Paul Westerberg Interview
I’m not sure what to say first when Paul Westerberg is the subject. I do know that at one point many of us felt like our generation had a Bob Dylan, because we had Paul Westerberg. He is that good and that unknowable. It isn’t just the Minnesota connection. Westerberg caught a lot of people off guard when he first showed up. A song like “I’m in Trouble,” from the Replacements first full-length recording, Sorry, Ma, Forgot To Take Out The Trash, certainly signaled that there was a writer emerging—but I don’t think it prepared anyone for the side of Westerberg that would soon yield songs like “Within Your Reach,” from Hootenany. By the time the Replacements put out Let It Be, the title of which demonstrated that, from here on out, nothing was sacred, Westerberg was viewed as something like a prodigy. Of course, he never asked for the pedestal he was put on. And no doubt the worship that had begun meant more pressure on Westerberg than any young artist should rightly have to deal with. But that’s how it was. Again, he is that good.
