Single Review by William Ruben HelmsJan 7, 202609:00

New Audio: Parlor Greens Share Strutting “Eat Your Greens”

Organ trio Parlor Greens features a collection of grizzled veterans and incredibly accomplished musicians:

Tim Carman (drums): Arguably best known for his lengthy stint in acclaimed, Boston-based blues outfit GA-20, Carman showcases his ability to start steady, heavy and downright funky pockets for his bandmates.

Jimmy James (guitar): Through his work with The True Loves and the Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio, James has firmly established a signature and readily recognizable funky approach that has won him fans across the world.

Adam Scone (organ): Scone is a soul revival scene stalwart, playing on many Daptone Records sessions since their inception, including with Scone Cash Players and The Sugarman 3. He has learned from some of the beloved lends of soul jazz, including Melvin Sparks and the iconic Dr. Lonnie Smith.

The trio’s highly-anticipated sophomore album Emeralds is slated a March 27, 2026 release through Colemine Records. Emeralds reportedly sees the acclaimed trio upping the ante while capturing the band in top form: tour tight and more confident than ever in who they are and where they’re going. And while the results are stronger than ever, the overall mood of the recording sessions was much different.

The first time the trio met in Colemine’s Loveland, OH-based Portage Lounge Studio, the meeting was marked by a certain sense of freshness: It was the first time they had all played together. Understandably, it was exciting and unknown territory. But the sessions were underlined by the heaviness each of the individual members were going through at the time. With each member dealing with personal tragedies in their individual lives, the sessions serves as a genuine moment of joy. Just three talented musicians, writing and playing music, now as friends, in a familiar environment.

Emeralds‘ second and latest single, album opener “Eat Your Greens” is a a strutting and rollicking tune, that showcases the trio’s unerring knack for tight, crafted, old-school-inspired hooks and grooves, all while being roomy enough for some impressively dexterous solos from James and Scone. Fittingly, the track captures the talent and simpatico of three old pros, who can effortlessly balance songcraft with road-tested improvisation.

Video by William Ruben HelmsJan 6, 202621:00

New Video: MEMORIALS Share Mind-bending “Cut Glass Hammer”

Canterbury, UK-based MEMORIALS — Electrelane‘s Verity Susman (vocals) and Wire‘s Matthew Simms (guitar) — will be releasing their third album All Clouds Bring Not Rain on March 27, 2026 through Fire Recordings. The album will be released digitally, on CD and three limited citrus vinyl editions: Orange Vinyl, Lemon Vinyl (Indie Store Exclusive) and a Lime Vinyl Bundle, which will include four hand-stamped art prints in a signed wax-sealed envelope plus a sticker sheet (Fire Records and Bandcamp Exclusive).

Having spent the first half of last year composing the soundtrack to an acclaimed documentary about Kate Bush, which aired last fall, the duo spent the summer writing and recording All Clouds Bring Not Rain, before embarking on a Stateside tour with Stereolab.

The duo locked themselves away in a studio in a secluded barn deep in the southwestern French woods, where the immediate environment imbued the recording sessions with a sense of freedom and an album of beautiful, unusual material that’s both melodic, unconventional and remarkably ambitious.

Written, performed, recorded and mixed solely by the duo, the album reportedly sounds much like an unearthed classic that sees the pair twisting their influences into their own unmistakable sound that draws from a wide range of influences including folk, dub, post punk, experimental tape music, 60s soul, garage rock, 70s spiritual jazz and Canterbury prog among others.

“We are increasingly drawn to the way records used to be made, both the sound of the equipment used and the choices forced by that equipment; there wasn’t the option to tinker for ages, it was about capturing a moment in time and committing to that,” the duo say of the new album’s creative process. “It’s far more satisfying to record sounds that exist in a real space and so become unique to us: they aren’t the same as the samples readily available everywhere . . . we were actively turning away from the easy option at almost every opportunity!”

That attention to detail in their sound meant finding several other studios to get what they needed to create what they wanted the album’s material to sound like and to record with, including a harpsichord at 4AD‘s London-based studio and a vibraphone and vintage Leslie speaker at Stereolab’s Andy Ramsay’s Press Play Studio.

Susman’s distinctive, unadorned delivery, which sees her moving from tender to wild throughout is a focal point oft the album. Her vocal melodies provide the tunefulness and hooky earworms around which their songs’ more unorthodox elements are arranged, showcasing Matthews’ unique approach to recording and production.

All Clouds Bring Not Rain‘s first single “Cut Glass Hammer” is a woozy and hypnotic song built around two looping modular synth lines, a motorik groove paired with Susman’s dreamy delivery singing lyrics inspired by a trip the duo took to see the Yoko Ono retrospective Music of the Mind at London’s Tate Modern Gallery. The result is an anachronistic, mind-bending, psilocybin trip that sounds as though it could have been released in 1967 or a B-side on Pavo Pavo‘s 2016 effort, Young Narrator in the Breakers.

The fittingly trippy DIY accompanying video starts with patches being plugged into an analog, modular synth, the song’s titular hammer being used to keep musical time, old toys on spinning a record player and more.

Tour Dates
April 08 – Le Hasard Ludique, Paris, France
April 09 – Le Tangram, Évreux, France
April 10 – Variations Festival, Nantes, France, w/ Einstürzende Neubauten
April 11 – Calm, Limoges, France
April 12 – La Petite Populaire, La Réole, France
April 14 – Le Consortium, Dijon, France
April 15 – Le Grand Mix, Tourcoing, France, w/ Bibi Club
April 22 – The Croft, Bristol, UK
April 23 – Little Bully, Oxford, UK
April 24 – Prince Albert, Brighton, UK
April 26 – Heartbreakers, Southampton, UK
April 29 – The Lexington, London, UK
April 30 – Hyde Park Book Club, Leeds, UK
May 01 – The Castle Hotel, Manchester, UK
May 31 – Nachtasyl, Hamburg, Germany
June 01 – Kantine am Berghain, Berlin, Germany
June 02 – Noch Besser Leben, Leipzig, Germany
June 03 – Kohi, Karlsruhe, Germany
June 04 – Club Manufaktur, Schorndorf, Germany
June 05 – Bellevue Di Monaco, München, Germany
June 06 – Rotown, Rotterdam, Netherlands

singer/songwriters by William Ruben HelmsJan 6, 202617:00

News/Announcements: Gov Ball Announces 2026 Lineup

Video by William Ruben HelmsJan 6, 202613:00

Throwback: Happy 73rd Birthday, Malcolm Young!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates the 73rd anniversary of the birth of AC/DC co-founder Malcolm Young.

Video by William Ruben HelmsJan 6, 202609:00

Throwback: Happy 67th Birthday, Kathy Sledge!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Kathy Sledge’s 67th birthday.

Single Review by William Ruben HelmsJan 5, 202623:00

New Audio: Henry Aberson Returns with Vibey “Call”

Henry Aberson is a Tulsa-based composer, producer and drummer, who has developed a reputation for bringing in top-tier talent for seamless collaborations and for lush, live instrumentation.

Aberson closed out 2025 with “Call,” which continues a run of vibey Quiet Storm-meets-neo-soul inspired material that seemingly channels the likes of Maxwell, D’Angelo and others. And much like its immediate predecessor, the new single thematically reflects on vulnerability, desire, longing and emotional connection with a lived-in earnestness.

Single Review by William Ruben HelmsJan 5, 202620:00

New Audio: The X-Flowers Share a Rousingly Anthemic Ripper

The X-Flowers are a mysterious and emerging punk outfit, who, released their debut EP, the three-song First Bloom last year.

The punk outfit begin the new year with “Tilted,” a rousing, mosh pit friendly ripper that seemingly channels a synthesis of Joan Jett, 90s grunge and riot grrl-era punk.

singer/songwriters by William Ruben HelmsJan 5, 202614:30

Albums of the Year 2025

JOVM turns 16 this year. And for first handful of years, my Best of List was an annual tradition until about 2014 or so. Between 2014 and 2020, it became sporadic and then it stopped. I haven’t done one of these in several years. There was a part of me that wondered if it really mattered much. And then life happened.

So here we are in 2026. And with the year starting in earnest, let’s check out my best of 2025.

Big Fish Fyra liter stoft
Tan Cologne Unknown Beyond
Moondaddy Dove Tapes
Sessa Pequena Vertigem de Amor
Preservation Brass & Preservation Hall Jazz Band For Fat Man
Silk Daisys S/T
The Circling Sun Orbits
Gabriel da Rosa Cacofonia
Yoo Doo Right, Population II & Nolan Potter Yoo II avec Nolan Potter
bat zoo The Upward Bird EP
Public Circuit Modern Church
L’Eclair Cloud Drifter
Gloin All of your anger is actually shame (and I bet that makes you angry)
CIVIC Chrome Dipped
Population II Maintenant Jamais
White Birches A New Reign
Anish Kumar and Hagop Tchaparian Kino EP
Friendship Commanders BEAR
The Besnard Lakes The Besnard Lakes are the Ghost Nation
SHOLTO The Sirens
S.C.A.B. Somebody In New York Loves You!
Pierpont & Hegeleson Of Time
RORO and snapir Colors Left
St. Panther Strange World
Nation of Language Dance Called Memory
Quad90 S/T
Slumbering Sun Starmony
Tunde Adebimpe Thee Black Boltz
Quad90 S/T
Die Spitz Something To Consume
debdepan LOVERS & OTHERS EP

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