Joy Oladokun

September 22, 2022 at PDT

Sweet Symphony (feat. Chris Stapleton) - Single

1 Trackfalse

May 26, 2020 at PDT

breathe again - Single

1 Trackfalse

April 27, 2023 at PDT

Proof Of Life

Joy Oladokun is a seeker. Her music, which toes the line of a number of genres but treads most closely to warm, rootsy power pop, often scans as diaristic and charts Oladokun’s good-faith attempts to find her own meaningful place in the world, as when she sings she “cried for the innocent a thousand times” on the hopeful but wrenching “Changes” or that she’s just “trying to find a way up when I’m down” on “We’re All Gonna Die.” Guests on the LP include Manchester Orchestra, Mt. Joy, and Maxo Kream, but the standout may be “Sweet Symphony,” a match-made-in-heaven kind of collaboration with Chris Stapleton that offers ample room for both artists to showcase the interplay between their powerhouse voices.

Opener “Keeping the Light On,” with its rhythmic layers of guitars and keys, gives a glimpse of Oladokun’s origin as she sings, “I grew up out in the desert/Where I learned to thrive alone” before encouraging herself and listeners to keep their heads up in the face of struggle. The Noah Kahan collaboration “We’re All Gonna Die” is surprisingly buoyant despite its title, offering a cheerful but grounded reminder that no one ever really has life figured out.

13 Tracks

October 8, 2019 at PDT

Blink Twice - Single

1 Trackfalse

October 17, 2024 at PDT

OBSERVATIONS FROM A CROWDED ROOM

Few artists have as keen an eye for human complexities as Joy Oladokun. The Arizona-born singer-songwriter has shown her incisive side on songs like the 2023 Noah Kahan-featuring Proof of Life favorite “We’re All Gonna Die” and the inspiring 2021 in defense of my own happiness cut “look up,” doing so with compassion and self-awareness. On this outing, which she produced herself, Oladokun turns that sharp intuition inward, pondering her place in a world that feels increasingly inscrutable.

That introspection can sound confused and adrift, like on the breezy but questioning “AM I?,” or determined and purposeful, as on the sweetly defiant “flowers.” “I’D MISS THE BIRDS” feels like a thesis statement for the record, with Oladokun admitting she’d like to ditch the “Proud Boys and their women” and a “world on fire” in favor of peace, quiet, and acceptance in nature. Oladokun wraps the record with “GOODBYE,” a quietly epic ballad with soulful, old-school production and wrenchingly emotional vocals. Spoken-word interludes are sprinkled throughout the album, making for an especially immersive front-to-back listen.

15 Tracks

May 13, 2021 at PDT

Bigger Man - Single

1 Trackfalse

June 27, 2018 at PDT

Sober - Single

1 Trackfalse

May 9, 2024 at PDT

Scared To Start (feat. Joy Oladokun) - Single

1 Trackfalse

May 9, 2022 at PDT

Purple Haze - Single

1 Trackfalse

June 18, 2019 at PDT

sunday - Single

1 Trackfalse

July 16, 2020 at PDT

in defense of my own happiness (the beginnings)

10 Tracks

December 13, 2022 at PST

i get high (feat. Joy Oladokun) - Single

1 Trackfalse

June 3, 2021 at PDT

in defense of my own happiness

It's no surprise Joy Oladokun cites Tracy Chapman as an influence. Armed with a guitar and an achingly beautiful voice, she's cut from the same mold, capable of telling stories with clear-eyed appraisal and unflinching vulnerability. “To see a Black queer woman take the instrument of the standard Americana dude and make it her own and tell her story was maybe the most inspiring thing that could have happened to me,” Oladokun told Apple Music's Ebro Darden in Februrary 2021. Now, in defense of my own happiness, Oladokun's major-label debut, cements her place within a lineage of folk singer-songwriters documenting the complexities of the human experience.

The album opens with “someone that i used to be,” a contemplative ode to growth and evolution that she approaches with a level of gentleness often reserved for others but rarely the self. “Having trouble giving grace to every one of my mistakes,” she admits in the opening verse, only to later find at least a bit of it: “Looking at the face inside the mirror with kinder eyes.” It's this sentiment that underscores the songs here. She's able to muster the strength to be fragile and imperfect, content to not know all the answers—to be a work in progress.

Oscillating between facing inward and outward, Oladokun balances confession with observation, though never losing her sense of mercy for herself and others. Single “Bigger Man,” a wrenching duet with Maren Morris, illuminates the grit and patience required to subsist in the face of inequality. “I've turned sticks and stones to an olive branch, I've made a full house from a shitty hand,” she sings on the anthemic hook, “yet here I am, still gotta be bigger than the bigger man.” Oladokun is measured in her singing; she opts, instead, to let her lyrics do much of the emoting. But in moments when she does open up her voice—on songs like “if you got a problem” and “jordan”—the versatility of her artistry is made plain as the vocal traditions of gospel and soul come into dialogue with her Americana and folk. It culminates on the string ballad “breathe again,” as she prays for respite from the world and for the “faith to bend.” As much a monument to her experiences as a declaration of release from them, in defense of my own happiness musically reveals Oladokun as both the root and the branch, but it's the permission she grants herself to grow freely (and, by extension, her listeners as well) that is ultimately transcendent.

14 Tracks

October 12, 2023 at PDT

Proof Of Life (Deluxe)

21 Tracks

April 29, 2017 at PDT

No Turning Back - Single

1 Trackfalse

September 28, 2023 at PDT

Sweet Symphony (Living Proof Version) [feat. Chris Stapleton] - Single

1 Trackfalse

May 13, 2021 at PDT

Bigger Man - Single

1 Trackfalse

October 12, 2023 at PDT

Proof Of Life (Deluxe)

Joy Oladokun is a seeker. Her music, which toes the line of a number of genres but treads most closely to warm, rootsy power pop, often scans as diaristic and charts Oladokun’s good-faith attempts to find her own meaningful place in the world, as when she sings she “cried for the innocent a thousand times” on the hopeful but wrenching “Changes” or that she’s just “trying to find a way up when I’m down” on “We’re All Gonna Die.” Guests on the LP include Manchester Orchestra, Mt. Joy, and Maxo Kream, but the standout may be “Sweet Symphony,” a match-made-in-heaven kind of collaboration with Chris Stapleton that offers ample room for both artists to showcase the interplay between their powerhouse voices.

Opener “Keeping the Light On,” with its rhythmic layers of guitars and keys, gives a glimpse of Oladokun’s origin as she sings, “I grew up out in the desert/Where I learned to thrive alone” before encouraging herself and listeners to keep their heads up in the face of struggle. The Noah Kahan collaboration “We’re All Gonna Die” is surprisingly buoyant despite its title, offering a cheerful but grounded reminder that no one ever really has life figured out.

21 Tracks

November 5, 2020 at PST

look up - Single

1 Trackfalse

May 12, 2020 at PDT

bad blood - Single

1 Trackfalse

April 28, 2016 at PDT

Carry

10 Tracks

December 9, 2020 at PST

My Girl - Single

1 Trackfalse

April 4, 2019 at PDT

Blame - Single

1 Trackfalse

February 24, 2022 at PST

Fortune Favors The Bold (feat. Tim Gent) - Single

1 Trackfalse