Story of
the Leaves
"This record is a travelog, a sound map, a time capsule of the journey I’ve had in the past few years, a collection of stories, encounters, and reflections on this voyage."
ALBUM PRESS RELEASE
Following his 2022 debut album The Bridge in The Mountain’s Hands (A Travelog), Haotian returns with the sophomore album Story of the Leaves. This new collection of travelogs transports listeners through cities and townships, days and nights.
Kunming, Mengzi, Jinping, New York, Shanghai, Berlin, Chicago… Moving between places has nourished his creative work. From ring roads to empty freeways, the East Coast to the Rhine River, these places hold different symbolic meanings for him. As he navigates his own life stories while traveling and living in different cities and continents, he observes the encounters and stories along the way, and how the ever-changing surroundings made him reconstruct the relationship between people, time, and space.
With "Story of the Leaves," Haotian’s songwriting involves a blend of ambient pop, indie folk, Chinese folk-inspired music, with sparkles of field recordings, found sounds, and spoken words. His space-poem-inspired, temporal, and visceral lyricism remains a constant, creating an immersive sonic experience for listeners. The album encompasses 9 original songs written over the course of 2020 to 2023, witnessing the transition of solitary bedroom production to dynamic studio collaborations with musicians around the world. Over half of the album features Haotian’s friends and collaborators: instrumentalists, audio engineers, performers he met in New York and Chicago.
"Story of the Leaves" draws inspiration from Haotian's special interdisciplinary project, "Tea Room," which encompasses sound, poetry, installation, and a multi-sensory performance combining tea ceremony and music. As he toured and performed in Chicago and New York, he realized his role as a performer and storyteller. Through these performances, he seeks shared connections between city and nature, Eastern and Western philosophy, sound art and music. By interweaving these dualities into a collective “story,” Haotian celebrates the idea of connection and exchange—artistically, culturally, and geographically. The worlds are not that far apart, and our story unfolds together.
「寻一片落叶。让落叶归根。与自己归依。」
「A Global Sense of Place」
「《Story of the Leaves 叶之故事》创作专辑」
继第一张专辑 「The Bridge in The Mountain’s Hands (A Travelog) 天生桥-游记」再次独立制作 以一叶扁舟出发 寻找自己与广袤世界的连结昆明、蒙自、金平、纽约、上海、柏林、芝加哥…辗转大城市与边境小城的这些经历充分滋养了他的创作。从环城路到冷清公路，东海岸到莱茵河，这些地点对他而言有不同的意义。在这张专辑中，他回忆起在不同城市旅居过的那个自己，遇到的人与事，以及周遭景物的变化再次让他重新审视人们与时间和（自然/城市）空间的关系。
“每到一个新的城市，我总会打开语音备忘录，以观察者的视角去捕捉有趣的瞬间。”在编曲上，这张专辑继续沿用上一张专辑以田野录音激发音乐制作的模式。每个城市的声音碎片也被重新采样进入编曲当中，与氛围、独立流行、诗歌念白、独立民谣、民族音乐这些不同的元素碰撞，迸发出新的火花。具有空间感的诗词与氛围声响为听众创造了沉浸式的声音体验。
这张专辑收录了 2020到2023年期间创作的九首原创歌曲，同时也见证了卧室音乐制作到专业studio录音环境的转变。这次的专辑中，有一半以上的器乐由朋友与合作伙伴参与——其中包括他在纽约和芝加哥结识来自世界各地的艺术家和混音工程师。《Story of the Leaves》的灵感同时来自皓天的跨学科艺术项目《Tea Room》。该项目是融合了声音、诗歌、播客、装置艺术，和结合茶道与音乐的多感官演出。
这两年来，他在纽约和芝加哥陆续举办了不少演出，体会到自己作为表演者和叙事者的双重角色。透过演出，他探索了城市与自然、东西方哲学、声音艺术与音乐之间的联系。将这些看似“对立面”的内容编织成这张专辑的“故事”，更加印证了这张专辑表达的：不仅是自我与环境的联结，亦是跨越艺术形式、地理、文化上的连接与交流的理念。
Songwriting, Composition, Arrangement, Production, Creative Direction: Haotian Wang
Recording: Xiaoyu (Alicia) Li, Peiran Zhao, Haotian Wang
Mix: Blake Sokoloff @Abbey Cat Recordings
Mastering: Micah Simmons
Lyrics Collaboration: Diya Ilinani, Emma Zhang
Featuring Performance/Musicians: Justin Cavazos, Erin Lee, Ruihao Li, Roy Nathanson, Andrew Perz, Jake Sabetta, SG, Haotian Wang, Peiran Zhao
Visual Credits
Album Cover Art: Jeanne Lacasse
Album Liner Notes/Insert Photos: Haotian Wang, Xiaoyu (Alicia)
Promo Photography/Video/Creative Direction: Tangjin Xu, Yuwan Zhang