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When I started theJoshWorld in January 2025, it began as a place to document the fascinating mix of things I work on — from music and markets to code and even cooking. It was meant to be a creative record of my life, a sort of open journal where others could follow along with what I build, make, and discover.

The Music Journey So Far

Since that beginning, music has remained at the center of my creative process. My first two albums, Lines, of Falling Ash and Ice Down, Harmonico, were both studio-produced projects that captured the evolving sound of my guitar work — part improvisation, part storytelling. Both are available on Spotify, Apple Music, and other platforms.

In 2025, I released my third full-length album, Edge Lands — a 14-track exploration of texture, tone, and reflection. The tracklist includes:

1. Treading Water
2. It Claims
3. 4 of 9
4. For Today
5. Rusted Metal A Liens
6. Evaporating Up
7. Winter’s Fades
8. Whether How
9. The Same
10. New Days
11. Late, of Night
12. These Years
13. Burning Bright
14. The Edge of the Forest, The Edge of the Sea

This album represents a deeper dive into emotional landscapes and improvised composition, blending ambient guitar layers with structured melodic flow. Each track grew from live performance energy and a desire to build something both cinematic and deeply personal.

⛪ Introducing Chapel Halls — Something New

Alongside my solo work, I’ve been quietly building a side project called Chapel Halls — a Christian music project focused on worship and spiritual connection. The goal is to help people connect to God, the Creator, through music that’s heartfelt, reflective, and worship-centered.

The debut Chapel Halls album is scheduled for release on October 10, 2025, and a single is already available. A good amount of work and intention has gone into it — from songwriting to production — and I’m excited for what it will mean for those who listen.

💡 Beyond Music

Outside of music, I continue to develop creative and technical projects — from software development and finance innovation to culinary experiments.

🌊 Looking Ahead

Whether it’s through music, art, code, or ideas, theJoshWorld is my way of exploring curiosity in public — documenting a life filled with creativity and sharing it with anyone who finds inspiration in it.

As the world of theJoshWorld continues to evolve, Edge Lands marks another step in that journey — one that bridges the personal and the shared, and sets the stage for everything still to come.

I’m excited to share my brand-new album, Ice Down, Harmonico. This project has been in the works for a decent amount of time, and it’s finally ready to meet the world.

The album contains 9 completely new songs — tracks that haven’t been posted to YouTube or shared anywhere else before now. I’ve also decided to post a little less frequently on YouTube going forward, partly because of the ongoing YouTube view subtraction issue I’ve been experiencing. (I’ve written more about that in detail here).

Alongside the new tracks, Ice Down, Harmonico also includes 7 previously released songs that some of you may already know from my YouTube channel. Altogether, the album weaves together both familiar and entirely new works, every song written and produced by me.

You can now listen to the album on Spotify, and it should also be available soon on Apple/iTunes, Amazon, and other major platforms and stores.

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Tracklist

1. Ice Down
2. Glass On Film
3. Time and Day
4. Colors
5. Korea Jima
6. The Rain
7. Try May Be Say
8. In Spanish
9. Broken Stairwells
10. Nor Murk Nor Meadow
11. Blue Light Mountains
12. People Go
13. Fake, to the Bone
14. Like a Blue Gray
15. Cold Foal
16. Nesting Shoals

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Thoughts on the Album

Much of this album is left open to interpretation. The songs are layered with meaning, and in many of them, there are hidden textures and threads woven in — pieces that listeners may catch on the second, third, or tenth listen.

For me, writing and developing this album was a lot of fun. Some songs came out of spontaneous moments, while others grew over time as I added technical elements and subtle production details. Together, they form a body of work that reflects both experimentation and personal storytelling.

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Listen Now

You can listen to Ice Down, Harmonico via the embedded Spotify player below, or by clicking through to the album on your platform of choice:

• Spotify
• Apple/iTunes (coming soon)
• Amazon

I’ve written and produced a song called Korea Jima. As its name suggests, the song references both Korea and Iwo Jima — two places that carry immense historical weight and personal meaning for me.

My grandfather fought in the Korean War, and my great uncle — along with other family members — served during World War II. My great uncle in particular played an important role in several Japanese battles, including Iwo Jima. He worked with heavy machinery to help prepare the beaches, clearing mines and laying the groundwork before troops landed under fire. Stories like his remind me that freedom is never accidental; it is earned through unimaginable sacrifice.

Korea Jima is a reflection on war, family, and memory. The lyrics hint at the brutality of Pearl Harbor, when America was attacked with no warning or alarm, and the conflicts that followed — the Pacific battles and Korea.

Lyrics:

when the sun is shining
the day is gonna be

when the sun is shining
nothings gonna see

Nothing down at the waters edge,
but you, me, and thee

when the sun is shining
the day is gonna be

when the sun is shining
nothings gonna see

Nothing down at the waters edge,
but you, me, and thee

Iwa Jima, Korea
Iwa Jima, Korea
Iwa Jima, Korea

when the sun is shining
the day is gonna be

when the sun is shining
nothings gonna see

when the sun is shining
the day is gonna be

when the sun is shining
nothings gonna see

Iwa Jima, Korea

Iwa Jima, Korea

Sitting back, watching things go by,
Sitting down, hoping all those lies

Sitting back, watching things go by,
Sitting down, hoping all those lies

But it draws, it draws,

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For me, this song isn’t just about remembering history — it’s about the importance of taking action. Life doesn’t wait for us when we sit back, hoping things will work themselves out. My family members, like so many others, didn’t just watch the world go by. They acted, they fought, and some gave their lives so that we could live freely today.

Korea Jima is a reminder: never forget the importance of family, never forget those who sacrificed, and never let their courage fade from memory.

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P.S. I actually created three different versions of this song. I’ve chosen to release one for now, but one day I might share all three. Each version offers its own perspective on the battles, the war, and the way we remember history.

-Josh

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Connect with Me

Follow for more music, art, and updates:

• Twitter/X: @thejoshworld
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• YouTube: @thejoshworldme
• Instagram: @thejoshworld
• Website: thejoshworld.com

Click here to watch Korea Jima

If you’re here just for the special bonus, scroll down to the last section — but I think you’ll want to stick around for these two brand-new tracks from my next album.

After my debut album — a 16-song collection of fully produced studio tracks — I’m excited to share two new songs that will be part of my upcoming 2nd album release. Like all my studio versions, both are built from original pieces I’ve written before, but this time they’ve been reimagined with more technical elements, including enhanced production layers and a touch more electronic texture to expand their sound.

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Glass on Film

This song is being left open to interpretation, though it carries lines that could be read as a nod to persevering through difficult times. It’s layered, dynamic, and one of my favorites from this new chapter in my music.

Lyrics:

the road is marked with nothing like and empty sand of rain
aint not water rock or glass nor fame

the road is marked with nothing like and empty sand of rain
aint not water rock or glass nor fame

Then you get a bit of rain outside
something saying dont demise

Like a piece of glass on film but not

Just saying, when nothing’s left to go,
you ought to ought to know,
it aint always so

Just when there’s nothing left to be
it’s closing time to see
where to go

instrumental

Just saying, when nothing’s left to go,
you ought to ought to know,
it aint always so

Just when there’s nothing left to be
it’s closing time to see
where to go

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Time and Day

Also left up to interpretation, Time and Day carries a reflective, almost cyclical structure in its lyrics. Like Glass on Film, it’s adapted from one of my original works but now comes alive with more intricate arrangement and subtle electronic elements that expand its atmosphere.

Lyrics:

the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day

then you find the road outside
of the lines that make the night

then you find the road outside
of the lines that make the night

then you realize nothing matters
then you realize nothing matters
then you realize nothing matters
then you realize nothing matters

the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day

the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day
the future lays time and day

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The Special Bonus: Martial Flaw

This is something different — a song I wrote around four months ago, when Volodymyr Zelenskyy had enacted martial law to maintain his office in Ukraine. The guitar portion was composed back then, but the lyrics came later. The track is a critique of using martial law as a political tool to manipulate an election — something I don’t believe the world should stand for. Nearly every nation upholds its constitution as the framework for leadership, and breaking that principle undermines trust and governance.

Coincidentally, the timing of this release aligns with the same week Donald Trump deployed the National Guard to Washington, D.C. for extra security. While that’s clearly not the same as exceeding term limits, it does serve as a reminder that leaders everywhere should resist overstepping constitutional boundaries.

Lyrics:

Uk of rain, nothing but the stain, like a bit shame
Your tick of tame, not to speak of pain, nothing but the frame
like the pic of do, nothing but your lieu, sitting in the off
on of what to tice, nothing but your lice sitting with a splice

Martial Flawwwwwwwwwwwww,awwwwwww,awwwwwww
Martial Flawwwwwwwwwwwww,awwwwwww,awwwwwww

Martial Flawwwwwwwwwwwww,awwwwwww,awwwwwww
Martial Flawwwwwwwwwwwww,awwwwwww,awwwwwww

Crane like a bird, nought but a word sitting of the U
wings like duck quacking not of luck peking like the stew
crossing faulty lines, flipping with the crimes, breaking term with times
moving to your back, watching what you lack, better hear you quack

Martial Flawwwwwwwwwwwww,awwwwwww,awwwwwww
Martial Flawwwwwwwwwwwww,awwwwwww,awwwwwww

Martial Flawwwwwwwwwwwww,awwwwwww,awwwwwww
Martial Flawwwwwwwwwwwww,awwwwwww,awwwwwww

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If you’ve been following my music, these tracks represent the ongoing evolution of my sound — rooted in my original writing, now taken further with thoughtful production and experimental layers. Glass on Film and Time and Day will be part of my upcoming 2nd album, while Martial Flaw stands as a timely commentary piece.

-Josh Montague

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Follow me for music, art, and updates:

• Twitter/X: @thejoshworld
• TikTok: @thejoshworldme
• YouTube: @thejoshworldme
• Instagram: @thejoshworld
• Website: thejoshworld.com

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Glass on Film – Click here to listen/watch
Time and Day – Click here to listen/watch
Martial Flaw – Click here to listen/watch

The Thematic Closing of an Album’s Journey

Lyrics:

In the light of the sun lit rays
in the light of what sank for days

In the light of the sun lit rays
in the light of what sank for days

is, the anchor of, your soul

don’t forget from you to me,
the tide and winds will not move thee

In the light of the sun lit rays
in the light of what sank for days

In the light of the sun lit rays
in the light of what sank for days

is, the anchor of, your soul

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Anchor End, feat. FXRN, feels like the natural, perhaps inevitable, final chapter of this journey. It focuses on the moments when something in life has “sunk”—whether that’s a failure, a loss, a betrayal, or simply a season where we’ve been pulled under. Yet, it reminds us that even in those depths, there is something—an “anchor of your soul”—that holds fast. Something that keeps us grounded and keeps us from being swept entirely away by the tide and wind.

The song doesn’t shy away from the imagery of struggle. It embraces the fact that life carries with it sunlit moments and shadowed days. The anchor here is both literal and symbolic: a point of steadiness when the rest is shifting water. It’s a quiet, steady encouragement that survival is possible, that holding on is worth it.

As the thematic close of the album, Anchor End ties together a wide arc of history, emotion, and metaphor—touching each work that came before it:

• Ashes in Rome (The Stone of Rome) – remembering the fall of empires.
• Ruins of Pharaohs in Egypt (Flys will Pharaoh) – history’s grand powers brought low.
• Mishaps of the Hapsburgs (Haps of Icebergs, Mis) – dynasties undone by missteps.
• Nothing but Blackness Between Light and Dark (Between Light & Dark, Places) – the liminal spaces between extremes.
• Our Darkest Days (Those Days) – and the reminder that they are gone.
• The Relentless Motion of Life (Ebb and Flow) – how change itself becomes a force to reckon with.
• What We Cannot Fully Grasp (Non,e) – the cryptic spaces between meaning and mystery.
• Lacks in a Ballroom (What Lacks of Ball, Room) – the absence of what should be there.
• Burning Pastures (Bright Pastures) – the risks of what we think will help.
• The Search for the End (Close, what?) – and the questions we never quite answer.
• Silence and Struggles (Velo, City) – the quiet wrongs that go unchecked.
• A Meadow Fallen Plain with Lime on Yews (Meadow Fallen Plain) – devastation in the midst of beauty.
• Falls of a Maestro (Falls, Maestro) – leadership, questioned.
• A Broken Mast in the Roadway (Middle of the Roadway) – being stranded mid-journey.
• The Space That Should Be (Ocean Meadows) – what it’s like to be denied space.

In this light, Anchor End is more than just a closing track—it’s the final tether in an album that’s navigated ruins, conflicts, betrayals, losses, and silences. Where so many songs in this set focus on what was lost, destroyed, or left incomplete, Anchor End speaks to what remains.

It’s the reminder that while ships may founder and storms may rage, if the anchor holds, the journey is not over.

—Josh Montague

🎧 Click Here to Listen to Anchor End

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𝕏 Twitter: @thejoshworld
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(First Studio Song Featuring Female Vocals)

Velo, City is a track wrapped in a strange stillness—an eerie, almost cinematic quiet that sits just beneath its melody. The lyrics center around “the distant silence” and “nothing’s put to bed”, evoking that uneasy feeling when wrongs are left unspoken, injustices are brushed aside, and truths go unacknowledged.

This is the first of my songs to feature a female vocalist, and her delivery amplifies the track’s haunting atmosphere—mysterious yet deliberate, weaving subtle urgency through the stillness. The song’s tone suggests more than it states, hinting at accountability and trust as values that are too often sacrificed for comfort or convenience.

The imagery of “locking the door and barring the latch” paints the picture of both protection and concealment—a duality mirrored in cities everywhere. Behind the walls and systems meant to uphold rights, shadows still grow. Velo, City plays with this irony—structures meant to defend you, me, all of us—while injustices persist in plain sight.

Highlighted Lyrics:

the distant silence
nothings said
the distant silence
nothings put to bed

lock the door and bar the latch
lock the door and set the catch
lock the door and bar the latch
but, something is, about, to hatch

velocity
reciprocity
is like a friend to be
from yours to me

from ta’s to ta’s*
from ta’s* to tu
from 2 to ti
from me to you

the distant silence
nothings said
the distant silence
nothings put to bed

the distant silence
nothings said
the distant silence
nothings put to bed

and so, you will go

In its title, Velo hints at both speed and a veil—something moving quickly, yet hidden from view. City grounds it in a place where these patterns are most evident: the dense, layered environments where silence and noise coexist, and where what is seen is not always what is true.

This song is a quiet confrontation—a reminder that the things people choose to ignore often speak the loudest. And when “nothing is put to bed,” the unrest remains.

Click here to listen to Velo, City →

🔗 Connect with Me
Website: thejoshworld.com
Twitter (X): @thejoshworld
TikTok: @thejoshworldme
YouTube: @thejoshworldme
NFT Art & Digital Works: thejoshworld.com/nfts

Falls, Maestro is a reminder of the facts of life — the unchangeable truths that shape us.
It nods to the apple in the garden, the apple that dropped for Newton, and the very roots we come from.
These are not moments we can bargain with or undo; they are set pieces in the human story.

Yet here, the “maestro” conducting it all becomes more than just a symbolic figure. Is it the one orchestrating nature’s laws, or is it a stand-in for the teacher, the guide, the one who presents the “truth”? And if so, how much of that truth is to be trusted?

Like a multiple-choice question — True, False, A, B, C, or D? — the song invites us to consider not just the facts before us, but the credibility of the voice that frames them. Even the most authoritative baton can waver, and so the listener is left to weigh not only the lesson, but the one delivering it.

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Lyrics – Falls, Maestro

the apple, the words
your blade the shade

the tree, your spree
your glee, of me

It falls, maestro
it falls maestro
it falls maestro
it falls

the world, it’s round
your words they sound
pierce like steel
it cuts, not kneel

It falls, maestro
it falls maestro
it falls maestro
it falls

🔗 Click here for the Studio Version:
👉 https://youtu.be/NkUh_elfkv8

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*”Space that there
Moments like days
Lime like that

In Meadows*

For meadows, for meadows, for meadows…

Tropeless craze –
Moments like years
Lime sapped yews

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“Meadow Fallen Plain” is the latest in my meadow/pasture-themed works — a continuation of the thread woven through pieces like Bright Pastures and Ocean Meadows. On the surface, it reads like an ode to nature: an observation of landscapes, trees, and the delicate balance they hold. Having visited roughly 70% of the national parks in the U.S., I’ve seen firsthand the beauty and fragility of these places — from vast plains to hidden groves — and I’ve carried those experiences into my writing.

But Meadow Fallen Plain is more than pastoral imagery. In the phrase “lime sapped yews”, there’s a subtle tension: trees that have stood for hundreds of years can be undone in a single moment — by fire, by storm, or by forces far more destructive. The imagery here isn’t far from a nuclear aftermath — a meadow that once held life and movement, now silent, flattened, and changed forever.

The song’s refrains — “Moments like days” and “Moments like years” — capture the strange elasticity of time in such events. A long stretch of peace can end in an instant. A single moment can stretch endlessly in memory. Nature, like life, can be both enduring and heartbreakingly fleeting.

It’s a reminder of stewardship — to protect what we have while we can — but also an acknowledgment of inevitability. Not everything survives, no matter how long it’s stood or how deep its roots reach. In that way, Meadow Fallen Plain is both a love letter to nature and an elegy for it.

-Josh

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🎧 Click here for the Studio Version → https://youtu.be/GfbK7e8rlJ4

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In agriculture, it’s common for farmers to burn grasslands intentionally — a controlled fire that revitalizes the soil, making it more arable for future growth. Yet, that practice comes with risk. A wrong wind, a moment of miscalculation, and the blaze can consume trees, harm livestock, or even destroy the very grain that was meant to be nurtured.

Bright Pastures takes that reality and flips it into a metaphor about human nature — how some people seem almost drawn to disrupting good things. Some do it without thought, others with deliberate intent. Like a fire started in fertile fields, their actions can spread, damaging not only what’s in front of them but everything connected to it.

Interestingly, this track follows my recent release Ocean Meadows. While that song pondered the space we make (or deny) for others, Bright Pastures almost feels like its opposite — a burning meadow finding immediate peace only in its aftermath. I didn’t plan it that way, but the thematic connection revealed itself after the fact.

Lyrics – Bright Pastures

bright pastures
people seem to burn

bright pastures
people seem to burn

the arable, the land that fills
people people seem to yearn

the arable, the land that fills
people people seem to yearn

instrumental

the pock, the flock, the driven nock
people people seem to churn

the pock, the flock, the driven nock
people people seem to churn

bright pastures
people seem to burn

bright pastures
people seem to burn

the butter wings flutter lings
of fowl, fowl, smoke

the butter wings flutter lings
of fowl, fowl, fowl, fowl, fowl, smoke

The song layers rustic imagery over a deeper commentary — a reminder that even in the most fertile, vibrant spaces, there’s always the risk of destruction from within.

🎧 Listen now: Bright Pastures

— Josh Montague

“Ocean Meadows” is one of those songs where the lyrics are deceptively simple, yet quietly loaded with meaning. The imagery itself is a contradiction—there are no meadows in the ocean. Is it satire? Is it a wishful imagining, as if meadows really could exist beneath the waves? Or is it simply a symbolic pairing meant to spark your own interpretation? That’s for you to decide.

What is clear, however, is that there is a “space.” It’s a healthy reminder to make space for others—something the world so often refuses to do, whether in physical, emotional, or even digital realms like social media and YouTube. Sometimes, it’s not strangers who deny space, but family. To me, if anything, the song means that I would make space for you, even when others would not. Perhaps the strange pairing of “ocean” and “meadows” underscores the hypocrisy of the way the world can be—how people and systems refuse what should be basic rights.

I’m reminded of the well-known story about the most prominent religious figure in history, Jesus—how there was no space for his birth at the inn, and he was instead delivered in a stable, placed in a manger. Not to come across as overly religious here, but simply as an analogy: even in a world that should have made room, there wasn’t, and yet a place was still made.

And just as man came into the world nearly lacking space, so might one leave it the same way—the ocean itself making space for ashes carried off into it, as if the ocean of meadows bears a space like a grave.

So whether “Ocean Meadows” makes you picture something real, impossible, or deeply personal, its simplicity holds room for your own meaning. That space is there—if you want it.

—Josh Montague

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Lyrics:

Like the meadows in the ocean
like the meadows in the ocean

there’s a space
there’s a space

Like the meadows in the ocean
like the meadows in the ocean

there’s a space
for your name

(Link to Studio Version)

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