Sky Blue Sky - Production

Production

In April 2006, Wilco was still touring in support of their most recent studio album, A Ghost Is Born which was released in 2004. The band performed a few new songs during this leg of the tour, including "Walken", "Either Way", and "On and On and On". The following month, drummer Glenn Kotche mentioned to Pitchfork Media that those new songs were going to be recorded as demos for a new album release. During a January 17, 2007 solo concert, frontman Jeff Tweedy announced that the band would release their sixth studio album on May 15, 2007 through Nonesuch Records. The album was named Sky Blue Sky, a reference to a childhood memory of Tweedy's, of a Memorial Day parade in Belleville, Illinois. He had come home from St. Louis with his family, but could not reach his house because the parade blocked the main street. This led Tweedy to reflect upon his future in the town: he knew that he would have to leave when he grew up because it was too small.

The album was recorded by TJ Doherty at The Loft in Irving Park, Chicago, where Tweedy had recorded Loose Fur's Born Again in the USA and most of Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. In an interview with Billboard, the band revealed that the album would be less experimental than the two previous albums and more influenced by The Beatles, The Beach Boys, and The Rolling Stones. Also, unlike the previous albums, the album was made with only minimal involvement of Jim O'Rourke; the album which was produced with very few overdubs.