Joe Wong is the Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist, podcast host (The Trap Set) and composer behind shows including Master of None, Russian Doll, Ugly Delicious, Awkwafina is Nora From Queens and more. He recently shared the lyric video for his first single “Dreams Wash Away,” featuring visuals by Justin Thomas Kay and Dan Didier and live footage from the Joe Wong + Nite Creatures performance at Hollywood Forever Cemetery last fall. Look for Joe Wong + Nite Creatures on the road this October (see dates below) and watch the “Dreams Wash Away” lyric video HERE.
“Dreams Wash Away” is featured in the emotional season finale of Adventure Time creator Pendleton Ward and comedian Duncan Trussell’s recently released and widely-praised Netflix original series The Midnight Gospel, which Wong also composed the score for. The song appears during a heartbreaking and intimate conversation between Trussell and his mother, Deneen Fendig, who was dying from metastatic breast cancer at the time of the recording. Trussell describes “Dreams Wash Away” as “an atomic blast of mystical sonic light!,” which perfectly encapsulates the episode’s themes: ego death and coming to terms with mortality. Hear Trussell and Joe discuss the show and more on a recent episode of his podcast The Trap SetHERE and on The Duncan Trussell Family Hour podcast HERE.
Netflix also recently shared a Titmouse-produced animated video for “Dreams Wash Away” featuring re-contextualized elements from the show with the characters and backgrounds combined in new ways not seen in the show. Watch the animated video for “Dreams Wash Away” here: https://youtu.be/ka-8KJOtFBk.
Wong is set to release his debut full length albumNite Creatureslater this year, produced by Mary Timony (Ex Hex, Helium) who also plays guitar on the album. Most of the songs on Nite Creatures feature a core ensemble: Wong on vocals, drums, bass, guitar and keyboards; Timony on lead guitar and backing vocals; and harpist Mary Lattimore, who recently garnered an avalanche of critical acclaim for the spectral minimalism of her 2018 solo album, Hundreds of Days. The basic tracks were recorded at the secluded Gatos Trail Recording Studio in Joshua Tree, California and the album was mixed by famed, depth-scouring Flaming Lips producer Dave Fridmann. The album's luxurious melodies accompany Wong's deeply personal lyrics, written in the years between his father suffering a stroke in 2010 and his death in 2019. The result is an album that – in the cinematic detail of one of Wong's film scores – explores the intersection of melancholy and joyful surrender.
