The group made Star Wars available on Thursday (16Jul15) without any fanfare, and it will remain free as a download and available on streaming sites like Amazon, Google, Spotify and Tidal for the next 30 days.

Announcing the album's launch on Instagram.com, singer/songwriter Jeff Tweedy writes, "Why release an album this way and why make it free? Well, the biggest reason, and I'm not sure we even need any others, is that it felt like it would be fun. What's more fun than a surprise?"

Wilco is not the only act to release a surprise album without any publicity - Radiohead, Beyonce and Drake have all dropped albums with no fanfare.