John Andrews & The Yawns

New Jersey multi-instrumentalist John Andrews spent years playing in other groups before launching his own endeavor, John Andrews & the Yawns. Initially the Yawns existed only as a name, since he handled every part himself on the first release. Subsequent records brought in additional players, yet the understated lo-fi sensibility endured, anchored by his hushed singing and understated keyboard lines. The 2015 effort Bit by the Fang and the 2017 release Bad Posture explored hazy indie-pop terrain, whereas Cookbook in 2021 and Love for the Underdog in 2023 leaned more overtly into California soft-rock textures of the 1970s.

Although Andrews focused primarily on his own material, he also supplied drums for Quilt and organ or keyboards for Woods; maintaining membership in both outfits left scant room for solo projects. He began tracking a debut album in 2013 while residing in rural Lancaster, Pennsylvania, amid Amish farmland. Several months later he moved into his grandparents’ vacant New Jersey house and captured the warm, Kinks-tinged roots-pop songs that became Bit by the Fang, issued on Woodsist.

After settling with fellow musicians inside a Colonial farmhouse surrounded by woods in Barrington, New Hampshire, he assembled his next record on site. The sessions involved housemates Rachel Neveu of Mmoss along with Lukas Goudreault and Joey Schneider of Soft Eyes, yielding the rootsier psych-pop of Bad Posture in 2017. Cookbook paid more direct tribute to 1970s soft rock; its opening cut, “New California Blue,” was crafted expressly as a nod to Joni Mitchell. Love for the Underdog, recorded straight to tape across New York State with touring comrades from Cut Worms—Max Clarke, Noah Bond, and Quilt’s Keven Lareau—expanded the late-summer atmosphere by incorporating a string quartet.