MJ Lenderman releases the video for ‘Wristwatch,’ his “brilliant coupling of loneliness and modernity” boasting “one of the catchiest choruses of [2024]” (Under The Radar) from his album, Manning Fireworks, released last fall on ANTI-. Directed by legendary filmmaker Lance Bangs, the video depicts Lenderman driving a pickup truck loaded with basketballs and inflatable pool rafts and repeatedly crashing into an overpass. Members of The Wind show up along the way. Of the video, Bangs says:
I had been drawn to make things with Jake for a while, and spent the late summer listening to the songs that would make up Manning Fireworks. The imagery of characters caught in persistence without progress that has recurred in his writing was there in “Wristwatch” and that song was the one I went back to the most while listening to the batch of recordings. I had seen low clearance bridges in this part of North Carolina in my past travels, a mismatch between the train trestles that were built in the first half of the 20th Century and the modern 13ft height of most tractor trailers. Durham has a notorious one called the “Canopener” that is featured on a website and Youtube channel “11foot8.com” by Jurgen Henn, who has captured 186 crashes since April of 2008. I took measurements and designed plans to add a few more crashes to Jurgen’s tally.
2024 was MJ Lenderman’s busiest year yet and 2025 has continued in that vein. Following the release of one of the year’s most beloved albums, he played a completely sold-out fall North American tour, sold out the Sydney Opera House, enthralled Aotearoa audiences and made his Jimmy Kimmel Live!, NPR Tiny Desk, and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon debuts.
Praise for MJ Lenderman & Manning Fireworks
“[MJ Lenderman] writes super sharp precisely observant lyrics that feel honed in the way that a great opening line of a short story is honed.” — The New York Times’ Popcast
“Lenderman is simply making the kind of warm and astringent rock and roll that has felt untethered from time since 1968.” — New Yorker
“[Manning Fireworks is] a record of hilariously evocative moments from pathetic people (or is it pathetic moments from hilariously evocative people?) atop purposeful, easy slacker rock melodies. From there, it’s a kaleidoscope of brilliant lyrical short stories.”— Associated Press, The Best Albums of 2024
“Manning Fireworks is the sound of one of indie rock’s most promising new voices coming into his own.”— Billboard, #38 in The 50 Best Albums of 2024
“[Lenderman] pumps his songs full of pop appeal and threads them with some of the raddest guitar work in recent memory.”— Stereogum, #2 in “The Best Albums of 2024”
“The Asheville singer-songwriter’s outstanding fourth album is loaded with zingers and losers. It’s witty and sincere, the mark of a songwriter finding his voice.”— Pitchfork [Best New Music]
“As a lyricist, [Lenderman] writes songs where both feel true in equal measure. The music is both pitiful and reflective of our worst selves. You can’t help but root for them.”— Paste, #4 in “The 40 Best Rock Albums of 2024”
“Pitched between the country-tinged slacker rock of Freedy Johnston and the reedy doom of Dinosaur Jr’s J. Mascis, Lenderman sings cooly of biding time and escaping a rut.”— New York Magazine, #6 in “The Best Albums Of The Year”
“the Poet Laureate of Indie Rock”— Interview Magazine
“[MJ Lenderman has] a gift for creating his own language…” — Pollstar
MJ Lenderman
Manning Fireworks
