It would be difficult to find a major publication that hasn't had a Wilco [ tickets ] article this month. And there's no question that--with the new album, leader Jeff Tweedy's recent stint in rehab and the hype leftover from 2002's "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot"--there's definitely a good story here.

But after a few listens to "A Ghost is Born" (and it does take a few), it's clear the music can stand up for itself, with or without a back-story.

From the opener, "At Least That's What You Said," it's obvious this album is about defying listener expectations. Starting with a soft piano and Tweedy's trembly lyrics ("Maybe if I leave, you'll want me to come back home"), the music abruptly turns into a violent syncopation of instruments. In "Wishful Thinking," after a start full of foggy, experimental sound, a simple acoustic guitar emerges, giving way to the band's folksier roots.

It's hard to explain the extended bouts of feedback, knob twisting and pedal pushing that keep showing up on the album. You could see it as a test for listeners, but it may be more about sticking with the music as it almost falls apart--for the rewarding sound when it tightly and forcefully comes back together. "Less Than You Think," with three minutes of song and 12 minutes of unmoving noise, sounds like it should be the album's closer, but then the poppy, tight "Late Greats" comes in, ending the album. And "Spiders (Kidsmoke)," the closest Wilco will get to being a jam band, is followed by "Muzzle of Bees" and "Hummingbird," songs that never come close to breaking apart, but are equally inventive.

The latter is an arguably perfect, sad love song ("A cheap sunset on a television set can upset her/But he never could"), and has hints of late Beatles. But in its subtle tension of strings and piano and haunting chorus--"Remember to remember me/Standing still in your past"--it is pure Wilco: seemingly simple and almost accidental at first, only later revealing its exquisite complexity.