A ghost is exorcised

For a long time, I have managed to suppress memoried of a band called Living in a Box who promoted their album 'Living in a box' with the single 'Living in a box' (in 1987), but, strangely to report, Wilco, almost the antithesis of those 1980s' one-hit-wonders-thank-God' have made me think of them, with the first song of their new album 'Wilco', off their new album 'Wilco'; I have managed to forget completely and quite contentedly what the eponymous song by the earlier exponents of the triple-decker-name sounded like, but I am pretty sure it did not start off sounding like the Velvet Undergound's 'Waiting for the man', like the new example does.

Wilco came from the ashes of the very alt-country Uncle Tupelo, and didn't move too far for their debut, 'A.M.' (1995), although 'Being there' (1996) and, in particular, 'Summerteeth' (1999, to my mind, their masterpiece) were near-perfect collections of pop gems and lovely ballads (of which much more to follow), but then they went a bit experimental (2002's 'Yankee Hotel Foxtrot') and then very bloody experimental (2005's decidedly odd and a bit scary 'A ghost is born') and then retreated from the future to the 1970s (in 2007, if you can follow) with 'Sky blue sky'. In between they did two mixed but generally lovely albums of versions of unreleased Woodie Guthrie songs with Billy Bragg ('Mermaid Avenue volumes 1 and 2') and a good live album ('Kicking television').

They have really covered a lot of ground in their music, from country to Radiohead and, while they have gone through quite a few line-up changes, their mainstay, Jeff Tweedy, always struck me as a basically decent and very talented guy (as evidenced by the pretty brutally honest documentary 'I am trying to break your heart' and some recordings of live solo shows I have seen and heard).

My main concern today, or rather source or some excitement, is that Tweedy seems to have found what I regard as his true voice again. Missing from the last several albums has been that vulnerable hoarse quiet voice that was just made for quiet love-struck songs, not mad computer-driven hard drives of noise with lashings of angry guitar bolted on top. I mean the voice that starts 'Via chicago' with the wonderful line 'I dreamed about killing you last night and it felt alright to me', as seen below:

I mean the voice that sings the wonderful tribute to Paul Westerberg of the Replacements that is
'The lonely one' :

And I definetely mean the one that sings 'We're just friends'

I downloaded the new album Friday and listened to it in the car yesterday, and might as well have just spotted a space-ship in terms of my reaction when I heard 'You and I' and knew that wonderful voice was back again, long-lost but never forgotten. And then there was 'You never know' ('pure 'Summerteeth' pop excellence, existential clouds banished by piercing sunshine), and more downbeat familiarity in 'Country disappeared' and 'Everlasting Everything'.

Put in such familiar territory, the experimental flashes of songs like 'Bull black nova' are far less intimidating and much more likely to gain my sympathy. I had started to worry a little that no album of 2009 so far had really excited me, but this may just be the one.

Welcome back Jeff. You have been missed.