Search

    Select Website Language

    Guitarist / bandleader Jeff Parker shares the Happy Today album-length concert film. The film was captured by director Charlie Weinmann at the 2025 performance at Los Angeles’s Lodge Room that became Happy Todaythe acclaimed third album from Parker’s long-running ETA IVtetHappy Today was released on May 15 via International Anthem / Nonesuch.

    Listen to and purchase Happy Today here.

    Weinmann’s live film offers a rare opportunity to see Parker and the elusive ETA IVtet in action. Across the 44 minutes of Happy Today, the ETA IVtet – featuring drummer Jay Bellerose, bassist Anna Butterss, saxophonist Josh Johnson, and Parker – engage in their signature, minimalist, form-bending improvisational syntax, encircled by audience at Lodge Room as they perform in the round.

    Watch the concert film here.

    In a recent Pitchfork profile on Parker, Grayson Haver Currin wrote of Happy Today: “With the rhythmic elasticity of a beat tape and the tonal splendor of almost everything he has ever done, it is a 44-minute synthesis of Parker’s last six decades.”

    In August, Parker and the ETA IVtet will do a run of shows that includes a three-night stand at Lodge Room in Los Angeles, tickets and info below.

    The past two years have been productive and busy as ever for Parker, who has long been a prominent player within a wide-range of music communities, in jazz and beyond. In 2025, he released new music and toured with his long-standing experimental rock band Tortoise and brought the ETA IVtet in for an NPR Tiny Desk performance. Additionally, Parker and two other members of the IVet — Butterss and Johnson — are featured on Flea’s solo debut album, which was released March 27 on Nonesuch Records. The album, Honora, also was produced by Johnson.

    Happy Today is ETA IVtet’s first recording made outside of the now-shuttered, widely-beloved Los Angeles micro-club ETA. Part laboratory, part low-stakes proving ground, ETA was where the band’s  collective sound coalesced over the course of a storied seven-year Monday night residency that yielded two critically-acclaimed records — 2022’s Mondays at The Enfield Tennis Academy and 2024’s The Way Out of Easy.

    Recorded and mixed in situ at Lodge Room by engineer Bryce Gonzales with a custom-made analog mixer and Nagra stereo tape recorder, Happy Today captures a bright moment during dark times. As Parker shares: “2025 was a very difficult year for me and my family. Dealing with being displaced from the Eaton fires for eight months, and the kind of toll that instability took on my family’s mental health and general outlook, coupled with Donald Trump being back in office and basically making life miserable for everyone… There was a lot of sadness and despair. But feeling the sense of community that we created with our concert, and later hearing the recording, seeing the beautiful footage that had been shot and the photographs of such joy to be back in that space and to be making music again: It was a very happy moment. So I called the record Happy Today. It’s meant to be a statement of joy.”

    With Happy Today, that sound—honed in such an intimate setting—is scaled up for a much larger audience and space at Lodge Room. But the essential formula remains the same, and has the same hypnotic, deeply-tuned listening effect. The almost alchemical musical communication creates a feeling of connection not only between the band members but also between the band and their audience—an ongoing trust exercise that invites listeners to become part of the exchange, and experience the joy of deep listening.

    TRACKLIST
    1. Like Swimwear
    2. Happy Today

    CREDITS & ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
    This music was recorded at Lodge Room, Highland Park, Los Angeles, California on August 20, 2025.

    Live recording by Bryce Gonzales.
    Mastered by Dave Cooley at Elysian Masters.

    Album layout and design by Aaron Lowell Denton.
    Photos taken from the series Thirdness by David Haskell.

    Jay Bellerose – drums and percussion
    Anna Butterss – acoustic bass
    Josh Johnson – alto saxophone with electronics
    Jeff Parker – electric guitar with electronics

    Thanks to Bryce and Highland Dynamics, Scottie, David, Dave, Hippo, Jocelyn and Ashley at IARC, David Bither and staff at Nonesuch Records, Chris, Tina and Ryan at Big Fish, David Haskell, and the wondrous audience and staff at Lodge Room.

    F@#K ICE. Power To The People.

    LIVE DATES

    The post Jeff Parker releases album-length concert film of ‘Happy Today’ appeared first on The Hype Magazine.

    Previous Article
    Fatt Smaxk Taps Playboi Carti for Explosive New Version of “Smaxk or Die” Accompanied by Atlanta-Shot Visuals
    Next Article
    alt-J’s Joe Newman aka JJerome87 Releases New Track “Mr Alligator.” Debut Album The Canyon Out June 26

    Related Blogs Updates:

    Are you sure? You want to delete this comment..! Remove Cancel

    Comments (0)

      Leave a comment