History
March, 1987 - Jasper is born in Vancouver, Canada, the middle of four kids.
Summer, 1999 - Jasper attends a fine art camp and meets kids who play music. He leaves inspired and asks his Dad to buy him an electric bass.
2000 - Jasper forms his first band, Luckin Fuxury, with three of his friends. They exclusively play punk covers of their favourite songs. They write no orginal material. They do not perform publicly. During this period Jasper begins to write songs privately at home.
2003 - Jasper gets his first guitar, continues to write.
2004 - Jasper gets his first job working at a drug store. He spends his first cheque on a Tascam 4-track portastudio and starts recording music.
2005 - Jasper starts University to study Literature and History. He finds himself uninspired and unhappy. He continues to write and record.
2007 - Jasper drops out and goes to Europe. Before leaving he compiles a collection of songs, makes 250 CDs, builds a stage in his back yard with his dad, calls up Luckin Fuxury, and hosts an album release show. The show lasts about a half hour. The band runs out of material and begins to repeat songs. Thankfully, the police arrive and shut them down.
2007 - Three days later Jasper boards a one-way flight to Paris and commences on a backpacking trip that spans ten months, fifteen countries, and three continents. During this time he continues to write songs.
2008 - While sitting on the ground in a park in Amsterdam under the influence of psilocybin with his friend Zoe, Jasper commits himself to music. He returns home and immediately begins writing, recording, and performing in earnest.
2009 - Jasper meets Mark. Mark contributes banjo, lap steel, and bass to Jasper's music. Jasper also meets Stephanie who contributes violin. Later that year Jasper runs into his camp friend Graham at a Shell gas station. Jasper invites Graham to drum on his first album, Graham agrees and one month later Jasper, Graham, Mark and Stephanie record Jasper's debut album, Every Day and All at Once, at Vertical Studios with producer Tom Dobrzanski. They begin performing under the name Kiddo.
Summer 2009 - While killing time in Downtown Vancouver, Jasper walks into a bar and meets John, who is playing the bar's piano. Jasper invites John to join the band, John agrees.
Late 2009 - Graham phones Jasper to tell him he hates the name Kiddo. They decide to release the music as Jasper Sloan Yip and that evening, Jasper uploads his music to this new thing called the internet (ie: Myspace and CBC Radio 3). The next morning he receives a phone call from CBC Radio 3 telling him he has won a contest. His music is immediately put into rotation on CBC Radio 3 and he is invited to tape a six-song Sessions podcast with his band at the CBC.
March 2010 - Jasper releases Every Day and All at Once. The album's second single "Slowly" reaches number 4 on CBC Radio 3's national chart. Jasper meets Marcus, a bassist. Marcus joins the band.
Summer 2011 - The band goes on their first Canadian tour to Winnipeg and back. It goes OK. The band performs at the Vancouver International Jazz Festival, it goes great. Jasper is selected as a Peak Performance Project top 20 finalist. It goes OK. To be completely frank, the experience kind of messes with Jasper’s head, but he learns some valuable lessons and his emerges from the experience a more grounded person.
2012 - Jasper and the band continue to grow, perform, and tour. Generally speaking things go pretty well.
Summer 2012 - Jasper meets Alex, a cellist. Alex joins the band. John leaves the band. Mark leaves the band. Jasper meets Owen, a keyboardist. Owen joins the band.
Winter 2012 to Spring 2013 - The band records their sophomore album, Foxtrot, with John Raham at Afterlife Studios in Vancouver. Later that year Jasper wins a $10,000 Best of BC award for his song "Show Your Teeth". The songs goes into high rotation on college stations and CBC radio 2 and 3, reaching number 8 on CBC Radio 2's national chart.
Summer 2013 - The band tours across Canada. During this tour Devon joins the band, adding a second violin.
2014 - Feeling burned out, Jasper takes a break from music and goes back to university for a year. He enjoys his courses and gets good grades.
2015 - The band plays the Vancouver Folk Festival, a dream come true for Jasper.
2016 - Jasper performs his first show in the United States at the invitation of Middlebury College in Vermont. Later that year the band records their third LP, Post Meridiem with John Raham at the new Afterlife Studios (formerly the legendary Mushroom Studios).
May 2017 - Jasper and Devon tour Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands. Jasper has his first serious panic attack. Aside form that, the tour goes great.
August 2017 - Jasper and long-time collaborator Nelson drive Nelson’s 1960s Volvo Amazon down John Day Park in Oregon to film the solar eclipse. They spend three days in the bush and turn it into a music video for Jasper’s song “The Day Passed and the Sun Went Down”.
September 2017 - Jasper marries A.C.
October 2017 - Post Meridiem is released via Afterlife Music. Jasper tours Canada again.
2018 - Post Meridiem lands Jasper a Western Canadian Music Award nomination for Pop Artist of the Year. He does not win. 2018 - Post Meridiem lands Jasper a Western Canadian Music Award nomination for Pop Artist of the Year. He does not win.
Summer 2018 - Jasper joins one of his favourite local bands, Ponytails, contributing guitar, keys, and vocals.
September 2018 - Jasper is invited to lecture at a creative writing class for lyric forms at the University of British Columbia. He gives a presentation of the narrative structure of Post Meridiem. He feels tremendously honoured to be speaking at the University from which he has repeatedly dropped out.
October 2018 - Ponytails tours the West Coast down to LA with Peach Pit and Sun Seeker. Jasper buys a forest green Wurlitzer 200 Electronic Piano from Old Town Music in Portland.
October 2018 - Post Meridiem is reissued on vinyl. Another dream come true for Jasper.
January and February 2019 - Jasper and A.C. (finally) go on their honeymoon. They spend two months in Thailand and Indonesia. Jasper learns to scuba dive.
April 2019 - Jasper is hired by CiTR 101.9 FM at the University of British Columbia as their Music Director. He is thrilled.
March 14, 2020 - Jasper, Graham, Marcus, and Owen arrive at The Noise Floor recording studio on Gabriola Island to record with producer/engineer Jordan Koop. They work hard for eight days and finish six songs.
Summer 2020 - Jasper lays low like everyone else. Plans to return to the Noise Floor to finish the album are cancelled and Jasper decides to release the six songs as an mini album entitled Strange Calm. Jasper begins making a six-episode liner notes podcast to accompany the album, which he calls Stange Commentary.
Fall 2020 - Jasper decides to write more songs. He books studio time at Afterlife in Vancouver for March 2020 with nothing written. Around this time, he learns that he is going to be a father. This news has a dramatic effect on his writing.
March + April 2021 - Jasper and the band record Blushing Autumn at Afterlife Studio with John Raham. These sessions are filmed by filmmaker Lester Lyons-Hookam for a short film.
October 26, 2021 - Jasper releases Strange Calm/Blushing Autumn via Tiny Kingdom.
