I’ve been kept waiting around for a number of bands over the years, and for a number of reasons. Tonight, is no exception. After Jeffrey Lewis & The Junkyard debunk from stage they lug their gear away and I stand patiently, propping up the bar. However, when Jeffrey appears close to finally packing his guitar away, yet another fan comes up, and another, and then another. Autographs, chats, drinks, it goes on. Then, as I and another couple of interviewers eagerly wait, he is accosted by another two sets of fans – two girls who are almost desperately enquiring “so, are you staying here tonight?” By the time Jeffrey Lewis finally gets to us, he must have spoken to half of tonight's audience and had several women literally following him around the venue. As a means of making up the time, we combine the two interviews, so I play question tennis with another set of interviewers – an intimate press conference perhaps.
As we sit down, Jeff starts to gush about Yo La Tengo and their ability to play almost anything, stating how he’d love to be like them. This comes off the back of discussing tonight’s enormously successful show - one that involved a lot of new material, a host of classics, and saw the band matching almost any shout out with an instant reply of a song. It seems if they are looking to draw inspiration from them, they are on the right path to success.
While Jeffrey’s songs (and specifically lyrics) have always captured a mature and worldly view, he seems to have also managed to encapsulate a youthful charm throughout his career - perhaps due to the fact that he, based on his voice alone, could easily be mistaken for a teenager. However, now 35, hair going, does Jeff think about getting old? “Well, I guess. When the last album came out, I realised afterwards that all the songs are about death or something like that. Maybe I do think about it a lot,” he pauses, “I think on my records I sound so miserable and I don’t know if I’m more miserable than other people. I do have happy songs, hell, most people think I’m just a comedy act anyway! I read these reviews that are like "Jeffrey Lewis is the most hilarious guy! He does this great comedy act, he writes all these songs about killing himself or something". It’s a big topic and I guess, especially from someone who has never had any kind of religious upbringing, for generations my family have just been communists, atheists, more political New York bohemian-types for multiple generations, so the idea of any kind of spiritual comfort [in death] is never something that I grew up with. So any kind of comforting way to find a reason for all of this has never really been a factor in my psychology. I just carve out my own parameters by asking "Why do I do this, why do I do that?"” These internal questions and dilemmas are common themes in Jeff’s work, but as he has gotten older and written more songs, has he come any closer to finding any answers? “I think I’m falling further into despair all the time! I felt like I got to a certain point where I was, "okay, maybe I’m getting better; I’m becoming a better artist, musician and songwriter. I’m getting better at talking to girls, booking tours and making more money" but you know, I’m just getting worse, there is no improvement - I’m getting uglier, I’m getting less creative, I haven’t done a comic book all year. Y’know, with every year that passes it’s one closer to death. Music especially, I mean everybody just gets worse. There are a gazillion artists out there that you hear people say "oh, you got to get their first record". Y’know, fuck the tenth record, everybody just gets worse and worse. The longer your career is the worse you get.” I suggest, with Jeffrey’s work being so lyrical, that there is perhaps an argument that some of the greatest writers in the world in fact improve, and only get better with age and experience? “Certain arts yes. Novelists should be able to get better. Poets – you know, an old poet should sound better than a young poet. Illustrators, a fifty-year-old illustrator has got to be better than a twenty-year-old one. But why don’t you get better at everything? You should get better at everything, but I get worse and it’s so depressing.”
The self-deprecation that runs through Jeff’s songs like a twisted neurological train seems to be operating at the same speed on the outside as it does within. It’s often difficult to tell whether Jeff is exaggerating for comic effect, or whether he does feel as hopeless as he says. I mention that series of girls that hounded him after the show, “I’ve spent years trying to go out of my way in interviews and talking to people after shows to be like "I’m just a normal guy, there is nothing interesting about me", my whole approach to music was that I didn’t want a band name, I just wanted my own boring name and no production value. But then I realised but that is actually more insulting to people than the approach of "I’m a rock star and I’m going to be arrogant and I’m not going to give you the time of day". People are paying money to come and pay attention to you for an hour, so if afterwards you talk to somebody and it’s just like "I’m a normal guy" you’re telling them "you’re a fucking idiot for listening to me, you could have listened to some other band." I’m trying to cultivate more arrogance”. I can’t help but laugh out loud at this suggestion, before Jeff continues, “but it doesn’t come naturally to me.” So, how is that method working out for Jeff? “So far… it’s been interesting because it kind of works. Y’know, if somebody comes and talks to me after a show and I’m like "I’m busy, I gotta do this thing," they turn around and go "oh, what an asshole", but they want that! They are happier thinking that I am this unapproachable arrogant guy, when I hang out with them I can see it in their eyes every time, just like those girls downstairs, like if I was a total arrogant bastard and was like "whatever", and I blew them off and walked off to my dressing room, that’s what they want! They’re like "this guy is fucking great, I wanna fuck him, or I wanna hang out with him," but two minutes talking to somebody and they’re just like "oh, you’re just a regular guy, I feel like an idiot for thinking that you could ever be special." It’s like insulting them; it’s like telling them they’re an idiot for thinking that I was special. So it makes them happier if I’m arrogant”. Does it make you happier? “That I don’t know yet, I’m in such a weird position in the music industry, I’ve been doing this and making a living for ten years. I’m still playing a bar here tonight, we’re making enough money to survive but we’re not going anywhere. We’ve been doing this ten years, we’re obviously never going to get famous… like, I go to record stores and they don’t have my records. It’s been interesting, it’s not what I ever expected.” Admittedly in print, this sounds like the ramblings a self-obsessed neurotic, but Lewis is far more humble and gentle than that, even if he’d like to appear otherwise at the moment.
Again - without meaning to trivialise - it’s difficult to attain whether Jeff is putting on somewhat of a performance in this interview, or whether he is in genuine emotional turmoil in his life and sincerely considers the above to be a good idea. His natural gravitation towards honesty in all aspects of his work would certainly suggest it’s real, but perhaps his newfound arrogance is a smoke screen for livening up Interviews. He is clearly someone who internalises perhaps excessively, taking over-analysis to unnecessary extremes and being overly critical of his often brilliant work. However, for all his insecurities, I think Jeff extracts a relative comfort from where he is. He seems to know where he is as an artist and maybe it’s just taken him a while to see where he’s going. As he quite contently sings in ‘Cult Boyfriend’ from his forthcoming LP: “I might not be in magazines as a heart-throb face, but in a few devoted fans I’ve found a strong fan base.” Ultimately, Jeff can try with all his might to become an asshole, but he’d be trying for the rest of his life.