b r a n d o n

Wilco's landmark Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was the most overhyped album of the past few years, which is remarkable given that it was also one of the finest albums of the past few years. Followups to albums which receive such universal acclaim from both critics and fans are always potentially disastrous; but somehow, Wilco have managed to stay mostly on track. A Ghost is Born simultaneously looks back, touching fondly on Wilco's multifaceted past, and fowards, boldly experimenting with motorik beats and extended noise freakouts. It has been fun to follow the confused reaction to this album from indie-rock critics. The two centerpieces of A Ghost is Born are arguably the two epic-length tracks, "Spiders (Kidsmoke)" and "Less Than You Think," and it's these tracks that have been the subject of serious critical consternation. Seems like 80% of the reviews I've read of this album have spoken derogatively of the band's newfound self-indulgence, its fondness for atonal guitar solos, its pretension in marring perfectly good songs by making them twice as long as they should be or adding eight minutes of meaningless noise. Yet those same reviews end by saying "this is a great album by a groundbreaking band." It's as if Wilco has become the indie-rock sacred cow: we don't really know what the hell these guys are doing here, and we're not sure we like it, but it's Wilco! it must be good. Luckily, we in the prog community have no such problems. After all, we're prog fans. We like pretentious shit! We like meaningless noise and self-indulgent guitar solos! No cognitive dissonance here! In all seriousness, A Ghost is Born is probably slightly inferior to the bombshell that came before it. The middle section of the album is generally composed of the sort of immaculate but slightly skewed pop songs that made Yankee Hotel Foxtrot so memorable - only they're not quite so memorable this time around. The style of these songs ranges from relatively upbeat, occasionally bouncy numbers like "Hummingbird" that remind of XTC or The Beatles (and Wilco's own Summerteeth) to the sort of downtrodden but beautiful vocal-centered songs present on the previous album; of these, "Wishful Thinking" and "Company in My Back" are easily the best. That said, the really interesting stuff is in the first third of the record: things start off promisingly with "At Least That's What You Said" - a two-minute pop song with a wonderful melody followed by a three-minute guitar freakout that's good enough to make me completely forget about the song section that precedes it (thus indelibly marking me as a Prog fan with a capital P). "Spiders (Kidsmoke)" features a static, looped Krautrock beat through virtually its entire 10+ minute playing time, which bandleader Jeff Tweedy proceeds to bury under awe-inspiring squalls of tortured guitar noise. The motorik beat is interrupted here and there by more conventionally melodic and rhythmic rock-out sections, and the contrast between all these elements makes this one a real great song. Most reviewers seem to think it's about twice as long as it needs to be; perhaps it is, but I never get tired of it. The other controversial piece is "Less Than You Think," which is a nice song followed by a long section of noise sans melody or rhythm. Despite my proud proclamation of my appreciation for meaningless noise, the kind of noise featured here isn't anything to get excited about. In this case, accusations of pretension may well be warranted, as the "noise" section of this song does nothing to add to either song or album. A Ghost is Born fails to live up to its tremendous predecessor; it lacks that album's thematic continuity and its knack for packaging simple, beautiful songs in elaborate, fascinating layers of arrangement and production. But Wilco is to be commended for continuing to play music on their own terms, refusing to conform to expectations, and exploring new styles with every release. Future work by this band should be particularly interesting, given that noted avant-jazz guitarist Nels Cline has signed on as a full-time member - a brilliant coup which managed to infuriate both avant-jazz fanatics and indie-rockers already upset with the growing prevalence of inaccessible guitar solos in Wilco's work. As far as I'm concerned, as long as Wilco continues to push the boundaries of pop and indie-rock, I don't really care who they infuriate. More power to them. review by Brandon Wu — 2-2-05 —