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rghammo

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Posts posted by rghammo

    Learning How to Die

    in Just A Fan

    Posted

    To save others who are interested a few minutes, I've pasted Brian Henneman's two most telling posts from the Farrar board. Link is below.

     

    "Hello friends,

    TRUST ME. The Wilco book does NOT paint the picture accurately. I love Jeff, I love Jay, I was there in the early days.

    I didn't see any outright LIES, but, I did, swiftly, catch the fact that it is a "spun" telling of the tale.

    I did see some inaccurate information.

    Jeff is a great talent. Jay is a great talent.

    Neither one is "better" than the other. They're just different.

    Don't buy into the "character assasination" of Jay, that seems to flow through the book.

    My personal evaluation, as a guy who was there, is this: consider the "vibe" painted, in the Uncle Tupelo, through A.M. chapters, as being about 50% accurate. The other 50% is slanted in Jeff's favor, but hey, it's a WILCO book!

    I have no idea what the accuracy rate of the Wilco, post A.M. chapters are, I wasn't there, and that's too bad, 'cause I really wanted to know what happened, after I left.

    Judging by the part I DID know, and how the story was told, I'm afraid I'll never know the true story.

    The inaccuracies, and "slant", in the early chapters, actually made me lose interest in the upcoming parts, which were the ones I was most looking forward to.

    Think of the book, as a Wilco story, written from the perspective of a guy, who knows, and, REALLY admires Jeff Tweedy, and, who respects, but, doesn't really know Jay at all.

    From The Horse's Mouth,

    Brian Henneman"

     

    "Let me set this, somewhat, straight.

    The Wilco book, is NOT fiction, by any means. I think Greg Kot did the best he could, with what he had.

    The inaccuracies, in the chapters I knew about, are trivial, and, meaningless to the story. I can't comment on the later chapters, 'cause I wasn't there.

    There DOES seem to be a "Jay bashing" taking place in the story though, which I found unenjoyable.

    I'd have rather had it be ALL "pro-Jeff", and, have no Jay in it at all.

    It looks, to me, like Jeff was made out to be a bit more "cool", and "heroic" than he really was, and Jay was made out to be some kind of oppressive "bad guy", which, really, isn't exactly true.

    What I don't like, is the fact that Jay was not given the chance to tell his side of the story (not that he'd really WANT to, in a Wilco book...).

    What you get, is a bunch of Jay's friends, talkin' about Wilco, and more of their quotes, than ANY of us would have ever imagined, being used, VERY discriminately, to paint a picture of Jay, as something I'm sure NONE of us ever dreamed would be included, in a Wilco book, AND in a way, that if we KNEW the context they'd be used in, we'd have made our points clearer.

    I'd say Jay was about 20% of what I talked about with Greg Kot, but, about 90% of THAT was used in the book.

    Jeff's not a bad guy.

    Jay's not a bad guy.

    Greg Kot's not a bad guy.

    I can only hope that somebody would "favor" me, the same way, as Greg did Jeff, in a Bottle Rockets book.

    I'd also hope they wouldn't "tear down" people I've worked with along the way.

    I'm not down with the "Negative Jay" vibe, not when painted by soundbytes, from second-hand stories.

    Kinda gives it a "tabloid" aura...

    Overall, I'd say the book gives the "essence" of what went down. I guess somebody's gonna lose, in any "break up" story.

    I think Jay lost a little "harder" than he should have in this one though.

    Brian"

     

    Farrar board on the Wilco book

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