Jeff Tweedy’s Modern Masterpiece

Design by Charlotte Heintz

By Wyatt Sardy

Jeff Tweedy’s right hand strokes the strings on his guitar like he doesn’t care, like it’s easy for him. He doesn’t have the best stage presence, he doesn’t prance or slide on his knees to face the crowd for a high-octane solo. Tweedy allows his music to envelop you, he wraps it around your body like some sort of sentient vine. Steady rhythms lull you into a meditative state, where his voice and diction permeate the space, and your mind. I attended the Twilight Override tour at the Royale in Boston. Before the show I talked to a woman who seemed to be a Tweedy superfan. She recounted to me a story of him calling her out for being on her phone in the first row, ‘He loves to talk’ she told me. This was an impression I would not have expected after listening to the album, there was a seriousness in his tone, it seemed to me this type of person wouldn’t care about petty grievances, maybe this was a thing of his past? As the show started I expected to see the front man’s persona in full fledged on-mode, but he just got right into it. Not skipping a single beat, letting the music speak for him. 

For the whole show, I kept getting the nagging thought that it should be recorded, as the music felt so monumental, this moment in time needed to last forever and should be able to be replayed. I kicked myself for not listening to enough Wilco, and only finding out about Tweedy recently from a New York Times article. Watching the show made me want to pick up a guitar, and Tweedy’s interactions with his sons reminded me of how I talk with my dad. I thought to myself, what other form of art is as communal as this one? In what other profession can you express so vibrantly, and do it with the people you love? Twilight Override at the Royale didn’t feel like any other show I’d been to, and the love and alliance between musicians was palpable and incredibly moving. 

Twilight Override is an album that feels like it has always existed. In the same way Beethoven’s “Für Elise” seems to be timeless and ageless, there are a few songs off of Twilight that elicit a similar feeling. Namely, “One Tiny Flower” and “Caught up in the Past,” are stunning tracks that seem to have the elegance and complexity of an orchestra, but are, at the same time, so simple. Tweedy creates something uncomplicated that feels monumental, like Paul McCartney jamming out the riff to “Get Back” in the vast expanse of a studio in Twickenham. Tweedy is able to do something similar with this album, it feels laid-back, but begs to be heard. 

This feeling, though, doesn’t account for the fact that the arrangements are intricate and the musicianship is excellent— like the perfect harmonies in the chorus of “Caught Up In The Past”, or the distorted guitar on “Forever Never Ends”. The mere fact that there hasn’t necessarily been explosive appreciation of the instrumentation, means that Tweedy & Co achieved their goal. For this album, rather than depending on his Wilco band members, Tweedy relies on his sons, Spencer and Sammy, and some other ultra-talented musician friends. The sum of the band’s parts comes together to elevate each other and Tweedy’s writing, and the album becomes a vast expanse of love. My favorite song off of the album, a five-minute vignette called “Love is for Love”, holds some of his most potent writing. 

“Someone’s cell phone comes sailing down,

 the bones of the books we never found, 

the lights on the ridge winding around,

Shadows in their shadows,

Drugs on drugs,

Crawling on the ground,

Love is for Love”

The album incorporates feelings of ardent nostalgia, but there seems to be some sort of intense trauma looming, hiding in-between the strumming of guitars, voices and steady drums. The album is a description of objects, places, people, love, forgotten. Listening to Twilight Override feels like I stumbled into a previous home of Jeff Tweedy, and in the closet of a tucked-away room is an 8mm projector, loaded with home videos of the things and individuals that helped shape the place that is his mind, Inside of which, residing tortuous sadness, laid-back confidence, exuberant joy, and silliness. A favorite of mine from this album, “Signs of Life,” has its own western twang. But I can’t help but notice Tweedy’s poetic influences, the shortness of the verses remind me of ancient Chinese poetry with its enjambed sentences that enunciate the next lines, and the next. 

Tweedy’s album is beautiful, and though it has a decently long duration, it feels like it wouldn’t be whole if it was any shorter. Its length reflects the breadth of emotional ground Tweedy covers. Twilight Override is truly what its title suggests; the same feeling a magical lonesome twilight gives you, is the feeling Tweedy gives spreads through each track, slowly and softly like jam on bread. Give yourself the time to let the album envelop you, and you may be transported into a world of deep feeling and love, along with all the other emotions that fill our lives. Tweedy’s long track record already seemed spotless, but somehow he’s able to do it again.