Bad Posture by John Andrews & The Yawns

Throughout his years of traveling, John Andrews has documented his life with his home recordings. His first record, Bit By The Fang, found him living in the amish country of Lancaster, PA. His latest record, Bad Posture finds him waving farewell to Pennsylvania & greeting the wooded hills of Barrington, NH. Sitting on top of one of these hills, coined Mt. Misery, is the colonial era farmhouse John now calls his home. This is where Bad Posture was born.
The songs were written slowly & quietly throughout the winter, usually late at night next to the wood stove for warmth. It was recorded in his barn with the doors ajar, welcoming the springtime. The humble recording gear invites the outside noises in. You can hear the crickets chirping with the occasional truck driving by. The songs themselves lend their hand like slow backwoods Beatles demos covered in a thin blanket of tape hiss. John’s voice lulls us in an earthy calmness as he sits hunched like a scarecrow over the piano.
Andrews’ band, The Yawns, has been crystallized with staples from the New England freak scene; Rachel Neveu & Lukas Goudreault (MMOSS/Soft Eyes) & Joey Schneider. All of who have been playing up in the free country for many years themselves and all of who call the same farmhouse home.
Over the past few years John has played as a session player on records by Woods, Widowspeak, EZTV & Kevin Morby as well as composing & recording with his band Quilt. Yet, the piano compositions on Bad Posture place him as a stand-out voice with this instrument. There are guitar-bands working in a similar territory as Andrews’, yet the focus on keys in many of the songs give the album a different temperament and a unique place amidst his peers. Windmill, Homesick In Heaven & Old News are three of the album cuts that boast this specific sense of multi-instrumentality. They wink at you with a Workingman’s Dead smile. The opener and lead-single, Drivers, showcases an older & wiser Andrews’ coming to terms with a new-found independence, the overdriven guitar echoing his home-state’s slogan, live free or die. “I don’t owe you no more.” Andrews hums.
Bad Posture was mixed with headphones at the foot of Emma Critchett's grave, who lived in the Yawns’ house during the 1800's. The record is an ode to her & all who have lived in this house. It also paints a picture of what it feels like to live in the “free-country” on the precipice of a rapidly changing political climate. Some folks go back to the woods to escape the harsh-realities of contemporary society, for Andrews it seems like he is diving head first into nature’s unknown, searching for love in the tundras of seclusion. When the cities become boring, we hop in our vehicles and drive to those places that are always beaming with newness. Bad Posture contains the anthems that will hold us over til’ we arrive.

- Shane Butler