News/Announcements: Shoutouts to Patrons
This site has been a labor of love throughout its ten year existence. Consider me biased here, but I think that this site is special: it’s one of the rare places where you as a reader can actually come across personal and eclectic curation and coverage of independent music from all over the world regardless of genre, style or country of origin. It shouldn’t be surprising that JOVM is very much inspired by the eclecticism inspired by own music loving parents — and from living in one of the most diverse places in the entire world — Queens, New York.
I’ve mentioned this countless times throughout the past decade, but I’ve run this site as a (mostly) one-man operation out of my apartment in Corona, Queens while working full-time in the editorial department of three different book publishers across trade and academic publishing — an an Editorial Assistant and eventually as an Acquisitions Editor. As a result, I often felt as though I had this very odd, dual life: during the day, I was a sort of mild-mannered, spectacled Clark Kent. And when it was time to leave for the day, I’d run off someplace to change out of my business clothes to become professional music journalist, blogger and photographer, covering shows all over town, returning to my apartment in the wee hours. I’d repeat this three to four days a week for the bulk of this site’s existence and my book publishing career.
Running a site like this has been a wild, fun ride. I’ve had experiences I never would have dreamt of — and would make my younger self envious: I’ve met some of my heroes, I’ve covered some amazingly talented artists, seen some memorable shows, traveled internationally to cover music and I’ve met some of the nicest, kindest and most open people in the world.
If I didn’t firmly believe in what this site is about, I wouldn’t bother. But I do know that this sort of work should — and needs — to be continued and championed as much as possible. Music is the emotional center of our lives. But I’ve found that finding new music helps us grow even more. Perhaps more than ever in this profoundly unusual and unsettling time, we have to take comfort in music, art, literature and all the other things that make us human and connect us with others. Hopefully my work here has — and will continue — to bring some joy, some escape from the bleakness of our current situation or it inspires you to do something.
Of course, running a site like this costs money. And sadly, it ain’t exactly cheap. I could use your help. Last year, I started a Patreon page as a way to help support my creative endeavors and this site. Check out the page for more information:
https://www.patreon.com/TheJoyofViolentMovement
I understand the financial uncertainty that many people are experiencing as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. So if you’re unable to contribute, you can do the following: pass the word on about this site and its Patreon page to other people, who might dig what we do. And as always keep on reading!
As, I promised on my Patreon page, I also wanted to give a shoutout to this site’s kind patrons:
Sash
Alice Northover
Bella Fox
Jenny MacRostie
Thank y’all so much for your support. Your support keeps the engine of this site going.
Be safe everyone. Hopefully we’ll all come out of this okay.