Natalie and Meegan Closner of JOSEPH stopped by The Current’s Morning Show to speak with host Jill Riley. During the interview, they discussed their transition to performing as a duo and their upcoming album, Closer to Happy, which is set to release on January 30, 2026.

Closer to Happy was recorded in Nashville with producer Luke Niccoli. It features the song "Bye and Bye," which started with a line Natalie typed into her phone in a bar bathroom in Portland.

Before the album arrives, JOSEPH will perform at The Current’s 21st Anniversary with Brigitte Calls Me Baby and Colin Bracewell at First Avenue in Minneapolis on Friday, Jan. 23, 2026.

This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

Jill Riley: You are listening to The Current. I have some special guests in the studio. I'm here with JOSEPH. Natalie and Meegan are here. Welcome back to The Current.

Natalie Closner: Thank you. Hi.

Jill Riley: It's nice to have you back. A couple summers ago, you recorded an in-studio performance and just a really great conversation with The Current host Mac Wilson. I was just recently watching it, and I needed it. You guys were talking about self-care, and it was so wonderful. And I just felt my shoulders drop. It was wonderful. So thank you for providing that inspiration. And the musical inspiration with the song "White Flag" that we just heard. That's been a favorite at The Current for so many years now. So it's so nice to have you back in the studio.

Natalie Closner: Gosh, we so appreciate all the support you guys have shown us over the years. I can't even explain how much it's meant. Twin Cities fans are the best in the world. Everybody is so present and brings their spirit to the show. And you feel it every time. And that is large in part, thanks to you guys that everybody knows about it. So we're grateful.

Jill Riley: It's nice to have a hub. We can all come together, celebrate the music. And then it's fun to watch that ecosystem happen, where it's like, "I heard the band. I'm gonna go see the show, buy the merch, all of it." So it's really nice to have you here. You're entering this new phase now as a duo, yeah, so I wonder if you could talk about that a little bit.

Meegan Closner: So my twin sister, both of our sister, her name is Allie. She left the band because she really had other things she wanted to do in her life. This is very all-encompassing. So Natalie and I had some very serious conversations. And just we were like, "Do you want to keep going? Do you want to do this?" And it was a resounding "yes" for both of us.

Natalie Closner: And we knew it would be different. I feel like a band is similar to any long-term commitment where you have to keep checking in to make sure it still feels right, it still feels good, especially as family. What's most important is being friends.

Jill Riley: Because that does add another level, doesn't it?

Natalie Closner: So I was really glad that Meeg still wanted to do this. It's been really fun.

Jill Riley: And so as you have been kind of adjusting and you're going forward as a duo. What are some of the ways in which you feel like you've entered into this new era of JOSEPH?

Natalie Closner: Well, this tour that we've been doing was one way we wanted to do it. "White Flag" came out in 2016, I believe. And the way that we got our start was no venue would book us. I would send this electronic press kit everywhere, and nobody would would book us for anything pretty.

Meegan Closner: Pre-"White Flag."

Jill Riley: Because you had a very DIY beginning.

Natalie Closner: So we ended up using this website that gave our record for free. The one that we made before I'm Alone, No You're Not. And then we would get their zip code. And then we literally emailed all of those emails and said, "Does anyone want to host a house show?" And this was in 2014 and that's how it began. That's how the groundswell happened of our band. Everything has changed so much. Starting a band, being a band, and getting your music out there between then and now. As we were releasing these new songs for our new album, with just the two of us, I was feeling how different it is to try and connect on the internet than in person. We're so lucky that we've gotten to play these incredible venues with hundreds of people, and that's so special. But I was craving a beginning similar to the first time, which is that very small, intimate, 30-to-100 people in a room hearing songs they've never heard before. So we've been doing a tour like that, where we partnered with small businesses who are hosting us in their brick-and-mortar space. And it's been like, just so good to be close and do something exactly DIY and pop-up, spontaneous feeling. So it's been really special.

Jill Riley: Yeah, you're listening to The Current with JOSEPH, Natalie and Meegan. We're very excited about a show that is coming up early in the new year at First Avenue, January 23. JOSEPH, you are going to be part of the lineup for The Current's Anniversary celebration.

Natalie Closner: We're deeply honored.

Jill Riley: Well, thank you for doing it. Speaking of those Twin Cities audiences, every year that we do this, it's gathering super music fans and like-minded folks together in a room. It's so nice to get together in a room and celebrate music. So I wonder, if you want to talk about this show coming up, you've been doing the partnering with the small businesses, but to be back out there on the stage at First Avenue.

Meegan Closner: That stage is so special to us. I remember the first time, what's the smaller room? We played 7th Street Entry. We were opening up for a band, and I remember that James Vincent McMorrow was playing First Ave. And I loved him at the time, and we he was sound checking, and we went in there, and we sat and just listened to his soundcheck, and I was like, "Oh my gosh, what? How do we play this room?" And I had that big moment of being like, "That seems so impossible."

Jill Riley: But it wasn't.

Meegan Closner: It wasn't. And I fell in love with the room at that point. And then it was, I don't know how many years later, we were playing it. So every time we come back, I have that feeling of like, "Wow, I can't believe we did it. That's so crazy."

Natalie Closner: And we just have so much reverence for all of the music that's happened in that space. And they have that motorcycle. 

Jill Riley: Prince's motorcycle in the back garage, yeah.

Natalie Closner: And actually, another special thing that happened there for us is it was the first show on our tour — that was the last tour that we did with our sister to send her off. And that was really sweet. All of the folks who came, some people surprised us and brought signs and gave them to the whole crowd.

Jill Riley: That is so sweet. Oh my gosh.

Natalie Closner: It's just such a special place.

Meegan Closner: We're really honored to be able to play it again.

Jill Riley: So part of the lineup for The Current anniversary celebration, January 23 at First Avenue, JOSEPH will be there, Natalie and Meegan on The Current. Hey, let's talk about new music before we let you go. So you've been releasing some songs. And when a band releases some singles or songs here and there, we sort of make the assumption that a new record is coming. You guys want to talk about it?

Meegan Closner: Yeah. It's announced, which is really fun. It's going to be called Closer to Happy, and it's releasing on January 30, 2026.

Jill Riley: OK, so shortly after your show at First Avenue. So where did you record the record?

Natalie Closner: It was really fun. The way that we like to write for our albums is we'll do these songwriting camps, where we get together with 10 different writers in a row, 10 different days in a row, and just see what comes up. And one of those writers was named Luke Niccoli. He produced the song as we were writing it. And we just loved all of the choices that he made, and loved him and had a really good connection. And so we were like, "Let's just make the whole album with him." He lives in Nashville.

Jill Riley: And so did you go to Nashville to make the record?

Meegan Closner: Yeah.

Jill Riley: What do you guys think of Nashville? I love it. I love the history. I love I feel like there's a spirit in the air there.

Meegan Closner: We love it. Probably 50% of our best friends live there. I almost moved there like couple years ago.

Jill Riley: The city has changed a lot. The growth — it's hard to even imagine what it used to be like there, as compared to now. Did you go to a particular studio? Where would you guys record?

Natalie Closner: It's at his studio, at Luke's home. He has a studio that he works out of, and it really felt very friendly and familial to be there together. And we really love his wife, Kelsey, as well, and she's actually on our A&R team at the record label that we're with right now, Nettwerk.

Jill Riley: I love that. The record is Closer to Happy, and it is coming January 30. Congratulations. And thank you so much for helping us celebrate the history and just another year of this station. And for your guys's support of public media and doing this at a time where we've got to band together and do this thing.

Natalie Closner: This is so, so meaningful, what you guys do, and it really helps us as a band.

Jill Riley: You are listening to The Current, Natalie and Meegan of JOSEPH. Over this last summer, we do something called the New Music Discovery Deep Dive on The Current Morning Show. One of our deep dive picks, I had to look back, because I'm like, "I know we played a new song from you guys," and it's a song called "Bye and Bye." I wonder if you could talk a little more specifically about that song.

Natalie Closner: Actually, the album title comes from one of the lines in that song, in the chorus. The song's called "Bye and Bye" because that's the name of a bar in Portland in which I started crying incredibly hard, in a way that I should not be in public. So I went to the bathroom. So much had happened. Allie had told us she was moving on to other things, and I'd been through a divorce. I was at the time 37 and kind of reckoning with this image of what I thought I would be and what I thought my life would be, and how differently it was turning out. I felt a lot of responsibility for that. And I was crying in the bathroom of this bar, I wrote in my Notes app, "Crying in the bathroom of the Bye and Bye / Saturday's mascara in my eye / it's Tuesday." The picture of like, where I was at. And then I was delighted. We worked on the song and came up with a song that's really ultimately about forgiving a past self for the choices that she made. And it's been really healing to get to sing that over and over. So yeah, it's called "Bye and Bye."

Jill Riley: Let's take a listen to it. You are listening to The Current. Natalie and Meegan. Thank you for stopping by. Thank you so much. "Bye and Bye." It's on The Current.

JOSEPH will perform at The Current’s 21st Anniversary with Brigitte Calls Me Baby and Colin Bracewell on Friday, Jan. 23, 2026. Details.

Credits:
Host - Jill Riley
Producers - Derrick Stevens, Nilufer Arsala
Digital Producer - Reed Fischer

External Link: JOSEPH - official site