Watch Jeff Tweedy Talk About His Awkward Grammys Encounter With Diddy & Play “Gwendolyn” On Seth Meyers
Both as a member of Wilco and as a solo artist, Jeff Tweedy has been nominated for plenty of Grammys. He’s even won a couple. But that doesn’t mean that everyone recognizes Tweedy when he shows up at the awards ceremony. Last night, Tweedy was a guest on Late Night With Seth Meyers to promote his new solo album Love Is The King and his new book How To Write One Song. While on the show, Tweedy told a funny story about a run-in with Diddy at his first Grammys.
Talking to Seth Meyers, Tweedy said that at his first Grammys, he ended up holding the programs for all the members of Wilco, as well as their wives and girlfriends, while everyone was in the bathroom. While Tweedy was standing around waiting for everyone, Diddy approached him: “He taps the programs that I was holding with a cane: ‘Give me one of those.’ And I’m like, ‘No, they’re mine!’ It didn’t escalate.” So Diddy thought Jeff Tweedy was an usher. (He didn’t think Tweedy was Usher. That would’ve been interesting.)
Wilco were first nominated for a Grammy for their 1998 Billy Bragg collaboration Mermaid Avenue, which was up for Best Contemporary Folk Album in 2000. I don’t know if Wilco went to the ceremony that year, but I do know that if circa-2000 Diddy asked for my Grammy program, I would’ve just given it to him. On Meyers, Tweedy also said that he’s been mistake for a seat-filler every time he’s gone to the Grammys. And he played a live version of “Gwendolyn,” his recent single, in a room full of guitars. Watch the interview and the performance below.
Love Is The King is out now digitally and 1/15 physically via dBpm. How To Write One Song is out now, via the Penguin Random House imprint Dutton.