Writer's Guild strike be damned, Rock Turtleneck crossed the picket line faster than you can say "scab-tastic" in order to hand out its first annual "T-Neck" music awards at Teaneck Municipal Amphitheatre in Teaneck, NJ.
In keeping with Rock Turtleneck's mission statement, the T-Necks celebrate the hidden alleyways and abandoned catacombs of music. We will be presenting these awards from time to time over the coming weeks. Dim the lights.
Best Steely Dan homage:
Wilco, “Impossible Germany”
Complex time signatures. Fluid,Coltrane-quoting guitar solos. Haiku-like references to the Far East. There’s a reason why garage bands rip off the Ramones and not Steely Dan.
“Impossible Germany” from Wilco’s bringing-it-all-back-home release Sky Blue Sky, is a charmingly cerebral mélange of Becker/Fagen’s “Bodhisattva” and “Deacon Blues.”
As with “Deacon Blues,” “Impossible Germany” seems to be a thinly-veiled excuse to do some tastefully virtuosic jamming. When you have a guitarist like Nels Cline in the band, why shouldn’t you?
Congratulations, boys on winning the first-ever Rock Turtleneck T-Neck award. From here, the sky's the limit.
In celebration, a live-in-the-studio clip from the Sky Blue Sky bonus DVD, plus a live mp3 from 2007 (get the full show from rbally here. And to bring it all back home, Steely Dan’s languid and bittersweet “Deacon Blues.” This is the day of the expanding man.
YouTube: Wilco, “Impossible Germany,” from their personal studio/funhouse The Loft, Chicago 2006
mp3: Wilco,"Impossible Germany," Live in Troutdale, OR, 8.22.07
mp3: Steely Dan, "Deacon Blues," Aja
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