* JIENAN YUAN 'WE SAW EVERYTHING' - In Stores February 2009
“Yuan’s melancholy pop makes rainy days, messy breakups, and shitty jobs beautiful. “Glint” and “No Lands Man” have soft vocals and delicate guitars that channel the spirit of Bread. “Because SK” and “Walking Between The Lines” are pure atmosphere, with straight-up piano and synthesizer, respectively. Both songs are cinematic, but nothing compared to “Magdalena Avenue.” The final track starts off as a field recording of footsteps, muffled voices, and distant cars, but Yuan’s piano hints at a narrative. The effect is haunting and awesome.”
- GIANT ROBOT
Jienan Yuan releases his debut EP, ‘We Saw Everything’ through “Actually, Records.” on December 9th 2008. ‘We Saw Everything’ is written and produced by Jienan Yuan and was recorded in various locations throughout Chicago between 2000 and 2008.
‘We Saw Everything’ prefaces Yuan’s forthcoming full-length album, ‘Afterglow’, with a concise introduction of his unique musical vision. Reflective and bittersweet, his music glimmers with the fragments of unrequited love and faded memories; an electro-acoustic current of sound over which Yuan’s delicate melodies float and tremble. From the graceful ‘Because SK’, the plaintive ‘No Land’s Man’, to the atmospheric and melancholic ‘Magdalena Avenue’, Yuan’s music inhabits the emotionally fragile and ephemeral space between lifelong regret and uncertain acceptance – a searching affection that resonates throughout the quietly devastating songs on ‘We Saw Everything’.
‘We Saw Everything’ also features two special collaborative works – ‘Glint’, a reworking of a Hope in Ghosts song, with new lyrics and melodies co-written with Jarrod Whittington of The Red Wheelbarrow, and ‘Walking Between the Lines’, which originally appeared in the titular Apple Inc/Cherry Sky Films short, directed by Vincent Tsu (‘Sons of Anarchy’).
Guest appearances on We Saw Everything include contributions from Ted Flynn (Hope in Ghosts), Jarrod Whittington (The Red Wheelbarrow, Captain Exploder), Carly Oishi (Oishi), and Jon Monteverde (XYZR_KX)
JIENAN YUAN – ‘WE SAW EVERYTHING’ EP
Tracklisting:
1. Glint
2. Because SK
3. No Land's Man
4. Walking Between the Lines
5. Magdalena Avenue
* Free OISHI 7" w/ every THE GOLD MEDALISTS Ctdltd order!
As a special bonus with your CD purchase from our distributor Carrot Top Distribution using their Sakistore, you’ll get a free bonus Oishi 7”! Who are Oishi, you ask? None other than the collaboration between Jon Monteverde AKA XYZR_KX and singer/songwriter Carly Oishi. This 7” previews four songs from their forthcoming album, due sometime in 2008! Free Swag = awesome!
