MERGED ----> Wilco - Sky Blue Sky

[elevation2u]

What Light

 

[gump]

Only one song???

 

[elevation2u]

yep, but it was worth it
i'm sure it will show up
on them youtoobs

 

[joyfulgirl]

So I was traveling on Tuesday when this was released and picked up a copy on the road. After two listens on the roadtrip I started getting upset because I wasn't loving it, and I've never not loved a Wilco record on the first listen (except for A.M.). It took 3 or 4 listens to start getting into it. I've no doubt its subtleties will start revealing themselves to me but for the moment I'm enjoying it but not crazy in love with it. But I can tell it's a grower.

 

[Westport]

I had been listening to this a couple of months ago when it leaked but then put it aside. But then I put it on again after dinner tonight after buying it on Tuesday.

All I can say....a beautiful Southern California night, having the top down, listening to the cranked up guitar solo on Impossible Germany while coming back from Malibu on the PCH with the Pacific on my right =

This is a great album.

 

[gump]

For those who have bought the album, you can watch the webcast from their concert in London on Sunday. Just put the CD in your computer and click on the extras folder.

 

[Tarvark]

I’ve found this album to be the most appealing Wilco endeavour yet. I think it’s comparable to a Harvest, Harvest Moon or Prairie Wind Neil Young album, Wilco having put some cords behind their country and blues inclinations. The music is tight and cohesive, songs like ‘You Are My Face’ serving to illustrate the cohesive sort of climate the recording stuio much have been steeped in.

I think if you gave Kicking Televisions a few spins you might have picked up the direction Wilco was heading in when they pressed record on these songs. Hating It Here standing as a good example of good steeping bridge between the sort of prolonged jams I liked so much on Television and the material that ended up on Sky.

I’m really enjoying it. It’s very much in the vein of Neil Young, Paul McCartney (Chaos and Creation), The Band, Crosby, Stills and Nash, and I suppose it might even be in the same genius as the Grateful Dead maybe?

Those descriptions supply at best an ill fit but still, I love this album. I really do. It’s comforting. It’s reminiscent of summer evenings. It’s enormously familiar, not in a derivative way but in a reassuring sense. I am really looking forward to having it on in the summer. It gets my vote for the best album of the year thus far.

 

[joyfulgirl]

I’ve found this album to be the most appealing Wilco endeavour yet. I think it’s comparable to a Harvest, Harvest Moon or Prairie Wind Neil Young album, Wilco having put some cords behind their country and blues inclinations. The music is tight and cohesive, songs like ‘You Are My Face’ serving to illustrate the cohesive sort of climate the recording stuio much have been steeped in.

I think if you gave Kicking Televisions a few spins you might have picked up the direction Wilco was heading in when they pressed record on these songs. Hating It Here standing as a good example of good steeping bridge between the sort of prolonged jams I liked so much on Television and the material that ended up on Sky.

I’m really enjoying it. It’s very much in the vein of Neil Young, Paul McCartney (Chaos and Creation), The Band, Crosby, Stills and Nash, and I suppose it might even be in the same genius as the Grateful Dead maybe?

Those descriptions supply at best an ill fit but still, I love this album. I really do. It’s comforting. It’s reminiscent of summer evenings. It’s enormously familiar, not in a derivative way but in a reassuring sense. I am really looking forward to having it on in the summer. It gets my vote for the best album of the year thus far.

That's a really nice post. I'm enjoying it, too. I guess overall I prefer pop/rock Wilco to more countryish Wilco but yeah, I am looking forward to sitting in the backyard with a beer and Sky Blue Sky this summer. Comforting, reassuring, but with the depth we've all come to expect with Tweedy's lyrics.

 

[impy13]

It's finally grown on me and I've accepted it for what it is and what the band wants it to be. It's not my favorite Wilco album by a long shot, but I'm finding plenty of things to love about it. I like.

 

[Tarvark]

It's finally grown on me and I've accepted it for what it is and what the band wants it to be. It's not my favorite Wilco album by a long shot, but I'm finding plenty of things to love about it. I like.

I understand where you are coming from and understand the sort of criticism and ire the album has drawn from the fan community.

But I think your approach is perfect. People need to give it a few listens and take it for what it is. Wilco has always operated in a coherent and consistent way, each album guided by a specific musical vision.

I think the philosophy of tight musicianship and almost lazy rhythm will translate really well in to the live show.

I also like how the album looks to shape the long term. This is a great rooster for the band, working well together and sounding like they really enjoy each other.

I think if they do some sort of composite type album next, where they incorporate pieces of the solid pop of Summerteeth in to the winding complexities of Yankee, held together by the sort of musicianship and musical tradition of Sky, I think you've got the perfect album ray:

And actually I can see that happening.

But before I get a head of my self, I am going to keep on really enjoying this album and would recommend it to anyone looking for that summer defining album.

 

[BonoIsMyMuse]

Amazon is taking forever to ship my copy

 

[joyfulgirl]

I was lurking over at viachicago.org and, damn, Wilco fans are smart, insightful, hilarious and good writers. I'm going to lurk over there more often.

Anyway, I liked what this person said about SBS as part of a discussion of the terrible Pitchfork 5.2 review:

Pitchfork is a very worthy music site, but they can be baffling at times.

The below quotes could almost apply for Sky Blue Sky, but are actually Pitchfork quotes from an album that got an 8.2 rating:

"beautiful moments-- even when the songs themselves aren't particularly engrossing"

"The (album) is so confident that its strangeness could easily go unnoticed"

"meandering tunefully through subtle but effective changes in texture and tone"

"doesn't provoke deep absorption or self-reflection so much as a kind of fond familiarity"

These are quotes from Bonnie "Prince" Billy's very good album, "The Letting Go".

Of course, Bonnie sings about love lost or love desired and sounds pained and sad throughout....y'know....he's a suffering artist. How dare Jeff Tweedy sing songs of hope! How dare Tweedy write lyrics that are more gray than black and white!
Had Rob Mitchum gave the disc more of his time, perhaps he would have written something as profound as this quote from Popmatters' review:

I've listened to the album countless times, and am fairly steeped in the consternation, confusion, and griping surrounding its songs, production, direction, lyrics, etc., in the reams of web and other chatter. No doubt you're familiar with it as well, even if you haven't heard the record yet, which, where the hell have you been? I can also understand a lot of the present and future complains with Sky Blue Sky, because at various points I've shared them: the album is too slick, oddly unexperimental, straightforward, sentimental, embarrassingly direct. But lately I've had to face the awkward truth that despite my initial misgivings, I've listened to the album more than any other released in 2007 thus far, and there's no stopping in sight.

 

[joyfulgirl]

For those who have bought the album, you can watch the webcast from their concert in London on Sunday. Just put the CD in your computer and click on the extras folder.

Now how did they do that?

 

[gump]

there is a file in the CD that will take you to the stream of the concert. It's all I know (sorry, not too good with technology!).

 

[BonoIsMyMuse]

I also mostly lurk over at Via Chicago. I think I've only made two or three posts. My screen name over there is 3 dollars and 63 cents.

 

[nightninja56]

impossible germany

 

[impy13]

My screen name over there is 3 dollars and 63 cents.

Diet Coca Cola




(and unlit cigarettes)

 

[U2Man]

cut all the bs talk, bitches. sky blue sky is awesome


you are my face

side with the seeds

impossible germany

leave me like you found me

on and on and on

 

[gump]

^
either way

sky blue sky

what light

walken (specially the dvd version)

 

[joyfulgirl]

After repeated listenings now, I think it's just okay. But I'm okay with that.

 

[Chizip]

Diet Coca Cola




(and unlit cigarettes)

so you must be dietcokeofevil then

 

[BonoIsMyMuse]

Diet Coca Cola




(and unlit cigarettes)

That's such a damn pretty song. It's probably one of my favorites by them, though it seems like I have a lot of favorite Wilco songs. They didn't play it when I saw them last summer, so I'm hoping they'll play it when I see them next month.

 

[gump]

Shepherds Bush Webcast

So far:

Side With the Seeds
You Are My Face
I Am Trying to Break Your Heart
Handshake Drugs
A Shot in the Arm
Impossible Germany
Sky Blue Sky
At Least That's What You Said

 

[Lancemc]

The ONLY songs on this album I'm not absolutely IN LOVE with are Shake it Off and Walken. And even those two are still excellent.

 

[gump]

Shepherds Bush Webcast

Side With the Seeds
You Are My Face
I Am Trying to Break Your Heart
Handshake Drugs
A Shot in the Arm
Impossible Germany
Sky Blue Sky
At Least That's What You Said
Shake it Off
Muzzle of Bees
Hummingbird
Via Chicago
Jesus, Etc
Walken
I'm the Man Who Loves You

The Late Greats
War on War
Poor Places
Spiders (Kidsmoke)

 

[gump]

Shepherds Bush Webcast - Final Setlist

Side With the Seeds
You Are My Face
I Am Trying to Break Your Heart
Handshake Drugs
A Shot in the Arm
Impossible Germany
Sky Blue Sky
At Least That's What You Said
Shake it Off
Muzzle of Bees
Hummingbird
Via Chicago
Jesus, Etc
Walken
I'm the Man Who Loves You

The Late Greats
War on War
Poor Places
Spiders (Kidsmoke)

What Light
Airline to Heaven
Be Not So Fearful (with Bill Fay)

 

[impy13]

Nice setlist.


I've got a rip of this bonus disc that was only available at a small number of independent record stores as an extra for Sky Blue Sky. It has a song called One True Vine and a dandy live version of one of my favorite Wilco tunes, Theologians. You guyz want me to upload them?

Edit: Aw, jeez. I know you guys will want them. Here you go:

One True Vine
http://www.send space.com/file/le3r7m

Theologians (Live)
http://www.send space.com/file/5vvibb


Allow me to stress that this isn't commercially available material.

 

[elevation2u]

Today I'm infatuated with Side With The Seeds,
which I was skeptical about the first two listens,
but this album literally only gets better with each listen. There is much depth and rich layers in every song awaiting to be discovered with each lsiten. Though, I must embarrassingly admit that at first listen the album seemed slightly daft, lazy and slow, and thankfully I quickly came to realize the error of my ways.

 

[gump]

thanks immyplace13, i was looking for that!

 

[U2Man]

yes thanks imp13, so was i.


and i've got something in my pocket that you bitches would kill for.