I haven't really listened to this song in years, one of those from the album that "didn't make the cut" for me. But in retrospect, it's not as bad as I remember. I often use Supertramp as an archetype of the kind of big 70s band that later bands like Wilco seemingly would never talk up in an interview as an influence, or any sort of pop paradigm to shoot for, despite the fact that Supertramp were enormous in their time and a very good, versatile pop band. I'll be damned if that time signature shift in the song with the creeping riff on the electric piano doesn't remind of this, especially at the 55 second mark where the band rolls into that wah-wah guitar riff section of the song:
Shake It Off I like the languid beginning of this song. Then it rolls into a section that reminds me of their own song “Kingpin” from Being There, and by 2:30 the first “shake it off” section begins. Afterward things cool down until at 4:00 we get the 2nd “shake it off” segment, before ending quietly for the final 20 seconds. So what’s the song about? It seems like it’s a bit of dream state in the sense that Jeff is waking up in a hotel and he’s having some bad thoughts, doubt about his art, missing his wife, etc. And the stop-start “shake it off” parts are him trying to rouse himself out of bed, throwing the covers off, and facing the day, “when I’m awake enough”. The song seems to exist in that time period between waking up and actually getting out of bed. That time period when you know there’s things to be done today but you just don’t want to start yet. That time period when your brain is not totally awake but is starting to remember all the stuff that has been weighing on your mind. So you’re stuck, not yet wanting to get up, but knowing that you need to “shake it off”, clear your head and get moving. Is it a good song? Well, I only really heard it first a few days ago, so time will tell. But it doesn’t bother me or anything. I thought it fit pretty well in the album and so far I am really liking this album.
"Shake It Off"- It's also news to me that many fans dislike this song. I like it almost as much as the previous song, and I have always lumped these songs together. Neither great, but both interesting. I would have never guessed that "Side With The Seeds" would be loved, and this one would be hated. It's not a favorite of mine, and I am not always in the mood to listen to it, but there are definitely a few songs on this album I would put below it. Some cool drums and a sweet little groove with a great vocal at the 1:30 mark. "It definitely starts to spoil my heart, somewhere there's a war, but sometimes there is art". It's just one of those songs that exists on the album that you quickly forget about after it's over. I enjoy it, and according to my pre-thread calculations there are about 5 songs that I find inferior to this one. 3.5/5
I agree with @Parachute Woman 's assessment of this song - its one of my least favorite songs on the record, but I don't necessarily dislike it. When I think of any album that I love or would put on my "all-time favorite's list," there are a few that are "perfect," but the great majority of them consist of really "high point" songs and "middle of the road," songs. Depending on how much of it I like those songs, my "favorite" albums could well contain a song I really dislike as well. This would be one of those "middle of the road" songs for me. While I don't particularly like it all that much, I never skip over it and weirdly, it has sort of an "ear worm" quality about it. My wife and I spent the weekend up in the mountains and we listened to this record on our rainy drive up from Columbia. Oddly, after playing SBS, this was one of the songs that sort of rattled around in my brain for the rest of the weekend (I "drum" with my teeth when I "play" songs in my head - it drives my wife bonkers - but I was drumming to this song for a lot of the weekend).
I think this is one of the most Lennonesque things Jeff ever did, somewhere at the intersection of Cold Turkey/Well Well Well/John Sinclair/Scared : unsettling, discomforting, repetitive etc. I guess the (lesser known) reference song could be : I distinctly remember Shake it Off being very controversial on release. "Obnoxious" was certainly a term I heard at the time. The general feeling was they were trying to remain "edgy" with an overly deliberate dissonant experiment right in the middle of an otherwise mellow record (a bit like It's So Hard on Imagine, if you don't mind another Lennon analogy). Of course, many already resented the "mellow" aspect of the album in the first place. I guess us Wilco fans can be just as contrarian as Jeff is. We learnt from a master after all.
Shake it off I guess I will be the lone pickle in the jar. I like this . The opening reminds me if something, but it's not coming to mind. I think the chord pattern at the start is great, and the smooth laconic disconnection really works for me. When the groove kicks in, it is really very cool. That keyboard is great. I have no real idea of the lyrics, and have no way of checking them out at the moment. The chorus I suppose is a little repetitive but not painfully so. Nels adds some really neat little guitar bits. I guess I just really like the music here. It is pretty different for Wilco and moves through some really nice feels... for me at least.
I was just playing this song, with my wife in the other room. Curious, I asked, "Hey, what did you think of that song." She said, "It's the Beatles." As if, duh, it's good. I told her it was Wilco though, like I said, she was in the other room and listening through a wall. Despite what I said yesterday, tongue in cheek, about the spare tire on the album's midsection, I actually like "Shake It Off." It isn't brilliant or anything, but I've always like the swamp rock sections, and the way the band transitions out of it. I first saw this one on the Sky Blue Sky tour in 2007. Since that year, Wilco has played it a whopping total of 10 times. They haven't played it on every tour, and some years they've played it only once. They haven't played it in six years. Somehow, I caught one of those shows, 2010/03/29 in Richmond, VA at the National, a renovated old theater. I assume someone requests this one on the band's website; it must have a handful of big fans out there. Jeff didn't say anything one way or the other about that at this show, but he did forget the lyrics to the first verse. The band didn't show any rust, though. The National. I sat in the balcony with my then-fiancée, and my two little brothers, who were in middle school when I got into Wilco and grew up with me as a megafan. And here's the poster from that show: I never paid much attention to the lyrics before the last couple of days. I really like them, except for "Somewhere there's a war / Sometimes there is art," which strikes me as painfully clunky.
yeh I can agree with that ... but I didn't realize this song was so hated! I like it pretty well, some good electric guitar
Here's an interesting one: Chris Thile covered 'Shake It Off' live in January 2019: Nobody rocks a mandolin like Chris. This version is both dreamier and rootsier than Wilco's. There is a pretty kick-ass fiddle solo.
Beautiful venue and great poster. Playing around on Setlist FM, I see that I have only seen Shake it Off played once - a 2007 show at Ovens Auditorium in Charlotte, NC.
'Cause the players gonna play, play, play, play, play And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate, baby I'm just gonna shake, shake, shake, shake, shake Shake it off, I shake it off No, not those lyrics... But "Tears get triggered/ Yours remind me/ Of the ice melting in my glass/ Finally full again/ So I listen for/ Your lips to break apart/ Into words" strikes me as painfully clunky, awkward poetry-journal lyrics, too. And then in the second verse, he seems to be describing either hotel inhabitants or the audience at his concerts as, "So many hearts/ Beating in one place/ Like a giant beast with many souls/ No, just a body/ Full of holes." Ouch. That took a turn. Wasn't this supposed to be the record where Tweedy found inner peace or something? Maybe he did rob his old notebooks for this one. I don't know if Jeff actually has thought to do this, but I'd enjoy it if Wilco covered the Taylor Swift song at one of their Solid Sound all-covers shows. Jeff could say, "Since y'all hate the song that I wrote so much, maybe you can get down to this... sick... beat." It would be a chance to take a jab at the haters, but in a self-deprecating way, and everybody could have fun with it. If he dedicated it to @Parachute Woman, so much the better.
I kind of like this song too. They played it a lot on tour in the summer of 2007, including the first Wilco show I attended, and not much since. I was in the pit right up close and what I remember was Jeff trying to get the crowd to go “Woo!” after each refrain, like “Shake it off (woo!)...Shake it off (woo!)” and then seeming to be genuinely disappointed when the crowd didn’t take him up on it. Sorry, Jeff. I tried...
Btw, Wilco played "Shake It Off" 38 times in 2006-07, but just 9 times since. The last one during their December 2014 residency at the Riviera Theater in Chicago, when I think they were trying to play their whole catalogue. Jeff played it in a solo show just once, in the middle of the set at the Vic on 4/15/11. I wonder what brought that on.
“Shake It Off” is certainly one of my least liked songs on the album, if not at the bottom. I wouldn’t say that it’s bad though. The lyrics have some nice lines in them and the feeling of inertia and dislocation comes across strongly. I think they dip into the quiet/loud/quiet well one time too many on this album and being placed right after another (better) track with this same approach does this song no favors. My main problem with the song is that the repeated title phrase is not pleasing to me melodically, and it’s the one part of the song that lingers in my head after it’s over. “Annoying” is an apt word for it. The drums and cymbals also have a sort of demo sound to them on that repeated phrase that I find off-putting. On the good side, I like the middle section with the electric piano and guitar (and definitely agree with the Supertramp comparison). All in all, not great but not awful.
Shake It Off - I'd say I'm pretty much where @robcar is on this one. I don't hate it but it is kind of grating or as @Parachute Woman aptly said, "nagging". I quite like the opening and Jeff's vocals therein. It's not bad enough for me to skip over it. A big salute to @fspringer on the Supertramp pick up!
Shake it Off. A bit weird and off kilter. Not weird enough to be awesome but not weird enough to be terrible. Certainly has some cool parts. The Wurlitzer and flanger give it that Supertramp vibe. Awesome cowbell. First song on the album not to have piano and organ.
Not to belabor it with Shake it Off, but I just listened to it again. It’s kinda jarring, but then again the latter day Wilco and Tweedy albums are being criticized for being too mid tempo mellow and same-y. I mean, at least Shake it Off can’t be called Dad Rock, that it is not
Totally this: weird. But not too weird. But off-kilter in an unpredictable way that makes it a worthwhile flavor to add into the album mix.
Please Be Patient with Me Jeff Tweedy: vocals, acoustic guitar, electric guitar John Stirratt: bass Glenn Kotche: glockenspiel Mikael Jorgensen: piano Pat Sansone: acoustic guitar One of the most stripped down songs on the album, 'Please Be Patient with Me' does not even feature Nels Cline. Jeff handles the electric guitar himself for an extremely understated and muted break. While there isn't anything ground-breaking about this song, I think it is lovely in sound and deeply affecting in the lyrical content. I've been listening to Sky Blue Sky a lot this past week as we have been covering it and nothing else in my collection has felt as right for me at this moment. I've been in a somewhat tender emotional state and this whole album is like a balm for my soul. As I've relayed in this thread, I have depression and Jeff Tweedy's music has often been extremely helpful in helping me manage it. This song is a no frills acoustic ballad. Deeply intimate. The lyrics really mean a lot to me. I've never listened to a songwriter who is so honest about the affects that issues with mental health can have on your relationships with loved ones. You find yourself apologizing for how you feel and how you act, though you can't really control it. It is exhausting for everyone. These opening lines: I should warn you when I'm not well I can tell Oh, there's nothing I can do To make this easier for you You're gonna need to be patient with me Those are the realities of living an everyday life with these kinds of issues. Jeff may have gotten sober, but that doesn't mean all of his problems were magically solved or that things would be smooth sailing forever. I actually find it pretty insulting that this song was dismissed and overlooked as being 'boring' or 'sleepy' by critics. This is incredibly honest, adult writing. It has meant a lot to me.
Please Be Patient With Me: Very stripped down singer-songwriter, touch of John Denver, pretty song. I like it.
Please Be Patient With Me is a pleasant song and fits well at this point in the album. I'm sure we can all appreciate the message. I like it, but it's not a track I look forward to.
