The frontman talks losing money, staying alive, and the message behind his rock band’s new album.
But then we reach a point [where] anything goes."
But the lyrics skew toward damnation: “Look back on our actions,” sings James.
Jim James has described My Morning Jacket’s current tour as a ‘survival mission.'.Amy Harris/Invision/AP
“Will we ever be redeemed?”
Amidst it all, there’s love to be found and connections to be made.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: This is the first new music from the band since theWaterfallrecording sessions.
Did you guys plan to take time off, or did it just happen that way?
JIM JAMES:We took a break for a while.
I just was beat down by the speed of everything.
I wasn’t really sure what would happen.
Was there a single moment when you realized you were feeling burnt out?
It built over years.
I just ran myself into the ground.
I didn’t know at the time what to do about it.
So the best I could do was step away for a while.
By more livable, what do you mean?
Like more sleep, more exercise?
I don’t know, just a way to stay alive easier.
I just felt like it was going to kill me.
And this one was really easy because it was just the five of us.
And so there really was no pressure or external forces.
You guys made the decision to engineer this record yourself, which was a first for the band.
I’m always working in the studio by myself.
I know how all the recording technology works.
But we had never made a My Morning Jacket record without a co-producer or an engineer present.
And so this was the first time we had done that.
We had always really enjoyed moments where it was just the five of us.
I’m not saying those people are bad or anything.
[This] was a tender time for us getting back together as a band.
We can also talk and get emotional and stuff like that.
Sometimes you feel weird in front of a stranger or a new person to feel really vulnerable or emotional.
Jacket really made its bones performing live.
We’re thinking about it constantly.
It’s an ongoing process.
This tour for us is really going to be a survival mission.
So a lot hinges on these shows financially as well.
Were you guys hurting bad financially without shows?
Or were you able to float for a little bit?
Well, everybody’s financial situation is different individually.
We made this joke to ourselves over the last decade as all of our album sales dried up.
We were like, “Well, they’ll never take touring from us.”
And then this pandemic comes and takes touring from us.
And we’re all just like, “F—, what do we do?”
So we’ve been really grateful for people like that.
Why was it important to kick off the record with a song like that?
The internal conflict of living in this period of history is pretty prevalent across the record.
Was that a through-line for you going in?
The technology in so many ways is brilliant.
But why can’t they pay us fairly?
Even technology itself, the way that it’s powered is still through f—ing fossil fuel.
Everything is possible here on Earth, to live this harmonious lifestyle with each other.
But the greed is f—ing killing us.
I did want to end the record that way.
That’s all that really matters.
It felt like a nice meditation to go out on.
My Morning Jacketis available now.
This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
