Gave this another go tonight, with greater success this time. This is easily the Wilco record that sticks with me least -- which isn't to say it's the one I enjoy least necessarily, just that much of it feels transient and ill-defined in a way that their other records never were (a few of the songs on the back half have demo-like qualities, like Bonnie 'Prince' Billy songs from "Superwolf," with multiple guitars chugging along as though there are bass and drums hammering away on the bottom, only there aren't). Conceptually, it reminds me of the Paul Weller album "Wake Up the Nation" -- a kind of lo-fi, mechanical sounding collection of songs that moves quickly from one thing to the next without much fanfare, but in a patchwork-like fashion that becomes increasingly attractive as more squares are stitched on. It's noisy and moderately experimental, but slight and not particularly demanding, and as such perhaps the one Wilco record I respond to with interest rather than feeling.

The thing that elevates it is context -- first its release model, off-the-cuff and in-the-moment like the record itself, and second the fact that it was followed up with a fuller, sturdier collection of songs barely a year later. Had "Star Wars" lingered too long as "the new Wilco album," I think it might have fallen victim to "Backspacer" syndrome, where a minor, somewhat anomalous work eventually comes to represent an extended period of creative inactivity, lessening the impact of the work by essentially asking it to carry a load that it can't. "Star Wars" sounds like a momentary indulgence, and "Schmilco" kind of bears out that it was -- and the two albums complement each other like no other two albums in their catalog do.

Jeff Tweedy on WTF Marc Maron this week.

Listening now. Tweedy is talking about how he likes to eat vegan. Hes not doing it right apparently.

It makes me very happy that they're spending a good 5-10 minutes talking about Jim O'Rourke

the stuff about his former therapist is pretty scary

Yeah what a quack. Reminds me of the Metallica guy who got fired during Some Kind Of Monster because he wanted to basically be in the band and go on the road with them.

WARM is pretty good

I’ve spent the past 5 years in the living room shows to get Tweedy to play Wanted by Loose Fur, but he refuses because he’s intimated. This year we have a classically trained pianist in attendance that will play with him on songs. I think this may be the year.

did you go the one maron attended?

I don’t know who Maron is. If you meant moron, that could be anyone here (including me).

it's not showing up for me

I have pretty much given up posting images on RM. I think there is a secret code.

*posts bro pic*

Where are you sitting at the Stones show Spike?

on your mom's face

Just make sure you're linking directly to an image (from a site that allows hotlinking). It looks like Trag tried to use the IMG code to link to a Google Image Search result.

what i fool i was

Spun this today. I agree -- pretty good. Wish the whole record sounded like that Red Brick song, that was my early favorite and yet it's the only one that sounds different from the rest of the album. Would love if he did a whole album of fuzzy, jagged rock like that.

for as much as i love wilco i’ve never bothered to listen to solo tweedy