singer shouter in PNW Philadelphia-based songwriter and producer, Justin Boone Helm, is digitally self-releasing his almost self-titled debut EP, JBH, out now.
Conjuring a bleary-eyed sense of nostalgia that stands just out of time, Helm's cooing, spangled odes to a faded youth that's never quite lost are a meditation on a rural life surrendered to the big city. A misty fog of melancholia pervades his tales of a decadence, adjusting from a ramshackle, dog-eared upbringing in the country to a hardened life in the concrete jungle. Produced at the Cutting R
oom in New York City by renown engineer, Tom Gardner (the National, Dirty Projectors), Helm's songs wear a wistful, spectral dusk like a broken halo. Utilizing the ethereal harmony vocals from Jennifer Painter, along with a distant, dissonant soundscape -- like wrecked radio waves from a past that still lingers -- the songs on JBH resonate like a dream that doesn't end as much as forever find itself embedded itself into your consciousness. Accompanying the EP's release is the haunting video for its lead single, "BB." Complementing the song's celestial grace, the images of a disquieting rural ruin softly instill a feeling of loss and isolation. Co-directed and co-produced by Helm himself, along with Painter, the video was shot in Cheney and Tyler, Washington, a plaintive return to the surroundings that inspired the EP's subject matter. Helm will be supporting his release with a string of upcoming dates around his current base of New York City, both solo and with spare accompaniment.
