Jimmy Diamond releases You Radiate

In the winter of 2021, Jimmy Diamond traveled to Los Angeles to dive into the Invisible Creature Studio with producer Kevin Ratterman (My Morning Jacket, Madrugada, Emma Ruth Rundle). Americana and roots rock from the seventies are fused with influences of contemporary indie rock. Music that along guitar and pedal steel creates a big sound.

Through their mutual tour manager, the members of Jimmy Diamond also became the European touring band of Timothy Showalter's Strand Of Oaks. In Tim, they found a mentor and a biggest fan. As Jimmy Diamond, they stand on their own two feet, but similar DNA flows through their musical bloodstreams. Fans of Jim James, Ray LaMontagne, Richard Swift will certainly appreciate Jimmy Diamond's eccentric sound.

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• 23/03/2023 Trix, Antwerp (release show)

Jimmy Diamond’s sweeping blend of roots rock and americana enshrines fleeting moments like a grand ritual fire. It comes with the territory for Jim Zwinselman, Ruud Gielen and Floris Poessé. Their base of operation isn’t some frenzied metropolis like Amsterdam. The Dutch trio hang their coats and hats amidst the regional beauty of Lemele, Overijssel, where the quietude spells out the gravity of one’s surroundings. The symphony of frogs and crickets at night, the hiss of rustling plantlife in the breeze, the soft rumble of distant tractor engines: in places like this, everything you absorb naturally amplifies tenfold.

Contrary to Jimmy Diamond’s grounded habitat, their genesis is, quite frankly, the stuff of fairy tales. Through their mutual tour manager, the band were handpicked to become Strand Of Oaks’ European touring band. In main songwriter Timothy Showalter, they immediately found a spiritual kin, a mentor and a biggest fan. It was in fact Showalter who unknowingly coined the group’s name during a tour stop at the Montenegro bayside, assigning Zwinselman “a Montenegro name”. “Jimmy Diamond” had a nice ring to it... enough for it to stick around.

When the world suddenly stood still, Jimmy Diamond, a band already accustomed to the vacuum of stillness, wasn’t so easily deterred. The three musicians hired a camping van and embarked on a road trip across Europe, mining experiences along the way as fuel for a fresh inspiration; laughing like children, howling like wolves, sleeping like dogs.

Similarly, You Radiate unfolded like a candid roadmap of nights spent in deserted parking lots, chasing endless horizons on blackened hinterlands and engaging in curt small talk with locals in thrift shops. Jimmy Diamond’s songs summon a humbling reverence for instances many would deem superfluous. It’s evident in the trio’s undeniable chemistry built over time. It allows Jimmy Diamond to sound much bigger than your average quote unquote power trio. Gielen’s canyoning drum salvo’s do more than simply hold down a pulse; they unravel and burrow vast aural landscapes. Poessé’s bass swerves from mediating motorik hum to a melodic balm for Zwinselman’s molten lava-like guitar torrents.

Furthermore, on You Radiate, Zwinselman has unlocked his voice as the band’s chief songwriter, never letting the album's more despair-laden moments stifle the music’s giddy spirit. Lead single “So Do I” is your quintessential nightdrivin’ anthem, marveling at how the little things in life hold intrinsic worth, and how the night becomes a silent companion to meditate on life’s virgin impressions. As Zwinselman’s voice glimmers in frank gratitude, Jimmy Diamond’s music towers in cosmic bliss. “In The Dark” offers reprieve for the introvert who safekeeps vulnerabilities from prying eyes.”The bottom line of the song is that you can show insecurities because no one sees them anyway, so you don't have to be afraid of them,” Zwinselman comments.

The lush, alt-country sparkle of “No Man’s Land” weighs the urge to escape with the need for connection. “Sometimes, you would like to break away from all of society, and move on a bit somewhere on the moor. That everything you love - friends, family, your passion, your lovers... That's ultimately what makes you stay. But sometimes that feeling creeps up that you would like to escape from everything.”

On You Radiate sentiments like redemption, awe and gratitude burst through the gates like your Good Samaritan, snatching the listener from the jaws of defeat. The lovesick title track basks in the wooze of witnessing your better half thrive. The break-of-dawn glimmer of “Let’s Not Get Used To This”, meanwhile, narrates the gut punch of suddenly feeling the absence from long-standing companionship. The climactic “I’m Still Here (In All The Things You See)” pries open the silver linings behind mourning a loved one. “That one is about my grandfather, who passed away the summer before the band traveled to the States. Purely of natural causes, which is of course a sad moment. But what brought me comfort was the fact that he was such a nature person. Before he died, he would still stick around and continue in existing nature. I believe in that a little bit myself. That you are not just gone, but that you stay around and become part of the greenery and the water and the wind.”

Jimmy Diamond’s journey across the US dovetailed in an eventful two-week recording stint at Kevin Ratterman’s Invisible Creature studio in Los Angeles. It was a dream come true, since Ratterman produced many of the members’ favorite records – for example Jim James’s Uniform Distortion and Madrugada’s Chimes of Midnight. With Ratterman acting as the de facto fourth member– filling the melodic space with synth and piano textures – many of that week’s day-to-day affairs freewheeled their way into the recordings. For example, the open-hearted bluster of Queen’s underrated swan song Made In Heaven was often played during ad hoc car rides and errand runs. Though they were not consciously influenced by it, Jimmy Diamond were similarly intent on stretching those brief glints of joy into blissful eternities.

“As stormy weather comes around/It was made in heaven,” one famous song on the aforementioned record proclaimed. It’s hard to fathom a better description for Jimmy Diamond’s spirited debut LP; the power of never taking things for granted never gleamed brighter than in these ten songs.