2022 marks the 30th anniversary of Jackyl’s self-titled debut album, which spawned five hit singles: “I Stand Alone”, “The Lumberjack”, “Down On Me”, “Dirty Little Mind”, and “When Will It Rain”. To celebrate this momentous occasion, the band has planned something truly special. Speaking exclusively to BraveWords scribe Aaron Small, Jackyl frontman Jesse James Dupree opens up about an incredible contest.

“I wanted to share with you that we’re giving away… it just so happens that the night we play in Sturgis for our annual show at the Full Throttle Saloon, this year – August 11th – happens to be 30 years to the day that our first album dropped. We didn’t plan that. We play on the Thursday night of the Rally every single year, and it just so happened that it actually fell right on August 11th this year. We were like, holy sh*t! Not only are we playing, and celebrating the 30th, we’re giving somebody a chance to win a trip. We’ll give them a camper. They get to stay at the Full Throttle Saloon. I’ll put some Jesse James Bourbon in there. We’ll give them some travel money to get there, and of course VIPs for the show. They can win the trip by going to Jackyl.com and becoming a member of The Chainsaw Mafia. Or you can download The Chainsaw Mafia App.”

“The cool thing about that app is when you come to a Jackyl show, you can check in on that location and earn points. You can take surveys and earn points. We’ll give you keywords periodically, and those keywords you put in, you hit the little trophy that’s on the app, and you get points that way. You can also rate the songs that are playing on Jackyl radio, and as you rate the songs, you get points. And you can cash those points in, in the prize pool, for additional chances to win the trip. There’s an autographed guitar up there, a chainsaw, all kinds of cool stuff that we put up on that prize pool. Get your points and you can try to win whatever you want to try to win. There’s also exclusive merchandise inside The Chainsaw Mafia. That trip to Sturgis is going to be a cool one!”

The 30th anniversary festivities don’t end there as a new Best-Of will be released this summer. “The album is dropping on August 11th. It’s called Jackyl 30 – Coming In Hot, and it’s got three brand new tracks on it,” reveals Jesse. “It’s got some songs off of Relentless, When Moonshine And Dynamite Collide, and Best In Show; it’s kind of a greatest hits. On the 25th anniversary, we leaned heavy on the first couple of albums, but we’ve got some cool stuff coming, and we’re going to put this out. We’re just now getting behind ‘Get All Up In It’, and the streaming numbers are really strong. We’re keeping our fingers crossed everybody will keep connecting with it. Wait ‘til you hear the next single; it’s a damn straight-up rocker. We’ll be ready to kick that one out too. Each of the three new songs draw on our influences. In fact, the next single’s a whole other space. I almost wanted to call the damn thing ‘Influences’, cause it’s got so much.”

Jesse peels back the layers of the aforementioned new single and video, “Get All Up In It (Another Round Of Mother Funker)”. “You know what? It’s fun! And in the truest sense, it’s just a song that, for me, pulls on all of my influences. There’s elements of so much that I grew up loving, especially that ‘70s groove stuff and the soul singers – ‘I’m gonna tell your Momma on you’. All that kind of stuff. It’s still Jackyl. It’s got that edge, and the sexual overtones, all that stuff – but in such a retro, fun way. That’s what we enjoyed about it, and we hope that people who are listening to it enjoy it. I mean, there’s always going to be naysayers, what can you do about that?”

“At 30 years of our career, if you can’t laugh at your own expense, and really be honest about what drives you and what you love… if people don’t get that… I generally find that the people that don’t understand what it’s about just to celebrate the fundamentals of rock ‘n roll – when Elvis Presley was gyrating his hip, or The Beatles were singing ‘Love Me Do’ and shaking their mop tops – nobody was thinking that music needed to cure cancer. It wasn’t about that. Music was just stimulating your glands – that’s the basis of what rock ‘n roll’s supposed to be about. A release to get away from busting your ass. These people that are obsessed with hearing some cookie-cutter, cookie monster sings stuff… it’s great. I like some of that stuff too, but God damn, every now and then can you just lighten up and have some fun? Does everything have to be like the apocalypse? Again, we’re just celebrating those fundamentals and loving what we’re doing.”

“We had just as much fun making the video as we did recording the song. When we did the video, we’d been on the road for a couple of weeks or so. We left out of Fort Myers after a great show down there. We woke up at the Sound Stage in Atlanta, got off the bus, went to work, and ended up with that video. It’s definitely not just same as it ever was. Everybody can see that we pulled off some cool influences, but it’s still Jackyl. I don’t think anybody can say we’re trying to be something we’re not. But again, right alongside that, we’re just showing our colors, and I’m proud of it. It’s a good summer song!”

For a guy who’s typically jeans and a t-shirt, Jesse undergoes a lot of costume changes in the hilarious video for “Get All Up In It”. “It’s funny, the guys were in the studio, and I said, ‘I want it to have a street corner vibe. Just like there’s some guys hanging on the street corner, back in the ‘70s, talking sh*t – an old BS session. So, we got out around the microphones, and the engineer, Jeff Tomei, pressed record and we were in the groove. We were all standing not facing each other. We had a microphone in the room, but we were all facing in different directions, and we all just started saying random stuff – ‘Girl, you’re going to make me lose my mind.’ That was one of about ten takes that we did with various different things. One of them I listened back to and Roman (Glick, bassist) goes, ‘Is that his real teeth?’ We laughed! Then, when we got shooting the video, we just acted out what we had said randomly. None of it was planned, just like guys standing on a street corner. What we ended up with on the record, is what we built around for the video. I’ll leave it to U2 and Springsteen to cure cancer with their songs. We’re just a damn rock band, and we’re having fun! We’re very honest about it and we just want people to enjoy themselves and get a little groove going.”

Speaking of influences, the one that comes through visually the most in the video for “Get All Up In It” is Queen. Specifically, the section where the four faces of Jackyl are set up the same way as the four faces of Queen were in the video for “Bohemian Rhapsody”. “We were just thinking about – cause it’s such a strong anthem. There’s so many vocals that are layered on ‘Another Round Of Mother Funker’. We multi-tracked that so many times, and we’re thinking, how do we visually make that big with just the four of us? We were thinking about ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ where you hear all those voices and everything that Queen did. We thought, let’s just recreate it. It’s so belligerent, but at the same time it’s respectful and paying homage to those great guys. I thought it was funny. Again, if you can’t associate rock and smiling and laughing, and having a good time. If you can’t do those things when you’re talking about rock, then you’ve got to really re-evaluate stuff. It’s totally within everybody’s rights to decide whether they like this song or not. But, regardless of whether you like this song or not, if you can’t at least not take yourself so serious to the extent where you generally find that people that don’t realize what the fundamentals of rock ‘n roll were built on, those are generally the same people that have a hard time admitting that they masturbate.”

Furthermore, the inclusion of the vintage black and white cartoon clips in the video for “Get All Up In It” add another light-hearted element, separating it from simply being footage of the band performing the song. “Yeah. The Sound Stage we were at, they asked us, ‘Do you want to use the white room, the black room? Do you want to use the green screen, the LED wall?’ And we said, yeah. All of the above. Why just pick one? I don’t know what tomorrow holds as far as the flavor of the day, but I can’t stress it enough, we’re still here celebrating those fundamentals of rock ‘n roll, and enjoying every damn minute of it.” 

Catch Jackyl live at the following shows:

June
16 - Big Night Live - Boston, Massachusetts
17 - Granite State Music Hall - Laconia, New Hampshire
21 - Toad's Place - New Haven, Connecticut
22 - Morgan Hill Event Center - Hermon, Maine
23 - The Chance Theater - Poughkeepsie, New York
24 - Club XL Live - Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
25 - Penn's Peak - Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania

July
1 - JD Legends - Franklin, Ohio
2 - Susquehanna Valley Big Twins Motorcycle Club - Lockhaven, Pennsylvania
3 - The Barrel House - Maysville, Kentucky
24 - Cumming Music Festival - Cumming, Georgia
30 - Sugar Creek Casino - Hinton, Oklahoma

August
11 - Full Throttle Saloon - Vale, South Dakota
27 - The Shed Smokehouse & Juke Joint - Maryville, Tennessee

September
8 - The Alliance - Sioux Falls, South Dakota
9 - RockTember Music Festival - Hinckley, Minnesota
10 - Beaver Bottoms Saloon - Fountain, Minnesota
15 - OC Bikefest - Ocean City, Maryland
17 - Bonnie & Clyde's Gangster Park - Harshaw, Wisconsin
24 - WIIL Rock Fest - Grayslake, Illinois