Japanese Breakfast In Concert
Japanese Breakfast was never meant to be a full-time musical project, but Michelle Zauner's fuzzy, dreamy indie pop has captured too many ears and hearts to call it quits. Instead, the Eugene, Oregon-based artist continues to push her solo project into new sonic territory while taking it to stages around the world.
The first thing to know: Zauner is not Japanese. In creating her moniker, she's stated that she wanted to combine something very American (breakfast) with something Americans find exotic (Japanese). She was actually born in Seoul, South Korea, and grew up in Eugene, where she started learning the piano at 5 years old and the guitar at 15.
She then headed to Pennsylvania to study creative writing and film at Bryn Mawr College. It was here that she began turning her musical interests into reality with a solo project called Little Girl, Big Spoon and, in 2011, as frontwoman for the emo band Little Big League.
But already by 2013, Zauner felt creatively uninspired. So, along with friend Rachel Gagliardi, she decided to write, record, and post one song every day for the month of June onto a blog. The result was the 30-track June, featuring 28 originals and two covers (PAWS' "Sore Tummy" and Liz Phair's "Chopsticks").
Around this same time, she put Little Big League on hold and moved back to Oregon to help care for her mother, who had been diagnosed with cancer. In her home state, she found comfort in music, particularly after her mother passed away in 2014. She began writing what would become her lo-fi debut album, Psychopomp. It officially released in April 2016 on Yellow K Records. Soon after, she was signed to indie label Dead Oceans and set out on tour around the U.S., U.K., and Canada.
A little more than a year later, she returned with her sophomore album, Soft Sounds from Another Planet, a more expansive set featuring spacey electronics and crisper indie pop, all topped with Zauner's melancholic beauty. Following the release, she set out for a lengthy world tour, including stops at big festivals like Coachella and Bonnaroo.
