stephen blyth’s blog

I’ve been searching around for a Wilco bootleg. After seeing the band play at the Opera House on Easter Monday, there’s something about the energy and intensity of the concert I’d like to recapture.

Already I’ve heard a couple of their live recordings as Wilco are prolific sharers and have embraced the Internet.

Aside for the commercially released Kicking Television CD, a concert recording from 4-7 May 2005, Chicago, Wilco have broadcast a lot of live concerts over the Internet. Currently on the official Wilco Roadcase you can hear concerts from the Riviera, Chicago, 20 February 2008 and Tipitina’s, New Orleans, 5 March 2008, both available for a limited time.

Change channel to NPR’s All Songs Considered you’ll find a live recording for their show at the 9.30 Club, Washington DC, 27 February 2008. NPR’s artist archive for Wilco lists quite a few other interviews and studio sessions, but two previous concert recordings are no longer available.

Most of the music is only streamed so you can listen to it just when you are connected to the Internet, but NPR put out a three song sampler from their 27 February 2008 show as a podcast (Wilco live sampler, 16.1 MB mp3).

If that’s not enough you can find gig photos on flickr taken by various photographers (see wilcobase), and set listings of concerts stretching back to their first ever concert in 1994 (including the set list of the Wellington concert). Oh yeah, don’t forget about Wilco on myspace.

Plenty to choose from and browse through but nothing comes close to actually being there (c. 1996).

BTW: The critics highly rated Wilco’s New Zealand shows. Russell Baillie, reviewing the 25 March concert in the NZ Herald, concludes that while Wilco “…may have been preaching to the converted, their performance answered all our prayers, and then some.” The Dominion Post’s Simon Sweetman was similarly entranced: “One of the greatest shows I have ever been a part of” (see Wilco in Wellington).

I didn’t need convincing.

Photo credit: Mahinty on flickr.