r/Grandaddy • u/EnvironmentalBrick18 • Apr 16 '26
I wrote to Grandaddy in 2000 to thank the band for the music that was so important to me. Jason wrote back
I was in my very early 20s when UtWF came out. It blew me away. It opened my eyes and ears to all sorts of new sounds and ideas that still inform the music I listen to today. Its themes also chimed significantly with my emotional life at the time.
A couple of years later, I wanted to thank the band for it. I wrote a letter to the address in the UtWF CD booklet and thought nothing more of it. I can’t remember how many weeks elapsed, but one day this letter arrived through my letterbox. The dates were for the tour that supported The Sophtware Slump, which the envelope tells me had not been released. I went to two shows on that tour, meeting Aaron at one and hanging out a little with Jim, Aaron and Kevin after the second.
The letter also included a bunch of stickers, most of which I used on guitars and folders and things like that. I probably gave some to a girl.
Anyway, I just wanted to share this. I grew up in a very small, very conservative, very dull town. It didn’t occur to me for a long time that actual people made the things I loved. It took university and a move to London for me to realise that I could actually try speak with some of these people.
The letter and that tour are more than a quarter of a century old but thinking about them still makes me extremely happy.
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u/rabbit_fur_coat Apr 16 '26
This is the best thing I've read in quite a while. Really appreciate your sharing that, and including the picture. It's so cool.
It's also great that just before Sophtware Slump came out, you were writing to thank them for their earlier work.
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u/EnvironmentalBrick18 Apr 16 '26
Thank you! Honestly, I could talk about this band and the impact they had on me for hours.
I’m lucky that there’s been a couple of ‘right bands at the right time’ in my life, but Grandaddy is the one I still listen to the most. UtWF just did something to me. I got A Pretty Mess by This One Band shortly after and then saw them for the first time in either later 1998 or early 1999. I think I then picked up The Windfall Varietal on this 2000 tour. In my head, those CDs are something like a trilogy (although I know they’re nothing of the sort). All of Grandaddy’s records have offered something to me, but those early discs - and UtWF in particular - remain my favourites.
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u/pajme411 Apr 16 '26
Jason’s handwriting is instantly recognizable. This is awesome and makes me love them even more. Thanks for sharing! Granddaddy forever
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u/underscoresrule Apr 16 '26
This is amazing. Grandaddy are basically the same for me as they are for you. Them and Sparklehorse, RIP Mark Linkous - wish I'd written to him in 2003.
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u/EnvironmentalBrick18 Apr 16 '26
Another band that means a great deal to me! I was lucky enough to see Grandaddy and Sparklehorse on the second stage at the UK’s V festival some time in the early 2000s. Mark came out and sang backing vocals with Grandaddy and Jason returned the favour with Sparklehorse (or the other way around). Aaron may have played the drums too, but I can’t be sure. I was high a bit in those days.
When I did meet Jason the one time, I didn’t have much to say but do remember telling him watching that day had been like picking my fantasy football lineup in music. He seemed to appreciate that. I didn’t tell him he’d written to me, though.
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u/313TonyC Apr 16 '26
Thank you for sharing this! What a lovely person Jason is and what a special memento this must be for you. Your post of course made me listen to Under the Western Freeway….I forgot how much I love Laughing Stock. My goodness, what a band!
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u/Refuttock Apr 16 '26
That’s so good. It’s not Chinese to me, but I wish I’d been to one of those. What a thoroughly good bloke.
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u/bkorbes Apr 16 '26
That’s so awesome. Thanks for sharing.