Wilco — A Ghost Is Born

Wilco can be tricky.

The critically revered band have morphed from an adventurous alt.country outfit to the rare kind of band that defies any sort of easy description, as realized on their last album, 2002’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. If Foxtrot was Wilco’s OK Computer, A Ghost Is Born is their Kid A.

Almost impenetrable on a first listen, the disc opens with a barely audible Jeff Tweedy whispering through the first track, moves on to a 10-minute jam on the third track and forces the listener to wrestle with another 10 minutes of tweaky noise before the album’s end.

Along the way there are some great songs (most notably "Handshake Drugs" and "The Late Greats"), but Tweedy makes you work for ‘em. The trick is that, on a second and third listen, the difficult bits start to make sense, binding Tweedy’s laid-back pop songs, pained lyrics and occasional bursts of rock swagger into a larger vision.

Ghost generally follows the same vibe that enveloped Foxtrot, but with even more artistic challenges. Don’t let the initial unfriendliness fool you — this one’s a grower.   

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