HYMNS OF KINSHIP
- 1John John Jumped
- 2Farewell Laments
- 3Their Backyard Stare
- 4Mirror In The Hall
- 5Absolving Pain
- 6Your Voice Over Water
- 7Manuscriptures
- 8Southern Haze
- 9Passing Through Blue
- 10A Mnemonist's Life Review
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Open edition
"HYMNS OF KINSHIP" was created in the summer of 2025 inside my home studio. Built on the framework of my family’s country gospel record, In Jesus’ Name, the album reimagines all ten tracks in the same sequence as the original.
The voice guiding the project wasn’t entirely my own. As I confronted both my own trauma and the wounds passed down through blood, the process began to feel less like traditional songwriting and more like sifting through various therapy sessions.
For a month, I shut myself away and generated more than a hundred pieces using everything from granular synthesis to stretched tones and heavy processing inside Reason Studios. I kept the ones that felt honest, the ones that fit with the story I needed to tell.
What remains is my first release as a solo artist: a collection shaped by ambient, drone, minimalism, and experimental sounds. An attempt to translate generational trauma into music and to make sense of what we inherit.
In Jesus’ Name, HYMNS OF KINSHIP, and THE BLOOD WE’VE GIVEN are part of a larger transmedia project that unfolds across music and visual storytelling. Following the creation of these albums in the summer of 2025, I spent the remainder of the year developing THEE HYMNALS, an experimental, found-footage hybrid unfiction horror web series (Oct 1, 2025 – Jan 17, 2026) that explores the trauma, history, and stories contained within the music.
The web series examines my actual family’s history, including the tragic loss of their youngest son, John John, and how it shaped their future. Across thirty episodes and thirty songs, the series functions as an alternate reality game (ARG): viewers can follow the cryptic, Southern Gothic narrative or dig deeper to uncover the connections to the albums themselves.
The story follows me navigating symbolic worlds that represent the traumas of my family, collecting six enigmatic melodies to confront and break a generational curse. In this way, the project is both a personal exploration and a reinterpretation of my history through art. Audience interpretation is encouraged. Viewers can treat it as a surreal, cryptic web series, or engage with the deeper musical and narrative layers.
Watch the series and explore the project here:
TikTok: tiktok.com/@theehymnals
YouTube: youtube.com/@theehymnals
Credits:
Written, Recorded, Mixed and Mastered: Justin Allen Nelms
Album Artwork: Justin Williams
The voice guiding the project wasn’t entirely my own. As I confronted both my own trauma and the wounds passed down through blood, the process began to feel less like traditional songwriting and more like sifting through various therapy sessions.
For a month, I shut myself away and generated more than a hundred pieces using everything from granular synthesis to stretched tones and heavy processing inside Reason Studios. I kept the ones that felt honest, the ones that fit with the story I needed to tell.
What remains is my first release as a solo artist: a collection shaped by ambient, drone, minimalism, and experimental sounds. An attempt to translate generational trauma into music and to make sense of what we inherit.
In Jesus’ Name, HYMNS OF KINSHIP, and THE BLOOD WE’VE GIVEN are part of a larger transmedia project that unfolds across music and visual storytelling. Following the creation of these albums in the summer of 2025, I spent the remainder of the year developing THEE HYMNALS, an experimental, found-footage hybrid unfiction horror web series (Oct 1, 2025 – Jan 17, 2026) that explores the trauma, history, and stories contained within the music.
The web series examines my actual family’s history, including the tragic loss of their youngest son, John John, and how it shaped their future. Across thirty episodes and thirty songs, the series functions as an alternate reality game (ARG): viewers can follow the cryptic, Southern Gothic narrative or dig deeper to uncover the connections to the albums themselves.
The story follows me navigating symbolic worlds that represent the traumas of my family, collecting six enigmatic melodies to confront and break a generational curse. In this way, the project is both a personal exploration and a reinterpretation of my history through art. Audience interpretation is encouraged. Viewers can treat it as a surreal, cryptic web series, or engage with the deeper musical and narrative layers.
Watch the series and explore the project here:
TikTok: tiktok.com/@theehymnals
YouTube: youtube.com/@theehymnals
Credits:
Written, Recorded, Mixed and Mastered: Justin Allen Nelms
Album Artwork: Justin Williams
