Jeffrey Lewis & The Voltage

Jeffrey Lewis never meant to be some professional songwriter. Raised in New York’s Lower East Side, Lewis was an aspiring comic book artist, studying the craft in school and even turning The Watchmen into his senior thesis. But in the same way that making comix, as Lewis dubs them, is about building a world, Lewis began doing much the same with the songs he was bringing to weekly open-mics—real-life observations of his experiences and opinions about them, rendered with a wry wit and emotional sincerity and (inspired by Daniel Johnston) delivered with an unfussy, straight-to-tape directness. Those songs and sounds became foundational to the anti-folk movement, with the rise of old friends the Moldy Peaches and even the Mountain Goats slowly pushing Lewis to wider attention and a Rough Trade deal a quarter-century ago. He is, in fact, a consummate songwriter, his personal tales achieving a kind of universal resonance through their candor.

Lewis opened his extraordinary 2025 album, The Even More Freewheelin’ Jeffrey Lewis, with “Do What Comes Natural,” a playful but unflinching excoriation of the title’s pedestrian advice. If he did what was natural, Lewis argued in a perfect encapsulation of modern malaise, he’d never work, get out of bed, or be nice. But in forcing himself to follow his natural proclivities and create mirrors that he holds up to the world that surrounds him, he’s built an extraordinary trove of songs and comix, all framed with revelations about what it means to exist and endure, to laugh and cry. “The only rule in my life is ‘Just do everything, all the time, endlessly,’” he once said, “because otherwise, how do I know if I’m not doing enough?” Lewis is one of his generation’s most incisive songwriters, capable of cutting to the quick with a single quip.