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"an architect of recollection" Exclaim!
"warm, wistful, and quaint all at once" HYPEBEAST
"'contemplative and comforting" NPR
"His voice lilts with every syllable, making the imagery feel crushing and poignant" Pitchfork
Montreal artist and songwriter Jonah Yano announces his new album Jonah Yano & The Heavy Loop due October 4th. Coinciding with the album news, he shares two new songs, the previously-unheard “Romance ESL,” as well as releasing his momentous album closer “The Heavy Loop." Both songs, and his new album as a whole, signal an experimental new chapter in Yano’s creative trajectory and his first time working hand-in-hand with his band, Christopher Edmonson, Benjamin Maclean, Leighton Harrell, Felix Fox-Pappas and Raiden Louie. Together, they’ve crafted a collaborative album with Jonah at the helm, that melds free sound, rock, R&B and jazz traditions into a panoramic view of the experience of making an album.
Yano is a soulful, genre-agnostic talent, always shifting the unstable ground his songs rest on, revising it, making it anew. Having emigrated to Vancouver from Hiroshima at the age of four, much of Yano’s approach to music is influenced by his own fractured identity as a member of the Japanese-Canadian diaspora, as well as his larger interest in memory, family histories, and the nuances of interpersonal relationships. The result is a soundtrack that defies easy genre categorization and captures the grey area in which we can find the most fruitful experiences life has to teach us while also highlighting Jonah’s expert musical compositional skills. Yano’s band – composed of Raiden Louie (Drums), Chris Edmondson (Saxophone, Clarinet, Synthesizer), Benja (Guitar), Leighton Harrell (Bass) and Felix Fox-Pappas (Piano, Rhodes) -- first came together to record his 2023 single "concentrate" with Clairo. Now, Yano sits front and center playing the role of conductor as he guides the gentle haze of his musical soundscape into a new ever-evolving world with a steady hand.
Jonah Yano has made songwriting contributions to fellow Canadians Charlotte Day Wilson’s Cyan Blue and Mustafa’s forthcoming album Dunya. In 2023, Jonah released his sophomore album portrait of a dog, co-produced alongside BADBADNOTGOOD and received critical acclaim from outlets like RANGE, Pitchfork, and Exclaim!. He was twice-nominated for the SOCAN Songwriting Prize, drawing the attention of Gilles Peterson, Benji B and the late Virgil Abloh. He’s played the Montreal International jazz Festival, the EFG London Jazz Festival and toured Japan for ten solo shows in 2023. Earlier this year, he released the little italy demos, a three-song collaborative tape with his neighbor in Montreal, Le Ren.
"an architect of recollection" - Exclaim!
"warm, wistful, and quaint all at once" - HYPEBEAST
"'60s soulful voice that has hints of Smokey Robinson" - NPR
"His voice lilts with every syllable, making the imagery feel crushing and poignant" - Pitchfork
Montreal’s Jonah Yano shares a new single today titled “concentrate." The new song bookends a year that he kicked off with the release of his critically-acclaimed sophomore album portrait of a dog, which was co-produced alongside frequent collaborators BADBADNOTGOOD.
Jonah recorded “concentrate” with his live band (Christopher Edmondson, Benjamin Maclean, Leighton Harrell, Felix Fox-Pappas, and Raiden Louie), the first time they have all recorded a song together in-studio after first coming together to support Clairo on tour in the UK in 2022. The song also includes guest contributions from Clairo herself on clarinet and backup vocals. Fittingly placed to cap off the year, “concentrate” is a song about beginnings, and it also marks the beginning of a confident step into a new musical direction for Jonah Yano, having worked alongside the likes of Mustafa and BADBADNOTGOOD.
In addition to the single, Jonah will embark on his European tour dates later this week. The tour includes a stop at the Pitchfork Music Festival Paris, where Jonah will share the stage with acts like Youth Lagoon, Weyes Blood, Crumb, and more. Tickets can be found here.
This is Jonah’s first solo release since his sophomore album portrait of a dog, which was released earlier this year and received critical acclaim from outlets like RANGE, Pitchfork, and Exclaim!. Jonah also performed several of the album’s standout songs live for CBC’s The Intro in April.
Read more about the release on Sterogum.
See his upcoming European live dates below and stay tuned for more from Jonah Yano in 2024.
Tour Dates
11/9 - Bruges, Belgium @ Cactus Club
11/10 - Paris, France @ Pitchfork Festival Paris
11/12 - London, England @ Jazz Cafe
11/15 - Istanbul, Turkey @ Zorlu PSM
In anticipation of his sophomore album out later this month, Jonah Yano shares his new single for "song about the family house." The album, Portrait of a Dog, is entirely co-produced with BADBADNOTGOOD and is out January 27th. The song sparks a fuse of familial memories, in a celebratory ode to his grandparents and the memories shared at their home in Vancouver. The themes of family and memory are central to Jonah's work, which he recently detailed in his cover story for RANGE's Winter 22/23 print issue.
'Song about the family house' is an amulet of the things we archive amongst ourselves as a family, the stories we tell at dinner, the knots of trauma passed down to untie, the details of family life that could only ever be understood by us, not because they are complicated to understand, but because they would never matter to anyone else, and in that public irrelevance, we privately celebrate each other."
Jonah's new offering arrives on the heels of his RANGE's winter print cover story and stint supporting Clairo for the last leg of her North American and the entirety of her European tour dates, which wrapped up last November. He also closed the live run with a headline show of his own at Servant Jazz Quarters in London.
Portrait of a Dog includes the previously-released singles "Leslianne," "always," "the speed of sound!," and "portrait of a dog," which is at the confluence of his love of folk and jazz music. It’s a focused departure from Yano’s previous recordings – establishing a clear sonic identity throughout the album’s 12 songs to weave together two complementary narrative threads of a family archive and exploration of the family dynamics in the Japanese-Canadian household he grew up in, and a deeply personal recollection of a fading relationship. Beyond the co-production of BADBADNOTGOOD, Portrait of a Dog features additional guest work from Slauson Malone, Sea Oleena, with string arrangements by Eliza Niemi, Leland Whitty, and Yano himself. Yano's forthcoming second album follows his stint supporting Clairo for the last leg of her North American tour and the entirety of her European tour dates, which wrapped up last November. He also closed the live run with a headline show of his own at Servant Jazz Quarters in London.
Hiroshima-born, Montreal-based singer-songwriter Jonah Yano shares his new single and video "portrait of a dog," the title track of his forthcoming sophomore album entirely co-produced with BADBADNOTGOOD, out January 27th. The new offering arrives on the heels of Yano's stint supporting Clairo for the last leg of her North American and the entirety of her European tour dates, which wrapped up last month. He also closed the live run with a headline show of his own at Servant Jazz Quarters in London. "portrait of a dog" is a sweeping arrangement that finds Jonah gliding over keys and guitar with heartfelt vocals before the song swells into a winding guitar solo, and is accompanied by a video co-directed by Erin O'Connor, Matisse A-M and Kostadin Kolev.
Speaking on the continued theme of the visuals he's released so far, Yano says "'portrait of a dog' is a video that, like the most recent video for the song ‘always’, is made up of uninterrupted, continuous, and static shots. The thinking behind the monotonous visual information in these new videos comes from a disinterest in the ever-increasing over-saturation and pace of digital media surrounding musicians that is furthering the divide between musicians-as-artists and musicians-as-commodity."
The collaborators, Erin O’Connor, Matisse A-M, and Kostadin Kolev ('portrait of a dog'), and Nik Arthur and David May ('always'), were the directors and producers of these videos because I feel they understand why it might be interesting (and surprisingly challenging) to try and make a music video that did not grab and attempt to retain the attention of a viewer through brightly colored sets and a large amount of cutting back and forth between an array of visually stimulating shots. In trying to subtract most of the elements that exist in the average music video we found it crucial that the idea for the video at its core had to be strong enough to stand on its own for 5 straight minutes – to get the idea across without making a pointless video."
"portrait of a dog includes the previously-released singles "leslianne," "always," and "the speed of sound!," which is at the confluence of his love of folk and jazz music.
It’s a focused departure from Yano’s previous recordings – establishing a clear sonic identity throughout the album’s 12 songs to weave together two complementary narrative threads of a family archive and exploration of the family dynamics in the Japanese-Canadian household he grew up in, and a deeply personal recollection of a fading relationship. Beyond the co-production of BADBADNOTGOOD, "portrait of a dog" features additional guest work from Slauson Malone, Sea Oleena, with string arrangements by Eliza Niemi, Leland Whitty, and Yano himself. Yano's forthcoming second album follows his cover of Jessica Pratt’s "This Time Around" and his highly acclaimed 2020 debut LP souvenir, which he spoke about with Lulu Garcia-Navarro on NPR's Weekend Edition.
Hiroshima-born, Montreal-based singer-songwriter Jonah Yano shares his new single "leslianne." The track is his second offering from his forthcoming sophomore album Portrait of a Dog, which is entirely produced alongside BADBADNOTGOOD, out January 27th via Innovative Leisure. From the very start of its rapid run time of just under two minutes, "leslianne" lays out a spacious, intricate tapestry of keys and strings for Jonah's soft story of a girl finding her way home.
For the past month, Yano has been supporting Clairo for the last leg of her North American and the entirety of her European tour dates. Yano has two more dates opening for Clairo in London before he closes the live run with a headline show of his own at Servant Jazz Quarters in London this Wednesday.
portrait of a dog includes the previously-released singles "always", which arrived with a video shot on location in Five Islands, Nova Scotia, and "the speed of sound!," which is at the confluence of his love of folk and jazz music. The 12-track project is an exploration of themes present throughout most of Yano’s catalog – identity as a part of the Japanese-Canadian diaspora, contemplation of different family dynamics, and the intricacies of interpersonal relationships.
It’s a focused departure from Yano’s previous recordings – establishing a clear sonic identity throughout the album’s 12 songs to weave together two complementary narrative threads of a family homage and archive, and a deeply personal recollection of a fading relationship. Beyond the co-production of BADBADNOTGOOD, portrait of a dog features additional guest work from Slauson Malone, Sea Oleena, with string arrangements by Eliza Niemi, Leland Whitty, and Yano himself.