JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Black History Month and pays tribute to Billie Holiday.
Category: singer/songwriters
Throwback: Happy 71st Birthday, Howard Jones!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Howard Jones’ 70th birthday.
New Video: Bella Litsa Shares Cinematic “Tied Together By a Silver Thread”
Isabella Komodromos is a classically trained pianist, who as a child split her time between Massachusetts and her father’s native Cyprus. Komodromos started piano lessons when she was six and quickly found herself gravitating towards minor keys and rewriting the lyrics in songbooks to be more macabre.
By the time she turned 13, she started vocal training, eventually attending Berklee College of Music, where she majored in songwriting and film scoring. Komodromos relocated to New York in 2020. Inspired by the city’s abrasiveness, she plunged into a musical and personal intensity to find her voice. The result is her solo art pop project Bella Litsa.
The bulk of her recently released full-length, studio album Drasticism was written between December of 2022 and February 2024 with much of her songwriting process occurring during periods of frenzied inspiration. “The choices I was making weren’t always good choices. I just was searching out all this extremity, like extreme love and extreme loss and to feel this crazy spectrum of things,” the Bella Litsa creative mastermind says. “The album is mostly asking: Why would I do that? But how could I not do that?”
Komodromos writes to cull her intense emotions and this personal excavation is part of her larger pursuit of the beautiful and divine. She cites her interests in astrophysics, synchronicities, Jungian psychoanalysis, the Book of Job, the Greek Orthodox church she attends, Andrei Tarkovsky and film scores for inspiration. Her work is rooted in a deeply-held belief that everything is beautiful and because every beautiful thing will end, everything is inherently sad. And in turn, songwriting is a relief, a way to preserve beauty. Similar to the drastic way she lives, she gravitates towards the extreme when it comes to her writing.
Bella Litsa writes to cull her intense emotions, and this personal excavation is part of her larger pursuit of the beautiful and divine. She taps her interest in astrophysics, synchronicities, Jungian psychoanalysis, the Book of Job, the Greek Orthodox church she attends, Andrei Tarkovsky, and film scores for inspiration. Because for Bella Litsa, everything is beautiful, and because every beautiful thing will end, everything is sad. Songwriting is a relief, a way to preserve beauty. And similar to her drastic way of living, she gravitates towards the extremes in her writing practice.
One spring day back in 2023, Komodromos came home in a strange, emotional state. She dat down at her desk, and eight hours later, she created the demo for “My Blue Eyes.” The next day she tried it again. After 12 hours, she had written “Tied Together by a Silver Thread,: a tragic epic inspired by the movements of classical music with three distinct sections. “It was probably the most inspired I was ever in my life,” she says. “I listen to it now and it just feels like my heart’s about to explode.”
That all-consuming feeling is what it feels like for the rising artist to dig deep into the core of her humanity. “I tell my psychoanalyst when we talk about songwriting: It’s like there’s a rope and I’m pulling on this rope, and the more I pull, the more the song is coming to me. But the song already existed. I’m slowly uncovering what was always there.”
For Komodromos, her propensity towards the extremes is ultimately about a desire to connect, not only with herself but with others. “I get to say all these things that I keep in and then all of a sudden people are listening to you, and they’re witnessing the breaking down,” she says. “I feel like I get so tortured, especially singing live. I think being witnessed is the most powerful feeling you can have.”
Her work is intimate and emotionally potent material that echo with a dreamlike intensity. Her sound sees her blending vintage romance with experimental textures, a sort of haunted Americana-meeting-minimalist futurism, has helped her draw comparisons to Lana Del Rey, Fiona Apple and Weyes Blood — while being a vessel for connection and cantharis. “Bella Litsa is my sadness personified. It feels like the closest I can get to my shadow, consciously,” Komodromos says.
Drasticism includes the previously released, “Angelica,” “Passion Plug,” “Never Ending Movie,” the Tori Amos and Lonny-like “1117” and the album’s latest “Tied Together By a Silver Thread.” Continuing a run of dramatic, remarkably cinematic yet deeply intimate material, “Tied Together By a Silver Thread” is a hauntingly gorgeous, lushly arranged song that features a mesh of elements of old-school balladry, rock, film scores and classical music. The rising artist’s equally gorgeous and expressive vocal dances and floats over the song’s arrangement. And much like its predecessor, the song evokes a sense of almost unreconcilable inner conflict.
Directed by Dylan Gee whose work has been featured in The New York Times, The FADER, Stereogum, NYLON and more, was shot entirely on form and thermal camera in Southern California’s Frazier Park. Fittingly, the cinematic visual evokes the swooning heart at the core of the song.
The rising artist will be playing a record release show at Night Club 101 on February 27.
Throwback: Happy Black History Month: Whitney Houston
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Black History Month and honors Whitney Houston.
Throwback: R.I.P. Willie Colón
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates the life and music of Willie Colón.
New Audio: Pom Femme Shares Breezy and Effortlessly Cool “Sunny SIde Up”
Swedish duo Pom Femme is a collaborative project featuring two highly accomplished musicians and producers:
- As a producer, Michelle Amkoff has worked with a lengthy list of Swedish artists. She also spent several years as a studio engineer for producer Patrik Berger.
- Phillipa Magnusson is a singer/songwriter and creative mastermind behind the solo recording project Bluephox.
The origins of the duo’s newest project can be traced to their meeting through Magnusson’s work with Bluephox. This quickly developed into Pom Femme, which is rooted in their commonly shared musical influences and interests.
According to the duo, as being a bit of “vintage pop with a French touch.” They add, “It was as if together, we wanted to make music Levi’s 501s — the core that has held genres together for decades and can be styled with everything.”
The Swedish duo released their debut EP Telenovela last year. Building upon growing momentum surrounding the pair, the follow up to their debut EP “Sunny Side Up” is a self assured and breezy tune that seemingly draws from yé-yé, 60s British Invasion rock and late 1960s psychedelia while showcasing some remarkably effortless and catchy hooks. The result is a song that’s insouciantly decadent and timelessly cool.
The duo explain that the song is about choosing simplicity over complication, something they can believe can be extremely difficult in the never-ending stream of choices we’re presented with every day. “Would you like milk, A2 milk, hemp milk or half-and-half in your coffee,” the duo say. “A short-haired economist or a long-haired culture worker in the dating app? ‘Sunny Side Up’ is a tribute to the opposite: can’t we just have a bit of fun without unnecessary hassle and live life in its simplest, most banal form?”
The duo’s full-length debut is slated for a September 2026 release.
New Audio: Tiwayo Shares a Soulful and Contented Sigh of Appreciation
Tiwayo is a Paris-born singer/songwriter, who released two critically applauded albums, 2019’s The Gypsy Soul of Tiwayo and 2023’s Desert Dream, which he supported with opening slots for Curtis Harding, Cody ChesnuTT and Marcus Miller among others. Adding to a growing international profile, the Parisian-born artist was celebrated by the likes of Norah Jones, Tony Visconti and Don Was.
As the story goes, Tiwayo, who has been nicknamed “The Young Old” for his timeless vocal, had nearly vanished before the scene when he crossed paths with Grammy Award-winning producer, songwriter and Black Pumas founder Adrian Quesada at Les Eurorockéennes Festival. Quesada heard Tiwayo’s demos and knew he must work with the acclaimed French artist.
Tiwayo’s third album, the Adrian Quesada-produced Outsider, which is slated for an April 10, 2026 release through Record Kicks Records was recorded at Quesada’s Austin-based Electric Deluxe Recorders.
Throughout his career, Tiwayo has refused to play by the genre’s rules. In fact, he stands uniquely apart as a Frenchman in Texas, as a soul singer with a bluesman heart, and a traveler, who is constantly an outsider. And while embracing being an outsider, he eschews the polish and shine of the contemporary soul revival scene for a raw, unvarnished take on the sound that to hm carries the deepest power.
Sonically, Outsider is a genre-bending take on soul that features contributions from Quesada’s Black Pumas bandmates, as well as guest spots from Eric Clapton‘s Doyle Bramhall II and JOVM mainstay Kendra Morris.
Outsider will include the previously released “I’ve Got To Travel Alone,” and “Up For Soul,” which received airplay from KCRW, KEXP, BBC Radio 2, BBC Radio 6, Jazz FM, Radio Eins, Jazz Radio, RAI Radio 1 and others, as well as its third and latest single, “Sunshine Lady.”
Arguably one of the brighter, more buoyant tracks of the album to date, “Sunshine Lady” is a crafted bit of Memphis and Muscle Shoals-inspired soul featuring Jay Mumford (drums) and Terin Moswen Ector (bass) that showcases the French artist’s catchy hooks, a soulful groove and Quesada’s unerring knack for gritty and timeless sounding production with earnest, lived-in lyrics and an effortlessly soulful delivery. At its core “Sunshine Lady” is a contented sigh and an expression of gratefulness for having a romantic partner, who completely and patiently understands you and what makes you tick. This is anchored by the understanding that finding that sort of partner can seem both extraordinarily lucky and rare, which fittingly adds to overall sense of thankfulness within the song.
“Sunshine Lady” was sparked by a comment from a close friendly, who told the French-born artist, “You always write sad songs, why don’t you write something happy to change a little?” Taking that suggestion to heart, Tiwayo wrote the song as a tribute to his partner, a constant source of patience and comfort during intense periods of home studio work.
Throwback: Happy Black History Month!/Happy 93rd Birthday, Nina Simone!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates the 93rd anniversary of the birth of Nina Simone — and Black History Month.
Throwback: Happy 66th Birthday, Steve Wynn!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Steve Wynn’s 66th birthday.
Throwback: Happy 59th Birthday, Kurt Cobain!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates the 59th anniversary of the birth of Kurt Cobain.
New Video: JOVM Mainstay Genesis Owusu Shares Breakneck “STAMPEDE”
Last year, the acclaimed multi-ARIA Award-winning Ghanian-born Canberra-based JOVM mainstay Genesis Owusu released two singles “PIRATE RADIO,” and “DEATH CULT ZOMBIE,” the first bit of new material since the release of 2023’s acclaimed STRUGGLER.
The JOVM mainstay’s first single of 2026, “STAMPEDE” is anchored around the acclaimed Ghanian-Australian artist’s punchy punk rock-meets-hip-hop delivery and a breakneck production featuring menacing, reverb-drenched synth subs, skittering and relentless military-like motorik pulse. The song conveys the desperate urgency of our moment while being a rallying cry to prioritize community and unity as a way out of our techno-feudalist/Christo-fascist hellscape.
“Left side to the right side, front side to the back,” he says in his latest offering, “we’re all in this together. And there’s a real problem. There are people who have expansive amounts of money, who are intentionally acting to separate us so they can keep getting richer at the expense of general human wellbeing. We’re all under that same thumb and we need to realise that.”
Continuing an ongoing collaboration with Isaac Brown, the accompanying video for “STAMPEDE” was filmed in the streets and surroundings of Accra and turns Owusu’s worlds to life: an army of rebels mobilize on motorcycles and horseback around him.
“This whole project is about humanity and community, not just in Australia where I live, but globally. It felt nourishing to go back to my home country (Ghana) for the first time in 11 years and showcase a bit of the culture there; the youth and the deep subcultures, far beyond the perceptions a lot of people may have of Africa,” says Owusu.
Throwback: Happy Black History Month!/Happy 86th Birthday, Smokey Robinson!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Smokey Robinson’s 86th birthday.
Throwback: Happy Black History Month!/Happy 63rd Birthday, Seal!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Seal’s 63rd birthday.
New Video: Thundercat Shares Posthumously Released Breezy Collab with Mac Miller “She Knows Too Much”
Acclaimed JOVM mainstay Thundercat will be releasing his fifth studio album — and first album in over six years — Distracted through Brainfeeder on April 3, 2026. Distracted was created in close collaboration with super producer Greg Kurstin with additional production from Flying Lotus, Kenny Beats and The Lemon Twigs. The new album also features contributions from an all-star cast that includes A$AP Rocky, WILLOW, Tame Impala, Channel Tres, Lil Yachty and a previously unreleased collaboration with Mac Miller.
Thematically, the album vividly captures the uneasy tension between overstimulation and introspection. Thundercat is deeply skeptical of technological “progress,” especially the way it has narrowed our collective imagination instead of expanding it. He jokes about Star Trek and childhood dreams of space travel, then pivots to the horrible anticlimax of reality: drones without lasers, phones that only feature upgraded cameras, innovation reduced to spying and access. The disappointment isn’t about just gadgets; it’s about a vision of the world we were promised versus what we got right now. Sure, some forms of deep space travel may be difficult, if not impossible, but we don’t have flying cars or smart-alecky robots. We barely have high-speed trains or anything else.
While the drawbacks of constant distraction are evident in today’s attention deficit economy, a true idiosyncratic like Thundercat can identity the ways in which it used to one’s advantage. You can’t spell “daydreams,” without dreams. “Sometimes you need to be distracted to focus in a different way,” Thundercat says. What the JOVM mainstay wants listeners to take from the album is remarkably, disarmingly simple: “Just enjoy it and have fun and just know that the struggle is real and changes shape, but just to keep pushing forward.”
Rather than instant and constant commentary, the JOVM mainstay offers something quieter, more radical, and maybe something more empathetic: The permission to be confused, tired and distracted — and yet still make something beautiful and necessary out of the noise.
Distracted will include the previously released “I Did This To Myself,” feat. Lil Yachty and the album’s latest single “She Knows Too Much,” feat. Mac Miller. Although posthumously released, “She Knows Too Much” captures the two long-time friends and frequent collaborators easy-going, carefree chemistry within their most natural element: Miller spits bars about desperately trying to win over someone, who he knows is out of his league and may be only into him for his fame and money, over a strutting neo-soul arrangement bolstered by Thundercat’s muscular “Superstition“-like bass line and his ethereal falsetto.
While working on Distracted, Thundercat felt it could be a great fit for the album and received permission from the Mac Miller Estate to complete work on the song, which he did with producer Greg Kurstin, adding final touches to the production so fans may now hear the ultimate vision of it. “I’m grateful to have spent my time on this planet with Mac,” Thundercat shares. “What an artist, what a spirit, what a joy to have experienced.”
Directed by Léa Esmaili, the accompanying video employs both claymation and traditional animation to convey the playfulness and the deep bond of their friendship, followed by the reality of loss.
“First of all, making this music video is a huge honor, as I grew up with these two artists and have admired their universe since I was a teenager,” Esmaili says. “I wanted to create, within a single video, a fun animated moment by mixing styles either it’s 2D animation or 3D. Beyond that, I wanted to build a burlesque narrative around two friends who spend a completely crazy day together, tied to their friendship and to anime of this kind.”