THE FIRST TIME WILCO SINGER Jeff Tweedy, 47, heard the phrase “dad rock,” he was reading a Pitchfork review of his band’s 2007 album, Sky Blue Sky, which a writer said “nakedly exposes the dad-rock gene Wilco has always carried but courageously attempted to disguise.” This was followed by a series of negative adjectives synonymous with dad music, including “passive,” “domestic” and “lackluster.” Tweedy’s response, he recently told an interviewer from Esquire (a dad magazine if there ever was one), was visceral: “Ouch. Wow.”
Dad rock was everywhere in 2014 — or rather, the phrase “dad rock” was, as an epithet, a punchline. Artists tagged with the label in print or online this year include U2, Bruce Springsteen, Led Zeppelin, Foo Fighters, The Kinks, Leonard Cohen, Julian Casablancas, Spoon and,…
