16 Facts About Jay Bennett

Jay Walter Bennett was an American multi-instrumentalist, engineer, producer, and singer-songwriter, best known as a member of the band Wilco from 1994 to 2001.

Jay Bennett was born November 15,1963, in Rolling Meadows, Illinois, a suburb northwest of Chicago.

Jay Bennett played guitar with Steve Pride and His Blood Kin and Gator Alley.

Jay Bennett was a full-time middle-school math teacher in 1986 at the then redesignated Urbana Middle School.

Jay Bennett worked for several years as an electronics technician for a local audio-video repair store.

From 1994 through 2001 Jay Bennett was a member of Wilco.

Jay Bennett claimed he contributed organ, guitars, and the "Noiz section" to "Poor Places".

The album was completed in 2001, and Jay Bennett was dismissed from the band immediately afterwards.

Jay Bennett released Whatever Happened I Apologize in November 2008 on rockproper.

Jay Bennett had been working on a sixth record, titled Kicking at the Perfumed Air.

In May 2009, Jay Bennett sued Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy for breach of contract stemming from his work for Wilco.

On May 24,2009, Jay Bennett died unexpectedly in his sleep.

The Champaign County coroner reported about one month later that Jay Bennett's death was accidental, and was the result of an overdose of the prescription painkiller Fentanyl.

Jay Bennett was wearing a Duragesic patch on his back when his body was found, said Champaign County Coroner Duane Northrup.

At the time of his death, Jay Bennett lived in Urbana, Illinois, where he spent most of his time writing songs and recording in his private studio, Pieholden Studios, which was named after "Pieholden Suite" on Wilco's Summerteeth.

Jay Bennett once described hearing the open spaces of the songs and holes that became his sonic landscape.