Tweedy’s “Sukierae” (dBpm Records), the debut album by Wilco singer Jeff Tweedy and his oldest son, 18-year-old Spencer, at first appears to be an unwieldy beast: 20 songs spread across more than 74 minutes, exactly the wrong type of album to release in these attention-deficient times.
There are countless options for approaching this music — an extended and potentially exhausting front-to-back listen, cherry-picking tracks on shuffle mode, and many points in between. Most of them will be unsatisfying in some way. But the duo conceived “Sukierae” as not one but two complementary albums, designed to be listened to separately. In these discrete doses, the logic and potency of “Sukierae” becomes more readily apparent. If a subtle but pointed case can be made for listening to an album — or albums — as the artist intended, this is it.
The backdrop for the music is home, family, death, birth and rebirth, and the recent struggle of Sue Miller Tweedy – Jeff’s wife and Spencer’s mother – with cancer (the album title is Miller’s nickname). The fragility of love in the face of mortality casts a long shadow over this music, and it is populated with the ghosts and strangers of doubt and loneliness. The personal references aren’t explicit, but it’s difficult not to read into tracks that reference the bittersweet feeling of a parent watching her children grow into independence (“Pigeons”) or a married couple yearning to grow old together (“Where My Love”). The album is recorded in a way that fits the themes: immediate, intimate, with little fuss or decoration.
The first disc lands a quick punch with the brief, punkish “Please Don’t Let Me Be So Understood,” all rude guitar and drums. Then “High as Hello” settles in like a low-grade hangover on the lazy morning afterward. By “World Away,” it becomes apparent that Spencer Tweedy is not merely an add-on riding dad’s coat-tails, but a crucial element in the sound. His subtle use of the kick drum, the sense of swing, subtlety and musicality he brings to his fills, mirror the lyrics sung by his father: “I’m about to feel it lift, sorrow floats away.”
“Diamond Light Pt. 1” pushes the drums into the foreground, reminiscent of Glenn Kotche’s work on Wilco’s “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart,” where the shifting percussion patterns guide the arrangement across six scenic minutes of shifting musical geography. “Are you … terrified of being alone?” Jeff Tweedy sings, and a dissonant interlude takes the listener to that desolate place. In contrast, the beautifully orchestrated “Wait for Love” – complete with melodic whistling – provides a balm from the anxiety. Only “Slow Love” sputters, a mantra that lags over 5 1/2 minutes.
The disc wraps with the ominous “I’ll Sing It,” but the heart-breaker “Nobody Dies Anymore” is the understated centerpiece, a hymn to family members, past and living, who have drifted away.
The second disc is lower key, a less varied collection of music than Disc 1. Though it might have made sense for tonal variety to distribute the acoustic pieces more evenly between the two albums, they work together in creating a sustained mood piece. Balancing the wistful and the autumnal, memory and heartache, “Summer Noon” is the kind of song for all seasons that evokes Ray Davies.
Tweedy understands the potential difficulty of 10 fairly subdued songs in a row. “I concede there’s beauty in bubblegum,” he sings in “Fake Fur Coat.” “I’m rolling up my sleeves.” There is no bubblegum pop on this album, but the acoustic finger-picking is deft and Spencer’s drumming serves the songs so well it rarely draws attention itself. In that respect it steps quietly into the tradition of session drummers such as the late Kenny Buttrey and James Gadson, master musicians who never showed off but were always right on time.
The closing “I’ll Never Know” provides something of a bookend to “Nobody Dies Anymore” on the first disc. In it, Tweedy remembers his late mother as they used to watch Judy Garland movies on late-night TV together while he was a child, quietly savoring their time together. “I loved to watch the ghosts,” he sings, “of cigarette smoke turning lithe and blue.” In the same way, this music lingers.
‘Sukierae’
Tweedy
3.5 stars (out of 4)
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