This feature appears in FLOOD 13: The Tenth Anniversary Issue. You can purchase this deluxe, 252-page commemorative edition—a collectible, coffee-table-style volume in a 12" x 12" format—featuring Gorillaz, Magdalena Bay, Mac DeMarco, Lord Huron, Bootsy Collins, Wolf Alice, and much more here.
BACKSTORY: Joey Bertolino and Braedan Lugue met while both were students at Penn State where they began to make music together, releasing their first LPs Punk Tactics in 2023 and No Hands in 2024
FROM: State College, Pennsylvania
YOU MIGHT KNOW THEM FROM: Their performance of their TikTok hit “Double Jump” on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in 2022, collaborations with Danny Brown and Ayesha Erotica on No Hands, or their growing presence on the summer festival circuit
NOW: The duo are winding down a summer of shows in support of last year’s Hyperyouth LP with a weekend set at Riot Fest
Joey Valence & Brae want to know why the fuck we aren’t dancing anymore. Much like Tyler, the Creator’s latest album, Don’t Tap the Glass, the burgeoning rap duo has embarked on a crusade to bring back dancing and having fun, the way they did at parties and shows growing up. “Honestly, Tyler’s album was our exact message,” Joey explains of the LA titan’s movement-forward concept album, which the duo credits with contributing to “a foundation for what this album could do” with regard to dance-forward hip-hop.
The latest offering from Joey Valence & Brae, last August’s Hyperyouth, yearns for those MGMT-driven house parties that punctuated the late 2000s and early 2010s. While Tyler has found the issue to be a fear of being filmed or turned into a meme, JVB focus more on the ludicrous conflation of maturation with no longer having fun. The tagline for Hyperyouth is simply “a club album about growing up,” interrogating the conflicting pressures of wanting to continue having a good time while facing the reality of getting older. “Our album specifically is telling people, ‘You grow up and you want to mature and not dance anymore, but don’t fucking do that,’” Joey explains.
Joey Valence & Brae / photo by Christian Sarkine
Joey Valence & Brae / photo by Christian Sarkine
“Our album specifically is telling people, ‘You grow up and you want to mature and not dance anymore, but don’t fucking do that.’” — Joey Valence
photo by Christian Sarkine
Overseeing the exploration of aging in Hyperyouth is BMO, the lovable and eccentric robot/gaming console that lives with Finn and Jake in the long-running Cartoon Network classic Adventure Time. While rewatching episodes, Joey had an epiphany: “I was like, ‘What the fuck? This is a perfect explanation for everything,’” he recalls. “Everything that BMO says very much resonated with me.” Reaching out to Cartoon Network and getting last-minute clearance on the samples allowed JVB to use BMO as a Virgil-esque guide throughout Hyperyouth, inserting quotes pondering whether getting older changes the soul, and cheerily talking about finding the light when bad things happen.
JVB claim that these themes haven’t been difficult to write about, despite their aesthetic departure from their previous projects’ less overtly reflective tones. They owe the ease to having seen themselves grow considerably from the release of their first LP in 2023 to now. Joey reminds me that those early singles from Punk Tactics were the first tracks the duo made together: “You’re hearing us evolve in real time.” The duo used that evolution as creative kindling on Hyperyouth, with Brae explaining that one of the key reasons they tackled this concept was “the fact that Joey and I both are growing up, and so is our fan base.” With shows getting larger and their own artistic practice sharpening and expanding, the right pockets have opened up in the music for Hyperyouth to emerge.
Joey Valence and Brae
Central to those pockets is the pop landscape between 2008 and 2013, the core sonic influences that are imbued throughout Hyperyouth. Joey credits Skrillex with being the reason he wanted to make music in the first place, cheekily admitting to being “one of those hipster-ass kids who started listening to dubstep and never stopped.” The producer-emcee pays homage to his biggest influence with a “Bangarang” beat drop on the title track, treating the beat as a defibrillator to send the first large shock of 2011 nostalgia straight to the heart. “It was cool to bring in that dance music influence, especially from that era,” Joey notes.
The rest of Hyperyouth keeps those doses of early 2010s nostalgia coming, a purposeful direction given the focus on danceability and growing up. “We want to make music that’s for the fucking club to make people fucking dance, so we have a lot of influence from that era,” Joey explains. The album is littered with tributes to these years, from calls to replace sucky-ass DJs with Lady Gaga mixes to a banging feature from Rebecca Black—a pop star whose rebrand from her 2010s cultural exile has “just been incredible” to JVB. Brae explains that the choice to bring in Black was driven by the desire to “make it sound hook-y” like the singer-rapper collaborations of the 2000s. “Shoutout Rebecca,” says Brae. “She absolutely killed it.”
photo by Daniel Cavazos
“I never thought I’d have the opportunity to be in music. Ever. I never touched a microphone until five-some years ago, and now here we are on this level.” — Brae
Joey Valence and Brae
Throughout our conversation, Joey and Brae lead with a deep appreciation for the position they’ve found themselves in. This is no real surprise, given the profound gratitude espoused by Brae on “Disco Tomorrow” on a verse he refers to as his “sealed-off kiss to all the JVB fans.” A rambling reflection on how he came to meet Joey and get into this music shit combined with profuse thanks to all the fans, the track offers an intimate look at a musician who has nothing but love in his heart for the work he’s doing and the people who have helped him get here. “I never thought I’d have the opportunity to be in music. Ever,” Brae explains. “I never touched a microphone until five-some years ago, and now here we are on this level.” He also makes sure to give his partner all the flowers he can, emphasizing that Joey’s been grinding for 10-plus years. “I’m so grateful I met [Joey] and fell into it, because I have the opportunity to do it now,” he says.
When asked what they wanted listeners to take away from Hyperyouth, the answer is simple for Joey: “It’s just a genuine piece of art that we made and we really care about.” At the core of the Joey Valence & Brae project is just that: realness. Hyperyouth inspires listeners to dance because JVB genuinely love dancing in the club. That’s why they had multiple free shows across the nation post-release: “We want to give back to our community and give people an opportunity to see us and hear the music and interact with it face-to-face.” Joey Valence & Brae are the hyperyouth, and they want to dance with you. Why? Because they love it, and they want you to love it, too. FL
