Impossible Germany, Unlikely Blog Entry

*Ed. note - Here's a guest post from my good friend Alex. He's a professional writer, so he's going to make my writing sound like horrible pointless drivel... But, I digress. Enjoy! - Halfcourt*



I’m sitting on my porch overlooking the courtyard in the apartment building on Emery. There’s a tree that is ready to topple over, and it’s hot as hell. I’m braving another Kansas summer night, the kind that produces a heavy sweat that engulfs your body and mind.

It’s another night of reflection, wondering how I could ever leave the hulking buildings, rusty bridges and swarm of humanity of Chicago for the plains of Kansas.

It’s another night of sighs, of questioning myself and pondering what I’ve gotten into.

In the background, there are dueling guitars.

“Impossible Germany/Unlikely Japan/Wherever you go, wherever you land”

As Wilco’s “Impossible Germany” leaks from my apartment, everything stops. For five minutes and 58 seconds, my worries subside.

It’s not because it’s a happy song. I really don’t think it is. It’s a song that just touches on moving from being single and scared to having someone to share your life and troubles with. It’s not a sappy ode to love. It’s two verses of pretty straightforward sentiment.

Of course, the song ends the same way it starts. Whether that’s musical metaphor or convenience, I’ll never know.

But that’s not why this song is brilliant.

It’s the precise guitarwork that follows. The dueling couplets and background riffs that make me close my eyes, tap my foot, shake my head and smile every time I hear the song. There’s passion in every note. Each note brings you through a relationship, starting slow and eventually ending in the up and down riff that ends on a high note (see what I did there?).

When Tweedy, Nels and Sansone play, you imagine them back to back, shaking their guitars like an 80s heavy metal band. Up and down the fretboard they go, deftly flicking off note after note. They capture a sense of freedom that embodies rock and roll, something I never felt in my self-imposed exile.

But for a few short minutes, everything that bothered me would disappear.

In May 2008, Wilco played in downtown Lawrence, Kan., the first outdoor show to take place in that area of town. I was so excited to go.

When they played “Impossible Germany,” again, it was like a heavy weight was lifted and I moved like a hippie at Woodstock.

The cheap Miller Lites probably helped.

They also played “Via Chicago,” which became a favorite of mine in the months leading up to my departure. Near the end of the song – which uses Chicago not as a final destination as it was for me, but as a point in a journey – Tweedy sings some nonsense:

“And crawling is screw faster lash
I blow it with kisses
I rest my head on a pillowy star
And a cracked-door moon
That says I haven't gone too far”

But when they play it live, he says “gone to faaaaaaaaaar,” his voice trailing off into another solo.

It’s just one of many Wilco songs that bring me back to a time and a place. “Via Chicago” takes me to Chicago – but also reminds of what I went through to get back here (mainly a tortuous graduate school program that taught me little except that academia is full of shit).

“Say You Miss Me” reminds me of winter commutes on the ‘L’, pining over a girl.

When I hear “Pieholden Suite,” I’m taken back to first kisses and the possibility of new love.

“Red-eyed and Blue” has whistling in it, and that’s just awesome. You’ve got to appreciate a song with whistling.

Somehow, somewhere along the line Wilco decided to play an important and defining role in my life. It’s more mature than the songs of my youth (the Offspring really were never good, and Travis has never evolved). But Wilco did evolve. And I guess, now that I’m 30, I have too.

While that’s still a bit of a scary thought, at least I know there’s always going to be a song that makes me forget my troubles.

Have a look at Wilco in Lawrence:


And two awesome covers: