JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Dolly Parton’s 77th birthday.
Tag: singer/songwriter \
Live Footage: Soccer Mommy on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert
When Sophie Allison says to the assembled friends and coworkers assembled around NPR’s Tiny Desk, “We’re finally doin’ it,” she really means it. Just about three years ago, Alison released her sophomore Soccer Mommy album, 2020’s color theory to critical applause. The album marked significant strides forward in the JOVM mainstay’s songwriting and production With the rapidly growing buzz surrounding her a the album, a big year was in store for her and for her bandmates.
The best laid plans of mice and men, right? The band’s visit to NPR’s Tiny Desk, scheduled for March 30, 2020 was the first of many to be canceled because of the pandemic. That particular moment in time required a lot of lemonade-making from just about everyone: Not too long after the start of the lockdown, Allison was the first to record a Tiny Desk (Home) performance for NPR — recorded by Alison on her iPhone.
Clearly for all involved, it was a deeply emotional experience to finally welcome Alison and her backing band — Julian Powell (guitar), Rodrigo Avendano (keys), Nickolas Widener (bass) and Rollum Haas (drums) — to NPR’s Tiny Desk for their long-awaited in-person debut.
Soccer Mommy’s four-song, Tiny Desk set is career spanning set featuring slightly stripped down versions of “Shotgun” off last year’s Sometimes, Forever, “circle the drain” off 2020’s color theory, “newdemo” off Sometimes, Forever and “Still Clean,” off 2018’s Clean. The NPR Tiny Desk set reveals a remarkably self-assured performer and artist, who crafts introspective songs rooted in lived-in experience.
New Video: Vanille Shares Shimmering and Ethereal “M’as tu vu passer?”
Rising Montréal-based singer/songwriter Rachel Leblanc, best known to the outside world as Vanille, specializes in a sound that exists somewhere between ’60s folk and French chanson and brings the listener into a dreamlike world of dense forests and swooning heartbreak.
Leblanc’s sophomore Vanille album, the Alex Martel and Leblanc co-produced La clairière is slated for a February 3, 2023 release through Bonbonbon Records in Canada and Boogie Drugstore in Europe. Recorded at Wild Studio and Le Pantoum, La Clairére sees Leblanc retaining elements of the dream pop sound and approach that won her attention — but while leaning heavily into 60s English baroque folk.
Last summer, I wrote about “À bientôt,” a swooning and expansive bit of psych folk-meets-psych rock featuring a lush arrangement of strummed reverb-drenched guitars, gently padded drumming paired with Leblanc’s achingly tender falsetto. And at its core, is tale as old as time itself: a heartbroken narrator, in the aftermath of the devastation of a newly-ended relationship i left with their memories — and the bitter taste of their heartbreak.
La clairère‘s latest single “M’as tu vu passer?” continues a run of gorgeous, baroque folk-inspired material featuring strummed guitar, atmospheric synths, gently padded drumming and percussion paired with Leblanc’s plaintive and ethereal cooing. “M’as tu va passer?” is simultaneously a song about heartbreak and depression, and of dark and cold Montréal winters without anywhere to really go or anything to really do.
Directed by Rachel Leblanc and Irina Tempea, the accompanying visual for “M’as tu va passer?” is shot on Super 8 film to give it all a hazily nostalgic, old-timey air. The video references winter in several different instances: Leblanc laying down on a furry blanket with fake snow falling on her, Leblanc holding a snow globe and edited footage of a couple fighter skating.
New Video: Heartworms Shares Startling and Cinematic Visual for Brooding “Retributions Of An Awful Life”
Jojo Orme is a South London-based singer/songwriter, producer and mastermind behind the rapidly rising, goth-inspired post-punk outfit Heartworms. Uniformity plays a huge role with Orme and Heartworms: the metronomic music and meticulous fashion of acts like Interpol and Kraftwerk have been a major influence on the South London-based artist. But she also cites PJ Harvey, whose dark sense of humor and lyrical dexterity permeates her own songwriting.
Orme’s Heartworms debut, “Consistent Dedication” quickly exploded across both the British and international scene: She received nods from the NME 100 and Dork Hype List for 2023, and she received critical applause from The FADER, The Quietus, Loud and Quiet, The Line of Best Fit, So Young Magazine, Clash Magazine and a lengthy list of others. The song was added to BBC Radio 6 Music‘s playlist following airplay from the station’s Chris Hawkins, Steve Lamacq, Lauren Laverne and Tom Ravenscroft. And the song received airplay from Radio X‘s John Kennedy and BBC Radio 1‘s Jack Saunders and Gemma Bradley.
She has also made a name for self on the national live circuit in the past year: She played DIY Magazine and So Young Magazine showcases at The Great Escape. She opened for Lime Garden. And lastly, Sports Team invited her to play their annual Margate bus trip.
Building upon a growing profile, the rising South London-based artist’s debut EP A Comforting Notion is slated for a March 24, 2023 release through Speedy Wunderground. The EP’s latest single “Retributions Of An Awful Life” further cements an uneasy and deeply goth-inspired take on post-punk featuring ambient noise, glistening synth oscillations, skittering beats and slashing guitars paired with Orme’s defiant and swaggering delivery, which seems equally indebted to hip-hop and punk rock. The song reveals a singular artist, crafting something completely new from the familiar, while delving deep into her own psyche.
Directed by Niall Trask and Dan Matthews, the accompanying video for “Retributions Of An Awful Life” is shot in a cinematic yet intimate black and white, and stars Orme, along with Natalia Tonner, Lizzy Walsh, Lizzy Walsh, Pip Smith, Marko Andic, Tom White, Simone Reca and Jazz as a military regiment going through some brutal military training exercises. Throughout we see the members of the miserable regiment, covered in dust and mud, wincing in pain, fighting to continue through the wet and cold. Their suffering is real and difficult to watch yet compelling and symbolic: We all have to figure out some way to push through in the face of terrible suffering — whether from outside forces larger than us or from within — and in face of our own fears.
“The song itself lyrically is deeply unsettling, I wanted it to come alive in action. I had an idea of being kitted up in full militaria of no specific regiments, in black and white, putting my body through cold water and wet mud,” Orme explains. “This was stepping outside my comfort zone because I’m not a skilled swimmer; deep water frightens me immensely, especially when cold and in full military gear.”
She continues: “Not many artists/bands I know have done something this raw. I didn’t want to go for a fancy video with pretty dancers or lovely wallpaper plastered with an airbrush filter – I wanted to imbibe a new pain, bring to life punishment, fight fears while abiding relentlessness with my friends by my side. To have put my body through something I found frightening just for the art… there’s something exhilarating about it.”
Throwback: Happy 64th Birthday, Susanna Hoffs!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Susanna Hoffs’ 64th birthday.
Live Footage: Claritzel Miyares and Adrian Ghiardo Team Up to Cover Bad Bunny’s “Amorfoda”
Claritzel Miyares is a Cuban-Spanish singer/songwriter, who first made waves with a 2012 appearance on La Voz (the Spanish version of The Voice), where she impressed the show’s judges with a unique blend of traditional Cuban music, Reggaeton and modern pop. Since her appearance on La Voz, the Cuban-Spanish artist has been busy: She has spent the past few years touring across the world, her native Spain and the Canary Islands with a 10-to-11 member backing band.
Last year, the Cuban-Spanish artist celebrated her tenth anniversary as a musician and performer with the release of two singles last year:
- “Te Equivocaste,” a single released to widespread acclaim.
- “Vive Y Deja Vivir,” which derives its title from a familiar phrase in Spanish and English — live and let live. The song, which features a highly accomplished cast of collaborators including her brother, Grammy Award– winning Carlos Miyares (sax), Alejandro Delgado (trumpet), Eduardo Sandoval (trombone) and Carlos Reyes Compota (percussion). Naturally, the song is rooted in a much-needed message of peace, respect and understanding. “It really is an honour for me to collaborate with such impressive award winning musicians. I feel we have formed a dream team for this single and have produced a masterpiece with this record. The message is very important too,” Claritizel Miyares said in press notes at the time. “Most Cuban songs are about love and relationships but this has a much wider meaning. I want to encourage people to ‘live and let live’ and stop fighting about things in the world.”
Miyares closed out last year with a piano-led cover of Bad Bunny‘s “Amorfado” with master pianist and producer Adrián Ghiardo that retains the swagger and heartache of the original but paired with an old school pop/jazz feel and the Cuban-Spanish artist’s incredibly expressive and soulful delivery. While further continuing upon her unique blend of Cuban traditional music, pop and Reggaeton, Miyares’ rendition of the Bad Bunny hit is a perfect vehicle to introduce her soulful and expressive vocal to North American audiences.
Throwback: Happy 64th Birthday, Sade!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Sade’s 64th birthday.
New Audio: SEMH Shares Sultry and Accessible “Please”
Susi Eva Maria Herzberger, best known as SEMH is a German singer/songwriter and pop artist, who crafts electro pop rooted in profound, earnest and lived-in emotions and experiences with the expressed purpose to move the listener to dance and to feel deeply.
Last year, the German artist released four singles, “Best of Me, “Shout It Out (SIO),” “Soul Stealer,” and “Mr. W,” all of which will appear on her self-titled full-length album slated for a March 3, 2023 release.
Herzberger artist starts the new year with her self-titled album’s fifth and latest single, “Please.” Centered around Giorgio Moroder-like synth oscillations and shimmering bursts of guitar paired with SEMH’s sultry delivery and an enormous hook, “Please” is a remarkably accessible pop song rooted in longing for a love that’s unspoken and/or possibly unrequited.
Directed by the German artist, the accompanying video seems to nod at Janet Jackson’s “Pleasure Principle,” as it features SEMH in a sparse, yet well-lit loft studio space, brooding and dancing.
New Audio: N’Faly Kouyaté Returns with a Genre-Defying Banger
Throughout his lengthy career, Guinean-born, Belgian-based singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist N’Faly Kouyaté has had a long-held interest in bridging two distinct worlds: the ancient and the modern, and his native Africa with the West. Growing up Kouyaté received a rigorous and traditional Guinean musical education. When he relocated to Belgium, he received conservatory training.
Kouyaté has collaborated with an eclectic and diverse array of internationally acclaimed artists including Peter Gabriel, William Kentridge, Phil Manzanera, Ray Phiri and others. But he may be best known for his work with groundbreaking, genre-defying and Grammy Award-nominated act Afro Celt Sound System.
Kouyaté’s forthcoming album sees the acclaimed Guinean-born, Belgian-based artist developing a new genre, which he has dubbed Afrotonix, which mixes polyphony, electronic production and traditional African instruments like the kora, the balafon and regional percussion. Last year, Kouyaté shared the album’s first single, “Free Water,” a slick synthesis of tweeter and woofer rocking beats and traditional Guinean instrumentation paired with a guest spot from Tiken Jah Fakoly. “Free Water” is rooted in a vitally necessary message for all of us — water is life for all of us.
The acclaimed Guinean-born artist’s latest single “Khili Kané” pairs glistening synths, dancehall -like tweeter and woofer rattling thump and glistening bursts of kora paired with big hooks. “Khili Kané” continues Kouyaté’s long-held reputation for meshing elements of contemporary production with ancient African instrumentation and the acclaimed artist’s expressive delivery. Much like its predecessor, the new single is rooted in contemporary concerns, pointing out universal truths: the song is a deeply philosophical tale about ingratitude and denigration.
New Audio: Lazywax’s Disco-Tinged Remix of DFNSE’s “Getaway” feat. AKA Lui
Rising Paris-based electronic music producer DFNSE specializes in a sound and approach that meshes elements of French touch, funk and pop. Before releasing his debut EP, 2015’s Pandorium, an effort inspired by the SoundCloud Future House scene, he participated in a number of attention grabbing producer battles alongside emerging artists like BlackDoe, Ikaz Boi, and Varnish La Piscine.
Back in 2016, the rising Parisian producer released material through Darker Than Wax, Souletiquettte and Nowadays Records, who released a single on their Oceans compilation, as well as the Moonrock EP, which features one of his biggest songs to date, “Show You.”
Last September saw the release of his most recent EP, Symphony Road, an effort, that featured EP single “Getaway,”a breezy, 80s-inspired summertime bop featuring Australian vocalist AKA Lui’s plaintive falsetto paired with twinkling keys, a strutting bass line, some Nile Rodgers-inspired funk guitar, an irresistible, two-step inducing groove and an infectious hook. While “Getaway” is a club banger, the song is an escapist fantasy, evoking a summer full of seemingly carefree, warm days and nights, hanging out at the beach and rooftop bars and clubs — and of vacation to tropical climes.
After highly regarded remixes of L’Imperatice, Poolside, and Todd Edwards, Aussie electro pop duo Lazywax recently gave DFNSE’s “Getaway” feat. AKA Lui the remix treatment. The Lazywax remix retains AKA Lui’s plaintive vocal and pairs it with a disco-meets-French touch production centered around a funky bass line and glistening synths, turning the chilled out summery bop into a dance floor ready anthem.
Throwback: Happy 56th Birthday, Lisa Lisa!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Lisa Lisa’s 56th birthday.
Throwback: Happy 54th Birthday, Dave Grohl!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Dave Grohl’s 54th birthday.
California-based singer/songwriter and musician Brandon Hoogenboom is best known as the creative mastermind behind HOOGENBOOM. His full-length debut, Good For Nothing (A Spiraling Blackout Montage) is slated for a February 10, 2023 release through Rose Garden, a newly-formed Brooklyn-based artist management company and label, founded by Ethan Converse.
Good For Nothing (A Spiraling Blackout Montage) is reportedly a collection of bold, beatific melodies cut with Hoogenboom’s deeply-lived in, introspective songwriting. “A lot of emotion went into these songs,” the Californian singer/songwriter and musician says. “This is the first collection of recorded music that I’m really proud of, and it feels like it’s just the beginning—but every day I’m pushing myself and my art forward, too.” For Hoogenboom, the album represents a showcase for his talent for crafting songs featuring lush atmospherics and an irresistible tuneless that sounds and feels timeless and immediate. Interestingly, the album sees Hoogenboom reflecting on a dark period in his life that the album’s title gestures towards: “I had a tendency to take things too far in an attempt to cope with what felt like the breakup of a tight-knit family,” he explains. “A lot of this album is me taking the time to address my issues inside and outside of the band, and it’s taken a decade for me to really understand that period of my life and be able to move on. This is me learning how much I need to take the reins of my own life and my own story.”
The album’s latest single “Damn Good” today is a breezy yet deliberately crafted 70s AM radio rock-inspired jam centered around strummed acoustic guitar, fluttering synths, glistening strings and Fleetwood Mac-like multi-part harmonies are paired Hoogenboom’s deceptively easy-going yet plaintive delivery. But the song is rooted in a narrator, who has a newfound security and confidence in the face of criticism.“After spending most of my life feeling incredibly insecure, I finally found confidence in myself,” Hoogenboom says. “I let go of the pressure to conform to what I felt like the world was telling me to be and found the joy in embracing who I am.”
M. Byrd is a German-born and based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalists and producer, who can trace the origins of music career, and his passion for music to when he was three: A young Byrd used to play drums in front of the TV. Eventually, he found his dad’s guitar. Encouraged by a teacher, he picked up electric guitar and attended countless roots jam sessions at local joints. Influenced by Alice Coltrane, Tom Petty, Elliott Smith and David Lynch, Byrd began writing his own material.
The German-born and-based artist turned heads back in 2020 with the release of “Mountain” and “Morning Sun,” tracks that amassed millions of streams and praise from Ones to Watch, Earmilk, Atwood Magazine and several others while firmly cementing his sound and approach: Intensely personal songwriting paired with shoegazer-inspired textures and pop-leaning accessibility.
At the end of 2020, Byrd and producer Eugen Koop holed up in Detmold, Germany in a WWII-era British Corps squash hall-turned recording studio, where they worked on The Seed, the German artist’s forthcoming, full-length debut, an effort that sees Byrd personally playing guitar, synths and bass. The album’s material reportedly draws you in to inspire your own evolution. As Byrd says ““When you listen to the album, I hope you feel like you can grow with me. Maybe you’ll find confidence in yourself. We’re planting this thought with The Seed.
Late last year, I wrote about “Over You/Over Me,” a song centered around Byrd’s plaintive and balmy vocal floating over a textured, shoegazer-like soundscape paired with a motorik groove and enormous hooks. Much like his previously released work, the new single is rooted in a bright, hopeful sense of the future. “I dreamt there were snakes all over my apartment,” Byrd recalls. “A snake is a symbol for drastic change in your life and you’re repressing it. There’s a lot of change for me. I’m starting to be a full-time musician. There’s still a pandemic. I tried to dress up this darkness nicely. I talked to a friend who is into interpreting dreams, and she said that snakes in dreams meant that I was going through a profound change in my life. I remembered a quote I once read in an essay by Freud: ‘A dream is the liberation of the spirit from the pressure of external nature, a detachment of the soul from the restraints of matter.”
The Seed‘s second and latest single, album title track The Seed is an anthemic bit of indie rock seemingly indebted to 120 Minutes-era MTV alt rock centered around Byrd’s uncanny knack for crafting rousingly anthemic hooks with earnest, deeply personal songwriting paired with a lush, Toad the Wet Sprocket meets Starsailor-like arrangement.
“We realized then that nothing will ever be, no matter how far away you feel from something that’s happening in the world, independent from the suffering out there,” the German singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist explains. “It was a hard realization but we needed to figure out a way to deal with it. Listening to the whole album reminded me of holding a seed in my hands. It felt like the start of something and symbolized birth in times of chaos. The song and the album, we decided, had to be called nothing more and nothing less – The Seed.”
The Seed is slated a June 16, 2023 release through Nettwerk Music Group.
Lyric Video: Matt Corby Shares Strutting “Reelin'”
Matt Corby is a multi-award winning Australian singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer. Since the release of 2018’s J Award-winning album, Rainbow Valley, the acclaimed Aussie artist and producer has been busy: He launched his own independent label and loaned his production expertise to material by JOVM mainstay Genesis Owusu, Jack River, Great Gable, Bud Rokesky and most recently, his award-winning collaboration with Budjerah. And back in 2020 he released two standalone singles “If I Never Say A Word” and “Vitamin.”
Corby’s highly-anticipated third, full-length album Everything’s Fine is slated for a March 24, 2023 release through UK-based Communion Music.. Marking his first album in five years, Everything’s Fine vividly captures the personal and creative growth of the acclaimed Aussie artist and producer, who like many of us, had life tip him upside down and downside up.
On the day Corby was going to start recoding his new album, he and his family were rescued by a neighbor. Their home had been engulfed by floodwaters that raged through Queensland and New South Wales, Australia. After nervously watching his very pregnant partner and young son be whisked away in a small, inflatable dinghy, he got to work ferrying provisions to stranded neighbors and locals and digging rotting mud out from beneath his home.
With their home inundated by floodwater, the whole family was forced to move into Corby’s Rainbow Valley Studios, during the album’s recording process. Juggling familial responsibilities with his creative and professional pursuits was a one-of-kind pressure cooker circumstance that helped galvanize his artistic evolution.
Firmly fixed on seeing the best of things, Matt reveals “I’m at a really beautiful point in my life. I’m accepting all this stuff: the good and the bad, but particularly the bad. Which is kind of great. It’s a good thing to come to that point. Life isn’t always magical, but the moments that are, well you really value them. I think this record is about that, about managing your actual reality. Sometimes I have those moments when you realize: well I’m still breathing, you still have the gift of life, so everything is fine I guess?”
Within a week of the flood, Corby returned to the studio, and wound up writing and recording “Problems,” a funky R&B-inspired bop centered around a strutting bass line, twinkling keys and boom bap-like drumming paired with the Aussie artist’s plaintive crooning and his unerring knack for well-placed, razor sharp hooks. Sonically, “Problems” sounds indebted to D’Angelo and Mayer Hawthorne — but while rooted in personal, lived-in experience and astute observation of human behavior and character. The song’s message is a simple and profound one: While maybe your own world is on fire or about to sink under water, the most important thing is that you and your loved ones are alive — and mostly well.
“It’s about how funny humans are creating our own problems and issues that we then have to solve. Or creating problems so difficult we then can’t solve,” Corby says. “And how people talk so much shit and don’t do anything – how we’re setting ourselves up for failure. People want to point the finger but nobody wants to carry anything themselves.”
Everything Fine‘s second and latest single “Reelin'” is a strutting bop featuring light yet propulsive percussion, twinkling keys and warm horn bursts paired with Corby’s effortlessly soulful crooning. Much like its immediate predecessor, “Reelin'” is rooted in lived-in personal experience and astute observation. The new single sees Corby reflecting on the inherent push-and-pull dynamic of long-term romantic relationships. Throughout the song, the acclaimed Aussie artist makes the observation that the cornerstone of every successful committed relationship is communication, compromise — and a bit of forgiveness and healing, too.