Review Summary: Strange as it seems, I’ve outlived my dreams
I was quite wary of Wilco’s direction nearly a decade ago - not only was
Yankee Hotel Foxtrot’s brilliance far in the rearview mirror by that point, but the releases of
Star Wars and
Schmilco didn’t inspire great confidence. On their own merits, I’ll defend both of those records as pretty great, but the former’s half-baked jam session feel and the latter’s laconic vibe (not helped by a throwaway album title) both gave the sense that Wilco was settling into a late-career phase of simply resting on laurels. Since that time, I’ve been happy to be proven wrong.
The band’s resurgence began with 2019’s
Ode to Joy - one of Wilco’s most mellow records, but its delicate nature doesn’t obscure the catchiness, beauty, and emotion present in spades. This was followed by 2022’s
Cruel Country, a sprawling double album advertised as the group’s long-awaited return to country, the genre that spawned them long ago. While it did add a steady touch of roots and twang, most of the expansive tracklist fit rather well alongside the mild fare of recent Wilco and solo Jeff Tweedy efforts, but if the marketing felt a touch overblown, the record still delivered, a rock-solid eighty-or-so minutes anchored by multiple career highlights. And now, only a year and change later, we have
Cousin, the third installment of a perhaps overlooked but undeniably impressive run by one of contemporary indie’s iconic groups.
Cousin is an incredible-sounding album. By that, I don’t mean that the ten songs here are reliably great (but they are!), or that the musicians on the LP play their instruments well (they do!), or that the record is arranged perfectly into a nicely-flowing forty-three minute listen (it is!). Rather, it’s the standout production job which proves particularly notable, courtesy of Welsh musician Cate Le Bon. Le Bon’s involvement itself is a relevant departure, as she is the first outside producer on a Wilco album since 2007’s
Sky Blue Sky. As someone without any expertise in production at all, but who is in possession of two working ears, I’d say the band hit a home run. Not only do the songs sound lovely, but the colorful, glossy, shimmery-ness which results gives the music of
Cousin a distinct identity in its own right.
More on that last note - I single out the production so heavily not just because it’s wonderful, but also because in most other respects
Cousin feels like more-or-less a “standard Wilco effort”. There are some “different” songs like the exceptional opener “Infinite Surprise” or the future classic “Pittsburgh”, both of which have an artsy tinge that the band have often wielded at their finest, and mark a transition from the more rustic feel of last year’s record, but a good chunk of the tracklist could’ve been pulled from various other Wilco albums - “Evicted” seems like a perfect
Ode to Joy cut, for example, and the noisier title track wouldn’t be out-of-place on
Star Wars. However, they all work together nicely, buoyed by the kind of drifting and ethereal vibe which the production style furthers.
All in all, the vibrancy of the cover art couldn’t feel more appropriate, with
Cousin coming across as drenched in warmth - if still rather melancholy, it seems notably bright following the oft-grim
Cruel Country. There may only be a few songs here which will take a place among Wilco’s finest, but this is a consistently strong album, and the band has never sounded better, at least from a studio recording perspective. And Tweedy’s songwriting remains in top form - the apathetic delivery of mass shooting-pondering “Ten Dead” hits harder than the more obvious enraged approach likely would’ve, while closer “Meant to Be” captures a sense of yearning beautifully - “
our love is meant to be”, he sings, expressing the thought more as an aspiration than a fact. I won’t try to assess where
Cousin fits within the panoply of Wilco albums, but it’s another worthy addition to a burgeoning discography. It’s a wonderful feeling when an old favorite is still in a groove and pumping out quality music after so many years. Here’s hoping that there’s decades more in the tank.
