JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Bad Religion co-founder and guitarist, and Epitaph Records founder Brett Gurewitz’s 64th birthday.
Category: Video
New Video: London’s The Howlers Share Swaggering, Arena Rock Friendly “Viper”
2024 was a breakthrough year for London-based rock outfit The Howlers. Their self-funded, self-released full-length debut, What You’ve Got To Lose To Win It All received widespread acclaim across Europe. The album exploded into the UK Independent Breakers Charts Top 10 while landing on several other independent, vinyl and physical sales charts. And adding to a growing profile, What You’ve Got To Lose To Win It All received airplay from BBC Radio 1, BBC 6 Music, Radio X and Absolute Radio as well as editorial playlisting internationally across Apple Music and Spotify.
The momentum and buzz surrounding the band translated to the stage. A sold-out 18-date UK headlining tour saw the band quickly establishing themselves as one of the country’s newest, most exciting live acts. This was followed by a European Union tour that featured sold-out shows across eight countries, while they road-tested material that would ultimately shape what came next.
As the year came to a close, the band went through a massive lineup shakeup, which led to the band continuing as a duo featuring Adam Young (vocals, guitar) and Toby Richards (drums). The lineup change was a shift that redefined the band’s sound and creative direction, while bringing a renewed sense of focus and identity.
Last year, as a duo, the London-based outfit released two singles “Night Crawling” and “You Can Be So Cruel” before signing with FLG, who will release their highly-anticipated sophomore album, Heavy. Written and produced alongside longtime collaborator, Black Honey‘s Chris Ostler, The Howlers’ sophomore album sees the band deliberately eschewing traditional studio methods. The album was written and recorded remotely — with demos, ideas and reworked arrangements sent back and forth across digital platforms — stripping everything back while pushing each song to its strongest form. Only in the album’s final stages did the duo enter rehearsal spaces to capture live drums, grounding the material’s experimental edges with raw, physical energy,
“This album is those late night experiences, the after dark conversations, late night phone calls, the seductive nature of impulsiveness that seems so alluring and losing yourself in the addictive nature of recklessness — but it’s also the mirror in the morning, the wake up call, and the harsh reality of knowing those feelings won’t always last,” The Howlers’ Adam Young says. “It’s the moment you find yourself again.”
Heavy‘s latest single “Viper” is a swaggering, arena rock friendly ripper, featuring a pulsing and slithering riff and driving rhythms paired with songwriting anchored in inputs, tension, unease, desire and consequence. The song’s narrator talks about being drawn to something or someone, knowing it’s bad for you — and doing it anyway.
“Viper speaks to an experience of being totally drawn towards someone even though you can see the red flags — the desire for all of us to willingly make bad decisions for the thrill of what comes next, regardless of consequences.” says Young “You’re lost in the moment together. But no matter how much you kid yourself into believing the Bonnie & Clyde fantasy, they will always cause you pain in the end.”
The accompanying video features some sleek, stylishly shot footage of the band performing the song in the studio — as though they were in an arena.
Throwback: Happy 85th Birthday, Eric Burdon!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Eric Burdon’s 85th birthday.
Throwback: Happy 61st Birthday, Greg Dulli!
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Throwback: Happy 74th Birthday, Sly Dunbar!
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Throwback: Happy 66th Birthday, Bono!
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Throwback: Happy 64th Birthday, Dave Gahan!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Depeche Mode frontman Dave Gahan’s 64th birthday.
New Video: Italy’s Way To Blue Shares Broodingly Cinematic “For All The Times”
Vincenzo Del Corno is a Pavia, Italy-born singer/songwriter, musician and producer, who developed a passion for music and film at a young age. As a teenager, he began playing drums, later learning bass and guitar, His passion for film, led to him writing for various film magazines, and by 2004 he became editor of the quarterly publication Buioinsala. Back in 2011, he published Suspira, a monograph on Dario Argento’s 1977 film Suspira.
Between 2020 and 2021, Del Corno co-wrote “Lonely,” “Bones” and “Lullaby” for Italian singer Camilla Wells, all of which received positive responses both in their native Italy and elsewhere. Back in 2024, he founded Way To Blue, a tribute to the music and production of 80s post-punk and New Wave, informed by his love of 80s memorabilia, vinyl and VHS.
Del Corno’s first two singles 2024’s Marco Barusso-produced “Love Again” and “Life Is a Big Joke” were release to positive response, as well as airplay on local and national radio. Building upon a growing profile in Italy, Del Corno released “Voices of Darkness” earlier this year, which was quickly followed by his latest single the Marco Barusso-produced “For All The Times” is a broodingly cinematic bit of synth-driven post punk that channels Depeche Mode — but with a sleek, modern feel.
The accompanying video for “For All The Time” is a shot in a cinematic black and white and evokes the brooding Romanticism and yearning at the core of the song.
Lyric Video: Shye Shares Brooding and Ethereal “I Always Knew”
Rising Singapore-based dream pop artist Shye is a self-taught singer/songwriter, musician, producer and engineer, whose music career began as DIY bedroom project that exploded into the international scene when she won the 2018 Vans Musicians Wanted competition when she was just 16. Since then, the Singaporean artist has released a handful of genre-defying singles while amassing a batch of awards and titles, including NME‘s Best New Act from Asia, Asia’s Forbes 30 Under 30 and sharing stages with acts like The Jesus and Mary Chain, Wisp, Clairo and Men I Trust.
Her sophomore album The Doves Came Home officially dropped today. The album features a collection of hazy, introspective songs that seamlessly transition from ethereal vocals and shimmering guitars to heavy walls of sound that draws from 90s dream pop and shoegaze. The result is material that sounds simultaneously expansive and deeply personal while exploring the push and pull between softness and tension.
The album includes the previously released “Smoke,” “Someone, Always“ and the album’s latest single “I Always Knew.” Much like its immediate predecessors, “I Always Knew,” features the rising Singaporean artist’s yearning vocal ethereally floating over a 90s inspired arrangement built around alternating shimmering, jangle pop and dream pop-like guitars for the song’s quieter verses and towering and swirling shoegazer textures for the song’s rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses. But underneath the song’s anthemic and stormy exterior is a tale of a meet cute that quietly cracks apart in the sort of betrayal and heartbreak that feels inevitable.
The lyric video follows a brooding and introspective Shye wandering the countryside and riding trains with her earbuds, singing the song’s lyrics — to presumably an unseen subject.
Throwback: Happy 75th Birthday, Philip Bailey!
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Throwback: Happy 75th Birthday, Chris Frantz!
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Throwback: Happy 73rd Birthday, Alex Van Halen!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Van Halen co-founder Alex Van Halen’s 73rd birthday.
New Video: SHUB Teams Up with Aysanabee and Drezus on Soulful and Introspective “Rise”
Dan “SHUB” General is a Mohawk producer and member of the Six Nations of the Grand River, the largest First Nation reserve in Canada. As a co-founder of the trailblazing and acclaimed, Juno Award-winning Indigenous electronic music outfit A Tribe Called Red, now known as The Hallucci Nation, General has been instrumental in the development of powwow-step, a blend of the ancient rhythms of powwow music with scratching, hip-hop, and modern, bass-heavy electronic music production.
In 2014, General left A Tribe Called Red and stepped out into the spotlight as a solo artist and producer. His debut, 2016’s six-song PowWowStep EP featured collaborations with the Northern Cree Singers, smoke dance singer Frazer Sundown and Blackfeet Nation-based drum group, Black Lodge Singers. PowWowStep won an Indigenous Music Award for Best Instrumental Album and the Canadian Organization of Campus Activities (COCA) named him DJ of the Year in 2017.
Since then, the Canadian producer and DJ has released two albums, 2020’s War Club and last year’s Heritage (Part One). Conceived as part of a two-part series, Heritage (Part One) saw General stepping beyond the DJ booth and boldly stepping forward as a composer, storyteller and artist dedicated to expanding the reach of Indigenous music on a global scale.
The second part of the series Heritage (Part Two) dropped last week, and across the series’ material, SHUB brings together Indigenous artists across generations, using collaboration as a way to explore identity, community and continuity within contemporary music. “Hearing these artists step onto these tracks and take them somewhere I never could have on my own… that was the most rewarding part of making this record,” General says.
The acclaimed Canadian producer and artist is helping to actively expand the space Indigenous artists occupy within modern music. Heritage (Part Two) completes that vision, bringing together voices across cultures and styles into a single body of work. “It’s about cultures coming together through my music. If you can forget about everything else for a moment, take it in, and just feel free — that’s the real beauty. This album is about movement aned growth,” SHUB explains. “It’s not trying to be one genre — it’s just where I’m at right now.”
Last month, I wrote about “I Know,” feat. Sebastian Gaskin. With the album’s release, last week General shared “Rise,” feat. Aysanabee & Drezus is a soulful, gospel-inspired tune that details hidden struggles with mental health with a deeply personal, lived-in specificity. But at its core, is an emphasis on turning to community and family in one’s most difficult moments, because as the saying goes “you’re not alone.”
“The song to me is community,” says Aysanabee. “Indigenous people rising together.” Drezus adds: “Success doesn’t mean anything if your spirit is still suffering… this one’s for the people fighting battles no one else can see.”
Continuing an ongoing collaboration with Matt Guarrasi, the accompanying video was shot in Toronto’s St. Stephen-in-the-Fields. The trio of artists are framed within a grand, scared space that deserves — and demands — solemn contemplation and reverence. These scenes are intercut with a hand reaching into light and archival footage of children in residential schools. The result is a video grounded in a shared history while honoring the enduring resilience of Indigenous communities. As a Black man, it’s deeply familiar on an almost atomic level.
New Video: RIP Magic Shares Woozily Claustrophobic “Screwdark”
Rising London-based quartet RIP Magic — Marco Pini, Felix Bayley-Higgins, Beth Boswell-Knight and Pedro Takahashi — recently signed to section1, the Los Angeles-based sister label to Partisan Records.
The British-based quartet’s signing to section1 is part of a breakout year that has seen early, word-of-mouth momentum turn into something much more tangible. Following last June’s self-released double single “Loot”/”Dox,” RIP Magic quickly built a reputation as one of the UK’s most compelling new live acts, balancing their own frequently sold-out headline shows with festival sets and opening spots for Tame Impala, Fcukers, Fakemink and others,
Late last year, the London-based outfit shared, the James Murphy-produced “5words,” which came out as they were opening for LCD Soundsystem. Building upon a growing national and international profile, RIP Magic’s latest single “Screwdark” is a dense, woozily claustrophobic tune that’s one-part brooding and eerie Portishead trip hop, one-part frenzied, Beck and Beastie Boys-like sample fest that’s both club and festival friendly and prefect for late-night headphone listening.
The new track comes as the rising act is opening for Tame Impala’s sold-out arena tour of Europe, and fittingly, the accompanying video directed by Velcro captures the band while in tour, edited in a frenetic fever dream of places, shows, people and experiences.
New Video: The Womack Sisters Share Strutting and Urgent “Chauffeur”
Rising Los Angeles-based soul trio The Womack Sisters — Kucha, Zeimani and BG — can trace the origins of their careers to their childhood: The trio were singing before they could even walk. They grew up on stages and in studios across the globe, singing behind their parents, as well as their legendary uncle, Bobby Womack. And adding to The Womack Sisters’ remarkable pedigree, their grandfather was the iconic Sam Cooke.
No matter where they called home at the time — London, Thailand, Amsterdam, Kenya, West Virginia, The Bahamas — music and family were always a constant at the center of their lives. Of course, as the sisters grew up, each with their own respective journeys, experiences and heartaches, they managed to find their own voices and their own path.
Each member of the trio has their own individual vocal, but they playfully trade leads and effortlessly (and perfectly) blend their harmonies in a way that only siblings can.
Back in 2016, a mutual friend introduced The Womack Sisters to Daptone Records co-owner and producer Gabriel Roth, a.k.a. Bosco Mann, who heard them sing and fell quickly and deeply in love with their voices. Shortly after, they met, they went to Daptone’s Riverside, CA-based Penrose Studios to record their label debut, “If You Want Me“/”I Just Don’t Want You (To Say Goodbye).”
The rising Los Angeles trio’s long-awaited self-titled, full-length debut is slated for an August 14, 2026 through Daptone Records. The album’s latest single “Chauffeur” is a strutting bit of old-school-inspired soul that showcases the trio’s remarkable vocal range, impeccable sense of harmony and their deeply personal, lived-in lyrics.
On “Chauffeur,” the sisters recount the trials, tribulations they each faced while trying to make ends meet as Uber drives. In each of their respective verses, they recount the hustle and drive required to make ends meet — by any legal means possible — while having greater ambitions, and grappling with the futility of trying to stack meager fares into rent money. While deeply soulful, the song evokes the drive, unease, desperation and seething frustration of someone who has to grind — to barely survive. And it’s rooted in the plain language of struggle and cash flow.
“’Chauffeur’ is about the hustle of life that we all are in – the day to day, trying to survive, and looking forward to your day in the sun,” The Womack Sisters’ Zeimani Womack says. “It’s a song for the underdogs, and the encouragement to keep pushing. Things can be rough and get a little rocky, but as long as you have the faith, you will make it.”
Directed by Shauna Presto, the stylishly shot accompanying video features each of The Womack Sisters as the song’s titular chauffeur, driving passengers who seem completely unconcerned sit in the back seat. They may be struggling to survive but they have their dignity and their dreams of making it.