JOURNEYGLO Photo credit: Lexi Muegge Sanchez
Singer-songwriter JOURNEYGLO’s first full-length album, Limp By Your Side, is born from the tension of liminal experiences. That uncomfortable space where we earn self-growth and our beliefs are tested. Her 10-song debut album documents a transitional time when the Dallas, Texas-based artist Gloria Lee shifted from faith-based music into a more secular indie sound with cinematic and ambient textures.
“Each song on this album came from a different pocket of that in-between. Many don’t offer resolve, and that’s intentional,” she says. “I wanted some of them to end mid-thought, mid-feeling without forcing a clean conclusion. They’re an honest pause between what was and what might be. I’ve learned that if we don’t sit with these uncomfortable moments and feelings, we miss something for the next part of our journey.”
JOURNEYGLO is a Korean pastor’s kid who discovered her faith after adolescence, and then embarked on a Christian artist career, releasing five singles to date. Her single, “Communion Proposal,” was featured in Indie Folk Central’s first-ever Christian playlist. Recently, the Limp By Your Side track, “Wave After Wave,” was featured on a thumbnail in NPR’s Tiny Desk Contest newsletter.
When writing the Limp By Your Side songs, JOURNEYGLO found herself asking questions and addressing feelings that didn’t fit tidily into the genre, as she understood it. “I never want to bash Christian music. I honor where it is then, now, and how it has evolved,” she says. “That said, I wanted to explore topics that could be taboo, and I didn’t want to feel boxed in.”
Fittingly, the songs on Limp By Your Side don’t have happy endings. “These songs are like having someone sit with you when you’re in a dark place,” JOURNEYGLO says. She writes cathartically and candidly about painfully complex feelings, and life challenges. Her words are direct, but have a poetic flow without sacrificing emotional candor for a literate flair.
JOURNEYGLO grew up involved in classical performance, and she even earned a pre-college scholarship to Vanderbilt as a clarinetist before choosing a different path. Her well-crafted compositions and haunting melodies exhibit a classical stateliness within an ethereal, and delicately beautiful indie-pop sensibility. The instrumentation is elegantly essential, often favoring her emotive vocals sparsely accompanied by either piano or acoustic guitar. These vulnerable performances are enhanced by moody and moony electro atmospherics.
Limp By Your Side was produced and arranged by well-known Christian music producer Oscar Gamboa with additional production by his brother, Julian. It was tracked at their Dallas studio, JOGS. The recordings themselves conjure a poignant sense of humanity. “I wanted to avoid perfection which ties into the overall theme of limping through life. You don’t have to have it all together to be there for a friend,” she says.
The album is bookended by two voice memos whose unvarnished charm act as a gentle entry and exit into the intimate and magical world JOURNEYGLO has sonically summoned. The first memo, “Sit Right Here Beside Me,” feels like a friend pulling up a chair to comfort you. JOURNEYGLO’s voice floats over nothing but surface noise, pulling you into a realm of hurting while healing.
The dreamy “Wave After Wave” addresses the monotony and uncertainty of waiting for someone. She sings: When you find yourself/Come find me then/But don’t waste my time/Until you understand/‘Cause I’m all in/And I’m falling/Without regret. The song’s jarring, middle hard stop symbolizes breaking the repetition. The middle-of-the-night musing, “1:27 AM,” captures those painful impulses that haunt us at our most vulnerable.
In a gesture of cleverness and comfort, JOURNEYGLO added a voicemail from her grandfather who asks if she received her Easter card. “For me, Easter is a time of life after death—it’s super dark to process it—but in the context of this song, I am saying there is life after this hard time, but I am here right now.” The beat-driven track, “A to Z,” is the sunrise after the dark night. It offers a sense of encouragement and uplifts with its exhilarating dance sensibly.
The album’s final two songs offer an intriguing variation on a theme. “No Good Apart” is an indie-folk faith song with devotional lyrics. She sings: Keep my soul/From wandering I’ve searched the world/Tried to fight/But no desire compares/You are my portion/You are my cup/I have no good apart/From you. The album concludes with “You Actually Like Me” which is the same song as “No Good Apart,” but with different lyrics and performed as a voice memo, replete with birds chirping.
About the album, Gloria tells The Big Takeover, “Over the past few years, I’ve been drawn to photos of liminal spaces — like an empty hallway or a vacant airport terminal. At first glance, they feel unsettling, but I’ve learned that if we don’t linger there, we miss something essential for the next part of the journey. Sometimes life circles us back to those in-betweens, asking us to stay longer than we’d like. This album was born out of that tension. Each song carries a different pocket of the in-between, inviting listeners to pause inside it. Even when it feels uncomfortable, I hope the music gives space to sit in that honest pause.”
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