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

N OBODY WANTS TO eat the cats eyes.

Im not an especially superstitious person by nature, but I get it. If a red velvet cake with a cats portrait in icing just mysteriously shows up backstage during a tour, and then it inexplicably reappears the next night, and five days and two cities later the cake is still there, with a slice or two cut out but the cats face and the eyes are mostly unscathed, I dont think its unreasonable to be cautious. What if its a demon cat cake? It probably isnt, but nobody in the band is taking responsibility for the cake, or has any explanation for how its followed us this far, so I cant automatically discount the possibility that its some sort of supernatural sweet.

Im in the dressing room of Kings Theatre in Brooklyn, sitting on a couch and mindlessly strumming my guitar and trying to avoid eye contact with the cat cake. Nels Cline, the guitarist for my band Wilco, has boldly volunteered to be the first among us to try a bite.

It tastes nothing like the record, he announces.

I find this reassuring.

The cat on the cake is the same white Persian cat featured on the cover of our 2015 album, Star Wars. Or maybe its a British longhair. I dont know nearly enough about cats. Its also the same cat from a painting that hangs in the kitchen at the Loft, the Chicago studio thats been our second home since 2000. Its a pretty fascinating painting. The cat is sitting on a black velvet cushion, in front of a vase filled with pale roses. Who poses a cat like that? Its ridiculous. The cats expression isnt the usual feline sneer of bored indifference. This cat has an expression thats more like I am Coconut. I am your new god. All cats are arrogant, but I find this one to be exceptionally so.

Since releasing the album, weve come to discover that there are reproductions of this exact painting hung on the walls in some of our followers parents and grandparents homes. So that was an unintentional though satisfying freak-out we were able to deliver as a bonus for a few lucky fans. Weve tried tracking down the artist (and by we I mean Mark, my close friend and studio manager, who also did the initial mock-up of the cover). Its signed by somebody named Tamara Barett, but nobody by that name claims responsibility for the cat portrait. We reached out to a half dozen Tamara Baretts, hoping one of them would take credit, but theyve all claimed ignorance. We even exchanged emails with Tamara Burnett, a pet portraitist whose style is almost identical to Tamara Barett. Burnett told us we had the wrong Tamara, but admitted, It looks like something I would have done.

I guess we were hoping that putting the painting on a record cover would get her attentionthe real Tamaraat least enough for her to call a lawyer and threaten us with a lawsuit for using her art without permission. So we could pay her. But it didnt work. We heard nothing, not even a peep. (We didnt even hear from George Lucas, and I was sure wed at least get a cease-and-desist letter for naming our album Star Wars. We even had backup artwork done so we could change the name of the record to Cease and Desist in the event he went after us. Nope. No such luck.)

At this point youre probably wondering, Is this whole book going to be like this? Is he going to spend almost three hundred pages overexplaining kitschy cat art? Maybe. Its too soon to say, really. Sorry if that isnt what you were expecting. (If that is what you were expecting, well... kudos, thats impressive.)

You might also be thinking, Speaking of cats, I bet there is a really elaborate and interesting explanation for why Wilco put a Persian or possibly British longhair cat on an album cover. First of all, thank you for assuming that. Let me answer your question by not really answering it. The cat painting, as I mentioned, is on display at the Loft, where I and the other Wilco members go to play and sometimes record music, so its something we see every, or almost every, day.

But the Loft is a big space with a lot of art. The cat painting is in the kitchen, so we only see it during lunch and snack breaks, in between jamming. (Yes, that is how professional musicians talk. Would anyone care to do some jamming? Why, yes, lets jam. Then jam we shall!) In the recording space, mounted on the console, are framed and signed black-and-white photographs of Bob Newhart and Don Rickles. Theyre the centerpieces of the room. Both of them are signed To Wilco, but only Dons signature is still visible. Newharts signature has disappeared. I dont mean faded. Its gone. Vanished. His handwriting has been eradicated by the power of sad mid-tempo rock. I know thats not a satisfactory explanation, but thats the best I can do.

Between the Newhart and Rickles portraits is an equally amazing photo (also signed) of Rich Kelly & Friendship. If youre unfamiliar with this New Jersey ensemble, I want you to do something for me. Put down this book, go to the nearest device with Internet connectivity, direct your browser to YouTube, and search for Rich Kelly & Friendship and Id Like to Teach the World to Sing. Then watch it. In its entirety. But if youre in a hurry, fast-forward to the 1:35 mark, when the bassist breaks into a happy foot solo. Everything about this video, but especially the dancing, makes me happy. I love how the guitarist moves his microphone stand out of the way, suggesting that the bassists happy-feet freak-out is entirely expected. I love how they shout his name after its overTom Sullivan!confirming yet again that, yes,