'Residue' & the righteous rise of Yea-Ming
Stairway to serendipity with Yea-Ming & the Rumours; photographed by Corey Poluk.
The varied landscapes of the Bay Area serve as the home to a constellation of stars. A tight, yet almost infinite, network of inspired peoples that shine like planets reflecting received light beams of radiating solar rays. These galaxies together glow as collectives that hold no trivial, nor arcane, hierarchical system of adherences: but rather friends that work together as fellow collaborators, with each individual championing the success of the other. These local choruses of generous support lifts up the whole of these talents, banding together as a grassroots gathering of united inspired spirits—working in tandem to create communities and an edifying ecology of social, spiritual, spectacular scenes that serve as a refreshing refuge from the almost inescapable regressive dregs of dispiriting civics and systemic rot.
In a hyper local artistic arena where everyone is a leader in their own right, it is a disingenuous fool’s errand to place one creative over another. Yet through observations of the vast East Bay and San Francisco cadres of inspired visionaries, one of the many names that are always one/two degrees away from everybody stands the prolific and influential Oakland-based artist Yea-Ming Chen. Celebrating the release of the recent Yea-Ming & the Rumours album Residue, last year’s lauded Ryli album Come and Get Me, catching the attention of many even beyond the Bay; the artist presents Week in Pop with some kindred kernels of light that point toward horizons of hope amidst the funneling vortex of our mercurial realm.
“Inspirations of late” by Yea-Ming Chen
The Redwoods
I’m always forgetting how lucky we are to live in California and that even if we aren’t living in the forest, the trees are only a hop and skip away. I drove an hour south this week to spend sometime between the bay and the ocean and found myself breathing the fresh air that happens from being amongst tall redwoods dancing with thick fog. My favorite detail is how the redwoods make for a new environment and ecosystem, from the ferns living in the cool shadows, to the deep brown of the dried thin leaves that cover the ground, to the moisture that the green leaves capture, retain and then feed to all those underneath. As a person whose head is so full of noise, I love that the redwoods make me pay attention to these details; watching the ground, hearing the critters and feeling the air.
John Andrews & The Yawns, “Goodbye Dirty Snow”
Recently discovered this song and artist and I have had this song on repeat (I always have one and this is my current). I’ve always been a fan of a simple and melancholy song, tasteful arrangements and gentle touches. The bass walks more than you’d expect, meandering through, but somehow stays playful and never takes over. The lo-fi way in which the drums are recorded feels close in nature, and of course I am captivated by John’s words and voice. I also love the imagery of the words goodbye dirty snow — so simple, yet so unfamiliar to a Californian girl like me—but conjures up so many feelings of change and sadness. At the same time, I discovered the art that John makes which seems to featured on his album covers and animated music videos. I’m always inspired by songwriters that are also visual artists—mostly because I feel like there is a pressure to stick to one art…but artists that have more than one outlet remind me that there are no rules.
Kids and their natural and untainted sense of exploration
This makes me sound so old ha ha, but the innocence of kids just breaks me and heals me and inspires me! When my kid was 4, I watched him paint Spider-Man without a care in the world, not worried about how the stroke of his paintbrush was a bit too harsh (as I squirmed when his brush bristles were being splayed in opposing directions), not concerned that Spider-Man’s lines don’t actually go horizontal, just doing his best to put down onto paper what he loves; and it’s fucking rad. In the same vein, when a young music student is passionate, their curiosity blows me away; the way they listen to music carefully and try to reproduce it before understanding any music theory, the way they keep trying over and over again not thinking about or understanding the time it will take to get there. If people are lucky, their sense of curiosity and exploration don’t get crushed - very few of us are this lucky, but every time I get to witness a child’s free exploration in real time, I remind myself maybe I could get back there, simply by lifting the veil of self-judgement or outside pressure. Just take it off like a blanket when you get too hot and we’ll all be fine!
Joined by fellow Ryli musicians Rob Good (also of The Goods, and recording engineer) and Luke Robbins Eóin Galvin (of Hoxton Mob, Readyville); Residue coats the senses like a concentrated sap of memories that sticks like wheatpasted posters and plastered on photographs to the archival marble walls of consciousness. Other outlets have already taken notice of the artists’ increased expansion of sound in the past two years; upwardly and outwardly scaling the environmental dimensions of their delivery and creative execution. Yea-Ming and cohorts remain true as ever to the intimate and earnest art school outlaw ethic that they all have long since established over an array of foundational albums and singles.
The beautiful and tragic opener "Paper Doll" shines, blooms, blisters, and breaks with those anxious feelings of being uncomfortable in assemblies, crowds, and dismal timelines that you would rather not be a part of. Big guitars echo like giants dreamt up from bedroom chamber bops, transformed into a studio-built colossus that wanders to the furthest extents of the world in pursuit of a simple, and comforting place of solitude. The classic DIY sound from the band is on full perfect pop display with "Cheap Thrill" that inquiries on the authenticity of amorous energies and affection, sparkling with the quaint fancy of fevered 'fifties favorites from the 45 RPM revolutions. A peculiar haunting inhabits the mind and perception of the listener on "Sweet Opiate" that materializes like a faint ghost in the dead of night, resembling the presence and prowess of a headstrong heroine from an Emily Brontë novel.
The pangs of uncertainty ring out on "Waist" that strikes the sublime center of the soul, cutting deeper with "Cold" that continues on with a candid cadence, albeit kicked up into a higher rhythmic gear. The odes to the sacred trios and trinities of popular music are carried forth on "Treasure of Loved Ones" that boosts classic balladry upward into the honey dewed heaven mists that populate the celestial atmospheres of eternal appreciation (and endless solidarity). "Uncommon Dreaming" manifests something better and more beneficial for all involved, as "Fine Afternoon" whisks the listener away to a far away midday place to reckon with the wants and the attachments that no longer serve us (with thoughts to the longings and needs that feel elusive amid the deluge of it all).
Soaring toward points of understanding, places of expressive exchanges and a sense of abode take flight on "Birds Fly Home", to the wishes of what could have been different on "Mistakes" that mulls over shortcomings and all the alternative outcomes that cannot be retroactively revised. Concluding with “Paper Doll (Reprise)”, Yea-Ming & the Rumours bring it all home with an echoing acoustic postlude that wraps up the artists’ cycle that sorts through the morass of disillusionment, discontent, determination, desire, destitution, dreams, personal drive, the detritus that remains in the wake of the past, and all the destinations that may reveal themselves to us whilst traversing the winding and rocky roads ahead.
Residue from Yea-Ming & the Rumours is available now from Dandy Boy Records.