Poor Places

Album: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (2002)
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Songfacts®:

  • This Yankee Hotel Foxtrot track finds Jeff Tweedy singing of a man falling apart piece by piece as the comforts of home transform into a prison cell.
  • Tweedy told Mojo magazine December 2013 there was a strong narrative arc going throughout the album, a unifying philosophy boosted based on reflection on America. He explained: "Up until that point I'd been very negative towards patriotism or feelings of nationality. But traveling round the world, I was starting to feel a deeper understanding that my country has shaped me and it is something that can be defined for yourself without it being a caricature. In other words it was home."
  • Pitchfork placed Yankee Hotel Foxtrot at #4 on their list of Top 200 Albums of the 2000s. The alternative music website also named this track as the 147th best song of the decade.

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