Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

Aw man, I wish I did file sharing then but I didn't have good internet at home, just at the library or school.

Very much think of it as 2001 album--listened to the mp3s so much before the physical release, to the degree I forgot it was so much later.

There's a new podcast called Kitschfork whose first episode covers this album. The hosts look at the album itself in detail and consider the massive press response to it as part of their overall project of looking back at Pitchfork's influence in the 00's indie music scene. I thought it was pretty interesting!

anybody heard this?

(a few of the tracks are certainly not new to me, but the rest would be.)

the early "hummingbird" from the unified theory of everything disc would be right at home on amnesiac

this version of "i am trying to break your heart" stays permanently in drones + wild percussion mode, cool to hear but really emphasises how much the album was a triumph of the mixing desk

"ashes of american flags (stravinsky mix)" is really cool

lmao the wah pedal that's all through "pot kettle black" is so goofy

oh wow this "poor places" is the biggest difference, totally different arrangement

where are you hearing this

it's out on streaming today

ahhh!

cannot find it in the UK though

it's listed as 'yankee hotel foxtrot (deluxe edition)'

though the digital release isn't the full boxset, it's missing the other three discs of outtakes/demos/early versions, so i haven't heard those yet

found it thanks.

Unified Theory is not simply Jay's mix then? What is it?

it's definitely not his mix (i don't think he made a full mix of the album to begin with, only a few tracks), it's just a set of alternate versions of tracks from what's clearly fairly far along in the process - though i expect the full liner notes in the boxset explains it. they spent a long time messing around in the studio recording many different arrangements of every track & it's some of the results of that + an early version of "hummingbird" that didn't make the album. some of the arrangements are very different from the final version, & some are just incomplete and in an earlier state or only part of what was used in the final mix. "ashes of american flags (stravinsky mix)" was intended for the final album though but they couldn't clear the stravinsky sample that goes throughout the entire track originally.

combined with the long-ago-leaked "engineer demo" collections that also probably make up some of the other discs in the set it's an extremely cool insight into the creative process of the album

Damn I wanted to splurge the whole super deluxe in one go but this will suffice for now

I'm reading some reports elsewhere from those who have the CDs of the full set, saying that the third disc is very 'Jay-esque'... the presence of Venus and Shakin' Sugar would only add to that

seeing reports that some of the other discs include some of the well-bootlegged demos/studio wip versions but a lot is still completely new

That does not bother me as those boots were goldmine to begin with

I love YHF but these alternate mixes really highlight how truly bad it could have been. It's a near miracle that Jim O'Rourke managed to pull off what he did.

Full-band Venus Stopped The Train is what I now want to hear though. I always wondered if the Ken Coomer appearances on the songs that reappears on the Bennet/Burch album had anything to do with repurposing tracks laid down during the YHF sessions

xpost much of the stuff that has just come out sounds like entirely different takes though? Pot Kettle Black possibly being one expection

Listening again now and I think the Stravinsky version of Ashes is another performance entirely. Hence you get the second outro which resembles that from the album

some of them are different versions entirely while some of them sound like they were heavily used in the final mixes - "i am trying to break your heart" was clearly edited together from this drones & percussion version as well as other takes such as the rhodes-driven version on the engineer demos bootleg, "radio cure" is pretty close to the final just the drums are different & it's missing a lot of the keyboard parts from the final version, "jesus, etc." seems to just be missing the strings, and so on

"ashes of american flags" isn't a different performance entirely but there are still a lot of differences from the final apart from just the sample - the drums are different (iirc bennett played the take that was used on the final version while it sounds like the stravinsky mix was kotche), there's a lot of synths added in places in the final version to try to capture the feeling of the removed sample & the way the main piano & guitar fade in and out is different

Nice. Are there detailed credits in the box? Can hear what sounds like Jeff lead guitar on the Stravinsky version too

Never knew Jay drummed on the final version either. Only now I can notice it's obviously not Glenn. Always assume the even earlier version that leaked in 2002 was Ken "not feeling the song" but no idea now.

the most 'who plays what' info we have available for yhf is just from this interview with bennett where he lists what he played on each track: https://gloriousnoise.com/jay-bennett-yhf

ah apparently the story with the stravinsky mix was that it's just a rough mix from when they were playing around with the idea of using the sample, but they found out they couldn't get clearance before the final mix was finished or anything which is why there's still a bunch of other changes

ooh there's a lovely full-band take of "venus stopped the train" on the american aquarium disc

The Stravinsky mix:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOMOB0I7rOc

As is, once it gets past the intro, I'm not sure it really works - it feels a little sloppy at times, like it needs more finessing. Very interesting though.

(To clarify, I mean the mix and getting the sample to really work within it.)

I listened to some of this box set today and I think Tweedy should send Jim O'Rourke a bouquet of flowers once a week for the rest of his life

Paul Ponzi otm.

agreed so far. I like the sorta mangled “when the levee breaks” drum take on the unified theory take.

It's not something I'd want to buy, but it plays like a great collection for a research library - something I'd explore only once or twice, but invaluable in showing how this album was made.

there's a few real gems & it's an absolutely fascinating insight into the creative process behind it, one of the very best as far as these sort of deluxe reissues go

Absolutely. I knew a lot was written (or rather speculated) in terms of how the album evolved, and I remember Kot (either in his book or elsewhere at the time) mentioning that one of the big misconceptions surrounding the album was that O'Rourke was all about adding experimental elements to it when he mainly took thing out as if he was distilling the mix. Even with those details, it still left a lot to the imagination, so it's really edifying to have these recordings finally available.

*took things

I started off thinking 'the song is strong enough to survive anything' but jeez, I had to turn it off about 2 minutes in. The drums are actively annoying.

the one song that _is_ more experimental in the final mix is "poor places", very different from all the earlier takes. i'm up to the barrel-scraping "lonely in the deep end" disc now.

barrel-scraping

I'm surprised no one's been cheeky enough to title a box set bonus disc that very phrase.

From these descriptions it sounds like 'yankee hotel foxtrot (drag city edition)' -- messing around in ways that could be unlistenable or brilliant or both.

I'm surprised no one's been cheeky enough to title a box set bonus disc that very phrase.

― birdistheword

https://gentlegiantmusic.com/GG/Scraping_the_Barrel

From these descriptions it sounds like 'yankee hotel foxtrot (drag city edition)' -- messing around in ways that could be unlistenable or brilliant or both.

― The self-titled drags (Eazy)

you could definitely put together an "all-avant-garde" version of the album from the stuff here. maybe i'll work on that project!

the album version of "poor places" is so different because restructuring it so radically was o'rourke's idea so that happened at a very late stage in the process

ok, i went ahead and did it:

Lost on the Sidewalk: The Unlistenable _Yankee Hotel Foxtrot_

Finally, Wilco has their own _Black Belt in Boogie_ - an unlistenably avant-garde record that everybody hates and which probably _isn't_ releasable. I am, of course, a staunch defender. The haters may claim that the John Bonham drums on "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart" are way overmixed, that the talkbox on "Pot Kettle Black" is wholly unnecessary, that the overly obtrusive Stravinsky interpolation and the gratuitous use of numbers stations recordings ruin what otherwise would be perfectly fine songs, that the keyboard wobble and woozy Mellotron on "Reservations" is way overdone, that "Has Anybody Seen My Pencil?" is obviously an unfinished jam that _maybe_ could have been a song if they'd done some actual work on it, that for God's sake they had perfectly good songs like "Jesus, Etc.", "A Magazine Called Sunset", and "Shakin' Sugar" that would have been _greatly_ improved the album, maybe replacing something like the obvious Radiohead knockoff "Remember to Remember". Nonsense. The album is _perfect as it is_. Y'all just don't appreciate the sublime artistry of Jeff Tweedy and Jay Bennett.

I Am Trying To Break Your Heart (The Unified Theory of Everything)
Kamera (The Unified Theory of Everything)
Radio Cure (Here Comes Everybody)
Has Anybody Seen My Pencil? (Lonely in the Deep End)
Venus Stopped the Train (American Aquarium)
I'm the Man Who Loves You (American Aquarium)
Ashes of American Flags (Stravinsky Mix) (The Unified Theory of Everything)
Pot Kettle Black (The Unified Theory of Everything)
Remember to Remember (The Unified Theory of Everything)
Poor Places (Yankee Hotel Foxtrot)
Reservations (The Unified Theory of Everything)

there's a 6 minute version of "poor places" on the long-ago bootlegged 'engineer demos' collection (but unfortunately left off the boxset) that's clearly an early take of the new structure that o'rourke came up with - the piano is still a fair-bit more bar-band than the album version etc. - so i'd include that version on that