An old friend of mine has a list of books he wants to buy. It’s very long and he is very disciplined (so he tells me), so when he goes into a bookshop and sees something else he wants, something that isn’t on his list, he doesn’t buy it, as anyone else would. No, he writes down the title of the book on a piece of paper, goes home, adds it to the bottom of his ‘master list’ and when the book reaches the top of his ‘master list’, he goes out and buys it, even though, by this time, the book is long out of print and he has in fact died of old age.
So obviously I mock him relentlessly, as is only appropriate with your oldest friends. But I seem to be reaching a similar point with CDs. The list of the ones I want is getting longer, the space in which to store them is contracting, and the years in which to listen to them…well, I’d rather not think about that right now. Like many people, I have so much music I quite like, but never enough that makes the heart race and the tears well up. So the search goes on, the endless mythic quest for the next great record. What you are really looking for are the musicians who understand this, because they themselves are trying to make the next great record. Unlike many bands (including some of the biggest in the world), they haven’t yet settled for just doing what they do as well as they can. So we keep listening to these people, and we buy their new records as soon as they come out, because their quest turns out to be our quest too. Sometimes they come a terrible cropper, but who doesn’t? Probably only the people who have settled for doing what they do as well as they can.
So to two newish albums I have spent a lot of time with this year. A couple of years ago in this space I raved about Wilco’s Sky Blue Sky, an uncharacteristically life-affirming release from this notoriously grumpy and mordant American alt.rock band. While there’s undoubtedly critical kudos to be had from grump and mordancy, not to mention a reasonable living, the more uplifting textures of their new material have widened their range and maybe even their appeal. Wilco (The Album) (Nonesuch) continues this progression. One reviewer has called them the world’s greatest rock band but, to be that, you would probably need to be making more extrovert music than this. Leader and songwriter Jeff Tweedy still seems to look inward for inspiration, the big difference being that he now obviously likes what he sees. He must know that greatness is within his grasp. I can’t quite wait to hear what he does next.
Jason Lytle is an older friend of this column, having led another American alt.rock group, Grandaddy, until their split in 2006. He may be the only musician alive today happy to admit that he is greatly influenced by the Electric Light Orchestra, and accordingly his records are getting lusher and lusher. But for budgetary reasons, he’d surely be putting choirs and strings on everything. Yours Truly, The Commuter (Anti-) is tighter and more consistent than the last couple of Grandaddy releases, if not up to the standard of 2003’s Sumday. Again, you sense, with a quiver of anticipation, that he is going somewhere very special with this. Where that is, I doubt even he knows, but that of course is rather more than half the fun.
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