In a day and age where most of us are lost in the haze of the instant gratification information age we live in, Jon Tyler Wiley and His Virginia Choir hope to remind us to stop and sniff the daisies on their latest single, “Mission.”
With a palpable inspiration from heavy-hitters like Dylan and Prine, lead singer Jon Tyler Wiley sought to pen his own song displaying commentary on the modern world around him.
Chock full of vivid imagery of old wise types passing down wisdom of mindfulness and not believing everything you hear, “Mission” serves as a message and reminder that’s never outdated and more pertinent than ever: live in the moment.
With a piano and fiddle intro that sounds like it could be a lost track from The Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main Street, the song is an earworm from the jump, soaking into the psyche with its uplifting anti-machine pro-human message.
Wiley’s prominent vocals soon take center stage with a booming chorus, as he sings, “You gotta throw away your television / It’s only talkin’ it don’t listen / Put away the mobile phone / Sometimes it’s fine to be alone / Put away your screened whatever / You don’t need it more than ever / Get yourself a brand new mission / Throw away your television.”
With each passing verse and chorus, the message hits harder and deeper, giving that little nudge we all could use to just shut the screens and embrace the earth around us and the loved ones in it. The dynamic country rock-fueled energy resonates heavy, as His Virginia Choir stands true to their name and throughout with their incredible chemistry and collaborative sound that rumbles through the speakers.
“Mission” is the whopping sixth and final single before the grand release of the band’s debut LP, Pictures in the Dark [private stream], greets the world on March 28th, 2024.
LISTEN TO ‘MISSION’
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With influences that shape their sound ranging from Springsteen, to Wilco, to Dawes, and much in between, Jon Tyler Wiley & His Virginia Choir have carved out their own unique Americana folk rock sound, and Pictures in the Dark will prove a pivotal moment in the band’s trajectory into the burgeoning scene.
“My wife and I have always lamented our individual addictions to our phones and other devices, and that’s how this song saw its lyrical genesis,” Wiley says. “I wanted to provide commentary on where we are now in screen culture. We’re in this information age, and we have all this data at our fingertips all the time, and I wanted to present the counter argument that maybe that’s not necessarily a good thing. Maybe there are repercussions.”
“Mission” follows the band’s cathartic January single, “Song of Moving On.”
Regarding the creation of the new album, Wiley says, “This album is the most mature thing we’ve done. The writing sounds more deliberate, more orchestral. Lyrically, this music was written between 2020 and early 2023. This is very much our ‘pandemic record’: there’s a lot of uncertainty, a lot of grappling with mortality. There’s also a lot of hope.”
Wiley’s first memories were looking at album artwork from his parents’ albums, which included The Allman Brothers, Santana, Tom Petty, and other classic rock legends. This fascination led him to get his first guitar at age 10, and at age 23 he was doing music full-time. By the time he was 30, he’d played guitar and mandolin for artists like Stephen Kellogg and Sister Hazel.
While a long time artist both solo and with other groups, Jon Tyler Wiley fatefully assembled His Virginia Choir on March 7th of 2020. They had a whole tour booked, only for it to be in the can mere weeks later due to the pandemic. Perhaps a positive twist of fate, the band then honed in to flesh out new material, recording in their homes and sending GarageBand sessions back and forth to one another. This would eventually result in a string of singles, starting with their barn burnin’ debut track, “Laura Lee.”
With the moniker ‘The Virginia Choir’ chosen, Wiley’s goal was always to harness different musical elements from the state of Virginia and combine them into one sound: rock from the cities, bluegrass and country from the rural communities, and Americana/singer-songwriter sounds from the college towns.
“When the band started recording the singles we released in 2021, it almost felt like driving a car for the first time. With this record, however, there was more comfort with one another, so I feel like we were able to push each other a little harder, and hopefully a little farther,” Wiley says. “We had a few years under our belt as a live band, so we also had the experience of our live show to draw from, which was very important. We wanted there to be moments in this record that people heard and immediately thought, ‘Wow, I want to see this live!’”
Pictures in the Dark was mixed by Doug Ross, and mastered by Grammy-winning engineer Hans DeKline.
Jon Tyler Wiley and His Virginia Choir have a string of shows lined up after the release of Pictures in the Dark, including an album release show in Vienna, Virginia, at Jammin Java April 5th.
Listen To “Mission”
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