Let's Go (So We Can Get Back): A Memoir of Recording and Discording with Wilco, Etc.

by Jeff Tweedy

Depressing and depressed in all of the familiar ways common to dying midwestern manufacturing hubs: a lot of old empty buildings and a lot of occupied barstools.

When I was a kid, I thought that she wasn’t getting what she needed emotionally from him. But in hindsight, it was probably the other way around. It was my dad who had no chance. She wasn’t going to trust a man with her happiness.

Midwestern sarcasm, when it’s done correctly, can be a thing of rare beauty. It’s like performance art. Everywhere else in the world, you can identify sarcasm if you’re paying attention. Even if the hostility isn’t overt, you can read the signs. There’ll be slightly elongated syllables or a pitch that’s just a little off. It’s like a trombone player with a plunger head. There’s that slight “wah-wah” tone-bending to let you know not to take this too seriously. Midwestern sarcasm plays it straight and makes you listen more closely. You have to treat every conversation like a safecracker. Unless your ears have been trained to recognize it, you’ll miss the hint of a minor key. Sometimes you don’t realize what’s happened until hours later, when it’s 3:00 a.m. and you’re half-asleep, and it suddenly hits you. “Aw, crap, they didn’t mean any of that, did they?”

Learning how to play guitar is the one thing I always look back on with wonderment. I’m reminded of “What ifs?” every time I pick up a guitar. Where would I be? I have sort of a survivor’s guilt about it that makes me want it for everyone. Not the “guitar” exactly, but something like it for everybody. Something that would love them back the more they love it. Something that would remind them of how far they’ve come and provide clear evidence that the future is always unfolding toward some small treasure worth waiting for. At the very least, I wish everyone had a way to kill time without hurting anyone, including themselves. That’s what I wish. That’s what the guitar became for me that summer and is to me still.

Really the thing that pushed me to start writing songs is the same thing that compels me to keep writing songs today. I listen to music—new records, old favorites, the radio, anything—until I feel like I can’t take it anymore, I have to make something or I’ll lose my mind. It’s as simple as that. Even when I believe I’ll never be able to make something even remotely as perfect or beautiful as what I’m hearing, I can’t just sit there and let that challenge go unanswered. I think that may be the highest purpose of any work of art, to inspire someone else to save themselves through art. Creating creates creators.

Anyone who makes stuff lucked out that they found an outlet for what most of the world has as a condition.

if we all learn anything from being alive on this planet, it’s that people will lie to you, especially about how much or little they care about you.

Stoicism can act as a sort of emotional Rorschach test, and it’s easy to project your mood onto the silent one in the room.

There was Dan Orman, the doorman. Who I always assumed had filled out an aptitude test in high school and when it came back, it said D. Orman at the top, and he read no further.

Sometimes I’ll read them with a highlighter, marking phrases that excite my lyric-loving mind.

I don’t believe that your kids should look at you as infallible. They should be able to look at you as a person who is struggling and persevering.

And I think that’s huge for people to be able to live in an environment where they believe that they can accomplish things. That it’s not strange to accomplish things.

My sister held the phone up to my dad’s ear and Sammy told him, “Grandpa, it’s Sammy. I just want you to know I love you. I’ll always love you. You’ll always be here in me as a part of me and Spencer. I don’t want to say goodbye, but I want you to know I’m going to be all right. Spencer’s going to be all right. And my dad’s going to be all right. We’re going to be all right. So, it’s okay to go. You won’t ever really leave us. We love you. Goodbye.” It’s hard to drive a car safely when you’re crying harder than you’ve ever cried. I was so proud of Sammy. I don’t know where he gained the emotional insight that the dying might not want to let go because they’re worried about the living, but it was poignant and beautiful.

It’s predictably awful sometimes. Any job, no matter how great it is, can become a job someone hates.