Depending on whether you were on the inside or outside of the band, Uncle Tupelo may have been one of the key architect's of what would become known as Alt-Country - a sub-genre of country that fused it with harder edged punk and rock n roll.
The two founders and principle songwriters would both go on to bigger things, especially if sales and longevity are measures - but they will both be forever tied to their origin story, as so-called alt-country pioneers.
Belleville, Illinois
When you read around the edges of the story, the fracturing of Uncle Tupelo seems to have very early on. But before that came high school friendships, hard work and all the usual frustrations of growing up in a dead end mid-western suburb of St Louis.
Belleville is actually in southern Illinois, but lies on the eastern fringes of the St Louis metropolitan area, and east of the mighty Mississippi. Across the Midwest of the US through the middle of the 1980s, unemployment rates were high and employment growth low.
There's a trouble around, it's never far away
The same trouble's been around for a life and a day
I can't forget the sound, 'cause it's here to stay
The sound of people chasing money and money getting away
A long way from happiness
In a three hour away town
Whiskey bottle over Jesus
Not forever, just for now
(Whiskey Bottle)
Jay Farrar's journey into music began on stage at Millstadt Grade School at the age of five, playing a harmonica. His dad Jim was impressed - "[when] he took that harmonica out and played 'Dixie', they just couldn't believe it." In fact all of the Farrar boys were paid a princely 15 cents a day to practice musical instruments, studying from shows on public tv.
The Plebes were a garage rock band formed by Jay and his brothers, Wade and Dade, along with Jay's high school friend Jeff Tweedy. Tweedy was a fan of punk music and this caused Dade's departure in 1984. The next recruit was drummer Mike Heidorn, and it was in his parents basement that the band conducted most of their early rehearsals, predominantly playing 50s and 60s rock covers.
Their musical coming of age was coming at the same time as the classic US punk and post-punk bands were still doing the rounds. They would go and see any band like that playing in St Louis - Minutemen, Black Flag and the like. "Me and Jay weren't even friends with anyone who wasn't into Black Flag," remarked Jeff Tweedy.
Around this time, The Plebes became The Primitives, playing their blues rock at high speed. Wade Farrar was committing less time to the band now, as he had started at Southern Illinois University, but then Heidorn broke his collar bone and the band went on an enforced hiatus in 1986.
Farrar and Tweedy used the time off well, starting to get into the habit of writing their own material, ready for when the band restarted in 1987. Because they realised there was a UK band having some moderate success, also called The Primitives, it was time for another name change. They settled on Uncle Tupelo, apparently having created two lists of random words and picking one from each. Whether that was true or apocryphal, they were gigging regularly (particularly at Cicero's bar near Washington University) and managed to pick up support slots for the likes of Firehose, Warren Zevon and Johnny Thunders.
Don't Go To Rockville
The band recorded some tracks in the attic studio of Matt Allison, in Champaign, Illinois, that would become known as Not Forever, Just For Now, and included early versions of songs like I Got Drunk and Screen Door. It managed to get a good review in the CMJ (College Media Journal) New Music Report. It was enough to get them signed to Giant Records, which would soon become Rockville Records.
In a 1988 interview with the St Louis Post Dispatch, Jeff Tweedy talked about influences. "We probably have more influences than we know what to do with. We have two main styles that have been influences. For instance, we like Black Flag as much as early Bob Dylan and Dinosaur Jr as much as Hank Williams."
For ten days in January 1990, the band found themselves at Fort Apache Studio in Boston, working on their debut record with producers Paul Kolderie and Sean Slade (who had worked on Bug for Dinosaur Jr.). No Depression married these post-punk and country styles in a record rooted in Belleville and adolescence.
Slade would comment that, "Uncle Tupelo had this astonishing raw energy, but they also managed to play as a tight and highly focused unit." He went on to say that the resulting album was "very much the work of angry young men with a bone to pick - equal parts breakneck punk and outlaw country." He framed the album, making it clear that the band was going into fresh territory - "There's an unvarnished bitterness and anger to what they're saying, which made it radically different from the cowpunk music immediately preceding it."
Graveyard Shift - here
(Early live version for local St Louis cable show 'Critical Mass' - note that here it is called Graveyard Song)
The album has been revered for the last three decades as a pioneering record, and as mentioned at the start, potentially the beginning of a new genre. Those that have followed have no doubt how influential Tupelo and this album have been, with songs like Whiskey Bottle resonating through the years. Lilly Hiatt (daughter of John Hiatt) remarks that "Whiskey Bottle is like a punch to the gut, but a comforting one that says, 'Yeah, we've all been there'. Then to Jay's thunder you have Tweedy's lightning. I see golden strips of light when I hear his voice."
Whiskey Bottle - here
(Audio here)
Despite the wave of positivity, then and through the years, by March 1991 No Depression had only sold around 15,000 copies, which was compounded by Rockville's neglecting to pay the band any royalties (a common theme over the coming years).
The band members also found time to play in a local country band called Coffee Creek with Brian Henneman, who would soon become their guitar tech and occasional on-stage multi-instrumentalist. The first signs of the the gap between Farrar and Tweedy also started to show, with the latter liking to carry on drinking well after shows, to the formers disdain.
Still Feel Gone and Peter Buck
They were soon back in a studio, this time Longview Farm in North Brookfield, Massachusetts. This time they got seventeen days to lay down the next album, again with Kolderie and Slade at the helm. The result was Still Feel Gone, the least 'country' of their albums, and one which the band weren't so happy with the production of (they didn't like the sound), but again it still stands the test of time more than thirty years on.
Option magazine said of the album that, "punk meets country energy, a homespun amalgam that's easier and less psychedelic than Green On Red, but has a similar spirit." Sputnik Music would say, "There is no longer a stark contrast between the band's punk and country influences, but rather a distinctive blending process that has a definite emotional impact." They would also say that it was "the kind of beer soaked that lends itself to personal contemplation without becoming too self pitying or campy."
Gun - here
(Half decent live video shot in Bloomington, Indiana in 1992)
They would gain a connection with the legendary REM guitarist Peter Buck, who recalls, "I met them right after their first record came out. I was talking to Kevin Kinney (of Drivin' N Cryin') on the phone and he said, 'man, these guys are really great'. The same day I just happened to look in the paper and realised they were playing in Athens, so I thought I'd check them out..... [they had] strong songwriting and good playing, they were really tight."
That meeting at the famous 40 Watt Club in Athens, led to Buck offering his services as a producer, which they eventually took him up on for the third album. The band actually stayed at his house and he didn't charge for his services. Brian Henneman came along for the recording. He had managed to teach himself to play mandolin and bouzouki, and got a bigger role in the album.
Grindstone - here
(Audio only)
The session was brief but successful, in fact the title March 16-20 1992 is an accurate description of their time with Buck, and despite its largely acoustic nature (in the face of the wave of grunge currently hitting the scene) it became moderately successful. It did, in fact, sell more than the first two albums combined, and meant they now had major label interest.
The Sire Years (both of them)
Mike Heidorn had a decent job with a local newspaper company and was in the process of settling down with his wife, so he didn't fancy the imminent tour of Europe opening for Bob Mould's band Sugar. A new drummer was needed, and following auditions, it was down to two. Ken Coomer was an imposing 6'4", with a head full of dreads, and so the gig went to Bill Belzer.
They were being wooed by Joe McEwen of Sire Records (who had signed Dinosaur Jr to the label), and band manager Tony Margherita triggered the $50,000 escape clause from Rockville. The deal was for seven years and at least two albums, with a budget of $150,000 set for the first one.
With the tour of Europe complete, Belzer left after just six months, and they turned to Coomer again. They also recruited John Stirratt to play bass, allowing Tweedy to move to guitar (and also replace Henneman, who had left to front his own band, The Bottle Rockets). Max Johnston, the brother of Michelle Shocked, also joined as a mandolin and violin player for live shows.
The fourth album saw another new producer coming in. Brian Paulson joined them at Cedar Creek Studio in Austin, to work on Anodyne. The record would sell a creditable 150,000, with the tour through the rest of 1993 culminating in a sell out appearance at Tramps in New York City.
Chickamauga - here
(Official music video)
Paste magazine said that Uncle Tupelo "crystallised their rebellious spirit with Anodyne, an inspired, influential and, at times, acrimonious marriage of country, punk and alternative rock." The St Louis Post focused on another quickly recorded record - "The ragged sound that dominates Anodyne can largely be attributed to the album's being recorded in just two weeks, live in the studio with no overdubs."
Two become none
The relationship between Farrar and Tweedy, often fractious in recent years, was getting markedly worse. Farrar for some reason, didn't like Tweedy's carefree attitude - and also there is an uncorroborated tale of Tweedy stroking the hair of Farrar's girlfriend. This story seems to have gained a lot of traction over the years since as a fairly singular cause of Tupelo's demise, but things had been drifting for a while.
In January 1994, Farrar told Margherita that he was no longer having fun in the band and it was time for him to move on. Tweedy got mad when he found this out indirectly, rather than straight from Farrar himself. Somehow, the two agreed to honour a final tour as a favour to Margherita, who had a laid a lot of his own money out for the band over their all too brief existence. But even this short tour couldn't pass untroubled, as Farrar refused to sing harmonies on any of Tweedy's songs.
The end came in the form of four shows between 28 April and 1 May 1994 - two at The Blue Note in Columbia, Missouri, and then two at Mississippi Nights in St Louis. And that was it... As Heidorn would note to the LA Times in 1996, "Uncle Tupelo is bigger now than ever. I guess death is a great career move."
Paste magazine speculated on the final reasons for the end of the band. "[History] indicates that Farrar found Tweedy's enthusiasm, pop sensibilities and drinking a little tiresome, while Tweedy found Farrar's inability to properly express his frustrations maddening in its own right."
By the end of 1994, both Farrar and Tweedy were already well advanced with their new projects; the former ploughing a similar furrow with Son Volt, while the latter would move into a more indie sensibility with Wilco.
The Long Cut - here
(Live on Conan - their one and only network tv appearance)
Reflection and legacy
"To us, hard-core punk is also folk music. We draw a close parallel between the two. We'll play both in the same set if we get a chance." So said Jeff Tweedy in the St Louis Post Dispatch.
No Depression (the Americana publication named after the Uncle Tupelo song and album - which itself was a cover of an old Carter Family standard) agreed with Tweedy. "The band was as comfortable tipping its hat to the Carter Family and Lead Belly as it was to The Replacements and The Ramones."
Singer songwriter with country-rock band Blitzen Trapper, Eric Earley is a big fan of Tupelo and noted the context of the rise of alt-country at the same time as grunge. "It struck me [on No Depression] that they were mining the same kind of sonically ragged psych-scope that the Seattle bands were pioneering, but coming from a kind of blue collar, Midwestern direction."
When asked about their legacy and influence, he said, "Off the top of my head, I'd have to say Lilly Hiatt, Aaron Lee Tasjan, Nathaniel Ratcliff, Lukas Nelson.... it's kind of an endless list, which is a testament to Uncle Tupelo's influence and power so early on."
So, did Uncle Tupelo invent Alt-Country?
It's not really the purpose of this article, but it has certainly been debated plenty in certain circles over the years.
It seems that to many outside the band, that yes they were a pioneer of what would become alt-country, even if they weren't the only proponent (Steve Earle is the other main name proffered in the debate).
But perhaps we will leave the last words to the two main men.
"We didn't come up with that whole Woody Guthrie meets Hüsker Dü thing. That was probably some publicist along the way." (Jay Farrar)
"There were lots of bands - X, The Knitters, Jason & The Scorchers, Green On Red, so many more - already kind of fusing these two worlds that we were straddling. I think out approach to it might have been a little bit more isolated and unrefined. Maybe it came out more punk rock or something, but I think anybody that credits us with inventing anything is wrong." (Jeff Tweedy)
Wilco: New Madrid - here
(Possibly my favourite UT song, played by Jeff and his next band a few years later)
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