Sabrea Soundworks’ Independent Artist Spotlight #1: THE GOSPEL OF JOATA

I met JOATA playing softball. We have known each other for a couple of years now, but mostly as competitors and sometimes teammates. I knew he was a musician, but what I didn’t know is the conscientiousness and care he lives his life with as an Artist. Originally from Hartford, Connecticut, just making it from there to living in Santa Monica, California because of music is for him a success.

The interview took place at a local family-owned Thai restaurant, Wirin Thai on Lincoln at Venice, a small square building where the owners welcomed graffiti artists to cover their parking lot walls. We didn’t plan on meeting here, we just ended up there, and somehow that ties into how JOATA lives his life as an Artist. Intentional yet carefree, directional without direction, without a fixed self to protect or defend, in a constant state of being and evolving in life through his art.

For JOATA, a self-described workaholic and marathon runner, music is a reprieve where work becomes play. In that playfulness he is able to connect with his inner child and access a place in himself where he is most free to create.

I sensed a healing effect from the connection with that creative, inner child, a healing that he expresses through his music. On stage, he feels the most vulnerable and the least scared. While so many of us have to repress the love we have in our hearts to protect ourselves energetically, psychically, and emotionally from this modern world, we all need a place where we can express ourselves freely and safely. For JOATA, that is on stage and the connection he makes with an audience of any size.

To him, he feels weird calling people fans. He sees them as people who understand. Something any of us are lucky to have from even our most significant others. Through his art, through that connection with those who understand, he is both open and self-contained, vulnerable and safe, exposed yet free. Even with a ski mask as one of his signature looks, it’s not to hide behind, it’s to expose the stigma of others’ judgements based on the masks we wear in public.

Life is not without irony, and for JOATA, it seems this is where beauty lies. In the contradictory truth, the masked experience beyond the logical where opposites bring balance and the lines that are drawn to separate us, or even the boundaries designed to confine us, are diffused through the music to both free us from societal constructs and unite us. United, curious, and open to one another is how we were in our nature as children, he explains, and that’s what he experiences throughout the creation process from iteration through performance.

The son of a pastor, JOATA describes himself as spiritual rather than religious. While intentionally staying respectful towards religion, the shows for him are like his church. The process for him starts by going deeper into himself when he creates a song. The act of creation for him often begins in isolation and feels it is an exploration into his deeper self that was once repressed through his religious upbringing where he felt he had to become a certain someone that wasn’t exactly him, but someone he was told he was “supposed” to be.

While some may experience a connection outside of themselves in their process of creating music, JOATA draws from that deep-seated reflectiveness writing a song. Through that he is able to discover and determine who he is and who he wants to become, free from the judgements of anyone seeking to judge him. If JOATA believes in any kind of “magic” in the world, it’s the magic of getting to share that true self on stage, and have it be embraced and celebrated both by his audience and by himself.

In the full interview, we get into subjects about what it means to be an Independent Musician, what is needed from music distributors, the importance of creating an artist community – and Sabrea Soundworks will incorporate those learnings in the creation of a toolset they are building to enable Independent Musicians to operate as their own music label. However, my main takeaway from JOATA’s experience of being an Artist is a modern gospel that incorporates spiritual teachings from both the East and the West.

Therefore, we are calling this inaugural episode of Sabrea Soundworks’ Independent Artist Spotlight, “The Gospel of JOATA.” A bit tongue-in-cheek in reference to being the son of a Pentecostal Pastor, it’s clear JOATA has found a way of being at peace while living his dreams, that applies directly to the modern world. While his music is not preachy or anything close to that, the real takeaway is in how JOATA truly lives. JOATA walks his Gospel, and we are honored to hear him talk it out with us.

See the full interview here.

Next for JOATA is a tour to promote his new album, Qué Pasó?. Pre-order now for an April 23 release.

The theme of the tour is around grit and honesty. Purchase tickets here.

He focuses on impact with his music. He doesn’t chase clout, stats nor scores. He wants to, more than anything, inspire other people to follow their dreams. In JOATA chasing his own, I found a certain peace, someone aligned with their soul’s desire, and by listening to him I found a way that we can chase our own dreams with style and grace.