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Q: Why don't you tell me as best you can what happened last summer when you left Wilco?
A: On the one hand, it's a lot easier to talk about in hindsight. Well, it's a lot easier to tell
the story without the extraneous variables, and it's a lot easier for me to talk about. And then I think I also will be speaking something more true, whatever the hell "true" means, you know?
Um, but in a sense, it will be a less exciting story, because I've left a lot of the – I've said goodbye to a lot of the fear and pain and anger, which are all the same thing, you know? So in the absence of the fear and the pain and the anger – because once you've said goodbye to those things, you can't conjure them back up, you know?
Or maybe if you're an actor, you can. That may be why actors are always fucked up. 'Cause they have to hold onto certain memories to be able to call them up, you know?
I mean, I happen to do my damnedest to live in the present. So if I'm telling a story, I'm just telling a story, you know? But, I mean, God, it's all just so clear to me now, you know? And it wasn't all that unclear at the time.
Actually, some Toronto paper today had my quote, a quote I've said before, but you know, it's as simple as this: Jeff just all but said, "I want my band back." You know? I mean, he may as well have said those words. He didn't, so, you know, I'm not putting words in Jeff's mouth, I'm not going to do that. He did not say, "I want my band back." But essentially, he did, you know? And he had every right in the world to say that, you know?
I mean, I think the elliptical way he, you know, the hyperbolic way he said it was, "I think a circle can only have one center." You know? Well, what does that mean? (Laughs.) "Uhhh. John's going to be the center?" You know?
So I don't know what more there is to say. Jeff basically, you know, take that, I don't know, I don't know any other way to interpret that statement. I guess I'm making somewhat of an assumption when I take that to mean what I think it meant, but at the same time, it's the most, that was the most grounded thing that came up during our discussion.
And I had been feeling a bit of an outsider for a little bit of time, you know? So it wasn't any shocker that that big conversation came about, you know? I was kind of – I was either going to – I was two days away from initiating it myself, you know? And Jeff happened to initiate it. Well, I say I was two days away. I don't know, maybe I was two months away, you know? Hindsight.
But, you know, Jeff initiated that conversation, and I was in a lot of ways relieved. I was like, "Phew. All right, we're talking about this now.” Because I'd just being feeling a little weirdness, for not a super long time, but a little while, you now? I'd been feeling a little weirdness.
Q: What was weird? I'm just trying to kind of get a handle on what led up to this.
A: How do I say this? One of my rules of life is to not put words in other people's mouths. And in particular, don't react to the words that you put in their mouth, you know?… And I think that's a good rule of life… Now, whether you can put words in somebody's else mouth, and then not react to them, maybe that's OK. (Laughs.) But if I can, I really try to stay away from making assumptions.
But … I think there's a difference between making an assumption and a speculation or a hypothesis. But maybe I'm just fooling myself and using different words. But I can speculate. And speculating's part of life, and I think I can speculate on some things… I guess the difference between a speculation and an assumption is an assumption becomes a truth for you… and a speculation remains a hypothesis for you, that remains to be proven or not proven in time.
But, you know, I speculate that there was distance growing because I was fucking wearing seven different hats during the making of that record. And it, uh, it, ummm, it hampered the communication in the band. Because people didn't know if they were talking to Jay Bennett the engineer, the producer, the musician, the songwriter, you know?
Someone, someone would approach me about something. Maybe I barked at them because I was engineering at the time. And they wanted to talk about some musical detail, you know? Or maybe something was going wrong with engineering and I barked at them because I was working on a keyboard part, you know?
Or maybe I didn't bark at them. Maybe they just looked at me and said, "Oh, shit. Jay's busy with his engineering shit and I really want to talk to him about the tempo of the song or the key of the song or the feel of the song." And I'm running around like, admittedly, like a chicken with my head cut off. Just ask my wife, you know? She'll tell you how I felt every day when I came home.
And I can't blame anybody, you know? You got a guy running around, and I probably should have had color-coded hats, you know? You'll probably see a little bit of it in the movie (the documentary “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart”), you know? Like, which Jay is that? Well, if you don't know which Jay it is, how are you going to talk to him?…
Then everybody else is just playing their role, that they've always had. You know? John's playing bass. Jeff's being the singer. Got a new drummer who is, mmm, being a little more than a drummer – which is actually really cool. He's very much a musician drummer, you know? And that's my best account of it… And that's my account of it where I take the fall, you know?
Q: But there wasn't any – It sounds – I mean, assuming because Jeff and the other guys have decided to put this record out, you know, with all of this work you did on it, it doesn't appear to me from the outside that it was, you know, basically, that he was upset with you because of the way it came out, or you were contributing the wrong kind of thing to the creative process. Uh, it seems –
A: I was wearing the wrong hat at any given moment. And I think that hampered communication, and I'll take the blame for that. But ultimately, did it affect the record poorly? No. I mean, I think the fact that I was wearing all those hats probably in the end, in the long run, make it a better record. It wouldn't be that record had I not played all the different roles I played, you know? If I hadn't co-written eight of the songs, you know? Or however many, I don't know, I forget.
But, and certain sonic things wouldn't have been the same had I not engineered. And certain parts wouldn't be there if I hadn't played, you know. So, you know, I probably wouldn't do that again. You know, if I had to do it again –
I mean, I do do it now. But it's just me and Ed, you know? And nothing in the world is going to … halt the communication between me and my best friend in the world, you know? Nothing is going to … stop that. There's a different – I can wear all those hats, and it's just me and Ed. And Ed knows when I'm wearing which hat. And this is me and him, so … if I'm wearing one hat and he asks me a question about something else, I put on the other hat. You know? Because we behave so intuitively around each other…
Even before I started making music to be sold with Edward, we've been making music together. And it's a just real primal bond between us that can't be broken, I don't think. I'll never have a falling out with Edward. I just know it. You know?
And if you had asked me the day I joined Wilco, "Do you think you'll ever have a falling out with these guys?" I'd say, "I don't know. It could happen."
Q: Are you still on good terms with Jeff at this point, or do you not communicate with him, or what's the –
A: I think Jeff and I, I hope – once again, speculation and, you know, maybe a bit of an assumption, but it's a positive assumption. Like, if you're going to make it an assumption, make it a positive one. I think we're giving each other space. So I haven't really talked to him. I mean, I talked to him once. But it seems only right that we give each other some time and space.
I talk to John a lot. I called him today. Yeah, we talk. I talked to Ken two days ago. LeRoy (Bach), you know, I brought LeRoy into the band. I've known him for 15 years. Or more. 18 years. 17 years. 18 years. Uh, you know, so I've known him four to three times longer than anyone else in the band. So, you know, we have this bond. Our friendship has always had ups and downs… Ed plays with LeRoy all the time, and they play songs off me and Ed's record. You know?
So I think everything's cool. But, you know, obviously the most intense part of this is between me and Jeff. And I don't know – That's not to say that it really isn't between all of us… It's not like, "It was Jeff's band, and Jay quit Jeff's band." You know? I mean, it's just that it's a lot easier to talk things through with John or Ken or LeRoy. A lot less intense. A lot easier to frame in a – it's "what's good for all of us?"
Q: Do you foresee working with either Wilco or Jeff Tweedy … in some capacity in the future?
A: I wouldn't rule it out, you know? … Put it this way: I am not a collector of enemies. I have few to none, you know? I just, I don't believe in that shit, you know. If there's anything I would want you to print in this article, it's that I do not believe in the holding onto anger and hatred and negative emotions, because they're all based on fear. And they're all projections, and I realize that... that all anger and fear and hatred is projection… Just like every egomaniac is really insecure, you know?
I think that if I were to hold on to any of those emotions – You know, it's the old saying: Emotions are unstoppable and immediate. But reactions to emotions are what really count… be they intellectual or emotional reactions to emotions, or physical reactions to emotions, you know?
Some idiot might feel a reaction to an emotion and pick up a gun. Some other idiot might feel an emotion, a negative emotion, and keep it with him his whole life. And, you know, someone who has their wits about them might feel a negative emotion, think it through and let it go. You know?
So that's what I've chosen to do my whole life. And it's a good step towards living in the present… which doesn't mean it's not possible to recount the past and tell a story. Because telling stories is part of life. Unfortunately, you know, it makes for a clean story. (Laughs.)
But you know, whatever. I don't have to tell you that I was hurt, that there was hurt and anger and fear. I don't have to tell you that. Of course there was.
You know, it's like asking someone, "How was your divorce?" "Ah, totally cool. Yeah, it was totally cool. We just talked and say, 'Hey, let's get divorced.' And we were like, 'All right. Cool.'"
You know what I mean? There's no such thing as a happy divorce, you know? There's such a thing as a happier divorce or a divorce that very quickly gets resolved so that everybody involved is happy. But, you know, the second it goes down, it's not happy.
But … it really comes down to the time lag between the immediate emotion and the reaction to the emotion, you know? Which I think for me was the drive home from Chicago, the night's sleep. Woke up the next morning and called Edward and said, "Want to make a record?"
Q: He told me about getting that call and how it took him about, all of about half a second to say yes.
A: I think he was sleeping. I call him up crying at 6:30 in the morning and as soon as I heard him kind of say, "Yeah. Of course, Jay, of course."
And I said, "This is going to be a lot of work, and this is going to be a lot of commitment." He said – I mean, it was so fucking natural. It was just so fucking natural. We'd been working together nonprofessionally for so long, you know? I don't mean in a nonprofessional manner. I mean in a non-money-making capacity...
It went through my mind, "What do you do?" "Oh, you call Edward." You know? There's just no, "Oh, what am I going to do?" There just wasn't any of that.
So that was nice. I'm glad he was there for me. But I knew he would be.
Q: In addition to all of this stuff you've been doing, you got married in the last few months?
A: Yeah, I got married Jan. 6 (to) Kristin Chalmers. I still call her "K.C.," which is kind of wrecked now, because she's really "K.B." It just doesn't have a ring to it. I still call her "K.C."
Q: The other thing about Wilco I wanted to ask is that the album's finally coming out... What's it been like viewing all of the hype and controversy about it from the distance that you've been at?
A: It's been fun.
Q: Because you were so intimately involved with it when it was being recorded –
A: Yeah, it's been fun. On one hand, you know, there's been a – Uh, let's see, I need to say this in a healthy, positive way... For whatever reason, I think there's been some misinformation on this record, in terms of my involvement… I think that's just lines of communication getting crossed. I don't think anybody deliberately set out to mislead anybody about anything.
But ultimately, there has been some dissemination of misinformation. Or just – I take that back: A generation of misinformation. Which I don't think generated from any one individual deliberately trying to misinform anybody.
Q: What’s been the misinformation?
A: There's been this notion that Jim O'Rourke recorded the record and he produced it and, you know, all this stuff. And that I wasn't on much of it, or whatever. I've just heard that from a few people. "Oh, you're on this one?" I'm like, "Hell, yeah!" You know, I don't where – it's like the soup-can telephone game thing, you know?
Q: Yeah, I think that's where that came from. Now, Jim O'Rourke mixed it at the end?
A: Yeah.
Q: But you engineered it, basically?
A: Yeah, with Chris Brickley, who's a real super-talented guy and I don't want to take anything away from him.
Q: Was there anything about the way Jim O'Rourke mixed the record where you heard it and said, "Oh, my God, why did he do that?" Or was it all pretty much all along the lines you had envisioned it? I mean, was there a creative difference there at all, or were you guys all on the same page about the way it should sound?
A: I don't think Jim and I are very alike characters, you know? You know how you just bump into somebody and you're like, "Yeah, you're my kind of guy"? … It happens to me all the time... That just didn't happen with Jim. (Laughs.) I can speculate on some things. I see why Jeff and Jim get along, you know? Not that I didn't get along with him. I just … never had a long enough conversation with him to decide whether we could get along or not. I can say that I did not have an immediate kind of bonding relationship with him, where like, "Dude, we're on the same wavelength." You know?...
Q: But in terms of what he did in the mixing process, was there anything you just thought –
A: I'm unhappy with some of the stuff he did. It's about 50-50.
Q: Would you care to cite any examples, or is that –
A: I think he did a great job on "Kamera." Most of "Ashes of an American Flag." Real good job. "Trying to Break Your Heart." Really good job. Um, there's some other shit. "Pot Kettle Black." I'm not real happy with that.
Q: Was there anything in particular on that one where you –
A: No, it's just, you know, he's got his style, and I've got mine. You know? And maybe his is right. (Laughs.) But … there's nothing in the world preventing me from saying I don't like that mix. I don't think that song got the mix it deserves. That's my opinion.
Q: What other tracks did you have some sort of problem with?
A: You'd almost have to read the track listing to me... You know, I can give you a 1 through 10, how good I think his mixes are. (Laughs.)
Q: Well, you mentioned "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart" and "Kamera."
A: Yeah, I give those 9's or 10's.
Q: "Radio Cure"?
A: Mmmmmmm. Six or seven.
Q: "War on War"?
A: Mmm. Seven or eight.
Q: "Jesus, etc."
A: Ooo. Four or five.
Q: Really?
Q: What was wrong with that one?
A: Oh, boy. That could have been a lot better. In my mind. I mean... what's weird about this industry is that when any musician just speaks their mind, they're like – and I hope, whatever the hell you write, I beg of you to incorporate this in there somehow, that when a musician speaks his mind, he's just like the guy on the street speaking his mind, you know?
Or like a rock critic. You know, a rock critic speaking their mind is just a guy speaking their mind. As much as you probably want to think it's more. You know what I mean? It's just one guy. Now, hopefully, it's a guy who's really well-informed, right? With a sense of history and reference points and a certain technical knowledge and a certain creative knowledge. And so we might let him, this guy – his opinions might have the strength of two normal guys. (Laughs.)
But you know what I mean? I'm just a guy. And, you know, I'm entitled to my fucking opinion, but at the same time, I could be wrong. In other words, I think there's a better mix of "Jesus, etc." out there. Either literally out there or to be done.
Q: Is it a matter of what instruments he – I had heard in one of the things I read somewhere that there were tons of tracks that you guys recorded, which wouldn't surprise me. And what you hear on "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" is, like, 30 percent of what's actually there in terms of –
A: Yeah, I'm not so sure that percentage is very accurate. I think more like 70. (Laughs.)
Q: You mentioned before "Ashes of American Flags," that a big chunk of that at the beginning is basically straight off of your demo?
A: Yeah, I think it all is, for about the first two minutes or something.
But… let me really quickly synopsize that last bit. Like, that's my opinion about it right now. But, you know, we have to understand we're probably looking at a public who reads this a little more – They’re going to read what I dispute out a little more decisively than I meant it, i.e., I might not feel that way in two years, you know what I mean?
I've had that happen to me before with records, where I really didn't like a mix, and then two years later I was like, "What the fuck? That's a great mix." You know? So those are just my opinions right now, and I'm not blaming anybody. I'm just saying, "Eh. I disagree." You know? I would have done it differently.
But, you know, I'm not in the band anymore. (Laughs.) And we can't separate those things, you know? I mean, that's probably why I'm not in the band.
Q: Jeff's probably not going to be calling up you up to remix these?
A: I don't think so. Maybe someday. I don't know. There's a certain kind of mix that I do really well.
Q: So what did you think of the version of "Ashes of American Flags" that ended up there on the final album?
A: I won't get real technical, but I think it's pretty good.
Q: "Heavy Metal Drummer"?
A: Mmm. Could have been a lot better.
Q: "I'm the Man Who Loves You."
A: Real good.
Q: You like that one a lot?
Q: You mentioned "Pot Kettle Black" already. "Poor Places"?
A: Mmm. Could have been better.
Q: And "Reserva –"
A: This is my opinion of Jim from what I know of him. I think he's more of an arranger than an engineer … At least from what I know of him. I could be wrong. I'm probably wrong, you know? And I'm not saying anything bad about him. I think his strength is arranging. And I think he's a really, really creative guy.
And I actually think the most important skill for a mixing person to have is the sense of arrangement and dynamics, and so he has the most important skill that somebody mixing a record should have. Um, in my mind, in my opinion, which is only my opinion, there's just some sonic shit, meaning just fidelity, you know, that is lost. I think it still sounds good and the songs still come across. So who cares?
Q: Now which of the songs, just going through the list here – you had mentioned that there was six or eight of them you'd co-written.
Q: Do you remember which of those they are? ... I was also going to ask you which parts of "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" where you made some sort of contribution, either playing or writing or recording that you were proudest of?
A: There's like six or seven of those songs are literally me and Jeff sitting down to write a song together. You know? That's fun. And that's a real – emotionally, that's a hard thing to do, man, to write songs with somebody else, you know?
You have to be pretty unwoundable, you know, to put yourself on the line like that, completely and totally, and go, "I've got this idea. You want to maybe start working on it and see where it goes?" And then have them go, "I can't go anywhere with that. I'm not getting anywhere." "Oh, OK. Let's go to another one. What do you got to start with?" "I've got this to start with. What can you add to it?" "OK, cool, I can add something to that." You know?
So, a good chunk of my co-writes are genuine sit-down-and-write-a-song-togethers. They're not like, "Ooo, he added that one little thing there." You know? "Kamera," "Poor Places," "Ashes of an American Flag," um, um, "Radio Cure" – those are real sit-down-and-write-a-song-togethers, you know? A couple more. I've forgotten. I have wiped it from my memory... "Jesus, etc." ... Like you've got half a song, I've got a half a song, let's put them together. In whatever way.
So that's what I'm the most proud of, you know? The songwriting... You know, in a sense, I wouldn't care if I hadn't played on that record, you know? Oh, I would have, whatever, I don't know. I'm proud of the songwriting.
Q: How did it come about that "The Palace at 4am" is coming out on the same day as "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot"?
A: That, believe it or not – You're not going to believe it, but you've got to believe it –
Q: I think I've heard Bob (Andrews, of Undertow Music) on this topic, that it's pretty much a coincidence.
A: We told Bob, we said, "Look. I am Jay Bennett. I will never finish a record unless you give me a deadline." That's what I just said. I know me. I know me, give me a goddamn fucking deadline, and I'll make it. Don't give me a deadline, and I won't make it. He gave us a deadline, he did the math, the release date came out that day. End of story.
Q: You found out later "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" was coming out –
A: Yes… I found later that it was the same as the Wilco release date. I mean, I'm not going to say that that's not a nice little coincidence. But it is a coincidence. You know, and I'd be the biggest moron in the world if I said, "Bob, oh, we're going to have to release ours on a different date because that's the Wilco release date."
Q: You know there's a ton of stuff coming out on April 23. Elvis Costello's new album is coming out. Paul Westerberg's two new albums are coming out. Tweedy's "Chelsea Walls" soundtrack is coming out. It's like everything coming out on April 23 for some reason.
A: Yeah, so here's, gee, Jeff's got two releases on that date. Don't tell me that's coincidence. (Laughs.) …
I just want to throw a few comments out. I think you know from talking to me that I have – that above and beyond all this musical shit, I mean, I'm having the time of my life, you know? And I'm a happy person, and I'm also a person for whom sense of humor, you know, just, is so more important than anything else, almost. In terms of my dealing with the world.
And there's this bizarre notion generated, I think, not intentionally, but not completely unintentionally, that, you know, Wilco, like, got seen as this as this mega-serious band. And so I got seen as this mega-serious person. And I was reminded of that today, when someone brought in a review from a month or so ago of a show that Ed and I did up here in Toronto. And my jokes were referred to as snipes.
And I'm like, "Dude, I'm trying to be funny." And if I'm not funny, that's fine. Like, please accuse me of telling bad jokes before you accuse me of sniping at people, you know? Like, OK, maybe it was a bad joke, but it wasn't a snipe. You know?
And in particular, I'm remembering one thing I said. Bob, who used to be in Wilco, Bob Egan,... lives up here in Toronto now. And he's a great friend. I've known him for 15 years, you know? And I said something like, "You all know Bob Egan?" Everybody was like, "Yeah!" I'm like, "That guy's a piece of work, isn't he?" And I said something like, you know, "Any of you women know Bob Egan?" Because Bob's a total ladies' man, you know? And it was just a fucking joke.
And I don't know. I don't know what I'm trying to say. I'm trying to say, is there any way to communicate that I say a lot of things in jest that get taken out of context. You know? I mean, half of my life communicating is jokes. You know? And that's real typical of musicians, actually. You know?
We have this inside vernacular, and half of it is fucking jokes. And you take someone from the outside, and you put them in that world, and all of a sudden your jokes taken a context are not jokes anymore. And read them back and you're like, "That was a joke. I made a joke, and this fucking journalist turned it into, like, a serious summation of my entire involvement in this thing."
And ... what lessons do I have to learn from it? Like, stop blabbering to journalists? (Laughs.) Like, "Shut your fucking mouth, Jay"? But I just can't do that. I'm an honest person, and that tends to get me in trouble. But I think it only gets me in trouble with people who don't feel the overall timbre of what I'm saying.
Q: Well, I hope that in the context of an interview transcript, people will not come away with the wrong impression.
A: Especially if you transcribe what I just said. (Laughs.) ... You know, that's the whole reason Playboy magazine interviews rock. You know? 'Cause they're interviews. They're entire interviews start to finish. They're not an article with blurbs…
I think a good journalist can still take all the credit in the world for being a great journalist even if all he does is ask questions and type out the answers. Because asking the right questions isn't easy, you know? But there is this notion that if I just transcribe an interview, that's not really an article. And that is true, you know, because you have things to say, that you deserve to have a platform to say them in. And the whole thing is, can you meld your platform without misrepresenting the person you're talking to?…
Let's face it, you've got the raw material to make me look like the biggest asshole in the world, and that's just the way it works... And I am not going to –
The (Allen) Ginsberg collected interviews that just came out, it's so beautiful. It's so beautiful. They're entire interviews. And you see Ginsberg's … approach to the interview, as like, every interview is a lesson in life and a learning experience. You know? And I don't claim to be Ginsberg… but I do believe that I have something to teach people. Maybe not something hugely important. And I believe I have something to be taught by the interviewer. And I try to approach interviews that way.
First of all, I'm a teacher, by blood. And secondly, I like to be open to learning things from other people. It's what life's about to me. We happen to live in this era where the full interview doesn't get printed. In this case, because it would already be a novella, you know?
But that's the way I'm going to approach interviews for the rest of my life. And it's going to bite me in the ass sometimes. Undoubtedly. It will. I have faith in you that this one won't. You know? It is going to bite me in the ass. So be it…
There's a basic human urge to be understood. I could be accused of trying too hard to be understood... When in reality, only the people closest to you understand you...
I do like the idea of putting the whole transcript on the Internet, right down to my last words, which are peace, love and understanding to the world, including my ex-bandmates.
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