Jeff Tweedy & Case Oats (2026-11-04)
My relationship as a fan of Jeff Tweedy is complicated. I first came to know of Jeff via his old band, Uncle Tupelo , who I discovered back in the early 1990’s via the old Neil Young listserve “RUST”. Mind you this was back in the days of 9600 bps dial up modems and i386 processor speeds. In any event most nights after the kids were asleep and the need to keep an open telephone line available, I would hunker down in my basement and peruse the Rust list for live tape trades and various news (mostly regarding Neil Young). But at some point the band out of Belleville, IL caught the attention of The Rusties with their penchance for a punk infused take on alt-country with a serious nod to Young and his music. (NOTE: Uncle Tupelo had their own listserve called “Postcards From Hell” which I sub-ed onto for a while but soon bailed on since IMHO at the time the people on “postcards” were kind of insane. That in and of itself is another story for another time).
Anyway, Uncle Tupelo soon crashed and burned and Tweedy went on to starting up Wilco, while his partner in UT, Jay Farrar would create Son Volt. right from the beginning, I was more entrecnched in the Jay camp rather than the Jeff camp. That’s not to say I didn’t LIKE Wilco, I loved AM and Being There but neither could hold a candle to the masterpiece that was Trace (Son Volt’s debut LP).
Over time I would kind of lose interest in Wilco’s recorded out put but after getting my hands on a Tweedy live recording of one of his solo gigs at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music I became enamoured with his solo work.
Which brings me to Wednesday night’s show at Music Hall of Williamsburg. Jeff and Case Oats (Spencer Tweedy’s band with Casey Walker) played the much larger Town Hall here in New York City (capacity 1500 seated) last week so it was a real treat to get to see him at the much smaller (650 capacity) MHOW. Case Oats who usually play as a full 5 piece band are only a duet act on this run of shows with Spencer playing guitar rather than his normal drums. Casey and Spencer (along with pet dog Basil) played a laid back yet quite enjoyable set of roughly 7 or 8 tunes comprised mostly of tunes from their 2025 release Last Missouri Exit, along with a couple of “new songs”. I personally found their set quite nice and liken Casey’s vocal style and presentation to a more polished version of Kimya Dawson’s work with Moldy Peaches.
Tweedy took the stage promptly at 8:30 PM and proceeded to play through 10 PM. Opening his set up with “Feel Free” off of 2025’s triple album Twilight Override. The set would go on to offer up a healthy dose of Wilco tunes along with one Uncle Tupelo song which seems to be a mainstay on this tour, “New Madrid”. Jeff would also throw in a couple of tunes from his early oughts side project Loose Fur. And of course, this technically being a tour in support of Twilight Override, there was an abundance of material from this album as well. Obviously, anyone who is a fan knows that a Tweedy solo show isn’t a real Tweedy set without a good amount of bantering back and forth between Jeff and his fans in the crowd. Jeff was in a particularly good mood on Wednesday evening, as was virtually everyone in the building after the blue wave we were gifted with on Tuesday. As such the set was filled with chatter and joking and quite a few funny stories, probably the best of which was a running theme throughout the evening where Jeff would comment (and laugh) about how crowds loved to cheer whenever the place they were from is mentioned in a given song. We of course didn’t let him down when the line, We all come from New York City in “New Madrid” elicited a loud roar from the room.
One of the most poignant moments of the night occurred when Jeff dedicated “I’m The Man Who Loves You” to Susie Tweedy. The evening also provided a couple of family sing alongs as both Sammy and Spencer Tweedy joined dad on stage to sing harmonies on “A Robin and A Wren” as well as “Lou Reed Was My Babysitter”.
All in all, what a fantastic night, one which will also (most unfortunately) be embedded in my memory as my last show to be seen at the soon to close Music Hall of Williamsburg.
SETLIST:
Feel Free
I Am Trying to Break Your Heart
Via Chicago
New Madrid
The Ruling Class
Country Song Upside-Down
Airline to Heaven
Forever Never Ends
Don’t Forget
Jesus, Etc.
A Robin or a Wren
Reservations
Shady
One Moment Magnified
Theologians
Handshake Drugs
Laminated Cat
Hummingbird
I’m the Man Who Loves You
Lou Reed Was My Babysitter
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