Last night, I had the privilege of seeing Wilco and Nick Lowe at the Wang Theatre.
Hearing Nick Lowe play unaccompanied, just a man and his guitar, uncovered a treasure chest of musical gold for me. I probably sound like an idiot to many of you for not knowing Nick Lowe’s body of work prior to last night, but trust me – this is not the first nor the last time I will sound like an idiot.
Nick Lowe, similar to Kris Kristofferson, wrote songs that found themselves into the fabric of the American popular culture, but the paradox is the songs written are better known than he is (they are)… but I bet you knew all of that.
What’s more, Nick Lowe even produced Elvis Costello’s first 5 albums! And I recently discovered Elvis Costello’s first few albums which I still can’t get enough of; particularly "My Aim is True." I always knew Elvis could write a good tune, but never knew he could write a good album.
Last week, I even took some time to learn “Allison” on the guitar (thinking it might pay dividends at a later date), what a treat it was to hear Nick pay tribute to his friend by performing the song. Timing is everything.
Oh yeah, and then Wilco played…
Before I get into the awesomeness of the show – what’s with all the guitar changes? Plug in and play. I can see why Jeff Tweedy changes from acoustic to electric, but even the bass player changed every song. Really? Do you think we can tell the difference?
Anyways…
Last year I walked out on Wilco at the Orpheum; they played a reported 39 songs and I just couldn’t handle it all. At the time, I had never heard more than a few licks of their music and only attended in attempt to challenge my mind to open up to something new. I didn’t really get the hype that night, but everybody around me did. On top of it all, everyone looked, talked, and smelled like the kind of folks I enjoy sharing music with. I wondered what I was missing.
Last night I found it. Jeff Tweedy finds these simple and sweet melodies to sit on top of the most twisted alt-country/folk/rock you’ll find anywhere today. Sometimes the melodies drive me crazy with their nursery rhyme-esque simplicity, but they never leave my head. There is no touring outfit like Wilco and they seem to be having a late career peak. At any given point you could tune into anyone on stage and be completely blow away by their sparse yet important contributions. Great synergy, no BS.
Two songs really stood out (to me): The opener “Art of Almost”, which really set the tone for the night and is a great opening track on Wilco's latest effort The Whole Love. And a mid-set jaunt into “At Least That’s What you Said”. The latter of the two really blew my mind wide open. Usually, ballads of epic nature have some sort of 70s/80s arena rock cheese lying in the weeds (See: November Rain), but this jaunt just blew my mind as guitar notes thrashed and flew into the ether. You can’t fake soul.
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