BACKSTAGE WITH JOYWAVE

If K-pop was the last thing you expected to find in a backstage interview with Joywave, trust me, you aren’t alone.

When I sat down with Daniel Armbruster, Joseph (Joey) Morinelli, and Paul Brenner (collectively known as indie-pop rockers Joywave) during their recent Permanent Pleasure Tour supporting the album of the same name, I was prepared to talk about almost anything else. However, the moment I mentioned I also write for KPOPWORLD, I was blindsided by Armbruster (quite literally) jumping at the opportunity to finally have someone to talk to about his recent watching of Pop Star Academy: KATSEYE.

That sort of curveball was a perfect way to begin my short time with a group of guys who have never shied away from loving what they love and doing what they want. Though Joywave may not be Taylor Swift-level famous, they’ve been around nearly as long, and their fanbase is just as ride-or-die. Their 2013 collaboration with Big Data, “Dangerous,” is something of a sleeper agent activation code, as nearly everyone who claims to have never heard of the band immediately lights up with recognition once I show them the song’s thick, bassy intro.

The latest entry in their discography, Permanent Pleasure, serves as a full-circle moment for the group in more than a few ways. While 2022’s Cleanse was meticulously constructed and assembled from the ground-up, Permanent Pleasure sees the group exploring a similarly shape-shifting sound as their first record from a decade prior.

“There's different philosophies between records,” said Armbruster. “I think that our first record is very all over, and it's like, here's this genre, here's this genre, here's this genre. It was interesting because at the time the record came out, people were not listening to everything as a playlist. So some of the old-head bloggers who were reviewing our record were like, ‘this band doesn't know what they're trying to do’ and ‘this isn't cohesive like a Coldplay album, so it's not good.’ They didn't understand it."

"And now, 10 years later, it's like everyone is celebrated for making a genre-less album that's jumping from thing to thing because that's how people listen to music now.”

It’s a return to home of sorts, but this time with greater experience as producers, songwriters, and a vision that involves, as Arbuster put it, intentionally asking themselves how many layers of things they could tie together — down to a giant rotating cat on stage.

Perhaps more intriguing, though, is how the album returns the group home thematically as well. The album begins and ends with soundbites directly alluding to Rochester, New York, the group’s hometown. Though the group has been through the same love/hate cycle many people experience with their hometowns, they now appreciate the role of the city in their story.

Of course, this is still Joywave we’re talking about here. Nostalgia is cool, but so is trolling Ticketmaster with one of the wildest seat upgrades I’ve ever heard of. “[Promoters] can sell balcony access, but only I can sell two seats on stage.” Armbruster laughed, explaining the idea behind “The Billionaires Club.”

“Now have we sold one? No, but that's not the point. The point is I get to offer those seats and no one else does. So we have fun. You can point the mirror back at the system, point out the absurdity, and have fun that way.”

Then there’s the group’s equally unconventional take on social media. “We're not a big social media band,” said Arbuster. “Like if you add up how many people are coming to the shows on this tour, you will end up at roughly the same number of followers that we have. A lot of people who like this band are just opting out of that social media experience.”

When asked if not knowing their true audience size bothered them, the response was an emphatic no. “I think they get to operate outside of the algorithms and not be sorted by the automation machine. That's great! That's amazing!”

Armbruster emphasized the point has always been to connect rather than to promote. “The thing that we're finding is that the people who love our band are more engaged than ever and love being part of it more than ever. The greatest thing to me is actually people finding each other, not finding us. Like, they're at the show and they look over to the person next to them and they go, ‘Oh, you feel this line of this song? You feel this way also?’ And they leave the concert together and keep in touch and they feel less alone in the world, which I think is like the most beautiful part.”

Turns out, when you create music that resonates on a deeply human level, you don’t need a choreographed TikTok challenge — you just need to be yourself and trust the process. And as Armbruster pointed out, sometimes yourself is embracing levity and silliness.

“Sometimes [other bands] will express to me, like, ‘I wish that I could joke around, but people think I'm a serious guy.' I'm like, ‘You can! You can be yourself.’ I do wish more people would entertain themselves and thereby entertain the audience.”

Morinelli and Brenner laughed along, with the latter pointing to Armbruster. “Sometimes he'll have something, a bit, that he didn't tell me about and he'll deliver it on stage. And I'll laugh.”

To Joywave, emotion is more than sadness, grief, or distress. While there’s certainly a place for seriousness, too many bands are afraid of getting sorted into the jokey "Weird Al" box if they even show a bit of levity. 

“If you are doing your job as an artist, you are exploring all sides of human emotion,” Armbruster said. “And if you are a person who doesn't experience humor, something is wrong with you.”

I can personally attest to how entertaining it is to see a band genuinely having fun onstage. Their set later that night was the best performance by any band I saw in 2024, and it had nothing to do with pyrotechnics or overly fancy gimmicks; it was because this was a band whose core philosophy is about never shying away from what makes them happy. Whether it comes from baseball, the latest Apple TV+ original series, Lord of the Rings, or even a Netflix special about a controversial K-pop competition show, Joywave has no problem exploring emotion from all sides. From genuine enthusiasm about comic books to the cheer that erupted when I asked them to sign a Magic: The Gathering card for my personal collection, they were all-in.