Pitchfork give Sky Blue Sky a miserable 5.2 and writes that the album:
nakedly exposes the dad-rock gene Wilco has always carried but courageously attempted to disguise. Never has the band sounded more passive, from the direct and domestic nature of Tweedy's lyrics, to the soft-rock-plus-solos format (already hinted at on Ghost's "At Least That's What You Said" and "Hell Is Chrome") that most of its songs adhere to. The lackluster spirit even pervades the song titles: "Shake It Off" is probably most accurate (not to mention the album's worst track), but "On and On and On" and "Please Be Patient With Me" are both strong alternatives.
Meanwhile, Stylus takes a much more leisurely attitude to the record, giving it a B- and stating:
save the fifteen bucks, because these will sound great once you’ve dropped thirty on Ticketmaster. And that’s where the real frustration of Sky Blue Sky really sinks in: Kicking Television presented Wilco Mk. II in all of its key-trilling, fretboard-smoking glory, while the songs here demand undivided attention that is rewarded less often than we’ve come to expect. And yet, just about everything on Sky Blue Sky, even soft-shoe skiffles like the title track, will likely sound better live. Typical is “Impossible Germany,” which has a triple-pronged axe coda that’s meant for open-air arena fairgrounds, but to get to that point, there’s a lazy, borderline mindless tune resting among guitar notes that flicker like brief fits of wakefulness during a daytime nap.
This is probably true considering how weak A Ghost Is Born sounded until you heard it live (as I did at Red Rocks, and later on Kicking Television). So the consensus is: skip the lp and buy your concert tickets today.
