Moozik

Excellent Joe Klein piece in The New York Times today, ostensibly reviewing a book about Wilco. But Klein ends up talking more about Jeff Tweedy than about the book, which is fine with me. Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is one of the best albums of the past five years, and I expect their new album- A Ghost is Born- to be equally amazing.

For those of you who have yet to check out alt-country, Wilco is probably a good place to start (or else Tweedy's former bandmate in Uncle Tupelo, Jay Farrar's Son Volt). It is not overly twangy and has a healthy dose or ironic, indie rock feel to it (Son Volt has a higher quotient of rawk).

In today's music world, success is determined by how much a record label can grease the palms of program directors at the radio station megalopolies. No matter where you spin the dial (except to the far left end) you will hear the same tripe as you see on emptyvee and vh1. And gullible consumers (lemming-like) follow whatever the media say is the latest trend.

Bands like Wilco are a breath of fresh air (even though they are on a Warner Bros. subsidiary) in today's stale, corporate rock wasteland.