Wilco Go Online With Free EP

Though Wilco scrapped plans to release a six-song EP commercially, the band will place it on wilcoworld.net for fans to download starting Tuesday night using a code included on copies of the band's 2002 release, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.

Despite industry complaints that the Internet has been detrimental to album sales, Wilco has been successful online. After being cut loose by Warner Bros. in the summer of 2001, the band placed Foxtrot on its Web site for streaming that fall. The album was released the following spring and has posted better sales than any of the band's previous three releases.

The EP was initially released as a bonus CD on the Australian version of Foxtrot (currently available in the U.S. as an import), issued to coincide with the band's January tour Down Under. The set features Foxtrot outtakes including "A Magazine Called Sunset" and an alternate version of "Kamera" (now titled "Camera"). Also included are "Bob Dylan's 49th Beard" (which has been regularly included in the band's live shows), and three newer cuts, "Handshake Drugs," "Woodgrain" and "More Like the Moon." The site will also offer three different artwork packages, each with a different title: More Like the Moon, Australian EP and Bridge.

The band had planned to do additional recording this year for what will eventually become its fifth album. Any work will have to fall in between sporadic touring which is now underway. Wilco have lined up seventeen summer tour dates, six of which the band will share a bill with Sonic Youth. In September, Wilco will spend five dates opening for R.E.M.

Wilco tour dates:

4/22: Lexington, KY, Singletary Center
4/25: Burlington, VT, Flynn Theater
4/26: State College, PA, Penn State University
5/1: Asheville, NC, Orange Peel
5/2: Memphis, Beale Street Music Festival
6/13: Minneapolis, Walker Arts Center
6/19: Cleveland, Tower City Amphitheater (with Sonic Youth)
6/20: Toronto, the Kool Haus
6/21: Pittsburgh, Three River Arts Festival
6/23: Boston, FleetBoston Pavilion (with Sonic Youth)
6/24: Wallingford, CT, Oakdale Theater (with Sonic Youth)
6/26-27: New York, Central Park Summerstage (with Sonic Youth)
6/28: Philadelphia, Penn's Landing (with Sonic Youth)
6/30: Washington, DC, Constitution Hall (with Sonic Youth)
7/2: Detroit, Comerica TasteFest
7/3: Milwaukee, Summerfest
9/3: Portland, OR, New Amphitheater (with R.E.M.)
9/6: San Francisco, Shoreline Amphitheater (with R.E.M.)
9/10: Los Angeles, Hollywood Bowl (with R.E.M.)
9/11: Las Vegas, Thomas and Mack Center (with R.E.M.)
9/13: Denver, Red Rock Amphitheater (with R.E.M.)

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Song Stories

“Help Me”

Joni Mitchell | 1974

Joni Mitchell wrote and recorded this song for her album Court and Spark, but she had to switch from her regular band to make the song sound exactly the way she wanted. "I had attempted to play my music with rock & roll players," she told Rolling Stone. "They’d laugh, 'Awww, isn't that cute? She's trying to teach us how to play.'" Mitchell switched to a jazz band, Tom Scott’s L.A. Express, and scored the biggest hit of her career in the process.

More Song Stories entries »

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