“Hymn (Part 1)” and “Punk Jazz,” the opening and closing tracks respectively on Joy on Fire’s forthcoming Hymn album, are two of the band’s most joyous and catchy tunes, and are now available online through Procrastination Records, here.  Though shorter in length than JoF’s usual fare, the songs still have an epic quality.  “Hymn” — featured earlier this year by Bob Boilen on his NPR show All Songs Considered — builds to a soaring alto sax solo atop the foundation of bass, drums, and bari sax, all amidst the introduction of an equally soaring supersaturated guitar, doubling the bass chords which initially set the song into motion.

“Punk Jazz” (apologies to Jaco, who got to this title well before we did) reinvents the head / out-head aspect of jazz into something both more dangerous and more dance oriented.  The solo section between the intentionally unbalanced head / out-head framework features some very groovy (djembe) and psych-out (vibratone) percussion work by drummer Chris Olsen.  A video for “Punk Jazz,” filmed and edited by Cody Nenninger of Momentum Printing, can be seen here.

Joy on Fire would like to thank Mat Leffler-Schulman of Mobtown Studios in Baltimore for engineering the Hymn sessions, as well as Zach Herchen and Anna for additional engineering at Princeton University Studios.  And of course, Tommy Hambleton of Procrastination Records for releasing “Hymn (Part 1)” / “Punk Jazz.”