Jeiris Cook Pleads To ‘Unbreak My Heart’
Jeiris Cook by Katharine Boyle
Jeiris Cook used to sell mattresses. He used to manage a warehouse. He raised his three boys with his wife Jennifer. But in 2016, at the age of 37, in his Jefferson hometown in Morris County, he first taught himself how to play the guitar and started writing songs. Five years later, in 2021, his “Date Night” signaled his arrival. He was “Drunk” (listen below) in 2022, and he hooked up with Vern Miller of popular ‘60s Boston band The Remains in an EP called The Vern Miller/Jeiris Cook Project. His Patchwork full-length debut came out in 2023.
Next month, his “Unbreak My Heart” will be released and it reveals a fully-formed artist comfortable with his talent, and direct in his soulfulness. Like Bill Withers before him, his artistry knows no genre boundaries. His voice is smooth yet tinged with a gritty roughness that houses his years in preparation for such a moment. His compositional prowess, combined with his funky flair on guitar, and unmitigated positive vibes, makes Cook a cat to catch. As he wrote in his “Work” song, “let’s just throw out the clocks and find a place to sit, and throw those deadlines to the wind.”