ARTIST PROFILE: Get to Know Joseph

Artist Profile: Get to Know Joseph

Artist:
Joseph (Allison, Natalie and Meegan Closer)

Genre:
Folk Indie Pop

Favorite Nashville spots:
Mas Tacos, Crema Coffee Roasters

If you just saw the name scrolling across your screen as you were looking for new music to check out, you might make an assumption about an act called “Joseph.”

For the last decade, sisters Allison, Natalie and Meegan Closer have been encouraging their audiences to think about things differently. Not just the name of their band, which was named inspired by the town of Joseph, Oregon, where their grandfather used to take them. And, yes, their grandfather’s name was Joe. (He is not a professional musician but loves music and the women have an uncle who is a musician in Paris.) “This is how we honor our grandpa,” says Allison.

The sisters have a lot of fun working together, Allison says. Like any band, they have occasional skirmishes often triggered by life in close quarters while touring. “We like each other, and we work through conflict,” she says of working with her sister.

Their new album, “The Sun,” was born out of a different challenging time: the coronavirus pandemic. During the pandemic all three separately had opportunities to sit down with therapists and work through some of their personal struggles and anxieties, Allison says.

When they came back together to work on new songs, they saw common threads in all of their work with their therapists, exploring relationships, personal strength and finding purpose.

“It just happened that all three of us are major believers in therapy. We have seen the personal transformations that people go through in therapy,” Allison says. “It is so beneficial for the majority of people. It gives them a moment of peace.”

The trio has gotten great feedback to the album and to sharing their personal stories through their music. For one song, Allison says, she took a page straight from her diary when writing the lyrics. It’s powerful, she says, to have audiences and other artists tell them they have been going through similar things.

Their performances include some “loud, belting harmonies and soft, quiet moments,” just like life does.

Allison lived in Nashville in 2017 and 2018 and Natalie did so for one summer, so the sisters are looking forward to returning to Music City for their performance on the Bobby hotel rooftop.

“Nashville is always a wild time,” Allison says. “It is always nerve-wracking to play in a town that is so musician-heavy. We should have a ton of friends at the show.”