Wilco's strongest competition for Favorite Song Not Single of 2004 is currently Sloan's "False Alarm," which may or may not have been released as a single in Canada (I can't seem to find out what the second single was, and I'm disappointed enough in their choices for the first and third that I have little reason to believe they got it right). If any song on Action Pact would have a chance of making it here it would be this one. I already mentioned before that the best songs on the album sound like the cheeriest Interpol songs ever, and this one's got a relentless "PDA"-style pulse plus chiming guitar riffs falling like rain (to steal Sundar from ILX's phrase).

What really takes this song TO THA NEXT LEVEL for me is Jay Ferguson's vocal, which is right up there with Christine McVie's on "You Make Loving Fun" when it comes to earned romantic relief. But where McVie is sated and resting in her lover's arms, Ferguson hasn't achieved that level of comfort (first line is "I know that I'm just a friend"). It's the day before the night after, he's looking forward to next time, getting ready to admit defeat and walk down her street while the bridge of "Falling" is on repeat (* awkward pause before chorus* "oh yeah"). Chorus opens with a swell of harmony and aching, elongated cry of "it's been so long" before the guitars, drums and vocals get all choppy and excited about how something always happens whenever you're together. It's all tension and release, anticipation and glow. Like "You Make Loving Fun," it's a testimony that lightning can strike more than once, an anthem for the newly excited and a glimmer of hope for those who'd like to be.

This needs to be on my radio, like, yesterday.