nadja

This should get you there:

http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/wilcos-jeff-tweedy-and-son-on-new-lps-inspiration/

For me, Max's character arc was that he went from being a completely self-absorbed, immature kid who thought his mother existed solely to comfort and protect and feed him, to finally recognizing her as a fellow human being who was also struggling and worrying and doing her best. It is the ultimate in character development - from being fixated on oneself to being concerned about another.

In the beginning, like any kid, all Max cares about is himself - wanting his sister to pay attention to him (and not to her friends), to have his mother all to himself (with no boyfriend), to be fed exactly what he wants (no frozen corn). And on the island all the monsters are as needy and whiny and self-absorbed as he is. They look to Max to make everything ok and build a safe place where no harm or sadness can enter, and he fails miserably. Just like he has looked to his own mother to protect him from pain, and she has not. It's hard for me to see how "nothing happened" on the island. What happened was that Max got outside of himself for the first time in his life. Instead of just feeling the pain of having his igloo smashed, he saw how the monsters felt when he smashed their huts. He recognized the consequences of his behavior. He grew up. How did nothing happen?

I guess I can see how people felt the film was depressing and defeatist, but to me the main point was: yes, life is hard and painful and lonely and no one can save us from that, but we're all in it together. We all feel that way. It's maybe the most crucial development we make as human beings - from seeing our parents as failures because they didn't shield us from harm, to seeing them as fellow human beings doing the best they can. It's called maturity, and it's what I saw on Max's face when he sat at the table in the final scene and watched his mother watching over him and closing her eyes in sheer exhaustion and relief. He felt compassion for her, and that was the whole point. It's how he changed.

Sorry - I didn't mean silly in a disparaging way. More like fun and kind of wacky as opposed to some of his shows which are so intense they make you feel like you've been kicked in the chest and it takes you days to recover.

And there were some very un-wacky moments like everyone singing along with Jesus etc, which sounded gorgeous. It was a great night.

I hadn't heard any of the new songs before, so that was a real treat.

Jeff's voice sounded amazing, maybe the best ever in the ten years I've been seeing his solo shows. I just wish we got to hear more of it. The banter was hilarious but it did start to get frustrating that people were spending so much time talking to him and shouting song requests when it was obvious this was going to be a short set. It was the first time I ever felt there might be a downside to Jeff's funniness and the sense of familiarity he creates at his solo shows. It doesn't have to be all intensity all the time, but I like to have at least a few minutes of closing my eyes and losing myself in the song.

Don't mean to be a bellyacher though. Any chance to see Jeff solo is great and it was a fun time and a great cause. Maybe it was just destined to be a silly show - the high school setting, the 4th grade choir with the one girl who could not stop yawning, Pete Seeger looking so adorable, the woman behind me who was singing "roll me under New Mattress" at the top of her lungs and apparently wasn't kidding.

Duh, sorry, apparently I can't read a seating chart. Thanks!

It's confusing, though, because according to that chart the back row is 'A'. When I emailed the guy at Clearwater asking for a seating chart he replied that the tickets were "self-explanatory." I bought $75 tickets and got row A, so I have no clue if I'm in the back, the front or somewhere in the middle. I guess it doesn't really matter - I'm just so psyched he'll be in this neck of the woods.

I was just going to say that - I always picture a guy with a mouthful of bees who wants to speak, maybe is trying to speak, but the sound of the bees buzzing doesn't let the listener hear what he's trying to say. The buzzing distorts his words, it's like static on a radio. And then there's the added feeling of danger, of these little creatures in his mouth that have a life of their own, that can sting. And that's something I get from so many other Wilco songs - the idea that words can hurt, that attempting to communicate is dangerous because when we don't understand each other, it causes pain. What might be meant as loving might come off as mean, what might be meant as laughing is heard as barking ( I think the muzzle image ties into the line about the dogs too).

But what makes this song so beautiful to me is that feeling of perfect non-verbal communication and intimacy at the end. The silence of the sun, the breeze, his head on her knee. They're communicating without words and there is no misunderstanding.

Which reminds me about another aspect of the bee thing - bees have this amazing capacity to communicate highly complicated information to each other. One bee can go out and find a field of flowers, then come back to the hive and actually describe where the field is - what direction, how far, what kind of pollen is there - and the other bees understand with perfect accuracy. It's been a whole field of study to figure out how that happens and I think they've decided that the bees communicate by dance. And that sort of ties into the part about how dogs communicate, and the feeling throughout the song that nature is perfect - the sun and seas and trees are all in communion - it's we humans with our egos and our fear and our clumsy language who are so isolated from one another.

Anyway, Jeff may or may not have intended all that but it's there to me nonetheless. Because, as always, there's no way to know what he meant, just what we hear. God, I love this band.

Thank you for posting this! My husband and I were at the park this day and it was one of our favorite shows of all time. It's wonderful to hear it again.