Wilco

One of the strangest trends in contemporary rock is the tendency of middle-aged bands, often well past their artistic and commercial zenith, to release eponymous albums. Pearl Jam did it in 2006 with their eighth studio release. By the time Blur released their eponymous album in 1997, their Britpop was already a dated genre. Rivers Cuomo ’99-’06, of course, seems to call every other album “Weezer”.

The motives for such a move are varied: often a return to roots, as in Pearl Jam’s case, or as a marketing gimmick to present the album as different and important. In naming their seventh album “Wilco (the Album),” Jeff Tweedy and the band seem to be announcing a realization of identity, defining their sound at an intersection of styles that they previously employed seperately.

Unusually, this solid album opens with its weakest track: “Wilco (the Song)” is a forced joke that falls flat. After this misstep, however, the album proves to be a consistently enjoyable listen. Wilco’s two previous releases, 2004’s “A Ghost is Born” and 2007’s “Sky Blue Sky” alternately displayed the band’s two extremes: “A Ghost is Born” was spiked with experimental guitar noise and studio tricks, and “Sky Blue Sky” was a return to old-fashioned laid-back songwriting. In the vein of Wilco’s finest works, “Wilco (the Album)” combines the traditional and experimental. While past triumphs like 2002’s “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” made each song a fusion of the two styles, The Album alternates experimental songs with stripped-down ones. “Bullet Black Nova” would have fit in well on “A Ghost is Born,” while “Country Disappeared” is their most straightforward piece of Americana in a decade.

There are several highlights here, but none is quite so incandescent as the elegiac “One Wing,” where Tweedy accompanies a graceful melody with wistful lyrics: “I always knew this would be our fate / This is what happens when we separate / This is what happens to all dead weight, eventually.” Like Joe Strummer, Tweedy has always been able to coax remarkable amounts of empathy and emotion out of his one-octave range, and his subtle vocal gifts shine throughout this album. Yet the greatest attraction is the guitar interplay of Tweedy and Nels Cline. Few guitar duos in rock history have their ability to delight both guitar enthusiast and casual fan.

“Wilco (the Album)” is not quite a towering masterpiece, and some of its more ambitious moments may well be considered missteps. But the album’s many peaceful, laid-back gems are testaments to a band that, after years of conflicting ambitions and changing lineups, has finally settled down. If it ages as well as the underrated “Sky Blue Sky,” it will certainly come to be regarded as a career highlight.

—Staff writer Keshava D. Guha can be reached at kdguha@fas.harvard.edu.