Six more to catch Wilco

My last.fm charts, as of this writing, shows that Spoon needs only six songs to tie Wilco for the number two spot (both would still be trailing Calexico by 257 plays) and I started to think about my every changing musical favorites.  And then I wish that there had been a such thing as Last.fm around my whole life where I could look back on statistics and wonder "Hey what was my favorite group when I was 12?"

The answer, I'm thinking, would have been Van Halen.  Maybe R.E.M.

Or what about my senior year of high school?  Probably Stevie Ray Vaughan.

Over the years there have been a few acts that I thought I'd never get tired of, but in the end just led to disappointment.

But back to Wilco as they are the band on their way out I'm afraid.  When I first heard A.M. I was too sad over the demise of Uncle Tupelo to give a crap but then my ears perked up when Being There came around.  There was enough about it for me to be interested even though I was beginning to hate anything and everything associated with Alternative Country (whatever that means) because everyone was talking about Ryan Adams (because of Whiskeytown) who I hated more than Satan then and that hatred has only grown to nearly consume me.  So it was in 1999 on my tail end of flirting with full on jam band fever that my jaw hit the floor on hearing Summerteeth.  This was during those days that I lived in a ratty apartment overlooking ETSU and had time to lay in the floor, feet up on my couch, ear goggles on sipping white russians while I totally consumed an entire album end to end and back again.

Now, in my mind, Wilco died after the release of A Ghost Is Born.  It was the last of a trilogy of of albums that were the perfect mix of weird/not-weird.  These days Jeff Tweedy actually seems happy, Jay Bennett is dead, and Wilco is on the verge of releasing the second album created with the same exact band.  Unreal.  What the hell happened here?

So who's next?  Who will be the next band to occupy my mind?  Calexico was getting close because I thought Feast of Wire was a masterpiece but their last two albums were sticks in the mud.  Spoon I love but I'm trying not to get attached.  Dr. Dog... maybe... will have to see what comes next with them though.

By the way, RIP Jay Bennett I didn't realize how much I'd miss you and I'm sad that the I'm Trying To Break Your Heart movie made you out to be an asshole.