Seven years ago, on the afternoon of May 11, 2002, Jay Bennett and Edward Burch were doing an in-store performance at Laurie’s Planet of Sound in Chicago to promote their newly released album, The Palace at 4am. GLONO was there and we managed to capture a bunch of crappy, grainy photos. Without a trace of bitterness, Bennett joked about how the guitar he was playing at the moment was the very one pictured on the cover of a famous double album by a different band.
Afterwards, we asked him and Burch to sign a copy of their new CD for a giveaway we were hosting on the site. He graciously stuck a Glorious Noise sticker on one of his roadcases. We chatted for a while and eventually arranged the interview that led to our track-by-track listing of all of his contributions to Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, which Wilco and its management were downplaying at the time. We didn’t think Bennett was getting a fair shake in the press and we wanted to let him share his side of the story.
Here are some of the photos we took that day.
We’re going to miss that crazy old mad professor. The world is a lousier place without him.
GLONO obit: Ex-Wilco Jay Bennett Dead at 45
MP3: Jay Bennett – “Replace You” from The Magnificent Defeat (Rykodisc, 2006).
Thanks for all the coverage of Jay. What a talent. RIP, JB.
I give Bennett and Burch credit for my current job at Laurie’s Planet of Sound. I went to buy Palace 1919 there. It was the only store in the city selling it, and they had just put a help wanted sign up.
I was also at the in-store.
I beg to differ on Jay’s comment that the guitar he is using at the Laurie’s in-store is the guitar from the Being There cover. I know the Being There guitar well, as it is now my guitar. In these photos, Jay has some sort of mid-1960s Gibson (I can’t quite tell the model). The Being There guitar is a 1963 Epiphone Texan. His momentary lapse is excusable, as the 1960s Epiphones were manufactured by Gibson, and the Texan resembles the guitar in his hands.
I miss that 1968 J-200 of his that I was playing that day. But way more than that, I miss Jay.
I was there that day! I may even have a dusty cassette recording of the show laying around in a box somewhere. Kay brought great joy into many of our lives.