Recommended tracks: “Lucy,” “Pink Lady,” “She Wants to Go Dancing”
Artists you night like: The Lumineers, Houndmouth, Caamp
In the wise words of Matt Quinn, “If your feet are here, you might as well dance.”
The lead singer and guitarist for the five piece indie rock/folk band Mt. Joy perfectly and playfully sums up their newest album Hope We Have Fun in one clear sentence. Matt Quinn (vocals, guitar), Sam Cooper (guitar), Jackie Miclau (keys, piano), Sotiris Eliopoulos (drums), and Michael Byrnes (bass) have completed their fourth studio album after three years, two of which were spent on the road playing iconic venues such as Madison Square Garden and Red Rocks Amphitheatre. Their music has seen a surge in popularity, and the band themselves lean on togetherness while learning to navigate transient feelings of immense hope through a free-spirited lens and shadows of doubt.
The Philadelphia native and Los Angeles-based Mt. Joy is known for their unique, rhythmic, soulful style of music, in which you can clearly hear the heartfelt passion behind the voices and instrumentals of each song and easily lose yourself in the sound. Hope We Have Fun is no different. This passion drives their main focus as a group: connection through music. Rather than aiming for commercialized, smash-hit songs, the group has an incredibly down-to-earth demeanor both outwardly and intertwined within their music as a whole. Sharing humanity is what they do best, reaching people through their profound authenticity, lyricism, and musical qualities.
Hope We Have Fun keeps this constant, as a theme throughout the album is embracing and celebrating the nuances of life in any situation. This album excellently uses their original sound in an evolved way, wherein the transformation through immense growth in vulnerability, unity as a band, and overall sound is recognizable. Life on the road with all the unforeseen twists and turns encouraged more reflection for the band members, helping to push creative boundaries and experiment while keeping their lighthearted sense of optimism in tone and in lyrics.
Opening track and single, “More More More,” in classic Mt. Joy fashion features an easing, lighthearted buildup with beautiful acoustic backings, transitioning with the incorporation of heavy keys into an eruptive, electric crescendo encapsulating the freeing feeling of seeing Mt. Joy perform live. This track aims to interpret the feeling of coming home to stillness after months on the road. It poses the necessity of zooming out and realizing how far you’ve already come before asking for more, and only then can you realize how much you have in the palms of your hands.
Another standout on the record, “She Wants to Go Dancing,” was released as a single in October 2024 and has amassed millions of streams. The upbeat, enthused tone of the song matches the lyrics well and communicates a highlighted theme across the whole of the album, which is embracing a moment for what it is while it lasts. “God Loves Weirdos” also connects with this idea, but with some added dimension to the music and the meaning. It’s a breezy, nostalgic, soft rock ballad about taking these moments, that may even be mundane in this case, and making them meaningful. For example, that feeling when you’re so comfortable in love and life that it’s the small things that nobody thinks twice about — like your person calling your name or holding up a funny t-shirt that makes you fall in love all over again — and forever remembering that moment because of the feeling associated with it.
The song that really brings the album together, intertwining themes and doing it beautifully, is “Lucy.” This ballad is musically easy on the ears, featuring upbeat acoustic guitar but with emotional depth and a heartfelt backstory. After learning about a friend’s battle with multiple brain tumors, Mt. Joy was inspired by the way in which this person chose to optimistically and wholeheartedly live their life, even after being told she had a less than favorable prognosis. “Lucy” emphasizes the importance of appreciating life; a life led without fear, all the while knowing that the odds are against them: “I wanna live like Lucy died, living my life wire to wire / Burn up like a star in the northern sky, dreaming only of the light / Dust to dust what becomes of us and will I ever be man enough / To be the woman that she was in life, when she knew she was gonna die.”
Circling back to the theme behind being a free spirit, “Pink Lady” is nothing short of a funky, unpredictable track where the insane keyboard skills by Jackie Miclau really set this song apart from the rest, creating a delightful, no-strings-attached vibe both in sound and lyricism. It’s similar to the upbeat energy that the backing tambourine brings to “Coyote” — they’re both energetic, fun-filled songs that are perfect for a road trip.
Closing off the album, Mt. Joy brings us the title track, “Hope We Have Fun.” A reflective, emotion-evoking end to the album, this song feels like it’s meant to be played around the campfire with all the people you love on the last night of an unforgettable trip. “Hope We Have Fun” unapologetically brings to the table who the members of Mt. Joy are, what they find important to act on, and encapsulates the band’s overall sentiment. The sentiment itself is having relentless positivity and staying hopeful while trying to live the only way you know how given the circumstances: “Whoa I hope we have fun / Chasing what we will become.”
