JERRY JOSEPH & THE JACKMORMONS

For more than 30 years, Jerry Joseph has been strapping on a guitar and chasing down truth, understanding and soul with tenacity and resonant skill. Joseph is the archetypal musician’s musician – something that’s resoundingly clear on his sweeping new double album Happy Book, to be released March 20, 2012 on Response Records. Look for Joseph and his band to tour this spring in support of the album’s release. The list of currently confirmed tour dates is listed below – with many others still to be announced.

Captured with muscle and blood by Joseph’s longtime trio The Jackmormons, Happy Book presents Jerry Joseph & The Jackmormons at their most diverse and confident; it’s a record with a wide swing that dexterously moves from whisper closeness to Technicolor expansiveness. Produced by Joseph’s former Little Women band mate Gregg Williams (Dandy Warhols, Blitzen Trapper), Happy Book is an emotional and sonic wallop fueled by the tightest, tastiest playing the Jackmormons have ever captured in the studio. “After 17 years, this album brings together a lot of things I’ve always wanted on a record,” explains Joseph. “This sounds like a band that’s been together 17 years and has evolved along the way.”

Happy Book incorporates horns and other choice elements from guests – Jenny Conlee-Drizos and Chris Funk (The Decemberists), Eric Earley (Blitzen Trapper), Dan Eccles (Richmond Fontaine), Wally Ingram, Little Sue Weaver and Paul Brainard – into The Jackmormons’ tight-knit chemistry to create an expansive work that captures Joseph’s startlingly broad musical range in a roughly graceful, swiftly intoxicating way.