JEFF BUCKLEY SECRET LEGACY EXPOSED

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27 years after Jeff Buckley’s passing, his most recognized piece – a poignant rendition of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” – unexpectedly soared to a remarkable chart position last autumn. This resurgence was primarily driven by teenage girls using the song as a soundtrack for their introspective reflections, causing “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over”, a wistful breakup track from Buckley’s 1994 album Grace, to rank at number 19 on TikTok’s Billboard top 50. A black-and-white video of Buckley performing the song received over 640,000 likes, with comments such as “The original yearner” and “Imagine having a song like this written about you”.

To older admirers of Jeff Buckley, these emotional responses from younger fans are completely relatable. As documentary filmmaker Amy Berg, aged 54, explains, “When you hear that song, it evokes the most profound romantic feelings imaginable.” Berg herself experienced a similar emotional response to Buckley’s music during the ’90s.

Prior to the surge of appreciation for Jeff Buckley’s music on social platforms, Berg had been working on a film about the singer titled “It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley“. This film is set to debut on January 24 at Sundance. The movie, hoping to secure a distributor during the festival, employs unseen footage and private voice messages to shed light on aspects of Buckley’s tumultuous childhood, his sudden death at age 30 due to drowning, and in-depth interviews with Buckley’s mother and former partners reveal the emotional turmoil that fueled songs like “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over”.

In Berg’s own words, “Among the countless potential Jeff Buckley documentaries, I opted for this particular tale. It’s a love story that delves into the impact of the women in his life on him and vice versa.

Amy Berg has a history of creating powerful and investigative films – her work includes the Oscar-nominated film Deliver Us From Evil, which exposed the Catholic Church’s sex abuse scandal in 2006; the documentary about child abuse in the entertainment industry, An Open Secret, released in 2014; and the HBO true-crime docuseries The Case Against Adnan Syed from 2019. However, this project benefited from Berg’s background in the music industry, having worked there before she moved into news and documentaries. Prior to creating these works, including a 2015 documentary about Janis Joplin, Berg was a booking agent at SST Records in Long Beach during the early ’90s and a tour booker for Vans; a band she managed, 16 Horsepower, once opened for Jeff Buckley at The Fez in New York. “His songs helped me get through every tough moment in my twenties,” she recalls of Buckley.

Jeff Buckley, whose father, the musician Tim Buckley, passed away due to a heroin overdose when Jeff was only 8 years old, was raised by his mother, Mary Guibert, who has maintained his archive since then. Similarly, director Kimberly Peirce, like Guibert, is a single parent to a son born in 1997 – the year Tim Buckley died. Speaking about the disappearance of Buckley in a Memphis river and his eventual discovery six days later, Peirce says, “I was deeply engrossed by it.” An autopsy revealed that Buckley had only one beer in his system at the time of his death, which was ruled an accidental drowning. However, there has been a lingering sense of mystery surrounding his demise. “I was keenly aware of not knowing what truly happened and yearned to uncover more,” Peirce explains.

After completing her movie “Deliver Us From Evil”, the documentarian initially contacted Buckley’s mother about creating a film about him. He persistently inquired, “Have you decided yet?” expressing his eagerness for final approval, as he required her trust in order to have control over the project’s editing.

15 years after Berg first proposed making a documentary about Jeff Buckley, Guibert finally agreed in the summer of 2019. “She wanted to share the story while she’s still alive,” Berg explained. Guibert, who was only 17 when she gave birth to Buckley, had saved countless voicemails he left her, which were instrumental in unlocking the project for Berg. “I would often cry listening to these long voicemails from Buckley to his mother,” Berg shared. “You could feel their bond and how they grew up together.” Before premiering the film at Sundance, Berg screened it privately for Guibert. “There’s no sugarcoating her story in the film,” Berg emphasized. “It shows a real mom who had flaws, did her best, and has regrets.

The movie’s name, “It’s Never Over, Jeff Buckley,” is inspired by a line from the song “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over.” This title is meant to pay tribute to Buckley’s enduring fanbase and his continued influence.

According to Berg, he intended to address him with the title, “We’ve stayed, and we continue to cheer you on.

You can find this article in the January 17th edition of The Hollywood Reporter periodical. To get future issues, consider subscribing.

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2025-01-21 21:26