Funky, ethereal electronica swirls seamlessly through rootsy guitar chords. Manufactured feedback explodes around exquisitely simple harmonica riffs. Your ears can’t believe that they are actually digging the seemingly incompatible sound; but your body, feet tapping and limbs itching with movement, knows no hesitation.
Behold the dualistic, chameleonic personality of live Wilco: one shot of Radiohead, two shots of lilting alt-country cowboy.
This isn’t Bob Dylan showing up at the Newport Folk Festival with a new coif — this is Dylan taking the stage, donning turntables instead of his guitar and opening with Prince’s “When Doves Cry.”
Yet, strangely enough, it works. Really well. Wilco succeeded with its innovative formula of pure rock and pumping electronica again and again throughout their triumphant marathon show on Saturday night under the candy-colored paper lanterns of the Orpheum Theatre.
For more than two hours — not a big surprise since Wilco is known for pushing the limits of venue curfews — Jeff Tweedy and the gang ripped through almost every song on their most recent CD, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. An incongruous departure from the acoustic, bluegrass sound that characterized their early albums — most notably 1996’s critically acclaimed Being There — that pigeonholed Wilco into the burgeoning alt-country slot, Foxtrot offers a refreshing blend of electronic experimentation and sprawling psychedelia, which further accent the timeworn elements that have earned Wilco a growing fan base: introspective, delicate lyrics and elaborate musical arrangements.
Tweedy, always the charmer, started the show on a deceptive note with the disarmingly wistful “How to Fight Loneliness,” from 1999’s Summer Teeth. If people sang rather than cried when they were sad, his voice would be the equivalent of lovely, maudlin sobs. And so the audience sat, weighed down with collective emotion.
The next two songs followed suit: acoustic ballads that simply didn’t motivate the audience to its feet.
“Don’t we look pretty?” Tweedy asked the seated crowd, almost in disbelief.
With that, the crowd jumped to their feet, showing admiration for his aw-shucks adorability — it was perfect timing, as the band quickened the pace with a frenzied, jarring rendition of “Shot in the Arm,” another throwback to Summer Teeth.
Two inarguable highlights, however, both from Foxtrot, screeched to life on stage. “I am Trying to Break Your Heart,” the album’s opening track, became a pleasing cacophony of computer generated sound effects layered with emotional lyrics; “Jesus, Etc.,” an unlikely, succinct version of the modern pop ballad, practically giggled at its own pretentious irony.
“Heavy Metal Drummer,” also from Foxtrot, was the evening’s crowd-pleasing sing-a-long song. In an admittedly rare interaction with the audience, Tweedy encouraged participation during the song’s chorus — he attempted to solicit a practice “ooh ooh yeah” from the energized audience, only to be met with insistent screaming and whistling. Nonetheless, the crowd remembered their cues, and the result was a danceable, participatory piece of jangle rock: “I miss the innocence I’ve known / ooh ooh yeah / Playing Kiss covers, beautiful and STONED.”
After the rousing, heavy-on-the-Foxtrot main set, Wilco came back for not one, but two encores, playing many well-known songs from their back catalogue. “California Stars,” a pretty piece of country-western cliché, evoked Dylan’s Nashville Skyline — with its saccharine lyrics, it was the musical equivalent of a shy smile.
A clash of style complimented the driving “Misunderstood,” the first song in the second encore. Wilco took the song-one of the gutsier, more innovative tracks on Being There — to a higher level of sophistication, a level clearly inspired by and infused with the band’s new electronic sound. On the album, the entire song builds into Tweedy ceaselessly chanting the word “nothing” for several bars. Yet in concert, the chant continued for a full five minutes, with each band member pouding, scratching, banging on their respective instruments — when the song finally collapsed, winded, Tweedy’s face assumed an oxygen-deprived, tomato red appearance, his voice barely audible from screaming.
Wilco has always been forthcoming with its heart, betraying its emotion for everyone to see — now the same heart, complete with shredded larynx, is ripped, torn and digitally augmented, but still beating strong.
