Sisters Allison and Meegan Closner and Natalie Closner-Schepman, collectively known as Joseph, make their Castle Theatre debut next week. The band’s one-day stop in Bloomington is part of a 13-city acoustic tour following the April release of their fourth studio album, “The Sun.”
Around 2011 or 2012, as Natalie’s solo singer/songwriter career wasn’t quite landing, she asked her sisters Allison and Meegan if they wanted to join a band. They both said yes — and it was an instant success.
“They were in college, working at a grocery store and a coffee shop and finding their way,” Natalie said of her sisters.
“Alli and I had sung a little bit,” said Meegan. “I had only done theater.”
The Closner household was a creative one. Their mother taught theater; their musical chops come from their father, a jazz musician.
“I knew I loved to sing, but it was not on my radar at all,” Meegan said. “In hindsight, it’s the best question I’ve ever been asked in my life that I said yes to."
The twins jumped in feet first — though neither was quite sure what they’d signed up for.
"The first couple times we sang a song together, I was like oh — oh my. I need to coax this into something, whether they know exactly what that is or not,” said Natalie, who is four years older than twins Allison and Meegan. “Apparently, they did not.”
“I don’t remember thinking about it at all,” said Allison, who also dove in despite experiencing profound anxiety in front of crowds.
“It was an invitation to grow up a bit and to share this dream,” Meegan said.
Named for a small town in eastern Oregon where the family frequently camped, Joseph is a magic blend of three-part harmony and catchy up-tunes that has consistently filled rooms for more than a decade. “The Sun” marries the indie-folk vibe of Joseph’s self-produced debut album, “Native Dreamer Kin,” and the full-band, pop sound of two subsequent LPs released under ATO Records.
It’s also their first album since the pandemic, following “Good Luck, Kid” from 2019.
“We’re really a working band,” said Natalie.
Joseph writes harmonies based largely on intuition, tweaking who sings what from time to time to suit Allison's rich, woody tone, for example, or Meegan's airier, brassy one. They put time and thought into where they stand on stage, intentionally moving Natalie from the middle to her current spot on an end. The change was strategic not just as a band, but as family.
"People would only talk to [Natalie] and no one would really talk to Alli and I," said Meegan, who now typically stands in the middle. "It totally changed the dynamic of how people approached us."
Their current sound was culled from the energy Joseph witnesses almost nightly through an exhausting tour schedule that has them on the road more than 200 days a year.
“A lot of what happened stylistically was in response to what it felt our audience was bringing to a live show,” Natalie said. “People are fun and rowdy and put their whole selves into the shows. We wanted to make recording that would allow us to expand the dynamic range.”
But “The Sun” also exudes maturity and confidence in its writing — perhaps a reflection on all three sisters having crossed into their 30s.
“For me, this was a period of really coming back to myself,” said Meegan, “having lost myself and gone through a lot of self-loathing.”
That theme manifests in various ways. Meegan explores finding herself after leaving a destructive relationship. Allison faces her anxiety and harmful self-talk head on. Natalie interrogates her views on God.
“It’s finding yourself in it all again,” Meegan said. Where “Good Luck, Kid” is right in the thick of their respective messes and the collective pressure of life in the music business, “The Sun” is what happens on the other side of that work.
“It felt like coming into our own,” Allison said. “We’re the decision makers here. If that means we scrap half of the album, that’s what that means. It was incredibly empowering.”
Joseph and opening act Sister play at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 23, at the Castle Theatre, 209 E. Washington St., Bloomington. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $30, available online and at the door.
