leaves filling shopping bags" interpretation, the tree would be the United States and Tweedy sings of shopping bags as going to a war is like shopping for death. Though the American Beauty parallel is striking as well.

I think somewhere Bob Dylan said that he does not think a lot about the meaning of his lyrics when writing them. He lets the others interpret them. And there are usually millions of interpretations. That is the art of writing good lyrics or poems I guess.

david- fair enough.

But this just shows that speculation on lyrics is useless at the end of the day. I'm english and I took that from an anti-american perspective (since sept 11th, also american foreig policy and so on).

That's why i restrict myself to sound itself (and the ound of the voice and how it interacts w/sound that the group makes) and from that perspective Wilco don't do enough for me.

Ha, Julio see my blog for my Dark Night of the Lyric/Soul.

(Curious, why restrict yrself?)

because first of all i can't register lyrics when i am listening to a record, more the sound of the voice. So a correction, i don't restrict myself, it's just that i find it hard to listen to lyrics.

but then you're trying to interpret lyrics and most reviewers do that to interpret what the 'artist' is thinking and that can lead to all sorts of shit that i read in record reviews.

I mean: Dylan is a poet you know? and that horse shit.

sorry no ? but an ! mark on the post above.

I like YHF pretty well, but Tweedy's lyrics sometimes make me wince. I like him best when he doesn't try so hard: "War on War" works for me because it's simple and perversely inane, "Heavy Metal Drummer" because it's not afraid to be emotionally direct. For the most part, the strained metaphors and evasive symbolism don't do much for me.

that's funny, 'heavy metal drummer' is one of the ones I want to pick on

There's no such thing as "sound itself".

that's funny, 'heavy metal drummer' is one of the ones I want to pick on

I dunno - it makes me feel warm fuzzy feelings.

It's hard for me to explain why I like abstract metaphor and symbolism when Bob Dylan or Stephen Malkmus does it, but why I don't like it when Jeff Tweedy does it. I think it's partly in the delivery, and partly in the sense of humor - or rather Tweedy's apparent lack of same.

Heavy metal drummer comes across as fake, like he never actually liked heavy metal music at all. I think he has a slight Mark Kozelek complex. And on the second(?) song he tries really hard to be Ryan Adams. The one that goes "honey, cheer up".

The "experimental" noise on this record is totally pointless, it's not integrated with the songs - just pasted at the end. I don't like the vague lyrics either, especially since I heard that they don't actually mean much. For me that is the worst type of lyrics.

doomie is dead right. "I am trying to break your heart" sounds like an under (over?) produced "Downs".

right about the sister lovers comparison I mean.

You 'heard the lyrics don't mean much,' Marc? Do you ever decide the meaning for yourself?

Q:

How come Tweedy is getting shit for his supposedly oblique lyrics when mister Convolution Disquised As Depth Bob Dylan has uttraly, at certain points, been propelled by it? Nuggets of strained words free passed as "oracular wisdom"?

Decide my own meaning from random words? No.

It was actually Jeff Tweedy himself that said the lyrics didn't mean much.