life's disappointments with wilco.
my son's first brush of rock fandom with his favorite band.
This autumn has been a harvest of exciting new album releases. From Sufjan Stevens to Blonde Redhead to Tré Burt, not to mention another Taylor’s Version (1989, people!), I’m feeling so sonically nourished as we creep into the sadder seasons I’ve matured to appreciate.
Only two weeks old, Wilco’s Cousin already feels like a seasonal standard. With its minor chords, tangled melodies, meditative lyrics, and the warped and dreamy Cate Le Bon production, it feels like autumn. But not in that pumpkin spice way marketed for my nostalgia. But in that dreary autumn morning where the dying leaves contrast the fog as I cross the backyard in rubber boots to dump the compost before digging the potager for potatoes to make a Brighton soup.
I know this run-on sentence is very specific. But that’s what this album feels like for me. And I love it for it.
But it’s also drifted my thoughts back to summer that already feel like a postcard memory when my family and I saw them live. As a longtime fan, it amazes me that it’s taken over twenty years. But it was worth the wait. I also like imagining what 20-something me nursing another heartbreak and overanalyzing Yankee Hotel Foxtrot lyrics over a bottle of two-buck Chuck in a studio apartment in L.A. would have thought of the experience. (My drunk ass would have loved it. She also would have been very confused…because someone decided to have children with me?)
But alright, alright, already. Let’s get to it.
Over the summer while visiting Aurélien’s grandparents in Toulouse, we learned Wilco were playing nearby at a place called Le Bikini. My immediate response was that it couldn’t be. I thought it was perhaps a programming typo and a band named Wilcox was playing. Then I thought maybe it was a Wilco Tribute Band with the promoters strategically omitting the tribute part to trick unsuspecting Toulousain Wilco fans because, really, how could it be? The last time we tried to see them was at the 13,000-capacity Forest Hills Stadium so you can imagine my hesitation that they were playing an 800-person club that sounded like a Tiki Bar. Or, okay, a strip club in the center of France where we just happened to be. My husband wanted nothing of this New York skepticism and bought tickets, his 90-year-old grandparents raved about what a great venue Le Bikini was while my son Georges asked if anyone had a camera that wasn’t a phone lying around.
The grandparents did.
Then he asked if we could sit outside to wait for a hummingbird to show up.
I saw where this was going.
But it was also 102 degrees outside and about a cool 98 degrees inside, so, less movement was advisable and instead we Googled an image leaving our son Georges to draw his two favorite Wilco songs (since he explained didn’t know exactly how to draw a company on a back and doesn’t know what a handshake drug is.)
The next night we were off in our family sedan to go see a band I wasn’t even sure we were going to see. I even prepared myself for the Wilco tribute band (which could also be fun if done right) because still, how could it be? I even asked my husband a few times in the car if he was sure he read the announcement correctly because I had left my reading glasses (that are turning more into every-second-of-my-life glasses) at home and literally couldn’t see for myself.
That was until we walked into the club and saw THIS.
Exhibit A: Wilco stenciled gear.
It seemed promising. As did the merch table and the English-speaking road crew and fans.
And then this happened.
Exhibit B: Jeff Tweedy…singing Wilco songs with…Wilco.
So, it was real. It was happening. We were at a Wilco show at Le Bikini where there was a swimming pool on the outdoor deck, hotdogs with toppings for sale and a thoughtful selection on non-alcoholic beverages making certain moms (no names) who are counting sobriety days feel included in the fun.
I tried to play it off like I knew this whole time, and I was totally kidding but my family wasn’t buying it. And the penalty for ruining the ride over to the show while accusing my husband of being illiterate was taking the responsibility of getting our son’s drawing to the band. No matter what.
Geez.
But how?
Option A: Slipping it to the nice person who sold us our t-shirt at the merch table.
Option B: Handing it to the road crew (who might have doubled as merch crew?) whom I suspected had other things on their mind than getting my son’s drawing to the band.
Option C: Ask the nice guy in the front row to completely contort his body over the metal stage barrier to hand it directly to Jeff Tweedy in the middle of his concert.
We went with Option C.
(I still wonder if we were being a little pushy.)
He took the drawing before reading the letter to the crowd.
He then told Georges that they would not be playing “Kamera” or “Hummingbird” and that he should get used to life’s disappointments.
Please believe when I say this was actually very funny. In print, it reads kind of hardcore, but it really did make our family laugh. As well as the room. It was a sweet moment, and really something special to see an entire rock band on stage smiling because on my son, including my drummer crush Glenn (I really do have a thing for drummers…all that time keeping…mmm, so sexy).
So, the concert continued on in all its wonderful small venue glory; the gorgeous acoustic moments from Cruel Country with fan favorites braided in to make a perfect setlist. A little after the drawing drop-off, Aurélien took Georges for a break when this kind front row super fan named Paul turned to me and said, “‘Hummingbird’ is coming.”
“They’re not playing it though,” I said to him like I knew everything.
“He was kidding!”
“Oh.” I may have placed my hand on my clavicle. Not sure. But that’s how I’m picturing this interaction.
And then I heard the piano intro to “Hummingbird” when pretty much everyone around me looked at me like “Where’s Georges?”
I then looked up at the stage and Jeff Tweedy put his hands out, like, “Where’s Georges?”
After all that fuss we made. And no Georges.
I didn’t know what to do. I was also a mother at a rock concert who didn’t know exactly where her son was. I’m sure there’s even judgement about me bringing him in the first place. But it’s Wilco. Not Sepultura. So, I stand by the choice. But there I was, awkwardly bobbing along and feeling kind of dumb (but not really knowing why because everyone loves this song), when I glanced up to the stage to see Jeff had made visual contact with someone I correctly assumed was my son. After the song, I felt a parental kinship to ask him, the lead singer of a rock band in the middle of his show, where my son was. He told me that Georges had prime seating with club security…phew…and was enjoying a beer. Quoi?!
Aurélien returned with Georges for the remainder of the show where highlights include…
Dancing with my son in my arms to to ‘Jesus, Etc’, a song that was a big part of my pregnancy and breast feeding sessions I struggled with.
Looking back on my heady two-buck Chuck days during ‘California Stars’.
The amazing lights and jumping around with my family during ‘Shot in the Arm.’
And pretty much losing my damn mind with the front row friends we made during the krautrock-y (total cyclical Jaki Liebezeit-esque drumming!) ‘Spiders (Kidsmoke)’ encore.
The tour manager handed front row Paul a handful of show memorabilia that to my delight was for Georges (we’d already been given so much we felt so this isn’t fake surprise - we really were surprised), which included embossed Wilco guitar picks, Glenn’s battered sticks with his name and signature printed on (!!) and the setlist that we’ve since framed as a reminder of a special night and pretty much the worst example of a life disappointment. I send to whoever finds this little essay, the warmest thank you from the lovely Franco-American couple in the front row to super fan Paul to the band to the road crew to opening act Tré Burt (who signed his record for Georges) and anyone else I forgot who made this night so special for my son who now thinks that all rock concerts are like this.
A real life disappointment awaits…
