Joywave

Upstate New York indie outfit Joywave infuses their electro-dance rhythms with a post-punk bite. Breaking through in the early 2010s, the group first gained traction via a featured turn on Big Data’s “Dangerous,” a chart-topping single that surfaced the same year their 2015 debut How Do You Feel Now? landed. Two years afterward they delivered the darker, more streamlined follow-up Content, which marked their second Top Ten showing on the Billboard Heatseekers chart. Launching the new decade in 2020, they unveiled their third album, Possession, built around samples from the Voyager Golden Record. The next year brought the EP Every Window Is a Mirror, setting the stage for their fourth full-length, 2022’s Cleanse. On their fifth LP, 2024’s Permanent Pleasure, they augmented their signature style with the weight of a full orchestra.

The Rochester-based band came together in 2010 when vocalist Daniel Armbruster, guitarist Joseph Morinelli, bassist Sean Donnelly, keyboardist Travis Johansen (eventually succeeded by Benjamin Bailey), and drummer Paul Brenner joined forces. Their first taste of ’80s-tinged electro material arrived early in 2011 with the single “Golden State.” Online mixtapes that wove together original material and borrowed tracks, all reworked with the group’s distinctive instrumentation and vocals, helped generate wider interest. Alongside those mixtapes and initial singles, they issued the Koda Vista EP in 2012 and the How Do You Feel? EP in 2014.

Beyond their own catalog, Joywave frequently lent their talents to friends’ projects, serving as both remixers and featured artists on notable releases by Big Data and Betty Who. Their Big Data link-up “Dangerous” topped the U.S. alternative charts in 2014, landed in several screen placements including the film Veronica Mars, and prompted Armbruster to perform the track live on Late Night with Seth Meyers.

Cut in Rochester, the full-length debut How Do You Feel Now?—which expanded the earlier How Do You Feel? EP by seven songs—appeared in spring 2015 on the band’s own Cultco Music imprint through Hollywood Records. KOPPS guested on the international dance-chart success “Tongues,” later reworked by RAC, Big Data, and Giorgio Moroder. The following year they released SWISH, a compilation anchored by the single “Destruction” that gathered a full album’s worth of reinterpretations plus the How Do You Feel Now? B-side “Life in a Bubble I Blew.”

In 2017 Joywave parted ways with bassist Donnelly and opened a fresh album cycle with the title track “Content” from their sophomore LP. Content also spawned charting singles “Doubt” and “It’s a Trip!” Promotional touring peaked in 2018 with a national run supporting Thirty Seconds to Mars, Walk the Moon, and MisterWives; midway through the trek the band dropped the non-album cut “Compromise.” June 2019 brought the first two singles from their third album, “Blastoffff” and “Like a Kennedy,” followed by three more before the LP’s arrival. Possession finally emerged in March 2020, drawing on Carl Sagan’s 1977 Voyager Golden Record and exploring themes of modern distraction and self-preservation. Days after release, the COVID-19 lockdown halted nearly all promotion and touring. Armbruster channeled the ensuing uncertainty into a side project with Sir Sly called Best Frenz and a new Joywave record, previewed in 2021 by the EP Every Window Is a Mirror. The 2022 album Cleanse mixed introspection with measured optimism across a set of hooks that included “Cyn City 2000” and “Buy American.” Touring resumed that year, preserved on the live release Live, which drew from their catalog and spotlighted the enduring fan favorite “Dangerous.”

Best Frenz occupied most of 2023, issuing several singles ahead of the full-length The Mall in August. The next year Joywave returned with “Brain Damage” and a sold-out tour alongside Two Door Cinema Club; the song later appeared on 2024’s Permanent Pleasure. Backed by the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, their fifth album stepped away from high-concept framing to present a direct collection of tracks centered on navigating contemporary life. ~ Neil Z. Yeung