Wilco Documentary

Before I delve into the actual content of the documentary and this phenomenal band’s music, I’d like to discuss the large amount of politics regarding this band in their musical career and discography. I found it very interesting and astounding at the way that this band was capable of playing record companies and labels in order to turn out on top. I was very intrigued by the story in which Wilco’s label company told the band that they were not going to publish their next album and Wilco slowly released their music online for donations in order to subvert this standard industrialized process. While many credit Radiohead with being revolutionary in music, I feel that Wilco began this trend of publicly releasing music. While many current artists have rid themselves from label companies and have reverted to direct funding/donations from their fans (such as Hoodie Allen or Macklemore), I found it interesting to see its origins in this band. It is interesting to see how technology has deeply influenced the sales of music and the way that music is distributed to the masses. Before technology had developed greatly in order to diffuse band’s music, there would’ve been absolutely no way for bands without a record label to succeed in the highly competitive world of music.

Another last not about the politics surrounding this band is the fact that they have cycled through a variety of different band members throughout their musical career. Only a couple of the band members remained constant all the way from 1994 to present day. I feel that this hasn’t happened much in music history up until this point. Bands such as the Beatles never changed their band members. This might have been a disadvantage, however, because those bands (unlike Wilco) could not adapt to the changing music scene in order to maintain appeal to the masses.

Additionally, throughout the album, I got a great vibe for the working environment of this band. While I gained a sense of their personalities and saw how relaxed they were while recording, I enjoyed being able to see how dedicated they were to their music. They were seemingly working nonstop and put so much into creating their music. I also liked being able to see the interactions between the various band members as well. I feel that too often, you don’t get to see the other side of bands because they are very superficial and hide behind their music. This documentary allowed me to observe Wilco’s personalities be fleshed out and it made them overall more personable.

Anyway, let’s dive into the actual music because now that I’ve been listening to them, I feel that I have a general idea about the type of music they are creating. While they are officially classified as alternative country, I think this band is a great fusion a variety of sounds that merge together in an overall great vibe. In the documentary, the band members say that at the time they were completely engineering and composing the album/music by themselves without any outside influence. They were able to basically create their own perfect recording environment with increased sonic in order to perfect the songs that they were creating. They put so much effort into recording these songs that it’s truly hard NOT to love their songs.

The genre coined as alternative rock has really grown on me as I continue to expose myself to different types of music. I feel that Wilco had a very large influence and impact on a lot of popular folk/alternative rock bands of today because I hear a variety of aspects in this popularize modern music that was at the heart of Wilco’s sound. The way that they were able to mix the acoustic sound of the guitar with the soft voice of Tweedy is truly impressive. The experimentation process really paid off on the creation of their 2002 album and I feel that this allowed the band to thrive as well later on in their musical career. While I was only able to hear bits and pieces of their songs/album, from what I’ve heard of their music I am relatively happy with. The documentary better illustrates their dedication to their work rather than the actual music, but I still feel that the little diddies that they perform throughout the video are polished and sound very down to earth. This particular vibe is very appealing to me. They have fresh and unique melodies mixed with a variety of wild percussion/auxiliary instruments that pepper and flavor their music.

If you want to hear some of Wilco’s songs from the time of this documentary, check them out below: