Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Nobody likes a whiner

The above is a quote from Bill Murray's character in the delightful, though I gather little-known, "Quick Change."

Brought to mind by the release of the new Wilco album. Jeff Tweedy can indeed be a whiner. But worse, based on the admittedly limited evidence of 30-second samples on iTunes, his new release sounds downright boring. Which is just as pitchforkmedia.com, though not popmatters.com, would have it. It's hard to tell this way, but 30 seconds a song was enough to sell me on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, back in the day.

By contrast, the new Elliott Smith release, New Moon, is excellent even though one would ordinarily be suspicious of multiple posthumous offerings.

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