Or, at the very least, never stopped being Wilco. Ode To Joy is for private contemplation on headphones only. Anyone who cares about indie rock already knows that Wilco is one of the best and most important acts of the last 25 years. Here are my 60 favorites plus one bonus track , though I could have included dozens more. They smile for the cameras, and even jump out of an airplane on snowboards. By the time of Summerteeth, Wilco was lacing its catchiest rockers with generous helpings of strychnine.
A sad yet quirky scrapbook into the wonderful world of Chicago's finest rockers
About Billboard
Jeff Tweedy was the junior partner in alt-country outfit Uncle Tupelo, playing bass and fronting the occasional song. The addition of multi-instrumentalist Jay Bennett was a huge asset for their band, his sonic sculptures shaping experimental records like Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and Summerteeth. Bennett was acrimoniously dismissed after the completion of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. The later era of the group has been bolstered by ace musicians like drummer Glenn Kotche and guitarist Nels Cline. Tweedy has always the emotional core of the band, his songs vulnerable and emotional. The motorik beat is straight from krautrock — Tweedy is a fan of German bands like Can and Neu! Tweedy wrote A Ghost Is Born while he was struggling with addiction, and used creature metaphors to communicate how he was feeling.
Wilco's Greatest Songs Ever
Wilco, perhaps more than any alternative rock band of the past couple years, has taken its listeners on a wild, unexpected journey through a confluence of diverse musical styles. The journey began with A. On Summerteeth the group expanded its sound exponentially. String sections, unconventional percussion, and complex keyboard songs peppered this collection of pop songs. With 's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot , Wilco went from being a solid, much admired alternative band to a musical and artistic institution. Critics recognized Yankee as not just an innovative musical effort, but one that was inflected with cultural significance.
Emerging from the rubble of alt-country godheads Uncle Tupelo in , Jeff Tweedy started Wilco as a straight-ahead Americana band with smart songwriting and checked affection. In many ways Being There felt like their real debut album, modestly stretching their instrumental boundaries and scratching the surface of more personal matters. It remains their only gold record. Essential Tracks came a couple of years ago. For this Greatest Hits entry it made sense to go in chronological order. Being There was a transitional album disguised as a magnum opus, its two CDs split between darkness and light in nearly equal proportions. After the breather of A. Summerteeth was the biggest hint yet that something might be up with Wilco. At the time it was the least subtle shift in their sound, ushering in a more diverse group of influences than Tweedy had allowed before.
