These certainly are strange times for Jeff Tweedy. Assuming you're literate and that you live somewhere other than an ammunition-fortified Al-Qaeda tunnel, you don't need to hear that old Yankee Hotel Foxtrot sob story again. So let's just say this: Tweedy is at the height of his success while making the most challenging music of his career-- not an easy feat by any measure.

And now, in conjunction with Wilco's latest opus, Tweedy has released his first recording under his own name, the soundtrack to Ethan Hawke's directorial debut Chelsea Walls. Now, frankly, this isn't the kind of thing that's going to solidify his stardom. For starters, there are only five 'real' songs, as we'll call them for convenience, and only two of them even feature him. The record's other seven tracks comprise his score for the film, and though each is effective in its proper capacity as soundtrack music, most of it isn't the sort of stuff you're going to feel compelled to listen to time and again.

Consider the seven-minute opening titles, for example. Tweedy layers swelling feedback and ambling guitar parts over Wilco drummer Glenn Kotche's sporadic percussion, but the loosely defined theme he plays isn't very commanding, and the sputtering vibes in the background don't help it congeal. In short, it does what an effective soundtrack should do-- establish a mood or feeling without distracting you from what's going on. The problem is that it doesn't make for very engaging listening outside of the context of the film. It gets more interesting toward the end, as Kotche's percussion rises in intensity and Tweedy's wall of sound grows thicker, but as a stand-alone piece, it never really arrives.

Part of the problem lies in the fact that each score track can be easily represented by a brief description of what happens in it. For instance, "Hello, Are You There?" is "the short one with the repetitive acoustic guitar and all the floaty keyboards on top," while "Finale" is "the overlong one with the repetitive acoustic guitar and all the floaty keyboards on top." "The Wallman" builds a lovely texture with vibes and what sounds like a harmonium, but only gestures at building a piece of music with that texture. Makes for wonderful sonic wallpaper, but that's about all I can say for it.

The remaining pieces each manage to hold their own on some level without visual accompaniment, with the sparse piano and cymbals of "Frank's Dream" sounding like the not-too-distant cousin of something Michael Krassner's Boxhead Ensemble might have dreamed up-- appropriate, as Tweedy appeared on that collective's last album. In fact, most of the score pieces on this album reflect Tweedy's recent involvement with Chicago's improvisation-oriented underground musical exchange-- Kotche himself has been a mainstay on that same scene for years now.

The two most aggressive-- and memorable-- score pieces come at opposite ends of the disc. "Red Elevator" follows the opening titles by swinging the vibe 180 degrees. Kotche lays down a heavy backbeat, over which Tweedy tosses off distorted riffs and some interesting manipulated feedback. There's a primal drive to it that contrasts well with the rest of the music here, and it's likely to catch your attention mostly for that reason. Better still is the music composed for the closing credits, wherein Tweedy weaves a gorgeous tapestry of themes and counterthemes on acoustic guitars over Kotche's subdued but steady drumming.

While the score pieces may not all be memorable, they at least have a consistent and seemingly coherent color and mood. That flow is broken, however, by the five other songs tossed like so many cucumber slices into the salad of the tracklist. You won't mind when it's Wilco interrupting the flow, as their two contributions are easily the highlights of the album.

"Promising" is vintage acoustic Wilco, and would have fit beautifully on Being There's second disc. Tweedy spins an arresting ballad, bathed in dobro and fingerpicked guitars. Even better is "When the Roses Bloom Again," another leftover kicking around from the band's Mermaid Avenue sessions with Billy Bragg. It was booted from the first album when they discovered the lyrics weren't actually Guthrie originals-- he had adapted a standard-- but it's easily the equal of any of the best material on either of them (Mermaid Avenue, Vol. 2 even cribbed the melody for "Blood of the Lamb"). Whoever wrote the lyrics, the humid swaths of slide guitar and organ bring the words to life in a way I'm sure would have impressed Guthrie himself.

That leaves three other songs, however, which are less essential diversions, and in the case of jazz man Jimmy Scott's contribution, considerably less pleasant. Scott's version of John Lennon's "Jealous Guy" is the only honest-to-god bad thing on Chelsea Walls, and the less said about his piercing, androgynous caterwauling and listless, loungy arrangement the better. The final two tracks seem to be simply sound clips from the film, of actor Robert Sean Leonard, who plays a songwriter running through some material, one of which happens to be Wilco's "The Lonely 1." Though hardly bad, they're also unnecessary and come across more as curiosities than fully developed, listenable songs.

So when the laser slides back across its little track and the disc stops spinning, what is there to say about Chelsea Walls? Not much, I'm afraid. Aside from a few mildly diverting pieces from Tweedy and Kotche and two excellent (and unfortunately, rare) songs, it has little to offer as an album divorced from the images that inspired it. I suppose Wilco completists will want it for those two extra songs, but only you know whether you're that devoted.

-Joe Tangari, June 3rd, 2002