My Morning Jacket share unreleased song from 'The Tennessee Fire" deluxe reissue

My Morning Jacket are celebrating the 20th anniversary of their debut album, The Tennessee Fire, with a deluxe edition of the album which will be out next week. This reissue matches the album’s 16 original cuts with 16 more, including previously unreleased demos, outtakes, alternate versions and more. One of those is “John Dyes Her Hair Red,” a low-fi demo that’s little beyond Jim James’ voice and distorted keyboards. “This is one of the first song poems i ever wrote — i always liked the idea of a song being this little picture or puzzle, and not necessarily having to ‘mean’ something or be about some big story or have tons of linear lyrics, but more just painting a weird little scene,” says James. “I have always tried to make my music gender neutral when it comes to love or romance for the most part, so that a person of any gender could experience a song and not feel excluded if i was using ‘he’s’ or ‘she’s’ or whatever and this is an early experiment with that, of a person named john, which is traditionally a ‘male’ name, who is dying her hair red and sitting in the shower til it all turns back brown — and maybe one would think — ‘well why did she ever even dye her hair red in the first place?'” Something to ponder when listening to the song, below.

MMJ will play The Tennessee Fire in full at Port Chester, NY’s Capitol Theatre on August 9 which is sold out, but you can still get tickets to their non-Fire show at Forest Hills Stadium on August 10 with Warpaint. Before those shows, they’ll play two sold-out shows at Colorado’s Red Rocks Amphitheatre on August 2 & 3.

My Morning Jacket – 2019 Tour Dates
August 2 – Morrison, CO – Red Rocks Amphitheatre – SOLD OUT
August 3 – Morrison, CO – Red Rocks Amphitheatre – SOLD OUT
August 9 – Port Chester, NY – Capitol Theatre – SOLD OUT
August 10 – Queens, NY – Forest Hills Stadium