Tracks 4 and 5  from Summerteeth (1999)

Tracks 6 and 7 from Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (2001)

Wilco is one of the most acclaimed alternative bands of its generation that I never felt a really strong connection to for a long time. Based on the Uncle Tupelo and Son Volt records I've heard, I think I respond a little more naturally to Jay Farrar than Jeff Tweedy as a vocalist and songwriter. But over the years, Tweedy and Wilco have become a far bigger deal, and I've slowly come around to them, particularly its later lineup. 

I remember being vaguely intrigued by the reviews of Being There and its lead single, and enjoying Mermaid Avenue with Billy Bragg when my brother bought it. But the first proper Wilco album I heard was Summerteeth and I wasn't crazy about it, and still am not, really. Then Yankee Hotel Foxtrot really made Wilco a big deal, and I remained kind of a skeptic. I've warmed to the album a bit, but I couldn't bring myself to include the famous album opener "I Am Trying To Break You Heart," I still just do not like that song at all. 

Wilco worked with Jim O'Rourke on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and A Ghost Is Born around the same time a lot of established bands started working with O'Rourke. And I have to say, I much prefer O'Rourke's work on Superchunk's Come Pick Me Up and Sonic Youth's Murray Street to his work with Wilco, the different styles just don't mesh as interestingly for me. Being There is by far my favorite Jay Bennett-era Wilco album. 

Wilco's O'Rourke period presaged a development that really changed things for me: Nels Cline being invited to join Wilco in 2004. By that point, Nels Cline had been one of my favorite guitarists in the world for almost a decade. He's made dozens of albums that I love, including work on Mike Watt's solo albums and a variety of Carla Bozulich projects (The Geraldine Fibbers, Scarnella, Evangelista), and his many instrumental ensembles (Nels Cline Trio, The Nels Cline Singers, Destroy All Nels Cline). He's an incredible creative talent who does things with a guitar that nobody else can. I've seen him play live several times in small rooms in Baltimore, and have on multiple occasions walked up and personally thanked him for touring here, since he's from California and often only does a handful of east coast shows with his smaller projects.

So I had complicated feelings about Nels Cline joining Wilco, a band I hadn't particularly loved up to that point. But I have to say, Wilco is probably the best thing that ever happened to Nels Cline, in terms of giving him a public profile closer to what I think he deserves, and probably more financial stability, and he's continued to make a lot of great music with and without Wilco over the last two decades. So the later chunk of this playlist is really a Nels Cline fan's take on later Wilco. From track 9 onward, I primarily picked songs that showcase him the best -- the band's first release with him was a live album, Kicking Television, where he was already starting to bring new dimensions to songs from previous studio albums.

Given how much more popular Wilco's first album with Cline, Sky Blue Sky, is than its predecessor A Ghost Is Born, I would say there's some consensus among Wilco fans that it was a good move for the band as well. Tweedy's guitar playing on A Ghost Is Born is actually really cool, though, I almost feel like he wouldn't necessarily need to add Nels Cline to the band when he can play like that if he wasn't also the lead singer (again, I worship Cline so I mean that as the highest possible compliment to Tweedy). "Impossible Germany" is very much the definitive Wilco/Nels Cline song and one of the band's top streaming tracks. I saw Wilco live once at the Virgin Festival in 2008, and honestly one of my favorite music festival memories of all time was just laying in the middle of a field in the early afternoon, listening to an incredible rendition of "Impossible Germany." 

I glanced at Spotify while listening to Wilco's 2015 album Star Wars the other day, and was amused to find that the progress bar had turned into a lightsaber. Apparently, Disney and Spotify created that as an easter egg years ago when people listened to Star Wars soundtracks, and whether it was deliberate or accidental, Wilco's cheekily named Star Wars is included in that (Tweedy once remarked that they were prepared to change the album's name to Cease And Desist if George Lucas ever brought legal action, so I suppose nobody ever objected to the name). So if you put on this playlist, you may look down and see a lightsaber while "More..." is playing.