JR JR Shares New Track “Control”; And Kicks Off North American Tour

In advance of a massive North American tour, JR JR have revealed a new single, “Control.” The track comes two days before the band is scheduled to the road with dates that kick off Thursday, October 5, at Chicago’s House Of Blues. Of today’s single JR JR’s Josh Epstein notes, “Control was written on November 10th (2 days after the election) at the Masonic Temple in Detroit, MI. I woke up late and was driving in our van–which has no radio anymore. Suddenly the melody and the lyric was in my head, ‘careful of who you let control the people that you know oh oh oh.’ I raced upstairs to sing it for the guys, and found that they were starting to write a song around a riff that Bryan Pope was playing on guitar. Somehow, the song they were playing was the exact same tempo and key as the lyrics and melody that I was singing. It’s like we were all writing the song serendipitously in separate locations at the same time. It came fast, and to this day feels like a song that we didn’t write–it wrote itself through us.”

https://open.spotify.com/track/53pwXzO6omeG1o2lMhzHvn

JR JR is Epstein and Daniel Zott. The Detroit-based duo’s tour will take them across the US and Canada with the dates concluding in Detroit for a two night stand at El Club November 17 and 18. Along the way the band will play Los Angeles’ El Rey on October 19, The 9:30 Club in Washington, DC on November 2 and New York City’s Irving Plaza on November 4. All dates are listed below.

2017 has seen JR JR release two additional singles – “Clean Up” in August and the March release of “Same Dark Places” which was featured in the hit Netflix TV Show 13 Reasons Why. Together they are the first pieces of music the band has released since their 2015 album JR JR – the album which spawned Top 10 Alternative single, “Gone”. (Watch them perform “Gone” on The Late Late Show with James Corden here.)

Listeners across genre lines have been drawn in by their adventurous, danceable blend of classic songwriting, intricate melodies and electronic elements. Paste has noted, “Epstein and bandmate Daniel Zott remain purveyors of kaleidoscopic pop music.” Coming together through a shared love for bands that effortlessly flexed harmonies like the Beatles and Simon & Garfunkel, Epstein and Zott recorded a couple songs in 2009 just for fun, and with that Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. was born (the band’s original name).

The last 9 months has seen JR JR perform a much-talked about slot at Austin City Limits, tour to benefit Mental Health Awareness month in May and appear on Comedy Central’s Detroiters. Since their inception, Daniel and Josh wanted to avoid the typical trappings that come with having defined roles in a band, so there’s no frontman in JR JR, just two guys who relish in the ying and yang of a close partnership.

JR JR North American Fall Tour Dates:

Thu, Oct 5 – Chicago, IL – House of Blues
Fri, Oct 6 – Minneapolis, MN – Fine Line
Sat, Oct 7 – Kansas City, MO – Record Bar
Mon, Oct 9 – Denver, CO – Bluebird Theater
Tue, Oct 10 – Salt Lake City, UT – Urban Lounge
Thu, Oct 12 – Seattle, WA – Neumos
Fri, Oct 13 – Portland, OR – Hawthorne
Sat, Oct 14 – San Francisco, CA – Independent
Mon, Oct 16 – Sacramento, CA – Harlow’s
Tue, Oct 17 – Pomona, CA – Glasshouse
Thu, Oct 19 – Los Angeles, CA – El Rey
Fri, Oct 20 – San Diego, CA – Irenic
Sat, Oct 21 – Phoenix, AZ – Lost Lake Music Fest
Sun, Oct 22 – Santa Fe, NM – Meow Wolf
Tue, Oct 24 – Dallas, TX – Trees
Wed, Oct 25 – Austin, TX – Mohawk
Thu, Oct 26 – Houston, TX – WOMH
Fri, Oct 27 – Birmingham, AL – Saturn
Sat, Oct 28 – Atlanta, GA – Masquerade – Hell Stage
Mon, Oct 30 – Nashville, TN – Basement East
Tue, Oct 31 – Carrboro, NC – Cat’s Cradle
Thu, Nov 2 – Washington, DC – 9:30 Club
Fri, Nov 3 – Philadelphia, PA – First Unitarian Church of Christ
Sat, Nov 4 – New York, NY – Irving Plaza
Sun, Nov 5 – Cambridge, MA – Sinclair
Tue, Nov 7 – Buffalo, NY – Waiting Room
Wed, Nov 8 – Toronto, ON – Velvet Underground
Thu, Nov 9 – Cleveland, OH – Beachland Ballroom
Fri, Nov 17 – Detroit, MI – El Club
Sat, Nov 18 – Detroit, MI – El Club