I’m an atheist , but I believe in religion. I’ve always been aware of the downsides, but when I got interested in gospel music I started to see what it could do for people, that it could create a place where you could surrender and become part of something bigger. I think we all want to achieve that, and we all do it in different ways. Sex, drugs,... See more

Live music is a ritual that evokes a common emotional response to which we attach our singular experiences.

As a teenager, I read guitar magazines not because I could play guitar or was a particularly talented musician but because I liked the technicalities they would explain. Regular music magazines talked about everything around the music; I wanted to get inside it. I haven’t played a violin in years but I still long to get inside the music, to inhabit... See more

In their own way, that’s what Jeff Tweedy’s songs are usually trying to do, too. They can be beautiful but they’ve also got those holes, those scars, those gaping wrecking-ball dents, all of which speak to the immense difficulty but absolute necessity of trying to make anything beautiful at all. They let off firecracker blasts that illuminate the... See more