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Interview: Ricky Sans of Melee

Orange County's Melee craft epic, spacey rock that's both infectious and intricate. On their Warner Bros. debut Devils & Angels, the band weaves swirling melodic tapestries of soaring keyboards, warm guitars and powerful vocals. In addition to Devils & Angels, Melee recently dropped an iTunes-only EP especially for Valentine's Day, entitled Valentunes. Better than flowers, teddy bears and candy, the digital EP features an unreleased track, a chilled-out version of their single "Built to Last" and videos. Singer Ricky Sans took some time to talk to ARTISTdirect about everything from creating songs to how one special English class proved more than educational.

You have this spacey rock style that's really hypnotic in many ways. Where are you coming from, in terms of inspiration?

You know, we're just a product of our generation. Everything has been done, for the most part. Now, there's a lot of access to all types of music, more than ever. Our sound is an accumulation of everything that comes through our ears. It's just a big mixture of sounds. Melodic and pop music throughout the past couple decades have dug their ground in our radar. Especially with this record, we wanted to pull together a little bit of a focal point and not be all over the place. We noticed that we were playing with classic R&B and piano rock sounds. It was centered on that, a bit. We just pull it all together.

You definitely traverse a whole spectrum of sounds. Being able to switch rhythmically from those funky melodies to the more pensive, keyboard-driven material shows real diversity.

Now that the record's been out for a little bit, we're able to step away from it. We're not so involved in it. So it's like, now, I get what I did. We're able to analyze it more and understand where we were.

So where do the songs usually start? Do you come up with riffs first, or is it a piano melody?

Chris and I share the songwriting. We had been in school together for a long time and actually started writing songs together in English class [laughs]. It was all the way back in high school, when we started. I don't even know why it happened. We were never great friends before that or anything. We met in English class and hit it off. We have a very focused way of writing lyrics. It sounds silly, but we learned how to work together, because we would always do group projects in class. So we're really respectful of each other in that aspect. He comes from a big music background. He majored in music theory in college, so he's definitely more methodical in that aspect. He'll usually start with a melody or a musical idea. However, I come from a more literary background. My mom's an English professor. So, I usually start with a bunch of lyrics, a poem or something like that. We bring it together and add what we think the other one's missing. It's very much like a yin-yang effect. Then, we just go from there. We're slight perfectionists. We don't move on until both of us are happy. That's where some turmoil can come from, because it takes a lot to get to that point.

Your lyrics are really visual, and they do have that literary sensibility. Are there any authors or works of literature that inspire you?

I really like James Joyce, a lot. I like stream of consciousness. I try to just capture that. There was a certain point where I gave up on metaphors and similes. I thought that was too complicated. I never wanted to be that kind of writer. I wanted to get straight to the point, but at the same time, paint an image in a particular environment.

You definitely do evoke a lot of images through your lyrics.

In the song "Imitation," I really wanted to create an intense, live environment with an undertone in the music that suggests uneasiness. And then on the chorus, there's a nice release.

You have that tension in there, and at the same time, it's delivered in a melodic and catchy fashion.

Yeah, that comes from growing up with the first Third Eye Blind record, which was heavily played [laughs]. I liked how the band took not the happiest of subject matter and made some of the most poppy songs ever.

There's a great cohesion on the record from the cover to the songs. From the imagery of your album cover, it's clear you have more of a spacey, ethereal tone, which is what really attracted me to the band, personally.

That's cool. The album cover was actually really important. Because, whenever I listen to music, I usually create covers in my head with the band and the song. So, I thought it would be really great to have this amazingly colorful and vibrant image as the cover. That's the first thing that you see. The cover brings you into the record. Hopefully, it's imprinted in your brain and affects the way that you listen to the songs.

The color palette is actually really representative of the album, because you cover a lot of sounds and styles. Each color can represent that too. Lyrically you also explore so many different emotions.

Definitely. Growing up, we were learning how to write. The main task, I think, is to venture out, rather than only writing about girls and relationships. We just really focused on writing about every aspect that we encounter in our lives.

Where was your place in the Orange County music scene?

We got into the Orange County scene when the Power Pop scene was ending: bands like Kara's Flowers and Phantom Planet. That's how we got drawn into it. That was when Ska was still big. All these Ska bands were turning into power pop bands—like Ozma and Limbeck. It was super catchy stuff, and that's where bands like Hellogoodbye came from. We started playing our own shows, by the time hardcore came in. We were able to exit at the right time.

You guys even stand out for LA. You have your own thing.

That was always something that we wanted to pride ourselves in. There's this band that really influenced me called Cibo Matto. It wasn’t so much their sound that influenced me, but their philosophy on music. Listening to their album, every song was different. Every song was exciting and fresh. I just really wanted to take that; we're not holding onto any certain scene. I want to write whatever we feel like writing. I aim to make it fresh and exciting for us, and hopefully that will translate to the listener.

It definitely does. The Valentine's Day iTunes EP, Valentunes, which you recently put out, is a great alternative perspective on some of your songs.

Definitely. I'm stoked that that idea popped up. It's cool, and I'm especially glad that we threw on one of our more not-so-Happy-Valentine's-Day songs on there. That song, "New Heart," is kind of like the un-Valentine's-Day song. Originally, the label wanted to have an acoustic mix of the song "Built to Last," so we went and recorded it with our friend Elliot. But, at the time, we were listening to a lot of Robin Thicke, and it came out super chill and loungy. We were like, "Oh this is awesome! We love it." And they were like, "No, we just wanted it to be acoustic, not to change the song." We figured we'd just have that to use at some point in time. Then the label was like, "We want to put out a special EP for Valentine's Day." So we gave them that new relaxed version of "Built to Last."

It's cool, because with the Internet now, bands can do so many cool things like that quickly.

It's awesome. Probably like a year or two ago, it wouldn't have been possible. You'd have to press all the CDs and go through all this. Now, you put some songs together, put them on the Internet, and you're done.

It cuts out a lot of costs too.

It really does. I think it's going to be great, at a certain point, because you cut all these costs from the producing, manufacturing and the distributing of CDs. Then you can apply all your spending on other things.

You can really start developing artists again. In a lot of ways, the advent of the Internet is important in music distribution, and it's ultimately going to be a positive thing. I know the whole old business model is against it, but there are lots of positives.

I agree. I think that once you factor out some of that old mindset, I think we're going to be left with a really great thing. The problem is just transitioning. I know that people have a hard time changing. It's more of a subjective matter than an objective matter.

Have you guys started writing anymore? Are you working on anything else right now?

We're always writing, whether it be just ideas popping into each other's heads or full songs. And just recorded on Garage Band real quickly. We actually had a week or two off finally at home so we've just kind of been playing with ideas and stuff. I think for the most part we're coming into closure with the last album. I think that when that fully happens we'll be able to really attack a new album. We obviously don't want it to be Devils & Angels Part Two.

Definitely. You must get a lot of inspiration out on the road. Just coming from that literary background, I know you can draw from a lot of different places.

Yeah, that's the thing. When you're asking what an influence is. It's everything that comes into my senses is an influence. Whether it be people or whether it be a new object, you know—anything to inspire a song. You can't even hear someone say a word or phrase–it just sticks in your head. We travel and see all types of new things, and get inspired.

—Rick Florino
02.21.08