The Pitchfork Project starts out with a softball; I listened today to Yankee Hotel Foxtrot the 2002 release by Chicago alt-contry-rockers Wilco. The album is one in which I am very familiar, though for this round I snagged a lossless FLAC version. This marks the second time in recent weeks that I’d upgraded from 128kbps to FLAC and the change is remarkable. The FLAC version seems to make the mix more dynamic and really allows the previously unheard subtleties play through. If you have the means, and don’t mind messing with VLC (or some other FLAC player) I highly recommend this format; it’s akin to the happy discovery of listening to a well mixed not-as-compressed vinyl release.
Though rewarding it a perfect 10.0, Pitchfork gives the album a pretty cryptic review and doesn’t say much. Beneath the hip discussion of pedigree I connected with an interesting observation – P’fork noted a previous release Being There likely descends from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers third release Damn the Torpedos; though upon reading (okay, initially misreading) I’d say that that’s a worthy comparison to YHF. My dad a huge TP fan always called DtT his favorite / the best Tom Petty album, though I always wrote it off as not really being that great and at least not having that many notable songs. Fast forward to the present where I rescind that statement. DtT and YHF are both albums that I’d describe as being albums that stand as wholes greater than the sum of their parts. Neither album has a song that I’d be eager to play to somebody as a single, but the collection works extremely well. Each album plays as a consistent body of music but doesn’t rely on cheesy concepts or rock-opera segues (rather subtle pieces that appear odder on subsequent listening - DtT’s intros about “just the normal noises” or YHF’s re/pre-quoting of their own material). Sonically, both albums are not only Americana rock-n-roll, but specimens of such that are indebted to the keyboard. While DtT used some period specific tones but defies being dated (a worry that Petty had in recording), YHF uses these same now-dated patches but integrates them in a contemporary setting without the crutch of irony or nostalgia.
The more I thought about the keys, the more I realized that YHF is incredibly though maybe unnoticeably synth heavy. Wilco is portrayed as alt-country, so the synth is pretty much not an option, but it’s always tastefully there. In “Kamera” it’s an 80’s lead-sounding synth sweeping beneath the lyrics of the chorus, in “War on War” it’s a spastic knob twisting solo where a guitar solo should be. Even “Heavy Metal Drummer” (Amen break alert!) has a delightfully dorky octave-bopping synth line in the Chorus that will probably always bug me now that I’ve made a note of it.
I’m cool with P’fork’s 10.0 rating, I certainly wouldn’t deny that it’s a near-perfect album (assuming we’re rounding that 100’s place up)….
BUT!
I found a mistake…and the perfection is blown.
Listen to “Radio Cure” (you may need a high-bitrate version, my 128 kind of obscures it but it's clear as day on the FLAC). Near the 2 minute mark, coincidental with the end of the line “Electronic Surgical Words” you can hear the xylophone hit the first tone of the xylophone lick that starts at the chorus. It’s seemingly out of key, out of place, and a bit timid which leads me to believe that it shouldn’t be there…maybe it bled on another track and they couldn’t edit it or maybe they recorded it live and that’s just what happens.
That said…9.9.
