Music Review: Wilco - Sky Blue Sky

The Rhapsody music service delivers the goods today by providing the new Wilco album, Sky Blue Sky, a full week before it’s official release date. You can listen to it in full, for free, and in high quality through your browser by clicking here.

This new record finds the band settling back into a comfortable place. Instead of reaching for the artistic pinnacles of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and A Ghost is Born, Jeff Tweedy and company have crafted an album that is soft, steady and beautiful, yet deeper than first impressions reveal.

If you can truly be subjective about a new Wilco album, you’ll find yourself head over heals in love with this expansive, straight-forward gem of a record. However, expectations are high, and whining is inevitable. But don't let yourself be swayed by  naysayers, revilers and malcontents. Sky Blue Sky is worth the investment of your money and your time.

The relaxed dynamic at play here is not traveling the same highway we’ve been riding, but that underlying tension we've come to love so much from this band is still there. It's just more subtle. Part of the reason we love this band is because you never know what to expect next, and Sky Blue Sky continues the game of "stump the fan". Tweedy forges his own path, oblivious to the expectations of media or customer. Would we respect him in the morning if he did otherwise?

The brilliance is that Sky Blue Sky sounds simple on the surface, but upon lending a more attentive ear a hidden landscape suddenly opens up before you. The aural equivalent of an optical 3D stereogram.

Suggestion: Clear your mind, forget what’s come before and listen without preconditions. I know you can do it, you are after all, a Wilco fan.

Tracklisting:

1. Either Way
2. You Are My Face
3. Impossible Germany
4. Sky Blue Sky
5. Side With The Seeds
6. Shake It Off
7. Please Be Patient With Me
8. Hate It Here
9. Leave Me
10. Walken
11. What Light
12. On And On And On

Article Author: Robert Burke

Robert Burke spends much of his time lovingly crafting thematic music playlists for the Rhapsody Radish and the Yahoo Radish.

Visit Robert Burke's author page — Robert Burke's Blog