A.M.

Performer: Wilco
Artist: Brian Henneman
Engineer: Brian Paulson; Wilco
Producer: Brian Paulson; Wilco
Distributor: WEA (Distributor)

Notes: Wilco: Jeff Tweedy (vocals, acoustic & electric guitars, bass); John Stirratt (vocals, acoustic guitar, piano, organ, bass); Max Johnston (vocals, banjo, dobro, mandolin, fiddle); Ken Coomer (vocals, drums). Additional personnel: Brian Henneman (vocals, guitar); Daniel Corrigan (vocals); Lloyd Maines (pedal steel guitar). Recorded at Easley Recording, Memphis, Tennessee. When Uncle Tupelo, the band that defined '90s alt-country, split into two camps, Jay Farrar's Son Volt took the relatively arty road while Jeff Tweedy upped the rock & roll grit quotient with Wilco. On Wilco's debut album, the band sounds righteously ragged, charging along behind Tweedy in a manner suggestive of the rootsier moments of the Stones and/or the Replacements. The occasional appearance of acoustic guitar, banjo or a 2/4 beat serves to remind us of Tweedy's roots. Still, A.M. has the sound of a band already well on their way to the gloriously chaotic rock & roll nirvana they would reach on the follow-up BEING THERE.

Rolling Stone (4/6/95, pp.62-64) - 3.5 Stars - Very Good - "...Wilco have made one hell of a country-guts debut....Just as classic country tells of...real life in everyday language...so does Tweedy's small-town worldview have an Everyman honesty..." Entertainment Weekly (4/7/95, pp.89-90) - "...Though [Wilco has] a '90s bleakness far removed from the sunny romanticism of the Byrds and Poco, [they] are following the same urge as those earlier acts: the need to sink roots into something more nourishing than mere rock & roll flash without losing their edge..." - Rating: B+ Q (9/00, p.135) - Included in Q's "Best Alt.Country Albums Of All Time" - "...A soundtrack for Midwestern teenagers out doing no good." Option (7-8/95, p.146) - "...The vocals are laidback and sometimes even strained, but the delivery only adds to the friendly familiarity of the album....Herein lies evidence that A.M. is as sound lyrically as it is musically..." Village Voice (2/20/96) - Ranked #34 in Village Voice's 1995 Pazz & Jop Critics' Poll.

When pioneering alt-country band Uncle Tupelo split in the mid-1990s, they broke off into two camps. Jay Farrar started the rootsy, twangy (if lyrically elliptical) Son Volt. Singer/songwriter/guitarist Jeff Tweedy, who co-led the band with Farrar, established himself anew with Wilco. Though Wilco initially offered country-influenced rock not unlike that of Tweedy's former outfit, they quickly progressed through the Stones-meet-Big Star shambling two-disc epic BEING THERE, the Beach Boys/Beatles-influenced pop of SUMMER TEETH, and the screwy, art-damaged, Jim O'Rourke-produced YANKEE HOTEL FOXTROT, whose release was notoriously delayed due to label apathy, though the album was eventually hailed as the group's masterpiece.

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