[Cover photo credit to Ben Rice]
Portland, Oregon-based artist Joshua Josué works in Chicano Rock and Americana traditions and is inspired by Hermanos Gutiérrez, Los Lobos, and Enrique Bunbury.
Often working with moods to create an air of mystery, Joshua Josué has teamed up with fellow Portland artist Ben Rice for a new track, “Tipping Point,” which we’re very pleased to premier on Wildfire Music + News today. The new song draws inspiration from personal experience but draws on universal themes.
The song quite openly speaks about the impact of drinking too much alcohol on the speaker’s life, and the dark dance the speaker and bottle engage in before going too far. However, the song initially creates a laid back, reflective space in which to consider these wrong turns, dramatizing the internal conflicts that the narrator faces in clear terms. The brightness of the music almost makes the drama seem hypnotizing at first, maybe even fascinating, but that’s not the final outcome. The self-judgement and clarity in the lyrics is striking, and shows that the narrator has reached a full awareness of the power dynamics in this relationship with the bottle. A particularly elegant comparison, where the speaker says that they “turn my world upside down” when the tip the bottle downwards, sums things up well. But there are even bigger stakes to this struggle, since they admit that through the bottle, “The wolf in me comes out.” This makes the conflict even more decisive, as the speaker is poised to transform into someone they really don’t want to be.
One element of the song that really adds to its urgency and message is that the pace and beat pick up in its final choral moments, and Josué and Rice duet as well, raising things to a frenetic pitch. While many people struggle with internal demons, whether its alcoholism, addictions, personality traits they want to counter, and more, this song goes a long way to show just how deep the struggle goes, and how much pain can go along with self-awareness of one’s failures. By articulating this tension and conveying it through music, the artists encourage both empathy for those who are struggling, and for these battles to be taken seriously. They are often far more than just a night of bad decisions, but elements that undermine one’s life and future well-being over time. The song’s self-awareness brings all these human realities home.
Joshua Josué says about the track:
A breakup is never clean, its gut wrenching. It can be one step forward and two steps back especially when you are trying to end the relationship with your most dear and trusted friend, a bottle of booze. Maybe I have reached my critical point of failure, my ‘Tipping Point’… but no, I’ll crack another bottle and regretfully I’m back at it again.
Joshua Josué got his start fronting the band Los Perros Olvidados and going on music tours by motorcycle through Latin America. He has been opening for regional and national acts such as Teddy Thompson and Metalchi in Portland, Oregon and headlining shows on the West Coast of the United States.
Ben Rice is a dedicated guitarist, but has been honing his vocals on his original tunes. In 2023, Ben Rice added horns, vocal harmonies, piano, and organ to his lineup for a larger, more energetic band that he calls Ben Rice & The PDX Hustle.
The most recent songwriting team up by Joshua Josué & Ben Rice is “The Only Way Out“ on Curtis Salgado’s album Fine Me which reached #6 on the U.S. Billboard Top 10 Blues charts in September 2024.
