Loose Fur is a collaboration between Wilco's Jeff Tweedy and improviser/songsmith Jim O'Rourke, along with Tweedy's drummer-in-tow Glenn Kotche. There's a number of directions such a collaboration could go: O'Rourke could pull Tweedy along with him into some sort of netherworld of academic jazz improvisation; Tweedy's lifeforce could dominate and make it sound like just another Wilco album, O'Rourke not contributing much more than what he does to Wilco already; or it could be a true collaboration, not unlike O'Rourke's pop orchestrations nor unlike Tweedy's (consistently-moving-away-from-)alt-country indie rock. On the threesome's first, self-titled album, the latter hypothesis is probably the one that ends up holding true, although with many of the songs it's clear which hands the original design came from.
The more collaborative songs seem to end up in a Allman Brothers-style guitar jam, eschewing the educated noise for good ol' riffing off a repeated theme. "Laminated Cats" starts the album with a looped clippedy-clap from the drum and a blob of tone-bending guitar. Tweedy sings lead here, delivering his lines quietly until a boogie-rock guitar line, not unlike those O'Rourke used on Insignificance, takes over the song. What follows is a study on repetition and subtle mutation, as O'Rourke and Tweedy entangle themselves during a jam marathon. Instrumental "Carnival Knowledge" also ends with a noisy guitar jam. The song begins with alternating, opposing sections of demented country twang guitar and a pristine, crystalline melody, showing both sides of team Loose Fur. As the song develops, the two sections merge together, causing the song to collapse like a sagging shelf into clattering-noise. The Loose Fur-as-jam-band theory only goes so far, though, as the Red Red Meat-esque "So Long" develops not into a guitar jam but rather a sweeping barroom melody.
The less collaborative songs are also good, but the fact that three of the six songs don't seem like true collaborations make the partnership seem to have less purpose. "Elegant Transaction" is a typical O'Rourke pop song, as "elegant" as the name implies with O'Rourke smoothly singing lead and somehow once again turning a folky acoustic guitar part into the perfect pop centerpiece. Towards the end, a banjo intertwines itself providing the requisite collaborative element, but it's crystal clear where the song originated. "You Were Wrong" and "Chinese Apple" are typical Wilco songs. Both are good songs, and technically the latter has an extended middle section of didgeridoo-like ambience, but the style diverges little from Tweedy's oeuvre.
Rumor has it that Jeff Tweedy introduced the first in a pair of Brooklyn Loose Fur gigs as "our first show as Loose Fur, and it's one of two, so you're seeing us halfway through our career." If that's so, ultimately it's no big loss to the music world and the rest of mankind. Loose Fur is good time rock and roll, but the collaboration adds little to the two's already noteworthy main vehicles. Forward-thinking Tweedy fans and backward-thinking O'Rourke fans will definitely get a kick out of it though. And, if you think about it, with the directions started in Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and Insignificance, maybe that pretty adequately describes the two guys' current main fanbase.
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