Sudden Day: Songs from the Nauvoo Expositor is a 16-track song cycle drawn directly from the June 7, 1844 Nauvoo Expositor — the single-issue newspaper destroyed by Joseph Smith three days after it was printed. Every lyric traces to the primary source.

The Structure

Act I — The Awakening · The whistleblowers find their voice
Act II — The Women · The hidden victims speak
Act III — The Revelations · What was taught in secret
Act IV — The Power · The machinery of control
Act V — The Reckoning · The silencing that wasn’t

Browse all tracks → · Read the essays → · About the source document →

“The remedy can never be applied, unless the disease is known.” — Nauvoo Expositor, June 7, 1844

Sudden Day

On June 7, 1844, a group of insiders published a single issue of a newspaper. Three days later, it was destroyed by order of the man it exposed. Seventeen days after that, he was dead.

Sudden Day is a 16-track song cycle drawn directly from the Nauvoo Expositor. Every lyric traces to the primary source. Every act follows the whistleblowers, the women, the revelations, the machinery of power, and the reckoning that followed.

“The remedy can never be applied, unless the disease is known.” — Nauvoo Expositor, June 7, 1844

Track 01 — June 7, 1844

The press runs for the first and last time. Insiders break their silence. The truth will out.

Track 02 — Forbearance

They begged him to repent. He said he’d rather be damned. Now forbearance has ceased to be a virtue.

Track 03 — Seven Wives

“What a thing it is for a man to be accused of having seven wives, when I can only find one.” He stood at the pulpit and lied.

Track 04 — Ten Thousand Miles

She crossed the ocean to find God. She left everything behind. She didn’t know what waited.

Track 05 — Positively No Admittance

A room with a warning on the door. An oath sworn under penalty of death. “God has revealed that you are mine.”

Track 06 — The Tender Tree

Sent away until the talk died down. Robbed of what only death can restore. Dry sorrow drinks her blood.

Track 07 — Under Condemnation

The revelation said wives who refused would stand condemned before God. Obey or be damned. There was no escape.

Track 08 — The Revelation

Austin Cowles sat in the High Council when Hyrum read the revelation. Plural wives. Sealing against all sins. He could not teach such laws.

Track 09 — Many Gods

They taught there were innumerable gods above our God. That He could fall. That we could rise. They called it progression. The Expositor called it blasphemy.

Track 10 — The Great Throat

They preached sacrifice. They preached gathering. The wealth flowed in and was swallowed by one great throat, from whence there was no return.

The Structure#

The Structure