Yardsss

"Regarding Yardsss: If you read about it before listening, you'd likely mistake it for a liberal arts master's thesis. Where most bands play "shows," Yardsss puts on "performance case studies" and multimedia installations, including a collection of songs inspired by—not covers of!—avant-garde composer John Cage. All this could be completely obnoxious except for one thing: Yardsss is transcendentally, earth-shatteringly gorgeous. If you can make music like that, you get to call your show a case study.

Yardsss tends toward the dark and droning and bombastic, with heady, swelling orchestrations. Perhaps because human voices appear so rarely and the music is so evocative, it occasionally brings to mind Emeralds' Does It Look Like I'm Here? It doesn't take many listens to understand that Krueger is breaking boundaries not for the sake of being (or seeming) transgressive, but to make sounds that awaken actual feelings—uplifting, inspiring emotions." - Portland Mercury

"On September 11, Portland experimental group Yardsss ∅∀‡ will release their new album, Cultus via Self Group. The album is a trio of extended improvisational pieces that prominently feature drones, dissonance and an ominous aura, bringing to mind the epic and eerie sounds of Godspeed You! Black Emperor or the no wave symphonies of Glenn Branca. It’s at times chaotic, beautiful and overwhelming, and today they’ve shared the lead track from the album, titled “Cultus II.” It’s a pulsing piece of dark psychedelia, underscored by a krautrock pulse, that builds up into something powerful and hypnotic, eventually boiling over into a climactic post-rock roar." - Treble Zine

"Free your mind and your brain cells will follow! WTF – Portland’s Yardsss is the straight up JAM and so is their soon to be released album ∅∀‡ | Cultus. Their improvisational Space Kraut Rock never fucking misses a beat, and that’s why I have their song “Cultus I” on repeat. Listening to their music makes me happy and stoked to be alive!" - Cvlt Nation

"This new album [Granfalloons] from Yardsss is bloody brilliant." - Echoes and Dust

"Granfalloons is a masterfully cohesive listen not for the faint of heart; immerse yourself in chaos and find wabi-sabi in the soothing ferocity of an album straddling shoegaze, electronica and psychedelia as one unifying tone for the present day. Granfalloons will blow your fucking mind." - Echoes And Dust

"The album’s first single “Granfalloons II” is a slow-burning, introspective and shoegazey track consisting of dirge-inspired power chords, soaring backing vocals, swirling electronic and feedback and anthemic hooks paired with Krueger’s earnest and yearning baritone underneath the arena-filling bombast, the song sounds as though it could be a moody, shoegazer-inspired version of Live‘s “I AloneI Alone” — but with an art school sheen." - The Joy of Violent Movement

"Delves into soaring drone noise and melody as cacophony reminiscent of late-80s/early-90s Swans, Emeralds and Popul Vuh." - New Noise Magazine

"I think it’s always interesting that I show bands like Swans and White Suns to people and they wonder how I could get enjoyment out of them, when in reality their sheer excess is what really makes them so enjoyable. The same goes for Yardsss, a band that sounds like a weird mix of Swans, post-rock, and orchestral music. Their upcoming album Granfalloons is going to be super awesome" - Heavy Blog Is Heavy

∅∀‡ = full band
ØØØ = Krist Krueger solo

Official Website: www.yardsss.com
Active Members: Krist Krueger, Paul Michael Schaefer, Robin Levy
Related Artists: Southerly, Healersss, Sndtrkr, Institute for Creative Dying
Related Labels: Self Group Collective, People In A Position To Know Recordings