Japanese issue includes one bonus track.

It's hard not to wonder if Wilco's breakthrough 2002 release, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, would have been such a critical success and so eagerly embraced by the indie rock community if it hadn't become such a cause c‚lŠbre thanks to the band being unceremoniously dropped by Reprise Records, and then signed by Nonesuch after the album had become a hot item on the Internet. Much of the critical reaction to the album, while almost uniformly enthusiastic (and rightly so), had an odd undertow that suggested the writers were not especially familiar with Wilco's body of work, registering a frequent sense of surprise that an "alt-country" band would make such an adventurous album while ignoring the creative shape-shifting that had been so much a part of Jeff Tweedy and company's approach on Being There and Summerteeth. The irony is that 2004's A Ghost Is Born, the eagerly awaited follow-up to Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, is also the Wilco album with the strongest stylistic link to its immediate predecessor, as if their new fans are being given a moment to catch up. A Ghost Is Born hardly sounds like a retread of YHF, but the languid, ghostly song structures, the periodic forays into dissonance, and the pained, hesitant vocals from Jeff Tweedy that were so much a part of that album also take center stage here. But while much of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot had a cool and slightly removed feeling, A Ghost Is Born is considerably warmer and more organic; the extended instrumental breaks in several of the songs (two cuts are over ten minutes long) sound more like a group in full flight than the Pro Tools-assembled structures of YHF. And while Wilco's former secret weapon, Jay Bennett, is now out of the picture, the rest of the group (especially multi-instrumentalist Leroy Bach, keyboardist Mikael Jorgensen, and guitarist/co-producer Jim O'Rourke) fill the gaps with admirable grace and strength. If A Ghost Is Born has a flaw, it's in the songwriting; while this album is a "grower" if there ever was one, revealing more of its unexpected complexities with each spin, there are no songs here as immediately engaging as "War on War," "Heavy Metal Drummer," or "I'm the Man Who Loves You" from YHF, and while "Hummingbirds," "Handshake Drugs," and "Wishful Thinking" are tuneful and charming, they lack the resonance and emotional impact of Tweedy's strongest work. And the album's most purely enjoyable tune, the witty "The Late Greats," closes out the disc after the 15-minute drone dirge of "Less Than You Think," dramatically blunting its effectiveness. A Ghost Is Born confirms what old fans and recent converts already know -- that Wilco is one of America's most interesting and imaginative bands -- and it's brave and compelling listening. But if you're expecting another genre-defying masterpiece, well, maybe we'll get one of those next time. ~ Mark Deming

With A GHOST IS BORN, Wilco continues in the melancholy and experimental direction of the preceding YANKEE HOTEL FOXTROT. Those intrigued, if not downright fascinated, by Wilco's transformation from a no-frills alt-country group to an unpredictably inventive avant pop ensemble will find plenty to marvel at on this fifth outing.

"At Least That's What You Said" begins the album quietly with Jeff Tweedy's ragged voice singing softly over a gentle piano line, but the song soon gives way to gloriously tattered guitar soloing and full-band backing. "Hell Is Chrome" follows with Tweedy taking on a surprisingly plaintive vocal tone that hearkens back to 1970s soul ballads, while the nearly 11-minute "Spiders (Kidsmoke)" glides along on Krautrock-like keyboards and features more fierce guitar work. This isn't to say that Wilco has abandoned its sense of melody and pop songcraft, it's just that the group has found new ways to express these aspects of its sound. A GHOST IS BORN continues Wilco's remarkable streak of innovative albums and upholds their reputation as one of America's most adventurous rock bands.

Rolling Stone (p.153) - Included in Rolling Stone's Top 50 Records Of 2004 - "Here they swerve into an equally shocking, poetic clarity..."

Spin (p.103) - "Languid melodies run second to weird sound gestures, soft-rock murmur, and aural pocket lint....Tweedy doesn't sound any less sincere than he usually does..." - Grade: B

Spin (p.63) - Ranked #38 in Spin's "40 Best Albums of the Year" - "[T]his is Wilco at their most organic and instinctual..."

Entertainment Weekly (p.161) - "Rarely has a dose of maturity suited musicians the way it has Wilco....[They] have made their most audacious and riskiest record to date....It has sparkling moments galore." - Grade:B

Q (p.119) - 3 stars out of 5 - "[It's] more confident, more coherent, yielding an all-enveloping warmth....Tweedy's songwriting has edged up a gear, too."

Uncut (p.122) - "[I]ts kinetic power has grown over time....In its singlemindedness, its guitar solos, and its melodic anguish, there are heavy echoes of Neil Young..."

Uncut (p.95) - 5 stars out of 5 - "A GHOST IS BORN feels like a band learning to be spontaneous and unencumbered, and coming up with their most engaging album yet."

Uncut (p.74) - Ranked #2 in Uncut's "Best New Albums of 2004" - "An organic and intuitive record....Exhilarating - and we suspect even greater things are yet to come."

Uncut (p.125) - 4 stars out of 5 - "[The album] consolidated Wilco's reputation as both the finest bar band in existence and a bunch of true sonic adventurers."

Magnet (p.112) - "The album's gorgeous and smirky second half rewards fans of Wilco's country and pop..."

The Wire (p.60) - "Musically and lyrically, A GHOST IS BORN is translucent, weightless, supernatural, capable of drifting back and forth across rock'n'roll's state lines at will..."

CMJ - "[With] longer and more experimental songs and tighter, almost McCartney-like hooks..."

Mojo (Publisher) (p.101) - 4 stars out of 5 - "GHOST is another engrossing, unorthodox record, rattling through styles as deftly and poetically as its chief architect sifts the jottings of his mind."