No Monday morning quarterbacking please.

For once, I will agree with the masses and choose to see Wilco on August 2nd. Here’s why:

1. My teenage years would not have been even half as tolerable without Rage being there to cradle my angst into a nicely packaged “F-U, I won’t do whatcha told me” followed by a toxic Morello solo that sounded like a turntable on acid. Also, I discovered Allen Ginsberg’s poetry not because I took a class, but because Zack read ‘Hadda Be Playing On A Jukebox” on this bootleg Rage concert CD I owned.

That being said, I don’t identify much with that 19 year old lad anymore. To see Rage now would be more about nostalgia for my youth than being into the music. Worse yet, I confess that I haven’t listened to most of the Rage tracks in months, some even years.

2. I discovered Wilco in late 2002, about 6 months before I started dating my wife. Originally, she lived in Connecticut and I lived on Long Island. Every Wednesday, I would take a train into NYC for work, then another train up to CT after work to see her.

At 11pm, I would then take both trains consecutively back to LI. Along the way, Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot played endlessly. Thus, those early moments are forever linked. Since I’ll be at Lolla with her, Wilco just makes too much sense to not miss.

KICKER: Wilco’s only show this summer in the NYC area (on 8/13) is all sold out, and Rage is not coming around at all. However, should the unscrupulous bastards selling Wilco tickets for triple price be forced to sell at face value, then we would choose Rage and see Wilco in NYC instead.

Wilco.