JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Earth, Wind and Fire co-founder Verdine White’s 75th birthday.
I’ve run this site for the past 16-years with a stubbornly defiant DIY ethos. But I must admit the past two years have been extraordinarily difficult. At the end of the day, even miracles need money to be achieved.
As always The Joy of Violent Movement is a completely independent and completely D.I.Y. media outlet. Over the course of this site’s 16+ year history, I’ve used my fiercely independent stance to cover music with an eclectic and global perspective that a lot of other publications just don’t have — and will likely never have.
To that end, I could use your support to continue to keep bringing you my unique global perspective on music. There are a number of ways that you can support this work.
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Before I close out, I have a big (and recurring) ask of y’all: I’ve been actively looking for work — for some time now. If you’ve been out there looking for work or if you know someone who is, you’re very aware of how dehumanizing the entire process can be. But over the past 6-12 months or so, it has been especially annoying and frustrating.
Over the course of the past two-plus decades, my writing and photography has been published in a lengthy list of publications including Downbeat, Sound Collector Audio Review, Playbill (photography), The Advocate (photography), Out Magazine (photography), Premier Guitar (photography), Consequence, Earmilk (photography), The Inventory, Glide Magazine.com (writing and photography), Publisher’s Weekly, Sheckys.com, Shecky’s Bar and Nightlife Guide, New York Press, Ins&Outs Magazine (photography and writing), Dish Du Jour Magazine, Queens Ledger (writing and photography) Aussie music publication Musicology.xyz (photography) and countless others.
Concurrently with all of that, I spent about 15 years — okay, like 14.5 total — in book publishing working in the editorial departments of three different New York-based publishing houses across both trade and academic publishing as an Editorial Assistant and as an Acquisitions Editor. The bulk of my publishing career has been in trade publishing with the last 2.5 or so years in academic publishing.
If anyone has any leads on editorial, communications, writing and/or photography jobs — including full-time, part-time, contract and freelance opportunities, please feel free to contact me.
Music industry folks, if you need someone to write bios for your artists and/or bands — or to take press photos, BTS photos, live concert photos or you’d like to have a tour photographer, please feel free to contact me.
New Audio: Gotts Street Park and Celeste Team Up on Soulful Lament “Easy”
Acclaimed Leeds-based trio Gotts Street Park— Josh Crocker (bass, production), Tom Henry (keys) and Joe Harris (guitar) —acclaimed full-length debut, 2023’s On The Inside included “Got To Be Good” feat. Pip Millettt, “Fuego,” “Mountains” feat. ENNY and “Tell Me Why” feat. Olive Jones. And in the subsequent years since its release, the album has amassed over 300 million streams across all DPS with “Got To Be Good” landing in Season Three of BBC’s hit series Boarders and this year’s Finding Emily starring Spike Fearn and Minnie Driver.
Their sophomore album Somewhere Between is slated for an October 16, 2026 release through Play It Again Sam. Somewhere Between is reportedly a departure from the soul, jazz and hip-hop influenced sound of their previously released work, with the album drawing inspiration from Bill Orcutt, Dylan Day, Dick Gaughan, Jessica Pratt, Big Thief and Blaze Foley, as well as the working methods of the house bands at Stax Records and Sun Records. The result is an album that combines the collective’s signature production prowess with an even greater warmth than before, as they also draw on the spirit of the 1970s troubadour singer/songwriter movement with a cast of long-time collaborators that include Celeste, Olive Jones, Pip Millett, Matt Maltese, Sofia and The Antoinettes, anaiis and Rosie Lowe.
In an era increasingly defined by automation and AI, Somewhere Between is threaded throughout with a quiet faith as music as an inherently human act — one shared by intimation, openness and the intangible chemistry of people in a room creating together. “The title only arrived once the album was finished, and it means something slightly different to each of us,” the members of the acclaimed Leeds-based band explain. “For me, it reflects the space that collaboration creates, a place where our individual lives, moods and experiences overlap for a while to make something together. We’re all arriving from different places, but in the studio those separate worlds meet. There’s something about making music that feels like stepping into a space between the tangible and the intangible, where ideas seem to come from somewhere beyond ourselves. In many ways, that’s what this album represents: meeting somewhere between who we are individually and what we can create together.”
The album will include the previously released, acclaimed track “Some Birds Don’t Fly” feat Matt Maltese, and the album’s latest single “Easy” feat. Celeste. The Brit Award and Academy Award-nominated artist Celeste’s achingly soulful and jazzy, AmyWinehouse-meets-classic soul-like delivery strutting over a shimmering, bass-driven Daptone-like arrangement with subtle hip-hop influences.
Thematically, “Easy” examines the push and pull of a romantic relationship that’s way too complicated than what it needs to be. And as a result, the song is centered on the narrator’s bittersweet and lament-fueled realization that it’s time to move on — with the hope that she’ll find the love she deserves.
“‘Easy’ came from one of our very first sessions with Celeste around eight years ago,’ Gotts Street Park explains. “There’s a rawness and spontaneity to it that captures those early days of working together. Nothing felt overthought or overworked, which gave Celeste the space to completely own the song through her performance. We’ve held onto it for a long time, so it’s exciting to finally have the opportunity to share it.”
The band have begun to support the forthcoming album with their Somewhere Here World Tour, which bean with a set at this year’s Montréal Jazz Festival. The tour includes an appearance at the inaugural London edition of The Roots Picnic and at this year’s Newport Jazz Festival, as well as a July 30, 2026 stop at Le Poisson Rouge. Check out the North American leg dates below.
Photography: The High Line in Monochrome (mostly) 7/20/26
The High Line in monochrome (mostly).
Throwback: Happy 65th Birthday, Martin Gore!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Depeche Mode founder Martin Gore’s 65th birthday.
Throwback: Happy 61st Birthday, Slash!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Slash’s 61st birthday.
New Audio: JOVM Mainstay Marie Dahlstrøm Shares Woozy and Soulful “Night & Day”
Over the past handful of years, Roskilde-born, London-based singer/songwriter, producer and JOVM mainstay Marie Dahlstrøm has built a catalog of contemporary R&B rooted in neo-soul, jazz and understated groove that includes 2020’s Like Sand and 2023’s A Good Life, albums that have received applause from Billboard, NPR, Complex, COLORS, NYLON, The Line of Best Fit, Wonderland and a list of others. Dahlstrom has also received co-signs from BBC 1Xtra, The Joe Budden Podcast and
others.
Adding to a growing profile both nationally and internationally, she has collaborated with Odeal, Jay Prince, Kofi Stone and Braxton Cook.
The JOVM mainstay’s highly-anticipated third album MARIE is slated for a September 18, 2026 release through her own JFH Records. The album also arrives at a moment when life for the JOVM has become much fuller, busier and infinitely more complex. Since the release of 2020’s debut, Like Sand and 2023’s A Good Life, Dahlstrøm has become a mother of two, while continuing to a build a life between London and Copenhagen.
Written over the previous two years between London, Copenhagen and Los Angeles, the Danish-born artist’s third album draws on deeper jazz influences, live instrumentation and a close-knit international cast of collaborators including Butcher Brown’s Corey Fonville, Los Angeles-based pianist and producer Elijah Fox, Cuban percussionist Eliel Lazo and her longtime collaborator and romantic partner Dan Diggas. The result is reportedly one one of the JOVM mainstay’s warmest and most personal work to date.
MARIE will feature the previously released “Frostbite” and the album’s latest single “Night & Day.” Built around an atmospheric and woozy production featuring skittering beats, a supple bass line, vocodered warbling synth beneath Dahlstrøm’s easy-going yet soulful delivery, “Night & Day” speaks of love and romantic relationship in a lived-in, realistic fashion, admitting that relationships require work and intention to make them last. But that work is often worth it.
New Audio: Hayley Law Shares Self-Assured, Hook-Driven “Circle Back”
Hayley Law is a Canadian-born, Los Angeles-based actor, singer/songwriter and producer, who initially wrote, produced and recorded under the moniker Hayleau. She has since retired the moniker and project, saying “Hayleau was a version of me that I really love. Softer, shyer, and still trying to figure herself out through everyone else’s voices. I think that name became a little too shaped by perception, expectation, and who people thought i should be. Coming back to Hayley Law felt like reclaiming myself and deciding I don’t want anyone else molding who I am anymore.”
Performing under her own name, the Canadian-born, Los Angeles-based artist has crafted a sound and approach that sees her blending pop, R&B and pop rock with diaristic storytelling. Her work lives between vulnerability and control in a way that’s intimate, nostalgic and quietly disarming, pulling listeners into moments that feel as impulsive as they are intentional.
As a completely independent artist, Law has built her career on her own times while amassing over four million streams across the DSPs through purely organic growth and without chasing trends or traditional industry pathways.
Alongside her music career, Law has played roles in globally distributed Netflix projects and studio films, including Riverdale, Altered Carbon and more. She’s set to star in Jackie! Zhou’s FLYOVER.
Building upon a growing profile, the rising artist’s highly-anticipated Law, Jesse Boykins III and Melo-X co-produced Last Summer is slated for an August 14, 2026 release. The album sonically is a blend of sensual alternative R&B-influenced diaristic songwriting and early 2000s pop punk, creating an album of material that’s intimate, emotionally unguarded yet cinematic. Across the album’s run-time, Law effortlessly moves between softness and control, exploring desire, performance, heartbreak, ego, femininity and the versions of ourselves we create to be loved. But the star of the show is Law and her voice: vulnerable without being self-pitying, confident without false armor and deeply self-aware of the contradiction of wanting intimacy while trying to remain in control.
The album will include the previously released album title and opening track “Last Summer” and the album’s second and latest single “Circle Back.” Subtly channeling hook-driven, late 1990s and early 000s R&B — think Brandy, Monica and the like — “Circle Back” is built around an atmospheric production twinkling keys, a soaring string sample, skittering beats and glitchy, DJ scratches beneath Law’s self-assured, self-aware delivery. The song’s narrator spends the song’s runtime recognizing that this love interest is probably just a fling — and that fling needs to back off a bit and just enjoy things for what they are.
“Have you ever had a fling that just moves sooo fast? By the time you come up for air, you realize you’ve spent 3 days with the person and aren’t even sure you see it going anywhere,” the Canadian-born artist explains. “That is ‘Circle Back.’ I wear my heart on my sleeve and fall quickly and this song is my reminder to check in with yourself. Not every fling turns into a relationship. And having two/three weeks of something HOT is awesome.”
New Video: JOVM Mainstays Elephant Stone Returns with Jangling “I Got A Pill”
Brossard, QC-born, Montréal-based singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Rishi Dihr has spent the past two decades blurring the lines between Western pysch pop and Indian classical tradition. What began back in 2006 as a quest for trasncendental sound has evolved into a singlar, self-contained vision. Operating out of his Montréal home studio, Sacred Sounds Dihr has estalbihed himself as studio autuer, producing, engineering and mixing his band Elephant Stone‘s increasingly complex and cineamtic output.
The JOVM mainstays — Dihr (vocals, bass and sitar), along with longtime members Miles Dupire (drums), Robbie MacArthur (guitar) and Jason Kent (keys, guitar) – will be releasing their 10th albun, ASHA on August 28, 2026 through Elephants On Parade. Limited edition signed and hand-numbered vinyl is avaialble for pre-order through Little Cloud Records. Named after the Elphant Stone frontman’s late mother, Asha translates to “hope” in Sanskirt — and is meditation on grief, hope, and the friction between sorrow and the darkness of our time.
While the band’s reputation has long-been built on airtight pop craftsmanship and spiritual exploration, their most recent work psoesses a new, raw intensity forged through Dihr’s lengthy history collaborating with The Black Angels, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, Beck and hte psych rock supergroup MIEN.
Elephant Stone remains at the forefront of the modern movement, constantly deconstructing the past to find something visceral, haunting, and undeniably human in the present.
ASHA includes the previously released “Everything Evil,” “Fascists Killed Yer Rock ‘N’ Roll,” and its third and latest single “I’ve Got A Pill.” “I’ve Got A Pill” is a jangling and deceptively upbeat tune that asks the listener to cede control; to take that pill to forget their pain; to take that pill to stop thinking so goddamn much and let someone else do the thinking . . . But just underneath the sweet wooing is something unsettling and menacing.
Elephant Stone frontman Rishi Dihr explains, “It’s about demagogues, the populist playbook. Leaders who feed on people’s fear and offer an easy fix. The pill. Take it and your problems go away. Except it doesn’t work like that. It’s control dressed up as relief.”
Directed by Adam Traynor and featuring handcrafted puppets by Diablo Puppets, the accompanying video manages to embody the song’s false promise of escape, the video follows Futzy, Radis, and Mascot in a surreal world that involves a mind-bending trip into Fraggle Rock-styled world that quickly turns into a paranoid nightmare.
“The lyrics to ‘I Got A Pill’ woo and warn all at once,” Adam Traynor explains. “I wanted to put the sweetness of that voice into the mouth of a Tony the Tiger-type mascot with a special breakfast gift for kids that would be sure to kick off a trip into a sugary Wonderland, a cardboard Oz, an awe-inducing game-world of artificial colours, a Dark Crystal quest for power, a Soylent Green feeding frenzy.”
Throwback: Happy 85th Birthday, George Clinton!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates the legendary George Clinton’s 85th birthday.
New Video: Josh da Costa Returns with Shimmering “Shireen”
Los Angeles-based artist Josh da Costa was a fixture in the early 2010s Brooklyn scene. Covering music back then, it seemed as though anyone could start a band or a project — and just about everyone did. And they all played at hundreds of now, long-shuttered venues like Cameo Art Gallery, Glasslands, 285 Kent, The Palisades, The Grand Victory, Trash Bar and countless others. da Costa’s first band Regal Degal toured with Real Estate and DIIV and opened for The Pop Group. (Unsurprisingly, I wrote about Regal Degal on this site back in 2013. Yes, this site’s early days y’all.)
When Regal Degal split up, da Costa relocated to Los Angeles. The old Craftsman house he shared with Geneva Jacuzzi, Shags Chamberlain, James Ferraro and Daryl Johns was a paradise for “freaks and friends,” as well as artists and musicians, who constantly wandered in for a jam session or for a hang. At the time, he played drums with Drugdealer and MGMT and he formed CMON, who released an album through Mexican Summer. (I saw CMON open for Jorge Elbrecht back in 2018! So I’m familiar with da Costa and his work.)
The party came to an abrupt end when the Craftsman burned down “in a blaze of glory,” set alight by a serial arsonist and the pandemic forced CMON, much like countless other acts, to cancel a big tour. da Costa’s serious relationship also ended. But for him, it wasn’t all disaster: his friends supported him after the fire, he met someone new and the pandemic meant that he finally had the time to revisit music from his adolescence and “get deep into some of the great I’d had lying around for years but overlooked.”
da Costa’s full-length debut, New Wave Graveyard is slated for a Friday July 24, 2026 release through Stones Throw Records. He imagined the album as a “greatest hits from a parallel universe, classic songs from an alternate reality.” “Instead of trying to hone in on one specific vibe or sound, I went through my own taste and record collection and tried out different approaches — as if I were more than just one artist,” he explains. While drawing from different styles and genres, the album’s material is anchored in how he crystallizes these very different approaches into something singular distinct, crafting a stylish record that defies easy categorization.
If you’ve been lucky to catch da Costa DJ around Los Angeles or have caught his Confusing Mix radio show on NTS, the album’s album overall aesthetic won’t come as a surprise. As a DJ and radio host, he has an uncanny knack for finding curious records from all over the place — music from Brussels-based micro-labels, Flying Nun Records favorites and left field post punk — and blending them in a way that somehow makes perfect sense.
Written over the course of several years, New Wave Graveyard was written during a transition period, a time when da Costa was “getting close to people and getting torn between the types of pleasure and discomfort all of that brings. Breaking people’s hearts, but mostly your own. And remaining excited about not just falling in love, but staying in love.”
Much like countless others, da Costa was drawn to LA’s “movie magic, bizarre music, sleazy sexy glammy druggy outsiders, and this blown-out bad vibe flipside to the California dream” – which interestingly enough, also describers New Wave Graveyard in a nutshell. The titular new wave graveyard is both a literal place (da Costa sometimes drives by his old burned-down house, which is still vacant) and a vibe, an elegy to forgotten fantasies and faded memories.
Nothing lasts forever: Bands start and break up. Friends flame out and lovers leave. Treasured spaces vanish. But the album reportedly bottles the sensation of being there, where the magic and cool shit happened — even if that place is completely imagined. It’s a celebration of strange people met once, but never forgotten, of shows and parties you attended and those you wished you had, of being young and earnest, and a little bit weird.
New Wave Graveyard will include the previously released, shimmering electro pop ballad “96 Year Old Girl” and the album’s last pre-release single, “Shireen.” “Shireen” is a a bit of XTC and Flying Nun Records-like jangle pop, anchored around a shimmering 12 string guitar and da Costa’s unerring knack for crafting a remarkably catchy hook. Much like its immediate predecessor, “Shireen” sounds as though it could have been released in 1983 or so — but with a subtly modern production.
Directed by Ambar Navarro, the accompanying video for “Shireen” features da Costa as a sort of unseen narrator to an 80s teen movie that quickly turns into a campy horror movie featuring a blood-thirsty vampire/werewolf.
Live Footage: Smag På Dig Selv’s Performs “Total Full Power Extreme Nuclear Confusion 2000” at Better Company
With the release of their full-length debut, 2024’s SDPS, Copenhagen-based jazz punks/acoustic techno trio Smag På Dig Selv (SPDS) — Oliver Lauridsen (tenor sax), Thorbjørn Øllgaard (baritone sax, bass sax, vocals) and Albert Holberg (drums) — firmly […]