>Teh problem with "softer" rock (and a lot of harder trock too
>of course) in the past two decades is that it has gone in a
>"texture-music" direction; people get blown away by all the
>little details and creativity in the arrangements and
>"interesting" sounds and it feels like prog-rock again, just
>in a vertical sense rather than a horizontal one. The love for
>Radiohead, Flaming Lips and post-early records Wilco is an
>example of this.

I don't find that to be a problem, personally. I like texture. I like krautrock and minimalism and (some) electronic music - all the stuff that influenced the post-rock bands from Chicago, as well as the three you just mentioned. I guess this is just a divide of personal taste. Texture is good stuff to me. And I think conversely it's quite possible to over-value riffs, song structures, and such - I think the relatively small amount of exploration left to be done in those areas (at least within the confines of the rock genre) is a big reason why rock feels so exhausted the last couple decades, and why there aren't as many great bands any more. If there's ever going to be another big rock boom, I think the genre is going to have to change pretty radically, maybe to the point that it won't even be rock any more.

To stand up for Wilco on your own ground though, I don't think their songs are as wholly uninteresting as you imply. Tweedy writes actual songs, not experimental jams, and some of them are pretty interesting little numbers (although a lot are just straight-forward verse/chorus pop rock songs). He is fond of the occasional weird chord change, the melody that takes an unexpected turn, etc. Some of it is borrowed from familiar sources like the formal boundary-pushing of the mid-to-late Beatles and so forth, but he does do interesting things, is my point. I've always loved the bridge/chorus section of "Can't Stand It," to name just one example - he wrings a whole lot of pretty out of a riff and chorus vocal that are melodically and rhythmically not at all standard (at least by pop/radio norms).