Fangirl Friday: Jonas Brothers

Happy Friday! Off the bat, I'm going to come out and say it: this is the longest post I've written. It's about three people who will all get their own separate Fangirl Friday posts inevitably. I have so much to say because these guys have impacted my life so much and for so long. So bear with me.

Warning: I mention my own struggles with depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation.

(L to R) Kevin, Joe, and Nick Jonas

Today's subjects are the Jonas Brothers! This is a long time coming. This is a love I've held for 17 years. I allow myself to ramble on these Fangirl Friday posts, hence why this ended up so long. I apologize for absolutely nothing. I am writing this in the middle of my second Jonas Brothers fixation. I am currently obsessed and I don't mean that lightly. I have been so annoying because I cannot stop talking about them to everyone I know. It's like 2008 all over again.

The Jonas Brothers is a band made up of three brothers:

Kevin Jonas - Lead guitar, backing vocals
Joe Jonas - Lead vocals, rhythm guitar, tambourine
Nick Jonas - Lead vocals, rhythm guitar, keyboards

NOW for the sake of everything, when I have to list them, I list them in birth order. Kevin is the oldest, Joe is the middle child, and Nick is the youngest. They also have a younger brother who is not in the band named Franklin. Franklin will also be getting his own Fangirl Friday because he recently dropped his debut EP and I am obsessed with it. He holds a special place in my heart.

Before I say anything else, let me answer the burning question: which Jonas is my favorite. I am, always have been, and always will be a Joe girl. I WAS a Kevin girl for a few years, but it's complicated and I'll talk about it later on in the post.

As of writing this post in October 2023, the Jonas Brothers are my second most listened to artist on Spotify of all time. They hit the #2 spot due to this fixation, but they have always been hovering around the top 10 because every year I go through a phase where I get nostalgic and listen to Jonas Brothers on loop. It has just been a thing even after the original fixation ended. They are one of my favorite bands.

Disclaimer: I had a very interesting childhood, so a lot of my memories of my early days as a Jonas Brothers fan are weird and jumbled thanks to mental illness. I am TRYING to make sure my timeline is right. That being said, this post will be MOSTLY in chronological order, but some things will be out of order for narrative reasons because some things happened one year that relate to something years later. It's been a jumbled mess and I have loved every minute of it.

Also bonus disclaimer, I see the Jonas Brothers through rose-colored glasses, so everything in this post is 100% biased in their favor and I don't care. I love them with everything in me. I am a diehard fan til the end.

Let's start at the VERY beginning of my personal journey with the Jonas Brothers in 2006. I was watching TV in my parents' room and I saw them perform "Mandy" from their debut album, It's About Time. Don't ask me what show they performed on or when exactly it happened because I have no idea. To this day, I haven't been able to find the performance again. I was 9 years old at the time and I fell head over heels in love with Joe Jonas. At that moment, I decided that was who I wanted to marry when I grew up. Thus began my delusional crush on Joe Jonas, that is still going strong.

I remember something in my brain exploded. I got a surge of energy watching these three guys perform. If you have seen the 2022 Elvis movie, the scene when he's performing and the women are losing their absolute minds was me at nine years old seeing the Jonas Brothers for the first time. But it was internal because I was with my mom and I was scared to annoy or upset her so I held it in, but I didn't hold it in for long.

Joe and his tambourine

If you ask me what was it about 2006, 17-year-old Joe Jonas that I fell in love with I, to this day, say I loved his voice before my brain processed that I thought he was cute. Joe's voice has always been one I enjoy listening to, even all the way back then. What I think is hilarious is that Joe is eight years older than me and it fully plays into my brand of liking older men. I have been attracted to older men since the beginning. It's hilarious because Nick is closer to my age and is so often called the hottest Jonas Brother, but I have only ever had eyes for Joe.

While I fell in love with Joe, I also loved Kevin and Nick. It wouldn't be the Jonas BROTHERS without the other two. However, I never really crushed on them. I guess you can say I friend-zoned them in a  parasocial sense. Those feelings still stand. I cannot see myself ever crushing on Kevin or Nick. I can acknowledge that they are both very attractive, but that's where it starts and ends with them. Joe is the only one for me,

My family had a computer in our living room. On that computer, I began writing my first-ever fanfiction. It was about dating and marrying Joe on Microsoft Word. I was around nine or ten. Let me explain why this is so important to the lore about me as a person. I didn't even know fanfiction was a thing. I just knew that I had such a crush on this guy that I had to write about it. I put my daydreaming down on the computer and my notebooks. I had dabbled in writing fiction for small school assignments, but nothing serious or substantial. That first fanfiction I wrote was what opened the world of writing to me. Had that never happened, I would have never started posting my writing online. I would have never started this blog. I would have never discovered the one thing I am good at if not for Joe Jonas. So thank you, Joseph.

Album cover for It's About Time

I believe I saw the music video for "Mandy" on Yahoo Music or some other video site because YouTube wasn't what it is today. I hadn't heard all of It's About Time until YEARS later, because I was nine and didn't learn how to get the CD or learn about the Jonas Brothers more. However, if you ask me what my favorite songs off the album are, it's a tie between "Mandy" and "Underdog". Those songs are so important to the lore of my love for JB because obviously "Mandy" was the first song I ever heard of theirs, but "Underdog" was the first time I felt seen by music. Part of what made me fall in love with this band was they made music that I felt like they made for me specifically. I know realistically, that is so unlikely because they don't know me. But that is part of the reason they've remained one of my favorite artists for the past 17 years and counting.

If you are interested in a Kinda Review of any of their past albums - or all of them - let me know! I am working on a Kinda Review of The Album that should be coming out in a few weeks if all goes well. I think it would be fun to go back and write about their past albums and talk about how they made me feel when they first came out and how they make me feel now.

So I thought this came out after 2007, but according to Wikipedia, the Jonas Brothers' cover of "Poor Unfortunate Souls" came out in 2006. Makes sense if you've seen the music video because that was between the 2006/2007 hair transition for Joe. I need Disney to put the cover on Spotify. Please, Mr. Iger. You can have my first born. It is one of the best covers of the song and that is the hill I will die on. Then in 2007, they covered "I Wan'na Be Like You (The Monkey Song)" for Disneymania 5. Two of my favorite Disney covers and it is 100% because of the Jonas Brothers.

Album cover for Jonas Brothers

In 2007, things started picking up for the Jonas Brothers. They released their self-titled album under Hollywood Records which is a label under the Disney Company. Disney made sure the world knew about the Jonas Brothers through their various Disney Channel appearances. THIS is the era when I truly became a fangirl for the first time in my life. The fixation truly hit me like a truck. I was obsessed to the point where whenever they had a TV performance, my parents always tried to record it on VHS for me. I don't think any of those VHS tapes still exist because after I watched them, they were reused to record something else.

They appeared in an episode of Hannah Montana and I lost my mind over it. I didn't have cable at home, but every Saturday morning, ABC had ABC Kids and they'd air various Disney Channel shows. I remember watching "Me and Mr. Jonas and Mr. Jonas and Mr. Jonas" for the first time and being HYPED because I was also a big fan of Miley Cyrus at the time and getting to see the Jonas Brothers on her show was so fun. They also gave us "We Got the Party" with the Jonas Brothers which I would play the fanmade lyric video on YouTube over and over again. The studio version with JB isn't on Spotify and I feel like that is a crime, but they do have the version from the Best of Both Worlds concert. Around this time, Nick and Miley were dating and he ended up writing "Lovebug" from A Little Bit Longer about her.

In the summer of 2008, I went to Space Camp - I promise it is not as cool as it sounds, but I loved it anyway. I had to take the bus every morning and on the bus, I met some kids who were also Jonas Brothers fans. I had my very first phone - a little silver flip phone - since I was taking the bus for the first time without my older brother. I remember us calling the Jonas Brothers fan club one day and we all lost our minds over their answering message. I remember having my phone on speaker and we were all trying so hard to listen because it wasn't that loud. I was eleven at the time. I think that is possibly my favorite Jonas Brothers related memory and one of my overall favorite life memories.

Before I completely move on to 2008, I need to talk about "Hold On" from their 2007 self-titled album. That was my favorite Jonas Brothers song up until 2019.

So in the late summer of 2008 - after Space Camp - I started middle school. My middle school experience was one of the worst experiences of my life. I would go as far to say the students in my school were mentally and emotionally abused by the staff and some of the teachers. So my mental health took a dive in 2008. I became depressed and for the first time experienced anxiety. For the first time in my life, I felt suicidal. I was eleven years old. What helped me get through that was "Hold On" by the Jonas Brothers. I had borrowed the album from the library and had a little portable CD player and I would just listen to the song on repeat and cry in my room sometimes. The Jonas Brothers were the first to tell me to keep going and for that reason alone, they will always mean the absolute world to me. I wouldn't still be here if not for them.

"Hold On" was my comfort song up until 2012 when Paul McCartney stole my heart and his Kisses on the Bottom album became my comfort album.

Album cover for A Little Bit Longer

A Little Bit Longer came out in 2008. I was borrowing my Jonas Brothers albums from the library and I'd rip them into iTunes and have my dad or my older brother burn me a CD with random songs. So I was always a little late to listen to the albums unless I got lucky and someone uploaded lyric videos of the songs to YouTube. In my humble opinion, A Little Bit Longer was their best album pre break-up. Maybe it's just the nostalgia I have, but I love that album with my whole heart and I know that track list like the back of my hand. I think it is possibly my most listened to album ever because I used to have it on repeat. It is one of the most important albums of my life because this is around the time when I started realizing how much I loved music and how important it was to my life.

I need to talk about the music video for "Lovebug" because that video has lived rent-free in my head for fifteen years. It's one of my favorite music videos not just from the Jonas Brothers, but in general. If you know me you know I love good music videos and I am a history nerd. I would argue the music video is a period piece short film. It starts with two girls pulling out a photo album that belongs to their grandparents and the rest of the video is recounting the grandparents' love story. The Jonas Brothers are seen as friends of the couple as we see them helping the two move into their first home together. Seeing them in period clothing is one of the reasons I love this video so much. 

Also, lowkey foreshadowed, Joe acting in a period piece, Devotion, in 2022. I need Joe Jonas in more period pieces. His role as Marty Goode was small but lives rent free in my head. Put him in more period clothing, please, and thank you, Hollywood.

Do I have a favorite song off A Little Bit Longer? I don't. It changes often. It definitely has been one of my favorite albums of the past 15 years. At the time of writing this post, I've had "Can't Have You" on repeat for the past 3 hours because it's stuck in my head.

Nick, Joe, Demi Lovato and Kevin on set of Camp Rock

NOW 2008, was an even bigger year for the Jonas Brothers than 2007 when they got picked up by Disney. It was the year Camp Rock came out. I recently just rewatched both Camp Rock films for the first time in over a decade. I might write about them because the first Camp Rock meant so much to me as a teen, but rewatching it now after so long was odd.

Camp Rock is tied to such a specific memory. As mentioned above, my family did not have cable. We had a little antenna box that had like 12 channels. One of them was ABC. I got lucky because they aired Camp Rock on ABC the night after it aired on Disney Channel. The day was June 21, 2008. I had been so excited to watch it after seeing the trailer on TV several times. It was the first time my parents let my brothers and I stay up past our bedtime at home. I was SO excited, we recorded it on VHS and I still have the VHS tape to this day. If you have never watched Camp Rock, it stars Joe Jonas as rockstar, Shane Gray. Kevin and Nick cameo as his band, Connect 3 who are one of my favorite fictional bands.

That night was special not just because I got to watch Camp Rock for the first time. It was also the night I watched the "Burnin' Up" music video for the first time and had my sexual awakening. I mentioned briefly in my Kinda Review of Joe's solo album, Fastlife, that he was my sexual awakening. The short version is I saw the man in white pants, heard the weird breathing thing he does between every line of his first verse and my eleven year old brain short-circuited. I had never felt that before. I didn't even know what that feeling was. I didn't understand what sexual attraction was because I was eleven being raised in a sheltered religious household. I will definitely talk more about it in Joe's Fangirl Friday because there is so much more. It's been 15 years and Joe's white pants still live rent free in my head.

Also the "Burnin' Up" music video is iconic. It has Selena Gomez AND Danny Trejo. A few other icons, but those were the most important to me at the time. I would like to know how Danny Trejo ended up in the video. Also Joe's mustache is iconic and I will not accept criticism at this time. Big Rob, their former security guard did the rap in the song and it's been so fun seeing them bring him out on The Tour - their 2023 tour to promote The Album.

Poster for Jonas Brothers: 3D Concert Experience

When I was a kid, my parents didn't take my brothers and I to the movies as often as we would have liked - it was maybe three times a year if we were lucky. So my older brother and I learned how to pirate movies at a very early age. I say this to say, the third movie I ever pirated was Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience and it was a camera bootleg. This means the quality was already bad on account of a camera recording a cinema screen AND since the movie was in 3D it had the weird red and blue lines which made everything just look bad. I still watched the whole thing but was upset that I couldn't enjoy it as intended. To this day, I have never watched it in full. I've seen clips, but I've never watched it from start to finish as intended. I know it's on Disney+ and I tried watching it at the beginning of this fixation, but I was too hyped - and drunk - that night so I didn't end up getting that far, but I do want to watch it very soon.

In 2008, their first show, Jonas Brothers: Living the Dream premiered on Disney Channel. It was basically a reality show, but the episodes were 6 minutes long. Every episode was narrated by a different brother. I don't remember it ever playing on ABC Kids because all the memories I have of watching it was at my grandma's house on Disney Channel. I love the show so much and I wish Disney+ would put it on so I can rewatch it. It was about them touring and writing music together.

Let me just say that the return of this fixation has me reliving my childhood. Most of the good memories I have from ages 9 to 13 are Jonas Brothers related. I just found out that Disney+ has the 2008 Disney Channel Games which the three of them participated in. I wasn't able to watch it in full so I do plan on binging it this weekend.

I remember in 2008, they performed in my city on their tour. I did not get to go see them because my family could not afford tickets and I was absolutely devastated. I remember that night so vividly because I was crying my eyes out. The Jonas Brothers were just 1.9 miles away from me and I couldn't see them. It still stings a little to this day. I was convinced that if I went and Joe Jonas saw me in the crowd, he would fall instantly in love with me. Keep in mind I was 11 and he was 19. Now looking back as a 26-year-old, I laugh at how delusional I was. However, I can kind of brag that I performed at the same venue a few months earlier because my childhood church used to rent out that arena for their Easter service every year and on Easter of 2008 I danced in front of 9 THOUSAND people. Wild bro. Would never be able to do that now. Child me had guts.

I grew up Christian. Went to church every Sunday. I got my purity ring when I was around twelve, I think. I was wearing my purity ring at the same time the Jonas Brothers were. That added to me being hopelessly in love with Joe because my parents were always like "you're going to marry a good Christian boy" and I was like "yes I am, and his name is Joe Jonas". I think my parents liked that despite making secular music, the Jonas Brothers were also raised Christian and their dad was a pastor. I was trying my BEST to be a good Christian girl for him. As you can see that dream crashed and burned because now I'm a non-binary heathen who has beef with the Christian god.

I've mentioned a few times in this blog that I have two brothers. I am the middle child, like Joe. I have an older brother and a younger brother. They are also fans of the Jonas Brothers. They really didn't have a choice when we were kids because I made them watch Camp Rock and listen to the Jonas Brothers albums so much so they either had to become fans or they were going to lose their minds. My older brother is a Kevin girl. Not because Kevin is the oldest, he was just the one my older brother gravitated toward. My younger brother is a Nick girl for the same reason. The fact that the three of us gravitated to the brothers who matched our birth order is honestly so funny. Because it was not on purpose. We just align with them. We would have had another sibling, who would have been diagnosed Franklin girl whether they liked it or not, but the gods decided that my parents could barely deal with three kids, how were they gonna cope with a fourth. The god giveth and they taketh away that child rightfully so. So we never got our Bonus Jonas. But there is a long list of weird coincidences between my brothers and me and the Jonas Brothers.

We plan to take a sibling trip to see them on their next tour. If all goes well between now and then. I would like us to all get matching shirts OR have us all wear shirts for our respective brothers. We'll see.

Album cover for Lines, Vines and Trying Times

NOW that brings us to 2009. This is when my memories start getting a bit jumbled. Their album, Lines, Vines and Trying Times is my least favorite of their albums. I didn't vibe with it when it first came out and this is when the fixation started dying out. Not completely, but this was the beginning of the end of my original fixation.

Let's talk about their show, Jonas. I know they don't talk very fondly about Jonas in the Chasing Happiness documentary. Which is valid. The show was very much for kids. Kevin and Joe were in their early 20s and Nick was starting his late teens. However, at the time the show was out, I was the target demographic. So I do look back at the show fondly. I was twelve and still obsessed with them. I have fonder memories of season 2, Jonas LA. And I have the Jonas LA soundtrack on my Jonas playlists. I do plan to rewatch it soon and maybe I'll agree with them that it sucked. My memories of it are sentimental. Just for the record, though "L.A. Baby (Where Dreams Are Made Of)" is a top tier Jonas Brothers song and that is the hill I will die on. Fight me.

In 2009, Kevin married his wife, Danielle and that was such a huge milestone. I remember being so damn happy for them. I know their wedding photos were in some magazine because I distinctly remember going to the supermarket with my mom and grabbing one to look at the photos while my mom shopped. When I talk about the Jonas family, no I do not know any of them nor have I ever met them, but I do feel like they're a family I grew up with. The best way I explain it is I feel like they are neighbors who occasionally invited me to parties and family events. I need someone to study parasocial relationships because why do I feel like these people are my extended family?

Jonas Brothers with their parents Denise and Kevin Sr. and younger
brother, Franklin at their Hollywood Walk of Fame Star ceremony

To Denise and Kevin (Sr.) Jonas - also affectionately known as Mama and Papa Jonas - thank you so much for blessing us with your sons. All four of them. Sure this post is about the Jonas Brothers™ but I am also so grateful for Franklin. Sewer Rat will probably be ranked very high on my SpotifyWrapped. It will be getting a Kinda Review and Franklin will be getting his own Fangirl Friday.

As stated above, Lines, Vines and Trying Times is my least favorite album, but I have since found a new appreciation for it. It's not as bad as I remember it being. It's definitely their weakest album, but it's not terrible. My favorite song on the album is "World War III".  Part of the reason it's my least favorite album is it holds the worst Jonas Brothers song in their entire catalog. It is a song I skip every time. I haven't taken it off any playlists because I have hope that maybe someday I'll like the song. What song, you may ask. "Don't Charge Me for the Crime" with Common. As soon as I hear the opening I skip. Maybe it's good, but it's just not my cup of tea, but I hate it. Which sucks, because I do think Common is very talented and his part is decent because he doesn't make anything bad. The part of the song I hate is the Jonas Brothers' verses. IRONIC! I think Joe's voice is great in the song, but I can't get behind the lyrics and the message of the song. I love the Jonas Brothers with my whole heart, but I need to know what was going through their head when they wrote and recorded this song. What was the reason? Don't get me started on three white boys singing "don't charge me for the crime". The song is not it. I'm sorry, guys.

Really quick, can we talk about their appearance in Night at the Museum 2: Battle of the Smithsonian when they played the cherubs. I was not expecting that when I watched the movie for the first time. And I most definitely was not ready for Joe rapping. Joe, I love you with my whole heart but no. Just no.

Joe in Jonas LA

So 2010 and 2011 is when the fixation died out. While we got Jonas LA and the soundtrack, we did not get a new JB album. Which is fine because they released four albums in four years which is insane. Jonas LA permanently lives rent free in my head just because short-haired Joe with glasses hit me like a train. I was not ready. One of my favorite Joe eras.

My memory has notoriously failed me so if I'm wrong, it's fine. I remember 2010/2011 being the era when Joe took off his purity ring. I could be mistaken, but I remember seeing a photo of him without it and I was offended. I had no room to be offended, but I was a dramatic 14 year old who was going through so much and I took it out on poor innocent Joe Jonas who never deserved it. I denounced myself as a Joe girl and began calling myself a Kevin girl. I was starting high school, which was worse than middle school. Both schools were owned by the same company so the emotional and mental abuse kept on. I was still depressed and anxious. Then I started getting bullied. I didn't have friends outside of church, but I quickly learned that those people weren't my real friends. There was also some drama within the church regarding my family that ended in us leaving the church I grew up in. I was overwhelmed and I took it out on the guy who had brought me joy for the past five years. I am so sorry, Joseph.

I was actually mad about the purity ring, but that anger should have lasted like a month maybe. Not four whole years. I was so mad at him for so long that I FORGOT why I was mad at Joe Jonas in the first place. He did not deserve that. I didn't remember why I was mad for so long until a month ago. Again, I am so sorry, Joseph.

NOW just because the overall fixation ended and I was lying to myself that I wasn't still in love with Joe Jonas, it doesn't mean I stopped being a fan of the Jonas Brothers. I was now a Kevin girl. I always had a soft spot for Kevin since the beginning and he has always been my second ranked, even now.

Promotional shot for Nick Jonas and the Administration

I was still keeping up with them because they were still one of my favorite bands. Nick has his side project, Nick Jonas & the Administration which I love so much and I miss. I cannot wait to write about them on Nick's Fangirl Friday. We stan the Administration in this household. I remember looking up every live TV performance on YouTube if I couldn't watch them.

Joe released his solo album, Fastlife, which I did not vibe with when it came out because I was mad at him, but I wrote about it last week and I have a new love for it.

In 2011 or 2012, I came across this Nick fanfiction. Why was I reading a romantic Nick fanfiction that did not feature either of his brothers? I have no idea. But it was related to his performance as Marius Pontmercy in the 2010 25th Anniversary Les Miserables concert. I was lucky that they had the full performance on YouTube and you can FULLY blame Nicholas for me falling in love with musical theater after that. I have so much to say about his musical theater career that I'll save for his Fangirl Friday. But long story short, I am a Nick Jonas stan and I don't care what anyone says. He played or is playing Frankie Valli in what I understand is a proshoot of Jersey Boys on stage and I am so interested and excited. Listen you had my attention as Nick in musical theater again.

In 2012, Kevin and Danielle had their reality show, Married to Jonas. My family finally had cable at this time so I was able to keep up with it religiously, which I did. I don't like reality shows. Married to Jonas is the ONLY one I've watched. And that is 100% because it's Jonas related. I am still upset it got canceled.

I kept up with the songs being released at that time and the live performances, but you did see that there was a little bit of distance between them that wasn't there before. I remember people were calling out the break-up before the break-up actually happened.

Kevin and his wife, Danielle Jonas

I will say I lost my mind when we got to hear Kevin sing in "First Time" because I think before that the only time we got to hear him not singing backing vocals, was in the song he did for their Disney show, Jonas. Even if I wasn't a self-proclaimed Kevin girl at the time. I still would have lost my mind over his vocal solo. Going back to Space Camp in 2008, I remember talking to my friends about how if you listen closely to "Play My Music" from Camp Rock, you can hear Kevin's vocals in the background.

Recently, I listened to an early demo of "When You Look Me in the Eyes" where the lyrics are a little different and Kevin sings most of the song. I want that version to listen to. This is a plea to Kevin: I want to hear you sing more. I know I'm not the only Jonas Brothers fan who wants this. I want a Kevin vocal solo. Please. I would sell my kidney for Kevin's vocals not backing his brothers on the next album. Even if it's only one verse. Make it happen, please.

NOW let's talk about the break-up. The 10th anniversary of the Good Morning America interview where they announced the break-up is coming up. Just like when I watched them for the first time in my parents' room, I also watched their break-up announcement in my parents' room. It was a full-circle moment in the worst ways. I was absolutely devastated. I cried my eyes out. It didn't help that My Chemical Romance broke up a few months before. It was a rough year because two of my favorite bands broke up.

I remember my mom telling me, "don't worry, they'll come back because they're brothers". As someone with two brothers of my own, I knew it was bad. And after watching Chasing Happiness, I learned it was even worse than I thought. They said they weren't even really speaking to each other at the time. Which breaks my heart. I'm super close to my brothers and I really do hope we never let anything take us to the point of not speaking to each other. I need my brothers to get through this hell we call life.

After the break-up I kept up with Kevin and Nick.

Kevin, Danielle and their daughters Alena and Valentina

Got to watch Kevin become a dad. I remember the day Alena was born. I got the Twitter notification at the supermarket. Same supermarket where years before I saw that magazine with Kevin and Danielle's wedding photos. I think I almost cried. Watching Kevin become a dad has been one of my favorite things. He's an adorable dad.

Kept up with Nick's solo career because man is so incredibly talented, it's INSANE! He has too much talent. What is the reason, Nicholas? Please never stop making music. I would die. My favorite songs of his are between "Levels" and "Nervous". BUT ALSO currently my most played song that he's sang is "The Ugly Truth" from UglyDolls. I recently watched it just for him and I think the man has a calling for voice acting in animated movies because his performance as Lou lives forever in my brain as a top tier animated villain. I highly recommend UglyDolls. It's on Netflix.

DNCE (L to R) Jack Lawless, Joe, JinJoo Lee, Cole Whittle

I remember the first time I heard "Cake By the Ocean" by DNCE because I was like "why does that guy sound so familiar?" and it killed me for days because I wasn't using Shazam at the time and all I knew was the lyrics so finally I looked it up and found out it was Joe. I couldn't believe it because it did not sound like the Joe I had fallen in love with years before. He sounded so much better. I don't know what happened but his voice from 2015 forward has been incredible and excuse my French, but it fucks me up everytime. Remember I ALREADY loved his voice. I will talk about his voice on his Fangirl Friday because I have too much to say. But yes I became a fan of DNCE and I kind of "forgave" him. Though there was nothing to forgive him for. I avoided all DNCE music videos and interviews for years because I could deal with his voice but the moment I saw him again I knew I was going to fall in love with him again and I didn't want that. But I did start calling myself a Joe girl again.

Nick and his wife, Priyanka Chopra Jonas

Nick married Priyanka Chopra in 2018 and I was over the moon for him. I cannot stress how deep the parasocial love for these people goes. The Jonas family is like my extended family. As a matter of fact, I love them MORE than my actual extended family. I just have to say that the photo I included above of Nick and Priyanka is one of my favorite photos of them. I am so soft. I love how in love they are.

On February 28, 2019 - my 22nd birthday - the Jonas Brothers announced they were getting back together. I cannot remember if I found out that day or not. They released "Sucker" the next day. I wish I could remember when I found out. I know I screamed about them on Instagram. But I'll be honest, 2019 was a weird year for me mentally. Which I think makes their comeback even better. Because when I needed them most, they came back to me.

Joe and Sophie Turner

Joe married Sophie Turner in May of 2019. I was already a fan of Sophie because of Game of Thrones and the X-Men movies. As a Joe girl, I jokingly posted on Instagram about giving them my blessing. I was so happy for them because as someone who had loved him since I was 9 years old, all I could hope for was for him to fall in love and be happy. My crush on him did not die, but I respect the sanctity of marriage and I know Sophie can kick my ass, so I was staying away from her man. The crush was still there but I wasn't posting my usual unhinged stuff about my celebrity crushes on my socials. But my self-control lasted all of three and a half years.

I will not be discussing what is going on at the time of writing and posting this. I fully believe Joe, Sophie, and their kids deserve all the privacy and respect that absolutely no one is giving them. It is not that hard to mind our business. It's what I hate about celebrity culture.

The Jonas Brothers were back together and touring and I was keeping up with them and loving them just as I had a decade before. They were still one of my favorite bands through the break-up and having them back, kept their spot in my top 10 most listened to artists.

Album cover for Happiness Begins

I absolutely loved Happiness Begins. Eerily "Sucker" just started as I began writing this paragraph. My favorite song on the album without any competition is "Hesitate". As someone who deals with mental issues, the song feels like a hug. It became one of my new comfort songs. As of writing this in October 2023, it is my main comfort song. I am back to Joe Jonas singing my mental state away from devastation. Welcome back, Joseph. I missed you all those years I was being a dumb moody teenager.

I hadn't watched the Chasing Happiness documentary until this past week. I waited four years because emotionally I knew I couldn't handle the doc in 2019 with everything that was going on with me mentally and emotionally. I also just didn't have Amazon Prime until a year ago. And I didn't know about Happiness Continues until after I watched the doc.

If you are a Jonas Brothers fan in any capacity, even if you're just a fan of one of them, I HIGHLY recommend watching Chasing Happiness. I learned so much from that documentary. My love for them was made stronger by the doc. Also learning some new things about them that continue to weirdly mirror my brothers and I. There are too many coincidences. It's weird at this point.

I have had TikTok since 2020 and I have been on Jonas Brothers TikTok ever since. Seeing tour videos, throwback videos and their occasional TikToks has been the norm on my FYP. The joke since 2019 was I am going to end up fixated and obsessed with the Jonas Brothers again. I didn't actually want to repeat the fixation, but TikTok has not helped.

Jonas Brothers with their wives and Kevin's daughters
at their Hollywood Walk of Fame Ceremony

In January 2023, they received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Did I cry when I watched the ceremony because I am insanely proud of these three dudes from Jersey? Yes. Sure, they're talented as hell for no reason, but they also care about their fans so much. That has never changed even as their fame grows. They put their all into their music. Now we wait for them to get their individual stars.

I had been fighting tooth and nail against the return of the Jonas fixation for months before it finally hit and I gave in. In May of 2023, I had my annual listen to the Jonas Brothers on loop for a few months to make my brain happy. It coincidentally was around the time The Album dropped, but I didn't know that. I knew that they had a new album coming out in 2023, but I didn't know it was out already. I didn't end up listening to The Album til September.

BUT BEFORE THAT the fixation hit August 2023. I let my guard down for a second and Joseph hit me with his verse on "Vacation Eyes" live on The Tour. Videos of him performing his first verse live have been affectionately called "Joecation Eyes". I can't explain it and sound normal, but when have I ever been normal about Joe Jonas or the Jonas Brothers. To put it plainly, he does little things in his performance - a hair pull and a growl - that drive all the girlies (me) insane. If you follow me on Tumblr, you may have witnessed the whole struggle of me fighting this fixation all of August.

The crush on Joseph returned so brutally. It hit me like a train, a truck, a bus. I was the girl in Final Destination and the bus was my crush on Joe Jonas. It returned because I was in need of a new celebrity fixation to support my mental state. Paul McCartney's Kisses on the Bottom was not comforting me as it had for the past decade. So the Jonas Brothers came to the rescue, just like they had in 2008. I have had a crappy past few months mentally so I fell back into old habits. The old habit being delsuionally in love with Joe again. Once again, the Jonas Brothers saved my life.

Album cover for The Album

I didn't listen to The Album til September 5th. I already said it earlier in the post, but let me remind you that there will be a Kinda Review of it. Not a single skip on the whole album. Similarly to A Little Bit Longer, I don't have a favorite. It changes every day. Joe's vocals on the album are so truly incredible. I cannot stress that enough. Hearing his live vocals on The Tour take me out every night I go on TikTok and watch a new tour video. I will say a song off the album that is near and dear to my heart is "Little Bird" because now all three Jonas Brothers are dads and they're girl dads.

This song makes me cry every time I listen to it. I started this journey 17 years ago. Nick was 13 years old. Joe was 16. Kevin was 17. They all have late birthdays. Watching them become husbands and then fathers. It makes me emotional.

Nick with his daughter, Malti

It's a blessing that Joe has kept his kids very private because he's already my type. Man has set the blueprint for men I am attracted to, but if I ever see him interact with his kids, I will go into cardiac arrest. My brain will explode. I can barely handle seeing him be an uncle. Seeing him as a dad would be too much for me. I've been avoiding the paparazzi photos of him with his kids like the plague. I have never in my life gotten baby fever because I don't want kids. I get baby daddy fever which is similar, but not. And Joe gave me baby daddy fever the first time I saw him hold Alena and I have had to hit that baby daddy fever back with a stick.

For the record, my crush on Joe Jonas is just a crush. I joke about being delusional in love with him, but I don't actually think I have a shot with Joe.

I am so proud of the Jonas Brothers and I hope they know that. They have come such a long way. These three men mean the absolute world to me. What started as a silly little crush on one of them has sprouted into 17 years of adopting them and their whole family as my extended family. It's in a parasocial way, obviously. But all the Jonases are always welcome to come over to my house for dinner anytime.

Thank you, Kevin. Thank you, Joe. Thank you, Nick. Thank you for the music. Thank you for helping me get through some of the darkest times. Thank you for always being there. I really do hope I get to see you guys one day. I hope to meet you so I can tell you how amazing you are and how much you have truly helped me. I am honored to be on this wild journey. I am honored to be a fan of yours and I will always be a fan. I cannot wait to see what the future holds for you guys. Holding out on The Album winning some Grammys!

If you have survived this whole thing, let me know who's your favorite Jonas Brother. Also let me know if you're interested in me going back to write Kinda Reviews of all their past albums.

If anyone is curious, the final word count is 7.6k words for this whole thing.