Last month, MJ Lenderman — the North Carolina-based singer, songwriter, and musician — announced his new album, Manning Fireworks, out September 6th via ANTI-. Lenderman now gives us another slice with the new single/video “Joker Lips.” A magnetic song about feeling pushed out by everyone else, Lenderman provides a look at a renewed sincerity in his work, as he deadpans “Please don’t laugh / Only half of what I said was a joke.” Maybe you hear a tremble in his voice? That’s the frown behind the mask, finally slipping from Lenderman’s face. The video for “Joker Lips,” directed by Ben Turok, features Lenderman and The Wind performing in an overgrown field clung to the side of a mountain in Western North Carolina as plants seemingly envelop the band.
Manning Fireworks is an instant classic of an LP — a remarkable development in Lenderman’s story as an incisive singer songwriter, whose propensity for humor always points to some uneasy, disorienting darkness. The punchlines from his previous albums are still here, as are the rusted-wire guitar solos that have made him a favorite for indie rock fans looking for an emerging guitar hero, with Lenderman letting us in on his frank observations on the intersection of wit and sadness.
Recorded at Asheville’s Drop of Sun Studios and co-produced with frequent collaborator Alex Farrar, Lenderman plays nearly every instrument on the album, routing sadness and shame through guitars that echo the sparkle of R.E.M and the insistence of Drive-By Truckers. Writing where the poetic clarity of William Carlos Williams and the economy of Raymond Carver meet the striking imagery of Harry Crews, there are feelings of self-doubt and world weariness present, but the conditions are rendered with a precision and care that make his songs feel like short films, as Lenderman simply offers everyday anxieties and enthusiasms in uncanny ways.
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