North Carolina-based singer and songwriter MJ Lenderman has shared the video for the second single “Joker Lips” off his upcoming album Manning Fireworks. The LP arrives Sept. 6 via Anti-.
In the visual, Lenderman strums his guitar alongside band The Wind amid an overgrown field in Western North Carolina. “Joker Lips” captures the feeling of alienation, with punchlines like “Please don’t laugh/Only half of what I said was a joke.”
Lenderman’s fourth album also includes lead single “She’s Leaving You,” which captures Lenderman’s clever songwriting as he chronicles a cheating husband’s midlife crisis. The track includes backing vocals from his Wednesday bandmate Karly Hartzman. Album cut “Rudolph” arrived last year and marked the first song Lenderman released since his 2022 album, Boat Songs. (Boat Songs was featured in Rolling Stone’s list of that year’s 100 Best Albums.)
He recently teamed up with Waxahatchee for “Right Back to It,” which was named one of Rolling Stone‘s best songs of 2024 so far. Rolling Stone‘s review of the song describes Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield and Lenderman’s musical chemistry, which “peaks on this sweet, leisurely duet about the joys of long-term partnership. Crutchfield and Lenderman harmonize like Emmylou and Gram, evoking Sunday-afternoon splendor in warm vocal tones punctuated by his laconic solos.”
The indie rock artist will set out on a North American tour this fall; it begins Oct. 4 in Atlanta, and makes stops in Nashville, Chicago, Detroit, Brooklyn, and more cities. The tour ends in Lenderman’s hometown of Asheville, North Carolina on Nov. 1.
From Rolling Stone US
