I Am Trying to Break Your Heart

I watched Wilco: I Am Trying to Break Your Heart last night. It was excellent. I'm a moderate fan of the band wilco's discography, but a big enough fan of the album Yankee Hotel Foxtrot to have burned and given away 5 or 6 copies to friends. This movie is a documentary on the making of that album.

The project (filmed and recorded by photographer Sam Jones) started out as a fly on the wall documentary of the making of wilco's follow up to the successful Summerteeth, and quickly became something else. Handed $80,000 to record the album by their label Reprise (a subsididary of Warner Bros.), wilco decided to expand their music by including many more expirmental sounds and instruments than before, while taping in seclusion at their Chicago loft. When they finally released the tapes to Reprise, they didn't receive any word for two weeks. Reprise eventually decided that the album was shit and needed to be either re-mixed or re-recorded. wilco balked, and was given back the record and dropped from the label.

unsure of what to do next, wilco embarked on a 30 date sold out tour and let the record label offers filter in. copies of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot leaked, and so the band decided to stream it on their website. around this time Jay Bennett left/was let go of wilco, and the band continued on as a 4-piece.

Like most successful documentaries, I Am Trying to Break Your Heart is best when the subjects forget that the cameras are rolling and are comfortable enough to be themselves. In this regard, Jeff Tweedy comes off as a pretty cool guy, a bit sensitive, but highly creative. Jay Bennett seems like a bit of a prick to deal with sometimes. This is best highlighted during the scene where Bennett is trying to explain, and then re-explain his reasoning for an edit at the beginning of the mix of "heavy metal drummer". It's like Bennett is trying to create and prolong an argument that Tweedy understood and agreed to five minutes ago... the next immediate scene is of Tweedy throwing up in the men's room -- obviously from uncomfortable stress -- and blaming it on migraines he's stricken with.

Also, an interesting debate brews within the doc that isn't fully explored (but easily could be) regarding the nature of the relationship between the artist and the corporation... the business of selling art. Reprise records did not see an easily marketable record, had not made much profit off of earlier wilco releases, and decided that the album turned in was too challenging to make a dime, so the band was released from its contract.

In end, wilco signs with nonsuch records, (ironically, a subsidary of Warner Bros.) for three times the amount they were paid by Reprise... essentially, Warner Bros. paid for the album twice. Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is released to big sales (interesting, considering that it was available for free online for several months prior to release), the band continues to sell out medium sized venues, and the album is hailed as one of the best recording of the year by several major media sources and music critics.

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A pal at work lives in the same neighborhood and is familiar with The Wild Goose. The Wild Goose is a bar that employs beautiful eastern bloc off the boat European women. They're the best: they wear tight club clothes all the time, speak broken english and are extrememly flirtatious. The guy that owns the bar is a fat Italian scumbag, and I was tipped off that the bar has a website featuring all of the Wild Goose Girls.

It's interesting to see these pics now, because I haven't drank at that place much in the few years since I lived around the corner. In 2001, Kellee was super fucking hot. Like off the hook beautiful. But, give it a few years of nightly shots, secondhand smoke and late nighters five nights a week, and a woman's face ages a bit. Now she's hot in more of a "late 20's/early 30's" sort of way.

Amy looks like a little wildcat with her beer tap pose.

And Diana's got that insatiable From Russia with Love pout that drives American men to empty their wallet.

The rest of the crew features women with attitude and killer smiles. Beware of these sorts, they are more than you can handle. Do yourself a favor and date a girl who isn't hit on everytime she steps outside, or boosts her income by smiling at men.