It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley: Doc About Singular Musician Cements his Legacy
By Karen Gordon
Rating: A-
For music lovers around in the 90s, the death of singer-songwriter Jeff Buckley was a shock that still resonates.
In 1994, Buckley released his debut album Grace, which become a hit in Europe and won him a cult following in North America. In 1997, he was in the process of recording his follow-up, My Sweetheart the Drunk, when he accidentally drowned in the Wolf River outside of Memphis. He was only 30 and already revered. His death felt like a cosmic affront.
Buckley with his mom, Mary Guibert.
Buckley’s short life, his career, and his impact on music and the people around him is the focus It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley, by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Amy Berg (Deliver Us from Evil).
Berg was a Buckley fan who wanted to make a documentary about him for years. But she waited until Buckley’s mom, Mary Guibert, agreed to participate. It was the right move. The film is an intimate, achingly beautiful look at a singular talent through the people who knew him best.
Berg directs with a light hand, not skimming the surface, presenting an artist and a miraculously talented human who died before he had really gotten to define himself for himself.
Berg doesn’t attempt to give a definitive answer the question “what was the essence of Jeff Buckley.” Rather, using clips from interviews with Buckley and insights from the people closest to him, colleagues, collaborators and performances, she builds a portrait of an artist who had such a special way of hearing and performing music.
Guibert was just 17 when she got pregnant with her son, from a relationship with classmate Tim Buckley, also a revered singer-songwriter who himself died at 28 from an accidental drug overdose. Tim Buckley was not a physical presence in his son’s life. They met when he was eight and spent a week together. That was it.
Even though the elder Buckley had little direct influence on his son — and Jeff Buckley always bridled at inevitable comparisons — it is interesting to see how similar the two were, especially when it came to not wanting to conform to established genres.
Music was in Jeff Buckley's veins. Guibert was a trained classical musician. His stepfather loved rock music and had a collection of albums that favoured hard rock including Led Zeppelin and Jimi Hendrix.
Buckley ingested it all in a brain that seemed naturally and permanent set to uniqueness. He was a trained musician, a talented guitar player. As a singer he talked about being drawn to a range of women, and says he wanted to be a chanteuse.
He talks about wanting to sing like Nine Simone, but he was equally also drawn to the great Pakistani Qawwali singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and learned how to emulate his singing style. He was equally drawn to Siouxie Sioux, Judy Garland, Edith Paif, and Robert Plant.
Buckley also embraced what was happening around him. He was big fan of grunge. He loved Soundgarden and bonded with the late Chris Cornell, another respected singer with his own inimitable style.
With a multi-octave vocal range, serious guitar chops, and a musical imperative to explore whatever hit him, Buckley was able to play and incorporate all the aeras of music that excited him. It allowed him to evolve a style that was his own, at once emotive and transcendent.
Things took off for Buckley when he moved to New York to pursue music. He found a job at a restaurant called Sin-e that had a small stage. He’d wait tables for a while and then take the stage working out his sound.
His reputation in the New York music scene grew to the point where people, including record executives, were jamming the little clubs he was playing. Buckley became a hot commodity and was pursued by every major label.
He ultimately signed with Columbia, attracted by its legacy of nurturing some of the most legendary artists in American music: Miles Davis, Thelonius Monk, Duke Ellington, Mahalia Jackson, Leonard Cohen, Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan, the biggest attraction for Buckley who similarly would only listen to his muse. And compromise wasn't in the vocabulary.
At that point you can begin to see how the pressures of the industry, the realities of working within that framework were for him. Buckley was hard on himself, a perfectionist, who needed to write more songs. He went into the studio and managed to attract collaborators from the worlds of classical and jazz to do arrangements.
The result was Grace. It had a mix of original songs and covers, including his version of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah,” viewed by many as the most beautiful interpretation of the song. The album was a game-changer and brought Buckley attention and fame that was difficult to process.
There is a very poignant moment in the film where his longtime girlfriend Rebecca Moore talks about how it affected their relationship. It’s not an unfamiliar story in the music industry, where artists become overwhelmed by their new status and begin to disconnect with the people in their lives, and not necessarily for the better.
Out on the road for two straight years, with the pressure of writing his second album, Buckley began to struggle with his mental health.
The contributors to the film were close to Buckley, including his two loves, Moore and Joan Wasser, and of course his mother. As well as musicians Ben Harper and Aimee Mann, and Buckley’s former bandmates including Michael Tighe and Parker Kindred.
Berg takes an unflinching but sensitive approach to the material. The people around him loved him and still do, and they are all very open and vulnerable. They let us see that the love they had for Buckley still affects them.
There was something both determined and fragile about Buckley. Someone who heard music and poetry in his own way and wanted to translate that and put it out into the world.
It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley is a reminder of the beauty of what he was looking for, and why his loss still reverberates so many years after his death.
It’s Never Over Jeff Buckley. Directed by Amy Berg. With Jeff Buckley, Mary Guibert, Rebecca Moore, Joan Wasser, Ben Harper, Aimee Mann, Michael Tighe, and Parker Kindred. In select theatres nationwide August 15 and others throughout the autumn.