My Morning Jacket Hand the Controls to an Outside Producer on 'is'

My Morning Jacket released is, the band’s 10th studio album, on March 21, 2025 through ATO Records.

The record is the first the band has not self-produced. Brendan O’Brien took the producer’s chair, a job frontman Jim James had held on every previous My Morning Jacket album.

James framed the handover as a matter of letting go. “Up until now I’ve never been able to let go and allow someone else to steer the ship,” he said.

Ten tracks, announced in January

The album holds 10 songs: “Out In the Open,” “Half a Lifetime,” “Everyday Magic,” “I Can Hear Your Love,” “Time Waited,” “Beginning from the Ending,” “Lemme Know,” “Squid Ink,” “Die for It” and “River Road.”

It was announced on January 15, 2025, more than two months ahead of release, alongside lead single “Time Waited.”

Songs from two writing sessions

The material came out of two exploratory writing sessions. James described the work as an attempt to connect with something beyond the human experiment, a framing that carried through the announcement of the record.

The credited lineup is James, Tom Blankenship, Patrick Hallahan, Bo Koster and Carl Broemel. The band remains based in Louisville, Kentucky. Its previous self-titled record was covered here when that album landed.

One Big Holiday follows in April

The band’s own One Big Holiday festival comes two weeks after the release, running April 3 through 5, 2025 in Miramar Beach, Florida. Preservation Hall Jazz Band and Dinosaur Jr. are also on that bill.

Sources: My Morning Jacket / Bandcamp, Consequence.

Photo: digboston, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.