question for Wilco fans

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famous beagle

famous beagle

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Hey y'all. Well we're finally getting to publish a Wilco song book, and it's going to be a "Best of" folio with 15 songs. I'm putting together the songlist, and this is what I've got so far. I was wanting to get some opinions on if there are any that should definitely be included instead of something that's not on this list.

Keep in mind that this is a guitar transcription book, so there are lots of awesome songs I've had to leave out simply because they're more keyboard-driven. By the same token, some songs are in here because they're such great guitar songs and not necessarily the best in Wilco's catalog. (Of course they're all still great though.) These are in chronological order:

1 Casino Queen
2 Passenger Side
3 Monday
4 I Got You (At the End of the Century)
5 Can't Stand It
6 ELT
7 Kamera
8 Ashes of American Flags
9 Heavy Metal Drummer
10 I'm the Man Who Loves You
11 I'm a Wheel
12 Theologians
13 The Late Greats
14 Impossible Germany
15 Side with the Seeds

I'm on the fence about "Heavy Metal Drummer," because it doesn't have that much guitar in it. It pains me to leave out "Misunderstood," but again, it doesn't have too much guitar. It's mostly just the strummed acoustic, and then some feedbacky guitars come in at times.

Also, just FYI, I can only include 2 songs from Sky Blue Sky.

Input please!

Thanks
 
Who're Wilco? Wikipedia tells me they did a collab with Billy Bragg...interesting.
 
Who're Wilco?

Just about one of the best alternative bands to come out of Chicago ever!

Check out every record, but especially YHF, Sky Blue Sky (Nels Cline plays on this) and the live one, Kicking Television.

Also, the two Mermaid Avenue records they did with Billy are two of my favourite records of the last ten years.

Stunning, stunning band.

As for songs, I'd like to see Jesus Etc. It's good to see Impossible Germany up there.

I would really like to see Muzzle of Bees up there. Crazy about the Sky Blue Sky restriction - it's got some of the best guitar work ever on it!

How about the Mermaid Avenue stuff? Can you put on any of that?
 
Box Full of Letters
Candy Floss
Ashes of American Flags
I'm The Man Who Loves You
Outtasite (Outta Mind)
Dreamer In My Dreams
Pot Kettle Black
At Least That's What You Said
 
Pot Kettle Black! Claro que si!

There's so many great Wilco tunes.
 
Hm, great list so far.
I would add Jesus, etc. and The Thanks I Get (for the acoustic people).
Is this a personal project or do you work for a company that does this? Cool job either way.


Mike
 
I LOVE Jesus etc, but it's really not very guitar oriented at all.
 
Nightfire said:
Hm, great list so far.
I would add Jesus, etc. and The Thanks I Get (for the acoustic people).
Is this a personal project or do you work for a company that does this? Cool job either way.


Mike
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I work for Hal Leonard, and we're putting out our first Wilco book (finally!). We just got rights for them.
 
Sloan said:
I LOVE Jesus etc, but it's really not very guitar oriented at all.
Click to expand...

Yeah, "Jesus, Etc." is an awesome tune, but there's just not much guitar.

That's the problem with a lot of the other suggestions too. I can't just pick "great songs!" They have to have a good amount of guitar in them for it to make sense for them to be in a guitar transcription book.

Also, I need to have a fairly equal amount from each album. Right now I have 4 from YHF and 2 from some others, and that's about as far as the disparity can get.

I'm thinking of taking off "Heavy Metal Drummer" and putting in "Misunderstood" instead. I know "Misunderstood" doesn't have too much guitar, but A) it's such an amazing tune and such a Wilco staple, B) It does have guitar throughout (acoustic) and has some cool feedback stuff, and C) It has a good amount of electric stuff at the end.

I dunno. This is tough!
 
MattNZ said:
Who're Wilco?

Just about one of the best alternative bands to come out of Chicago ever!

Check out every record, but especially YHF, Sky Blue Sky (Nels Cline plays on this) and the live one, Kicking Television.

Also, the two Mermaid Avenue records they did with Billy are two of my favourite records of the last ten years.

Stunning, stunning band.

As for songs, I'd like to see Jesus Etc. It's good to see Impossible Germany up there.

I would really like to see Muzzle of Bees up there. Crazy about the Sky Blue Sky restriction - it's got some of the best guitar work ever on it!

How about the Mermaid Avenue stuff? Can you put on any of that?
Click to expand...


Can't use any Mermaid Avenue stuff. That's under different publishing.
 
Thanks for the input y'all. Some good suggestions --- most of which I've considered at some length, believe me.

Let me take another route. Are there any tunes on the list that you feel don't belong? If a certain tune gets a bunch of votes, then that's probably a good sign that it should go.
 
Yeah "Muzzle of Bees" is great, and it really has a lot of good guitar --- and with fingerpicking, which is kind of missing from this list so far. I think that one belongs on there. Which Ghost tune should it replace? Maybe "Theologians?"
 
TelePaul said:
Famous Beagle are you in the band?
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heheh ... No I'm not. I work at Hal Leonard as a publications editor, and I was picked to do the songlist for the new book because I'm a big fan.

Edit: I just don't know of too many other fans (at least not around here), so I wanted to get some input.
 
I'm not going to be any help on songs that should not be included. I love Wilco!

I saw Jeff Tweedy live, and he played "Shot in the Arm" on acoustic and sang, and it was incredible -- how about that one? "She's a Jar" is another good one.
 
My band actually covers "Hate It Here". Great song...don't know what album it's on though. I'm just getting turned on to these guys. They're pretty phenomenal.
 
RickW said:
My band actually covers "Hate It Here". Great song...don't know what album it's on though. I'm just getting turned on to these guys. They're pretty phenomenal.
Click to expand...

That's on Sky Blue Sky, their latest album. The great thing about them is that they've really changed throughout their years. Their first album, AM, is pretty much alt. country --- very traditional sounding. But they grew exponentially from there with each release: Being There, Summerteeth, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, A Ghost Is Born. For Sky Blue Sky, they took a slight back-to-basics approach.

By the time they got to Summerteeh and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, they were sounding more like latter day Beach Boys and Beatles than the Rolling Stones. They started to scale things down a bit for A Ghost Is Born, and really did so for Sky Blue Sky. My favorite albums are Summerteeth and YHF, but I really like them all.
 
antichef said:
I'm not going to be any help on songs that should not be included. I love Wilco!

I saw Jeff Tweedy live, and he played "Shot in the Arm" on acoustic and sang, and it was incredible -- how about that one? "She's a Jar" is another good one.
Click to expand...

Those are both incredible songs, but they're both so keyboard-driven. There's hardly any guitar except a strummed acoustic.
 
antichef said:
True enough -- and at that show there was only the strummed acoustic. I guess I'm missing the point of the book? You'd be showing transcribed leads?
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It'll be showing any and every guitar on the recording. If there are 8 guitar parts, they'll all be transcribed, note-for-note.
 
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