Album review: Wilco - Wilco (The Album)

Published on Friday 26 June 2009 17:16

WILCO Wilco (The Album) **** NONESUCH 7559798496

Something of a wolf in sheep's clothing, Jeff Tweedy's new album flirts with electro in the process of playing the soft rock straight card. His poetry has never sounded so noir and paranoid – "I can't calm down, I can't think" he frets on the epic Bull Black Nova, which sounds like it ends drenched in cold sweat.

The contrast is supplied immediately with the sweetly strummed You And I, and that, as ever with Wilco records, is the charm, the gentle diversity that can take you from chilling out to something that genuinely chills. You Never Know bounces along like an Elton John piano pounder from the Seventies, with George Harrison on slide guitar, coloured with Tweedy's resigned refrain "I don't care any more".

Nels Cline embellishes with clever guitar motifs, from steel work imitating Hawaiian birdsong to chunky pub rock chords on Sonny Feeling. Deeper Down is where Tweedy's storytelling is best heard, studded with the detail of a Chandler or Leonard, populated by punchdrunk worthies struggling to stay on their feet.

Melodies? Well, One Wing takes a bit of beating, the guitar hook soaring defiantly to a groaning climax. Then the closing Everlasting Everything demonstrates that devastating ability to do the simple thing brilliantly as Tweedy has done so often in the past.

Not his best album, but maybe five of his best songs.

Download this: Deeper Down, Bull Black Nova