Atlanta, Georgia-based multi-instrumentalist J. Wilms is releasing his third album as a singer/songwriter titled The Fighter. The album was recorded, mixed, and mastered summer of 2023 by Kyle Spence at RJS in Athens, GA, produced by Wilms and Spence. The album arrives on 12” LP vinyl, as a digital download via Bandcamp, and through streaming platforms on Cart/Horse Records on December 8th, 2023.
After a number of years as a session musician in New York, Wilms stepped away from the grind of the city in 2020, during the beginning of the COVID lockdown, and moved back to his hometown of Atlanta. There he returned his focus to stripped-down playing and singing, writing songs that conveyed intentionally direct storytelling.
J. Wilms was joined in Athens, GA’s RJS studios by Nick Robbins on bass and Bo Bedingfield on drums. Guest musicians included Julia Haltigan on vocals on “Born to Die,” “I’ll Start Tomorrow,” and “Stopping on a Dime” and David “Smoota” Smith on trombone on “Props”.
Jeremy “J” Wilms has recorded with artists as diverse as Bebel Gilberto, Beyoncé, TV On The Radio, and many others. Wilms has been a guitarist in the orchestra for MacArthur Fellowship winner Taylor Mac’s 24 Decade History Of Popular Music as well as the bassist on ABC Network’s The Gong Show. He was the arranger and musical director for The Heathens and other acts based at the McKittrick Hotel in Manhattan, home of the “Sleep No More” immersive show.
Wilms arranged strings and brass for songs on Run the Jewels’ RTJ 4 and Tim Fojahn’s I Dreamed a Dream. Wilms is still busy working as a sideman in both NYC and ATL, scoring for film and other media, and teaching. Wilms also releases instrumental music as Jeremy Wilms and is the leader of the Metal/Prog band NOMOTO.
