Friends, I've been on a brief hiatus... got the flu, then I got Holy Week and Easter, then I got a few days off to go see John Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg at Eden Seminary's Spring Convocation, and then it was back to work...
It's a bit like John Cleese in "The Holy Grail" when he claims that a witch turned into a newt. And, once everyone is looking at him and obviously though he looks a bit newtish, he's not a newt. The punch line is "I got better."
So, although I've been listening to a lot of great new music, I haven't been here writing about it in a while. I got sick, got busy, got distracted and then got better. Maybe soon, I'll just have to write a quick recap of discs that slid by in the mean time... but first:
"ASHES OF AMERICAN FLAGS," Wilco, (Nonesuch/Trixie DVDs)
If there's a better, more interesting, more fun American band working today, I don't know about them. Look, I'm not saying anything bad about Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers or Kings of Leon - two of the classic American rock genre bands that come to mind, one a classic the other a crisp, gritty bright spot that may turn out to be more than a flash in the pan - I'm just saying that I find the unique, smart blend of Americana roots music, an educated appreciation of the rock music lexicon, and commitment to make something of all this that is an honest expression of the here and now. It's as connected to the music of the Mississippi valley from Minneapolis to Chicago and down to New Orleans, yet remains profoundly fresh and thoroughly modern. It's got something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue... and so much more.
And of course, when I say Wilco I mostly mean Jeff Tweedy. I first interviewed Tweedy back with his then partner Jay Farrar, back Uncle Tupelo was still a three-some. I remember sitting in the kitchen of their run-down apartment, being grilled about what I was listening to, before they would really settle down and answer my questions about their new, third album. I have a couple great memories of beer drenched nights with that trio at their early best, playing crowded confines of Cicero's Basement Bar. Later, I would get to sell some quotes to RollingStone magazine when the 5-piece Tupelo was breaking up, just as I thought they had matured enough for prime time... It's still not clear to me how it all went down, but Farrar was out and Tweedy went on with the remaining Tupes to form Wilco. I interviewed the entire band for Billboard magazine, sitting in the cramped upstairs office of Tony Margherita in Maplewood, MO, around their debut, "A.M." Jeff and Tony moved on, but I lived and worked near there for another 13 years or so... and loved walking by that old building, above an empty, abandoned pharmacy, and looking up at those empty windows and thinking... it's places like this that real music, real rock & roll gets birthed. Well, at least conceived, it's birthed on the stage.
And if that's the case, then this new film, about the last incarnation of Tweedy's sojourn as a post-modern, rootsy Americana, singer-songwriter, troubadour, noisy rocker and paradox, is capturing some rare, lovely live birth footage.
But it's not Wilco's first movie either. "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart" captured the then-Wilco at the time of the making of "Yankee Foxtrot Hotel," which was really as much about the ending of the band as it was as it was the creation of Tweedy's next masterpiece, this time a commercial breakthrough. You see, Wilco's second and third albums, "Being There" and "Summerteeth" were pretty amazing... I mean brilliant. And to my mind, the Ken Coomer/Jay Bennett era Wilco had finally returned to the musical potency and depth of the "Anodyne"-era Uncle Tupelo when performing live. It's like Tweedy gets something built up, both in catalog, musical chops and personal chemistry, until it reaches it's creative potential... and he has to deconstruct it, switch it up, move on to the next set of creative challenges. But again, it's a paradox. He kept bassist John Stirrat by his side, even as he let go of Coomer and Bennett, and I remember mourning the loss of that band, that unique unit, almost as much as when the Tupelo quit. But I'm not a slow learner, and I began to suspect that Tweedy would do it again.
And, of course, he has. But again, the transition wasn't immediate, and required time to ripen, evolve, come of age. The first couple times I saw them as the new version was coming together--Glenn Kotche on drums/percussion, Mikael Jorgensen on piano, and Leroy Bach on guitars, etc.--I loved the powerful new Tweedy songs from "Foxtrot" and Grammy winning "A Ghost Is Born" but was still less than blown away by the band live... but it got better. When Bach left and rock god guitarist Nels Cline and guitars/key player Pat Sansone came on board, the "Kicking Television" live album and tour not only found things coming together in a great way live, but again Tweedy & Co. had taken it to the next level. And that band is the band on the quieter, more songwriter driven "Sky Blue Sky," which some found underwhelming, but again... after all this time, I don't take anything for granted as Tweedy's ongoing, unfolding, multi-layored talent. Like Dylan and Van Morrison, and not unlike R.E.M. and Radiohead, I'm willing to put up with some ebb as long as there's flow... I don't mind the valleys as long as there's another mountain on the other side... at least nobody turned him into a newt.
So, as you've figured by now, "Ashes" captures this current era of Wilco, again at the top of it's game. Film-makers Brendan Canty & Christoph Green captured 13 live songs for their movie (there are seven more in the DVD Extras) in five distinctive American venues, several legendary--Cain's Ballroom in Tulsa, Tipitina's in New Orleans, Mobile Civic Center in Mobile, Al., the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, and 9:30 Club in Washington D.C. Most of the music is from the more recent releases, but "Kingpin" goes back to "Being There," and "Shot in the Arm" from "Summerteeth" bring the best of the earlier era.
But the unique mix of singable pop/rock like "Handshake Drugs" and "Heavy Metal Drummer," the hints of country here and there and in the title track, the unashamed classic rock references and the unrepentant love of feedback, noise and the crash & burn frenetics that Cline can unleash like few modern rockers that come to mind--these are the makings of some of the most masterful, emotionally raw and vital rock music that you're likely to hear anywhere.
Cline is a monster, but this band all rocks hard when the chips are down, and they also know the power or reining it in, the pull of the quiet that makes the loud all the more potent. Kotche also shines, but it's the way this combo works together, churning and grinding, yet not losing sight of the song, Tweedy's lyrical and melodic intent in all the frenetic energy. Take "Via Chicago" which finds Tweedy in folk ballad mode which must have been imagined on an underpass near Ohare, as it sounds like a 747 is landing right on top of the band, twice. This is a great band, and good, very good movie, that catches these fun, flashy, yet often humble and workmanlike performances. When they achieve greatness, they never lose sight that they are all cogs in the wheel, but they are always in service to this bigger thing.
Together with the music and the fine performances, Canty and Green give a glimpse of life on the road, beautiful highway visuals, views of the cities where they play, and storytelling of what makes this band, these venues, this musical experience so very special.
As for Wilco, there's talk for a new, seventh CD by summer. I can't wait, but this quick burst of live music, some with Wilco backed by the Total Pros horn section, gives a bright, beautiful time capsule. I hope this doesn't mean that Tweedy's about to be turned into a newt again... but either way, I'm confident he'll keep getting better.
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