#20 Wilco – Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
Their apex. The story of YHF has been told many times about a record company (Warner Bros.) selling the album back to the band due to the fact the record company did not like it. In the meantime the record gets leaked and creates a tremendous buzz among fans and critics alike. A subsidiary of Warner Bros. (Nonesuch Records) ends up buying the album back from the band for a profit on top of signing a record deal with Wilco. This album creates an aura around it, possibly due to some of the overriding themes of the album and the fact that it was around 9/11. Where this album stunned was with the addition of Glen Kotche on drums whose percussion was central in it’s sound.
It’s the Wilco album with the magic. It is the one, if you have not paid attention to them yet, to start with and I think that theme wise it’s not just good songs but topics that feel a little broader than Wilco’s typical relationship blues.
The title of the album came from a recording that Tweedy had listened to that went by the name of “The Conant Project” which included individuals giving transmissions to spies. A section of this recording ended up on the song “Poor Places”, and thus also became the title.
The combination of the title, the aura of putting a photo of Marina Towers in Chicago made several allusions to the events of 9/11 but the fact remains is that while the album had been released after 9/11, the entire album had been completed and sent to the record company (and rejected), in early summer.
But the topics were grander and just fit for the moment. “Ashes Of American Flags”, Tweedy suggests, ‘I wonder why we listen to poets, nobody gives a fuck”, and it has often just punched me in the face. I guess the easiest way to describe it would be like going to a Wilco show and sitting there talking to your friend all night. The concept of going to a rock concert is a fairly anti-social endeavor. If I am truly interested in going to see a band live, I am spending that money to go see that band live and not to talk to you. How do you value the artist? That individual is writing shit on a piece of paper and making it public and you have decided to pay good money to talk away to your friend and that I do not understand.
On a larger scale how do you view the concept of America, as Tweedy alludes that it would appear that it’s not “Freedom” we are fighting for but “Convenience”.
The concept of the album feels more central around a general disillusionment with our society. Listeners were dealing with post 9/11 thoughts and the tragedy that had surrounded us and had to examine what did America really mean as well as the relationships that we had.
Behind the blips, the psychedelic sounds was something very visual to me. I often remembered just walking about the city and staring at the buildings, the lights and the people when I would listen and figure that this feeling is not going to end anytime soon.