A quiet fire inside.
Ian Winkler and James Turner they talk about Pathwaysabout the first album they produced completely alone and why the 2023 show at the Indie Rocks Forum! It remains one of his favorites.
Meltt They’re from Vancouver, they grew up between the ocean and the mountains of the North Pacific, and they make exactly the kind of music you’d expect from someone with that landscape glued to their retinas: psychedelic rock with layers of dream pop and something that floats between consciousness and dream. Pathwaystheir most recent album, is the first they produced completely by themselves, and also the most interior of their discography: less external fires, more still fire.
On September 10 they arrive at House of Vanstheir second show in Mexico City after the one they gave in the Indie Rocks Forum! in 2023.
Indie Rocks!: For those discovering you today, how would you describe your music?
Meltt: We’re a group of guys who just love making music. I would say it’s psychedelic rock with elements of dream pop and indie pop, all mixed together. I love psychedelia. It’s quite psychedelic.
GO!: They have had a huge year. How has it been along the way and how does it feel to play the songs of Pathways?
M: Very good. Having released the album feels incredible, we had been working on it since 2024. We returned from Europe about a month ago, it was a relatively short tour but it was very cool to play new songs. We toured right before the album came out, so it was fun to be playing shows leading up to the release. The North American tour starts next month and we’re really excited because we haven’t played all the new songs live yet. So we are very excited to see how some of them sound.
GO!: In an interview about Eternal EmbersIan, you said something that stuck with me: that while you were writing that record there were huge forest fires all over Canada, and those images ended up embedded in your psyche, in your subconscious, without you looking for it. And I wonder, what got embedded this time, while they were writing Pathways?
M: The cruel march of time, I suppose. Everyone growing old together is, to a large extent, what this album is about. There was no compelling visual image that inspired him, but rather the fact that we are all right now moving forward together. We’re all thirty-one now. And this album is our process of assimilating that.
With the previous album we started just when the COVID thing was happening. There were a lot of huge external events: the pandemic, the fires. We had all this imagery going on around us. With Pathways It was much more of an internal process. We are all the same age and although everyone has their own life experiences, we were going through a lot at the same time. It’s less like a fire outside, more like a still fire inside.
GO!: This is the first album you produced entirely on your own. How did you come to that decision?
M: The idea was to take complete responsibility for every sound on this record. In terms of writing and recording there wasn’t that big of a difference, but the important change came when recording and choosing the effects: we knew that was going to be the final version. Before we relied a little on our previous producer so that with what we had recorded he could make it sound good. This time the responsibility was completely ours. And we dedicated many hours to making it that way.
GO!: And for the mix they worked with a legend. (Chris Cody, who has worked with Beach House, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Grizzly Bear, TV on the Radio, Slowdive and more) How did it happen and what do you take away from that experience?
M: Yes, we knew that was going to sound good no matter what. We produced the album ourselves, we put everything into it, but to get to the point where we were happy with what we wanted it to be, it took the powers of Chris Coady. And that put some pressure on us: knowing that we were going to pass this material on to someone we admired so much, we had to get it really right. He is someone who has worked with legends.
What I took away from that collaboration is that it gave us confidence that we can work at that level. We’re very happy with how everything sounds. He is a magician.
GO!: I not only love the sound but also the artwork. How was it born and what do you want people to feel when they see it?
M: We always make a conscious decision to find art that we all like and that reflects the music. It’s something we think about a lot, and it’s another stressful part of the process: you’re trying to find something that will excite all four of us, that’s within budget, and that works with the music.
We work with an artist called Jerry Lee Bosmans. He is Dutch, a digital artist, and everything you have seen on the singles and vinyl are his pieces. It was very good to work with him. We found things in their catalog that we all really liked and that reflected the different moods of each song. We always think of our songs as evocative of different colors and energies, and we felt like his art would work really well with that.
GO!: For me it’s almost impossible to imagine that they make this music without some visual inspiration. Was there one in the creation of Pathways?
M: What constantly comes to mind is where we live: Vancouver, the North Pacific, the ocean, the mountains. It’s a pretty permanent inspiration. There is nothing more directly visual than that in my case.
The environment plays a huge role in inspiring us. And in addition to being visually beautiful, it is also an experiential influence: being in nature and what that gives you. There is no specific image or movie that directly inspired this album. Rather it was the other way around: the music came first and then we looked for what visually fit with it.
GO!: Listening to their music I feel that they understand psychedelia in a very natural way. How would you describe it?
M: I would say that achieving a heightened or altered consciousness through art is our quest for the psychedelic. That’s how I would describe it.
It’s hard to describe because you’re trying to get to another plane. You take your experiences and everything that comes with them, and you try to evoke emotions, but also images and all the senses at the same time. And when audio, visuals and writing work together is when it is most powerful.
GO!: They already played in the Indie Rocks Forum! in 2023. What do you remember about that show and what can we expect for September 10 at House of Vans?
M: You can expect us to be absolutely thrilled to be there and put on the best show possible. The last show was one of our favorites of the entire run. We had never experienced that kind of passion from an audience to that point. We had never heard our lyrics sung so loudly.
The first time I heard our lyrics through my in-ears That’s right, it was incredible. And something similar happened in Manchester: at some point I got a in-ear thinking, “Am I hearing this right? Are they singing them?” We hope the same. I’m sure it’s going to happen.
GO!:And if you can bring vinyl to the show, that would be amazing.
M: We will do our best. It was a pleasure, thanks to you.
