Wilco will love you

Wilco (the album) starts off with "Wilco (the song)" where Jeff Tweedy asks "Are you dabbling in depression?" before getting to the chorus: "Wilco will love you". One minute into their new record, you have to ask if they are joking or not.

Are Wilco trying to make an album that defines their sound? Even their biggest fans, myself included, can't figure out what "their sound" is - that's why we love them. They've put out great alt-country (Being There), avant-garde pop (Summerteeth), dark electric folk (A Ghost Is Born), and a masterpiece that I can't even really describe (Yankee Hotel Foxtrot). What is their sound?

Despite the self mockery of the first track, it's a great song with a churning guitar that sounds like early Velvet Underground; I think this one will kill live. Most of the rest of the album is even better. "One Wing" is a building mid-tempo ballad with some inspired guitar work from Nels Cline. "Bull Black Nova" picks up where "Spiders (Kidsmoke)" left off with its driving staccato guitar rhythm - they just kept it short this time.

The ballads aren't the highlights here, but they are short and interesting and don't take momentum away from the record the way they did on Wilco's disappointing last release Sky Blue Sky. "You and I", featuring a nice backup vocal from Feist, is the cutest song Tweedy ever wrote (granted, he really doesn't do cute).

The album finishes on some good but not great country rockers. Overall, this isn't the best Wilco album, but it is a nice addition to the catalog and it sets them up to go in a dozen directions next. They've earned the right to put out an album with few experiments - it's a recap of their strengths, of which they have plenty. With six months to go in 2009, they are at least in the conversation for best American rock band of the decade, so they have laurels to rest on.