Uncle Tupelo is known as the band that established the alt-country genre, and its successor, Wilco, has been one of the most influential indie rock acts of all time. The frontman of both bands, Jeff Tweedy, is a true elder statesman of the craft of writing and songwriting. His expertise has been demonstrated repeatedly through his numerous collaborative and solo records, as well as his books on music and memoir. His upcoming triple album, Twilight Override, is one of his most ambitious works yet.
Twilight Override features thirty songs in three chapters that represent the past, present and future. Tweedy’s songwriting process delved into the various ways these three themes interconnected.
“A theme that keeps coming up is those individual temporal designations and how impossible it is to keep them separated from each other,” Tweedy said. “The past and the future tend to be dominant over the present, but I think that there's a future version of the past that is different than what I think of the past right now [...] I think [time] is a really fascinating man-made concept. Or is it?”
Tweedy’s appearance at the inaugural Iowa City Songwriters Festival included an intimate artist’s talk moderated by Hancher Auditorium's executive director, Andre Perry, at The Den. Tweedy kicked off his fall tour with a solo acoustic set at the Englert Theatre later that evening. His conversation with Studio One highlighted the Midwest native’s humble outlook on being a living legend.
“One hundred years from now, what piece of writing or songwriting do you want to be remembered for the most?” Studio One’s Cece Mitchell asked.
“It would be audacious to even allow myself to believe that there’s a world where it matters, that anything I’ve done survives,” Tweedy said. “I’m more interested in how the songs live in people individually, like my family and my friends and people that will remember me that knew me. [...] The exalted public status of being a songwriter that some people listen to kind of presents more psychological problems than solutions, so I don’t tend to focus on it."
“It'd be really flattering and nice to know that some part of my work survived, and I imagine the most satisfying thing would be if it survived in that it was a catalyst for someone else’s work, that their work grew out of it as a part of this continuation of song that I'm a part of, that came before me.”
The Iowa City Songwriters Festival was not only a music festival but a songwriters’ workshop and retreat, complete with a multitude of educational opportunities and even an artist-in-residence, Courtney Marie Andrews. Tweedy had a lot of advice to impart to festival-goers, especially on imposter syndrome, since “fake it ‘til you make it” was a key part of his origin story.
“The story goes that you learned guitar when you got into a bike accident, and you had to stay inside all summer. But, I think the most important part of that story to me was that you had already told everyone that you knew how to play the guitar. I thought that was like using imposter syndrome to your advantage before that was even a buzzword. [...] What's your advice to people to overcome that imposter syndrome when it comes to songwriting?” Mitchell asked.
“I think that probably the biggest hurdle for most people is giving themselves permission to make something,” Tweedy said. “The most liberating thing to be reminded of, I think, is that the people that they think of as being great songwriters [...] are much more comfortable with failing than other people.
“I honestly think it's a good frame of mind to go, ‘I'm going to try and write a bad song,’ and I don't think you could. Every day of the year, if you wrote 365 songs, I think that you'd end up writing a good song or more. I think that it would be really unnatural for it to be something you didn't get better at. [...] The act of making something, to me, is the most valuable part of it.”
Tweedy’s most recent book is World Within a Song: Music That Changed My Life and Life That Changed My Music. In it, he explores 50 songs throughout music history that impacted his life and his songwriting. While Tweedy may be too humble to believe his own work might not make its mark on music history, it already has — not just for the attendees of the Iowa City Songwriters Festival. When Twilight Override drops this Friday, it will be yet another installation in Tweedy’s extensive oeuvre of meaningful works.
