JERRY JOSEPH & The JACKMORMOMS

The long awaited double-live album from Jerry Joseph and the Jackmormons, Mouthful of Copper, will be released September 23rd on Terminus Records. Mouthful of Copper captures the magic and power of the band's legendary live shows. The Portland, Oregon based trio consisting of Jerry Joseph on guitar and lead vocals, Junior Ruppel on bass and Brad Rosen on drums recorded Mouthful of Copper in Butte, Montana over three nights in August 2002. No guests, no fancy stage props, no frills-what you get is an honest and visionary rock band captured in their prime delivering classic performances to a fortunate audience in the Badlands of Montana.

Mouthful of Copper showcases the prolific songwriting skills of Jerry Joseph and embodies a characteristic mix of the sacred and profane. The album consists of mostly unreleased material that Joseph had originally penned for future studio releases, but fortunately the songs have arrived sooner than expected. Joseph has been compared to great songwriters such as John Hiatt, Tom Petty, Graham Parker, David Lowery, Chris Whitley and rockers the Clash and the Meat Puppets. Joseph has earned respect from critics and peers such as Pete Droge (a past member of Joseph's band Little Women), Vic Chesnutt, David Lindley and Widespread Panic amongst others. Mouthful of Copper is dedicated to Michael Houser, a close friend of Joseph's and the former lead guitar player for the band Widespread Panic who passed away in 2002 after a battle with cancer. Widespread Panic has performed and recorded several Jerry Joseph songs over the years including "Climb to Safety", "Chainsaw City" and "North", all of which appear on Mouthful of Copper.

Before starting the Jackmormons, Joseph led the reggae/rock band Little Women, based out of Boulder, Colorado, which ruled the Rocky Mountain club circuit for most of the 80's and broke up in 1993. Joseph continued to record before an oft-publicized drug addiction temporarily sidelined his career. The process of getting clean took Joseph to New York, Montana, Salt Lake City, where the Jackmormons were formed in 1996, and eventually to Portland. Mouthful of Copper is the second release from Jerry Joseph & The Jackmormons on Terminus Records and follows the critically acclaimed Conscious Contact which was released in early 2002.

When asked why the band chose to make a live record in Montana, Joseph replied, "The Jackmormons used to hang out in Butte and we decided to record there because it's the weirdest place in America and Evel Knievel is from there." Mouthful of Copper is actually the second live record in which Jerry Joseph & The Jackmormons reference Butte, Montana. The first being Butte, Mont. 1879 (recorded in Salt Lake City, UT) released in 1996 on Holladay Records.

Jerry Joseph & The Jackmormons integrate excitement and expressiveness, thoughtfulness and thrust, poetry and pure power. The varying material from Mouthful of Copper ranges from: the hard driving and deep lyrical content of "The Jump", the radio friendly "I Know There's a Darkness", the Americana soundscape of "Thistle", the bouncy reggae of "Electra Glide in Blue" (incidentally, written before Robert Blake was arrested), the punk rock aggressiveness of "Bright Young Thing", the towering ferocity of "Climb to Safety" where Joseph recounts the facets of heroin addiction, the tender "Tanker" where the singer compares a fading love to a Japanese tanker sinking, the fury and passion of "Soda Man", the sensitive pop of "She's Going Out" that explodes into a bombastic guitar exploration, to the classic rock epic of "Savage Garden", and "Hallelujah Trail", the beautiful set closer.

The live recording production of Mouthful of Copper was handled by the legendary Betty Cantor-Jackson who produced and engineered classic records by the Grateful Dead including: Workingman's Dead, Dead Set, Live Dead, Reckoning and several Jerry Garcia solo projects. Cantor-Jackson also engineered the Apocalypse Now Soundtrack and has worked with countless artists over the last thirty years. Mouthful of Copper was mixed and mastered by Alex Lowe in Atlanta, GA at Southern Living at its Finest Studio. The final results are dynamic and torrential.

Jerry Joseph & The Jackmormons preach the gospel of rock and roll with vehemence and will continue to tour the world relentlessly in support of Mouthful of Copper. "Stretch out your fingers and stand on your toes!" --- the definitive Jerry Joseph & The Jackmormons live record has arrived.