Wilco

Description: alt.country and folk rock

Comparisons: Wilco can be compared to other seminal alt.country and folk rock artists like Townes Van Zandt, Steve Earle and Bob Dylan. Members of Wilco have also played in Uncle Tupelo and the Gourds, and Uncle Tupelo also spun off into Son Volt.

Starter CDs: A.M. (Sire, 1995)
Being There (Reprise, 1996)
A Ghost is Born (Nonesuch, 2004)

Wilco Band Members: Through the course of their career, Wilco has included the following players:
Jeff Tweedy—guitar, vocals
John Stirratt—bass
Glenn Kotche—drums
Niles Clire—guitar
Pat Sansone—multi-instrumentalist
Leroy Bach— multi-instrumentalist
Mikael Jorgensen—keyboards
Ken Coomer—drums
Max Johnston—multi-instrumentalist
Brian Henreman—guitar
Brian Egan—multi-instrumentalist
Jay Bennett—multi-instrumentalist

Wilco Biography: After the disbanding of seminal alt.country band Uncle Tupelo in 1994, Tupelo co-founder Jeff Tweedy organized Wilco with three of his Uncle Tupelo bandmates. Based in Chicago, the band has released a slew of CDs, each of which stretches the boundaries of outlaw country and good, old fashioned Americana folk-rock.

In addition to their work together as a band, Wilco's members have all pursued several solo and side projects, and have collaborated with Billy Bragg on one of the best tribute albums to Woody Guthrie—Mermaid Avenue.

Nonetheless, in their workings as a unit, Wilco's musicianship is among the best and tightest in their genre (whichever one they happen to be toying with at the time), and Tweedy's lyrics run from irony to brash honesty. While much of the group's aesthetic roots are in alt.country (as was the affiliation of Uncle Tupelo), Tweedy's influence and the revolving line-up of band members has inspired them more in the direction of roots rock and more edgy areas of Americana.

Solo, Tweedy treads more on the folk side of things, with live performances that call to mind a mid-1960s Bob Dylan or any of his contemporaries.