Jeff Tweedy on ‘ How to Write One Song’ and learning about yourself
Jeff Tweedy wants you to write a song. Just one.
He wants you to become so focused on writing that one song that you lose yourself in it, you “disappear ... There isn’t anyone else’s image of who you are to compete with. In fact, even the image you have of yourself can take a breather.”
And maybe, as he writes in his new book, you’ll come to understand that doing something is more rewarding than being something. You might even learn something unexpected about yourself.
We spoke with Tweedy, leader of the band Wilco, about his new book, “How to Write One Song,” and his new solo album, “Love Is the King.” Both, he said, were conceived during the pandemic, projects he dug into once Wilco’s tour dates were canceled.
“I like to keep busy. I like to make stuff, and I figured it would be a good time to see if I could get my thoughts down,” he said.
The book, which was released on Oct. 13, is a generous and thoughtful argument for carving time out for creativity. He attempts to demystify songwriting, offering both encouragement and practical tips that from anyone else might read as self- help. But instead, Tweedy strikes a tone that’s more like that of an exuberant friend: You have to try this, man. And you’ll want to.
Listening to the new album deepens the reading — and vice versa — as sounds emerge from songs in ways you might not have heard before. Snippets of lyrics mentioned in the book unspool, transformed.
Tweedy spoke from his cabin in Michigan via Zoom.
Q: The book is “How to Write One Song,” but it’s about creativity more broadly. Did you intend it to be read by a broader audience than aspiring songwriters?
A: Absolutely. I tried to instill the notion that a song can be anything. If we define a song for ourselves as a moment that we intended to create — that’s what I think a song is. It’s something that you want to hear again, and it’s even broader than that. It’s figuring out a way to make your kids laugh. I think that’s a song. It’s an intentional act of creation using your own imagination.
Q: Can you talk a little bit about how having kids and watching kids has influenced you in your work?
A: I think kids are creating the world as they experience it, and they are super connected and engaged with their imaginations. They haven’t developed a judgment center or an observing ego that is discouraging for whatever reason. A lot of things societally make people feel like their imaginations and that side of their personality is frivolous and less serious and something that should be sort of almost looked down upon as people get older. And kids are just creation machines, man. They just barrel forward. And that’s really the ideal state for anybody making something. Figure out what it is later. Just make it; keep pedaling forward. Kids don’t spend a lot of time dwelling on which drawings are on the refrigerator. They’re busy coloring the next one. I really think they pretty much have it all figured out.
Q: You write in the book that “We have a choice — to be on the side of creation, or surrender to the powers that destroy.” This book feels inflected by the chaos of our current moment. How did the novel coronavirus and the strife we’re facing now influence you?
A: I actually had to kind of edit out a lot of references that were more specific and topical to things that were happening. But I do truly believe that when people spend more time making something, when they build their lives around their own creativity, that it’s a much more difficult task for them to destroy other people’s creations. I think that people start to mistake being empowered, because it’s easy to tear ( expletive) down and it’s easy to tear other people’s hope down. It feels like creation almost, but it’s not. To me, there are definitely things in this world worthy of being torn down. But I think you’re probably going to be misguided in your assessments of what needs to be torn down if you haven’t spent any time building something in a positive sense and spending time with the side of yourself that can risk loving something that you made. That’s a hard hurdle for a lot of people: There’s a little fear that you’re not gonna like something you made and even deeper fear that you’re gonna love it and someone’s going to take it away.
Q: That feels even more likely now that we have a constant stream of critics on social media. Do you tune that out?
A: No, I’m too curious about it all just to tune it out; I try to understand it. Social media caters to and exacerbates a specific type of psychological disorder, I believe, that is rooted in some of the things we’ve been talking about — this need to feel empowered by tearing things down. It’s like an invention by a supervillain to cater to that specific human dysfunction. It’s extremely effective, but it doesn’t take a whole lot of introspection to think, Oh my god, how sad is that person? How much pain must that person be in to feel compelled to tell someone that their dog is stupid looking? My son’s pointed out that when you’re gaming with strangers, people have to “friend” you to tell you that you suck. There’s something incredibly poetic about that in a way. No science- fiction writer ever could have come up with anything that demented.
Q: You make a point of telling people in this book that they have to play their song for someone else. Why?
A: I think I strongly suggested it ( chuckles). Maybe I said you have to. I just think everybody at one point in their life should sing a song for somebody, and I don’t know if I can articulate exactly why that is. I just think it’s an act of faith. I think it’s a really pure, intimate thing to do. There aren’t a lot of opportunities for intimacy in the world, and you’re trusting someone else enough to listen to you sing a song that you’ve written, and trusting yourself enough or believing in yourself enough to do that. I just like to think that it would help almost anybody that attempts that. Even getting to the edge of it and chickening out, I think is going to uncover and reveal something about yourself that is worth knowing.