Interview by Todd Matthews

Five years ago, Seattle band Mayfly were huddled in University District cafes and bars, and touring Seattle's cache of Irish pubs. Today the foursome's catalog of gifted songwriting and catchy, lyrical melodies -- captured on their albums From This Point On and Immersion -- have made them one of the most impressionable pop bands in the Pacific Northwest. Founded by childhood friends Brian Marshall and Dan McKinnis, Mayfly are a salute (and breath of fresh air) to the art of writing classic, timeless pop/rock songs. I recently caught up with guitarist and vocalist Brian Marshall to discuss the evolution and songwriting endeavors of the band.

TODD MATTHEWS: I first saw Mayfly perform at the Ugly Mug Café in the University District.

BRIAN MARSHALL: Oh, wow! That was just about the beginning. We have been at it for about four-and-a-half years, in various forms.

TODD MATTHEWS: How did Mayfly get started?

BRIAN MARSHALL: Dan McKinnis and I had known each other since we were kids. When his parents divorced, we lived at opposite ends of Los Angeles. We came back together through the music. Writing together, recording together. I was in a band in Orange County, California, and he leant his recording knowledge to our band. So then when that sort of unraveled, Dan had moved up to Washington to attend the University of Washington. He invited me to come up and start a band from the ground up, which was late-1996. So I did. In September of 1996, I moved up here and started writing songs and recruiting members. We got two members of the University of Washington to fill out the band -- bass player Brian LaFranche, and a drummer named Brett Akesson. So we played that lineup for close to a year, writing songs and playing a lot in the garage.

TODD MATTHEWS: What happened next?

BRIAN MARSHALL: We wanted to get out and play a little bit, because I had been in a band that had toured and I really wanted to perform again. None of the guys in the band had done a lot of performing, if at all. We started small, at parties and coffee shop gigs, to see how the songs we were writing would sound, and how they would go over on a crowd. Dan had a friend who worked at the Ugly Mug Café -- he owned the place at the time -- and he had nothing but nice things to say about our music and what we were doing. He gave us a good recommendation to the Owl & Thistle people – they also own the Galway Arms. And that was really the beginning of how we got to play out a lot. The bigger gigs were very few and far between. I think we played in Redmond. We played at the Ballard Firehouse. We played at an old smoky bar on Capitol Hill called Uncle Rocky's. We were very out of place there because our music was way too mellow and way too clean sounding for a lot of the harder edge stuff. It was the grunge era, and there was a lot of butt rock and metal. It was very rudimentary. We had a great songwriter in Dan, and I had been playing guitar and singing for a while, but not full-time singing. This is what I had really wanted. I wanted to be a singer and writer and lead guitar player. So we decided to start the band here from the ground up, write the tunes ourselves.

TODD MATTHEWS: What was the feedback from audiences at the time?

BRIAN MARSHALL: It was tough. It didn't seem that anyone was interested in original compositions, especially stuff that was melodic and lyric based. It's very much a thinker's kind of music. We had always been into bands like U2. Dan's really into Depeche Mode, The Cure, Tom Petty, The Beatles -- we have such an amazing combination of influences, great songwriters. I love to hear great vocalists. It has evolved to the point now where I love the process of writing new songs, trying out new things, and seeing what works and what doesn't.

TODD MATTHEWS: What was the relationship like between the band members at that time?

BRIAN MARSHALL: Mayfly was very friction-based. Dan and I fought a lot about how things should be. I would be very good at playing guitar. He was learning to play guitar, because he had gone from doing a lot of sequence work and keyboard based stuff to mostly acoustic bass, for the most part. He had no background in how to craft any kind of guitar tones, the rhythm was very choppy. He was constantly breaking strings at shows. We struggled a lot with the dynamics of playing. And the people we were playing with, they just seemed bored out of their skull. Our first drummer -- Brett Akesson -- was practically packing up his drums while we were playing the last song. Having moved as far as I did to start a band, it was disheartening at times. Brett was a nice guy, and a fun guy to go drinking beer with. But when it came down to evolving the band and getting more serious about how to tighten up the sound . . . . The guy that became our drummer – Jason Maybell -- was a friend of mine from Orange County, and he was in a band in San Diego with a mutual friend. Jason moved up to Seattle and we hooked up. We were going to play at Uncle Rocky's. It was a real divey bar, and Brett hated playing there. I told him don't worry about it. And our bass player – Brian LaFranche -- didn't want to play that show. So Jason wanted to play the show. I was a little nervous about it. But when it got back to Brett, he felt very betrayed. But there was no going forward with him -- Jason was a far superior drummer. So we had a talk with Brett and said, 'We want to move on with someone else.' It was a bitter break up and we never talked to each other again. But Jason was a very professional drummer -- very tight and professional. I was very driven to record that first CD, make contacts, and book shows. Dan was more focused on writing songs and getting to the point where we sounded better. And our bass player was sort of there, just playing bass. He and I wrote songs together a lot easier than Dan and I did most of the time. There was a huge amount of ego involved. Constantly one camp versus the other. Dan versus myself. Whenever I wrote a song, I didn't like the feedback designed to undermine what I had written. It's tough, as a songwriter myself, being told how to sing melodies. Words weren't really feeling write. It was a very friction-based thing all the time. It was very unpleasant. We weren't yelling at each other, but close to it.

TODD MATTHEWS: Is it like that now? What is the relationship like between you and Dan now?

BRIAN MARSHALL: There were some times when I thought, 'I don't think Dan and I should be in a band together.' We were friends from way back. I didn't really make a huge effort to try and understand where he was coming from. I constantly criticized his approach to things because he thinks on a different level than most people. That's where the creative center comes from. He sees the world in a different way than pretty much anybody else I know. He's not crazy, but he has a different take on things. I'm very practical, grounded, down to earth. He's very much, at least he was, very much a dreamer, idealist, John Lennon type. It's hard to reconcile those huge philosophical approaches to music because I was very much pushing for us to get more serious about the business and more together as an outfit, and Dan was sort of out there. We didn't mesh well living together. We tried for a long time after that first year, having a band together, we figured we would be able to use our basement and practice whenever we wanted and write songs all the time. We had three out of four band members living there. Dan and I are like fire and ice. We go back a long ways. Now, with a lot of years under our belt, I think we understand each other better. But it was just like butting heads all the time. I could always count on Dan being there. Loyalty has never been a question in our relationship.

TODD MATTHEWS: Tell me a little bit about recording that first album, From This Point On.

BRIAN MARSHALL: Depending upon who you ask, I think a lot of people really like the first album because there was such a diversity of song styles on there. I wish we had better sound and producing on it. It was tough. Dan and I were both in the studio and we said, 'OK, let's put our differences aside and make a great record.' I didn't want to listen to what he wanted to do, and he didn't want to listen to my totalitarian approach to what we needed to do. I was sort of taking a huge role in producing it and getting the money together, and orchestrating the whole project. I was sort of getting serious about the music after all of this. I started taking vocal lessons a year after that album came out. We were playing lots of shows, trying to make money to recoup our costs, and saving for our next collection of songs. We were very excited to make our next album, but I knew I had to get better. Hearing about a lot of bands that were signed -- Seattle bands -- where they were signed to a label and making a record, and they were still taking lessons. That really hit me. That's amazing. You went that far, but you're still very humble about the fact that you always need to improve and work at your craft. On the first record, I was really more concerned about getting it done. This time I wanted to make sure that what we were singing, what I was singing, carried a message. You tapped into the emotion and the feel of what I was doing. And it was after we recorded our second CD that I started taking more lessons to work on technique and power and range and stuff -- that's where the big regret comes in. I love the songs on the first record. I think we could go back and record maybe four or five of those again, better versions. I love the songs, but I don't think we did them that well. That's just inexperience. The people that recorded it did a pretty good job. One of the guys on the first one became the producer on the second album. And you can tell, night and day, he learned a lot over the years. By the time we went into the studio for the second album, his ability to produce a record really came out. We had never heard anything that he had produced. He knew the material, he knew us. We just felt comfortable with him. We gave him as much time as he needed: 'You make the decision. You are the producer.' That took the pressure off us, so we weren't fighting each other so much. It was so great to have an independent party who was looking at it from our best interests -- making a good record -- and not fighting each other.

Mayfly (pictured clockwise from left): Dan McKinnis, Brian Marshall, Jason Maybell, and Aaron Evans
+ + photo courtesy Stellar Talent Services + +

TODD MATTHEWS: After the second album was recorded and released, what were some of the band's interests and pursuits?

BRIAN MARSHALL: After the second CD was done and released in October 2000, things were looking pretty good. We had been out on the scene for a while. We were immersed -- that's where the album title came from -- we were in this hole, making this record. Taking a hard look at ourselves as a band, and making the best record we possibly could. Once that was done, we had never played some of the bigger places in town. We said, 'We are going to take this record, it's a good record, and use it to hopefully make a name for ourselves. Get some press on it and make some A-list clubs. Get out of the Irish bar circuit.' We wanted to play at the Tractor Tavern and the Crocodile Cafe. So within a month or two, we just started hammering away at these places, with the help of our keyboard player -- she was helping us put together press kits and press releases and contact sheets. We got the Sit and Spin, the Crocodile, and the Tractor Tavern. And it felt like we were really headed toward something. After the first of the year, we played the Tractor on a Friday night. And we had our CD release there. We did great business. We felt like we were really getting into the scene. January turned into February. We played a few shows. Things were going awry with our keyboard player, Brian, who was originally our bass player. He knew that we were getting a lot more serious. We wanted to find a manager and eventually get out on the road and tour more. He knew that wasn't in the cards for him, and so the keyboardist -- there was a time when Brian was going to quit as our bass player. Well, we found a bass player relatively quickly. Brian wasn't saying he wanted to be out of the band. We suggested he play keyboards because that was his background -- piano. Suddenly it opened up a huge dynamic in his music. That came through loud and clear on our record. All kinds of organ layering, sound, piano -- it raised the bar. That was the single greatest contribution to evolving the sound. We became better musicians as well. When Brian decided to leave in late-February, early-March, we were wondering what to do now. We had to find a keyboard player. We still haven't found one.

TODD MATTHEWS: What happened next?

BRIAN MARSHALL: It was like a one-two punch. Two and a half weeks later, on St. Patricks Day, Dan goes into a meltdown and has a nervous breakdown, thereby shooting us from five members to three members. It was very disturbing because we could see it happen. I've known Dan the longest. I was very concerned for him. I didn't know what was going to happen to the band. It really wasn't until late-July that I had any inclination that he was capable of coming back. We gave him all the time off he needed. He was convinced that he could come back, but he was still not stable enough from everything he underwent personally to follow through on playing. So we started looking for a replacement guitar player. We sat down with Dan and said, 'Look, we are going to continue. We are going to seek out a replacement. We want you to focus on getting better. That's got to be your number one focus.' We went through about three different auditions with people, and they just weren't the right fit. We played a showcase at the Tractor Tavern with a replacement player. It was good to play again, but the chemistry wasn't there. And I remember Dan came to that show as a guest of mine, and was very upset that we were playing songs that he felt he wrote and owned -- this is all part of a dark period. We almost got to the point where we said, 'If you want to get a lawyer and get an injunction, go ahead, but we intend to use the songs on Immersion to promote the record.' It was still a relatively new record at the time, and we believed in it. We thought it was worth pushing. Then it got to this really heavy tension point, and it's like it all just got released. At the time, Dan viewed me as an adversary. After the worst of our conversations, he came back and started having a more civilized dialogue about it. We needed to hammer out publishing rights. It was not our intention to cheat him out of any money. But we wanted to promote Immersion, and we hadn't been able to do so since March because Dan was gone. Dan took a year off. I don't know how he did it. Through the years, he kept advocating that we do the same thing, and really dedicate ourselves to the music. He was coming from that post-meltdown, different view of the world and reality. He was going to come back and play one show after he said he was fine the first time, and he wound up ditching out on us -- he still had a lot of paranoia and didn't like to be around crowds and stuff. And he left this letter basically requesting that we play the show without his songs, without him -- a whole host of demands. It was a little bit unrealistic for us to do that, and it caused a big rift between him and the drummer. It was like the three of us were here, and Dan was out here.

TODD MATTHEWS: How was the conflict between you and Dan resolved?

BRIAN MARSHALL: I was about to go on a vacation to Europe at the end of July, and we sat down for the first time in several months. He showed me some songs he had been writing, and I thought they were great. We made a plan to play at the Galway Arms when I got back from Ireland. It felt great to play with him again, and be on a mutual respect level. When I was in Europe, I was thinking about the Immersion album for a long time. I just realized there was so much of his spirit and so much of his soul in that record. You can't really replace any of that. It's not like a studio musician who comes in and plays a part. Dan is someone who contributed to writing some of the lyrics and a lot of the music, and you can't separate the two. I can continue to write songs on my own and with other collaborators -- there's something about the way that he and I work in that friction-based way, there's just no way of getting away from it. For Mayfly to be Mayfly, both of us have to be there. But my big concern was whether he could come back, given his health -- everything he has undergone and the stresses and all that stuff. We were a little hesitant. We said, 'Hey, we'll play a few small, low-intensity shows.' To me, that show at the Galway Arms was so significant because we had repaired a lot of damage in our relationship. We were finally looking at each other as adults. He wasn't in the band, but we could finally get past the bitter break-up. It seemed like a relationship thing. It was a like a spat. We were separated for a while, and realized what we appreciated about each other. It really wasn't until I went to Europe and listened to Immersion, having not listened to it in a long time, I thought, 'I can't imagine this without Dan.' I can imagine writing songs and working on projects, because I do it all the time. I will always want to do music, and will always do music, but there's something about the way we do music together that you can't replace and still call it Mayfly. I can't tell you how happy I am that he got better. There were so many times prior to when I asked him to come back, when he said things like, 'I'm finding it hard to find things to believe in.' This is the most important thing in his life. He gave up school and realized that he wanted to devote his life to writing songs. He is the consummate songwriter. If you take that away from him, he doesn't have the vehicle to deliver the songs without a band. I feel fortunate that he wants me to be the singer. I told him, 'You are a great songwriter. Why would you ever stop just because you aren't in Mayfly?' But it was like his spirit and heart was broken by the fact that we were going to carry on without him. I believed that we would eventually come back together. It would work itself out. He would get better. This process of him growing up a little bit and getting more responsible -- I knew that, eventually, we would gravitate back toward working together. He needed to get back to that core. I was really terrified. I was writing songs on my own, some of which were developing into complete songs. But I was the only one. Jason doesn't write songs. Aaron doesn't write songs. I faced this tremendous fear, something that I always wanted to conquer, but I didn't want to do that out of some egotistical move. That's how I started in the band. I wanted to prove to everybody that I could start a band in Seattle and make it work. But that's not right. You do it because you love to write songs. That has to be the foundation. I didn't want to write my own songs out of spite. I was concerned about Dan's health. That was my primary concern. Once it became apparent that he was getting better, I needed to find a way to be able to work with him. He's a creative type. If you know people like that, they don't take well to criticism. They retreat. You have to find a way to bring out their talent. It's there, and it's a good talent. That was my challenge. I always kind of walk this balancing line. I want everybody to participate, and know that they are a critical part of it.

TODD MATTHEWS: How are things now that Dan has returned to the band?

BRIAN MARSHALL: Coming back from Europe and picking up a manager was a huge help to me. I was doing all the promotion and marketing and stuff for the band. I wasn't very good at it. I got a lot of things done. We recorded two albums . . . I got us into some great places . . . we made some good contacts -- but that's not really my forte. Taking a lot of that pressure off my plate, I'm in this adjustment phase where I have to sort of let go of things. That's an adjustment in a good way because I can now focus on writing. That's why my relationship with Dan has changed a lot. It's not me saying, 'Why are you not showing up to practice? Why are you not being responsible?' He's doing something productive. That's the most rewarding thing for me. I'm learning how to work with him, his personality type, and I'm feeling like it's going pretty well. It's been pretty effective. It's so much better now. I actually enjoy his company for the first time in many years. I didn't mesh with him. I didn't like that it had taken such a huge toll on our friendship. Being in business, being in a creative venture. That's a lot of pressure. Now it just seems like we've been through so much, it's like we're old war buddies. We both got our scars to show. We both want to write great songs. And I trust his judgment. He's one of the best songwriters I've ever known and ever heard. And it's a privilege that he has that faith in me to show me what he has created.

Mayfly performing live at Easy Street Records in Seattle, Washington (Photograph by Todd Matthews)

TODD MATTHEWS: Would you describe Mayfly as a pop band? A rock band? Or something else?

BRIAN MARSHALL: That's a good question because, when I think of pop, I think of bands like Greenday and Weezer. Music that is incredibly catchy . . . sticks in your head . . . charging and with a lot of electricity and energy to it. I wish that we could be more like that. I think that we are better at telling stories. One of the hallmarks of the lyrics now is that they can be interpreted in different ways. When you look at a song like 'Bottom of the Well,' we're talking about contradictions and paradoxes, but it's going to mean something different to everybody in how it relates to their own personal situation. I love telling stories. I've always loved storyteller songwriters.

TODD MATTHEWS: Tell me a little bit about how your songs were written. What about 'Dirty Dozen?'

BRIAN MARSHALL: 'Dirty Dozen' is a song that I wrote where I wanted to tell a story about a guy who knew he was going to die in World War II. I've always been kind of fascinated with history and D-Day and stuff like that. So when I get a concept like that in my head, I love to run with it. 'Zebras and Elephants' is one that I wrote and it's very different. I also love stream of consciousness, and how the music sort of suggests the lyrics. The other one was 'Lemonade' -- I didn't even really have a plan or lyrics for that one at all. I just sort of was listening to the bass player play piano. He had a little bit of the chorus and he walked away. I started playing a chord structure that would work around that chorus, and about twenty minutes later, I sat down and wrote the words out. Playing it at shows, I never really realized what I was talking about. I knew that it all kind of worked together lyrically, but it was essentially just a stream of consciousness piece. 'Zebras and Elephants' was a more evolved version of that, because the music was darker. And even the strings section had a tough time playing it because the key that it was in. But I was essentially talking about not missing the magic in life that's happening all around you. I'm very blind to everything from mysticism to astrological stuff to people's spirituality. I'm a pretty regular guy. I was trying to remind myself that there is so much that you can't explain that's wonderful in life all around you. 'Zebras and Elephants' is essentially a metaphor because zebras are black and white, very rigid and very structured. And you have elephants that are so big and they go where they want because it's very difficult to keep them out. And I just think that those are two major types of people in the world. Aside from that, it's multi-leveled. Here are people sitting on an airplane, missing the point, because they are there on this structured vacation for people in their age group. They're just living this sort of prescribed life. I didn't really outline it or anything like that. I don't even really think that 'Zebras and Elephants' came out that well on the record. I needed more oomph. And I think I could have done the vocals better. But I love the song. It's so striking. So different sounding. A lot of people tell me, I love the album, but I'm not that into 'Zebras and Elephants.'' I didn't really think it would make it on the album. When I showed it to the guys, I didn't think in a million years they would want to use it. But then eventually, all the people who weren't sure about it at first, they started saying, 'I really like that song.' That's a cool thing. Everyone who creates things, I'm sure they go through self-doubt. I just wrote it based on a notion. That's the way my mind works. When I think about something, it almost instantaneously creates a three-dimensional or diogenic world, and I try to write about that as quickly as I can before I forget. That's why I don't have clear metaphors. 'Zebras and Elephants' confuses a lot of people, but I like it because it's such a great feel for the music and how the arrangements worked out. And it's just weird. It's really weird. So I think there are story songs, which I really like to do. Dan is a great wordsmith. So a lot of the songs that he writes are very clever, in the word choice and the way that you can come to your own conclusion. 'Twenty-Something Years From Now', when I first heard it, was a little bit hard to swallow. It says 'Twenty-Something Years From Now' so many times, it's sort of hammering the point home. But the feel of the song, I guess what turned it around was when we repeat at the end, 'Will I know where you are?' Because there is a barrage of twenty years from now – but essentially the point is: will we still know each other? Will we still care about each other? Will we still be there for each other? It's so universal. And to this day, aside from maybe 'The Island Song,' that's the one that we get the most feedback from. I love to play it. I love the feel of it. But I can't say for sure. People comment all the time. 'The Island Song' is probably the song that I get the most feedback on. I get e-mails from people saying that they were going through a tough period of their life and it gave them inspiration to follow their dreams. Or they were going to take this big test and they needed something to get their nerves calmed down and get their inspiration. That's the most flattering thing for me. I really wanted to write a story song. In the realm of pop, you don't have a lot of time. Whereas I would have liked to have told a lot longer story, you don't want to bore people to death. That's sort of the downside of music -- if you want to sell it and hopefully get it picked up by a label or played on the radio, they're not really going to take your rock opera. Maybe we are a little bit pop, because we follow a structure -- we have verses and three choruses and maybe a bridge. There's definitely an identifiable structure to it. Is it rock? I wish it was a little more rock than it is. But it's got some rock elements. Above and beyond, it has a quality element to it. We're really trying to write great songs that no matter if you listen to it now, or 10 years from now, or 15 years from now, it's going to hit you the same way because it's speaking about something that's hopefully timeless. That's why I try to avoid popular references like Tae Bo and soy lattes. I want people to get the universal message. If you were going to write a song about the World Trade Center, talk about the emotions and the fear of never knowing if you are safe or something like that, so that somewhere down the line, someone has to ask you, 'Was that about the World Trade Center?' You can say yes or no whatever you want. I really love those types of songwriters. Like R & B and hip-hop are tough for me to swallow, because there's very little poetry in it. It speaks literally about love or physical lust or something like that. But songwriting is poetry, and the way words work with music. And that's the great experiment for us. I want to get better at making songs that are real catchy and you can tap your toes to, but I don't know, we flow with what we do best. And that's evolving as we go on. I would love to write something super huge -- a big Oasis guitar wall of sound. But I also love mellow music. I wrote something recently that has a Frank Sinatra / Radiohead vibe. I love exploring what a melody can do -- writing without a guitar or piano or something, see what you can do with the melody itself. So that when you bring the music in, it's a complementary piece, rather than a dependent thing. I'm just experimenting with the songwriting process, and I'm sure Dan is, too. That guy used to write tons and tons of chord changes. Two songs that he introduced to the band recently, one of them only has two chords through the whole thing. Now we have to figure out how to present it dynamically. The other one is an amazing, poignant song called 'One More Day To Go.' He showed it to me right when I got back from Europe. I just suggested this one change in the chorus so that it descends on the third measure, and the melody ascends. And it just has this amazing vibe through the whole thing. Everyone we play that song for instantly loves it. It's simple. When you know his situation, and what he went through to get better, it's even that much more poignant. And when you take it in the context of the World Trade Center – it's such an amazing song. When we make the next record, I'm going to insist that we put it on there. It's a classic.

TODD MATTHEWS: Are you guys performing that song at shows now?

BRIAN MARSHALL: Yes. We did a showcase down in Tacoma. We played that one and a couple of the other new ones that I was working on. We are still working on the two-chord song. But 'One More Day To Go' is going to be one that people really click with.

TODD MATTHEWS: On your second album, you introduced so many other instruments – such as the cello and piano. How important is that to have in your music? How much of an influence does that have on you when you sit down to write songs?

BRIAN MARSHALL: When we were doing the Immersion record, it was such a treat to put a song like 'Eyes Wide Open' on there, because it was just a piano and my voice. I wish that I would have been a little further along with my voice lessons. I wanted to do it real badly, but I think that I could do it a lot better now. I wish we had a piano player as a full-time member, not just a hired gun. That's what Brian did. He sat down, explained the keys that he was working out. I worked with him to kind of shore it up a bit. I suggested a melody. We put it together so quickly, I wish we would have had a little more time. The very last show he ever played with us, March 31st, we had a jam that came out of the end of 'Eyes Wide Open' that I wish we could have captured on the record. That's an instance where alternate instrumentation comes into play. In the absence of that now, we currently have two guitar players, bass, and drums – how do we write great songs and not fall into the pitfalls of where we used to be? As an early band, we would start with the same guitar chords. I was starting to smoothe out where Dan was playing a little choppy. I think now we are playing and asking, 'What can we do with a melody? What can we do to de-centuate the presence of the guitars until they are really necessary?' In other words, playing when absolutely necessary, but don't play it all the time. That space becomes an instrument you play with in a song. On top of that, we have another guitar player who is going to move up from California. We wrote 'Give Me A Sign' together, and a number of other songs that we haven't recorded with Mayfly. We all played together over Labor Day weekend. That was kind of more when Dan was back in the band, and I wanted to see how it would go. Having three guitar players allows me to back off as a guitar player, and focus on the singing. Come in for layering and chords and stuff. That's going to give us a bigger sound. Dan has a little bit of a background in light keyboard stuff. But we are still actively searching for a keyboard player. I would like to experiment with things like percussion-driven songs. It would be nice to not play guitar in songs. I would love that. Very simple electric piano. That's the reason we got into the old Black Crowes albums. I would love to see steel guitar or slide bass. Or acoustic bass. I don't have all the instruments I would love to have to write musically. The challenge of writing with less has been a huge task. I love to play melodies over the chord progressions. I'm not a very good lead guitar player when it comes to extraneous guitar solos. I always try to put something in there that weaves well into the theme overall. This guy, Jim Nicholson, if he comes up sooner than later, you are going to see a big potential for a lot of these songs. He has a very good ear for producing. He's more of a producer than a band guy. That's nice. He's speaking for the whole maturity of the song. I think we're playing more with space. I took violin lessons for Immersion, but there's no way I could have played what was on there. There are people that are good at what they do. I don't know if I could be that jack of all trades. I wish I could do it live. I would love to be able to sit down at the piano and play 'Eyes Wide Open,' or when it comes time to add what would normally be my lead guitar part, play the electric piano instead.

TODD MATTHEWS: How much do you pay attention to other bands in Seattle, and the music they are producing? Does that have an influence on the type of music that you write and perform? Is that even a factor?

Mayfly performing live at Easy Street Records in Seattle, Washington (Photograph by Todd Matthews)

BRIAN MARSHALL: It was a big obstacle when we first started. I had come from a band that had gone on tour. We had opened for No Doubt. We played the House of Blues. Pretty good venues for a local Orange County band. I think I had an attitude. I thought we deserved to play great shows. It was tough to see other bands. Regardless of where they were on the food chain, I wanted to be playing. I wanted to be up there performing. I was just like a little kid. Eventually I got over that. Now it becomes a study. When it first became a study, it was a critical study. I've always criticized bands – they have a bad look, or a bad sound. But you have to undo that. This is what they are trying to do. They may not have the sound that I prefer. But what they are doing is what they have. I am fascinated by the arrangement. Anyone has the ability to identify when they are good at what they do. When I see a band play, I don't get out as often as I should, but when I do, I love to see what people are capable of. I try not to let things like crappy sound get in the way. I want to see the material, what they are doing. I've been in this band for four and a half years, and I know how difficult it can be to get a show. And the people that are doing it after all these years, they must have something in order to continue to do it. That's worthy of admiration. Especially a touring band. Whenever a touring band opens for a national act – I was at the Crocodile and saw The Doves. There was this New York band called The Strokes. I didn't even know they were from New York until I started talking to the guy afterward. They looked like they weren't from here. Their sound was much more raw. I'm fascinated by where people come from musically, and why their music sounds different. We sound different from most Seattle bands I know about. I love the different tastes, blends and styles – when a band is good at what they do when they get up there, it's exciting. I don't mean to rip on any other bands that are out there, but it's tough. I don't give a lot of recommendations. Not that many people are talking about bands. You can pick up a magazine, and they may talk about someone here and there. But I don't listen to enough bands on The End or KCMU. I don't think that we necessarily fit on those stations. We played with bands like Voyager One and I thought, 'Wow, that's kind of interesting what they are doing.' But it's different. It's not really aimed at becoming mainstream pop music. I don't know that we want to become the next Goo Goo Dolls, but I wish we had more of an edge sometimes. You take a band like U2, they used to be real punk infused. Now what they are doing excites me, even though a lot of hardcore U2 fans don't like what they are doing. I like someone who can write great songs. Someone who is not afraid to write about what's important to them. But that's not to say that I want to go buy Tool's album. There is just finding that blend of what works. I loved Voyager One when I first heard them play on a number of different occasions. But they're not singing anything that's speaking to me. I really need to relate to what they are talking about. I love Noel Gallagher as a songwriter. I almost wish his brother wasn't a singer. I understand what he's talking about, and I relate to it. I want to get excited about a band again. Danny Godinez is playing with us next Thursday, and that guy is phenomenal. I want to see bands that have our bent on writing songs. Where do you find them? We just feel like lost kids a lot of the time. They will book a show and say, 'Who do you want to play with?' It's not that we don't want to play with anyone. I just can't think of a band that works hand-in-hand with the Mayfly sound.

TODD MATTHEWS: I want to talk a little bit about where you were coming from when some of the Mayfly songs were written. 'Something's Different Today' – tell me a little bit about the process involved with the writing of that song.

BRIAN MARSHALL: That was one of the first songs Dan and I worked on right after I moved to Washington. A lot of it was stemming from frustration with his girlfriend at the time. Where I was coming from, on the parts I wrote, in particular, 'I'm in the clouds again this morning.' There was a literal reference to the clouds. But also, I was wondering, 'What am I doing?' I moved to a town where I knew absolutely nobody to follow a dream or an inclination to start a band. What the hell was I doing? It's tough. On many of the songs, we both wrote lyrics. I could almost go line by line with you and say, when I'm talking about, 'I don't mean to ignore you,' I'm saying, 'I'm zoning you out because what you are saying is detracting or negative. It's not really helping me be productive.' So much of that is my perspective and Dan's perspective. You will see that on a couple other songs on the album. I love the way that song comes in with the chord progression – it reminded me of Wonder Wall. It's a universal theme that things are different now. People relate to the song really well.

TODD MATTHEWS: That's one of those songs that a lot of people immediately like and understand. It really sticks in your head.

BRIAN MARSHALL: That's a good point, actually. When I say that I'm frustrated about how that album turned out, the strengths really were in the songs. We didn't know how to come up with hooky guitar parts and all that hoo-ha. Not that we do now. But when we were making that record, we were in this little garage. There was something about that repetition that gets stuck in your head, and then you throw a melody over it – those were the songs that would stick in your head. It's cool to see that wasn't just the case with the band. There's nothing really great or grandiose about those earlier songs. There's something simple and easily identifiable about them.

TODD MATTHEWS: They are simple pop songs. But the lyrics are well written, and the melodies are nice. I think there is a difference between being sophisticated and being overindulging with songs.

BRIAN MARSHALL: I know exactly what you mean. I think I'm a student of pop. I never really got into the Beatles or classic pop. I listened to bands like U2, Men At Work, Depeche Mode, The Cure, AC/DC – but I don't think any of them were great. I love pop music. I'm not the kind of person who is going to seek out independent music. I just don't hear about that stuff. I'm just one of those guys who listens to the radio, and I like a handful of songs.

TODD MATTHEWS: Have you thought about approaching some of the local record labels with your music, rather than producing the records on your own?

BRIAN MARSHALL: That's what our manager's strategy is: make sure we are in a position to be presented. And she has connections through different labels. She has worked with a bunch of different bands and radio markets up and down the West Coast. I've put my faith and trust in her. But we definitely want to work with some kind of label that will give us the ability to be presented to radio stations with some level of legitimacy. I can't do that as a member of the band. 'Hey, you guys should play us!' It's a business and it's about economics. I think there's quality in what we do. I'd much rather go with a small- or medium-sized label that's going to push the record, and build interest in the markets we are going to hit. Someone that understands on a regional level where we are and what we want to accomplish, as opposed to saying, 'Here's Mayfly, and they are going to open for Train on their third record.' I know there are guys in the band who want to do that and jump right into the fray. I think people can make money off our music. I don't have the infrastructure to do it. I know that on a microscopic level we can play a show and I can unload fifteen CDs in a crowd of 150 people. If that's a cross-section of a music-buying population, you could easily sell a couple hundred thousand records with adequate promotion. I go back and forth. They think that Immersion is good enough to sell on that level. It's the best that we could do with our financing and capabilities. But is it better to push that record, or make another one with a little bit of backing? But not the kind of backing that they are going to bring in a producer and make it sound like some hokey pop band. I want it to contain the vibe of our music, and everything that Mayfly is. You get better with time. That record was a slice of life.

TODD MATTHEWS: Do you think that's true? Do you think artists get sick of records because it's a reflection of where there were at that particular time?

BRIAN MARSHALL: There's a lot of that. Honestly, when I go back and listen to, say, 'Twins,' I love that song. I don't listen to the album, so I never hear it. But when we play it at the Galway or something, I forget how much I loved that song. There's always that part where you get into the cycle of playing a lot of shows, and a lot of songs off Immersion, and your natural instinct as you are writing new songs is to focus on what's new and exciting. What else are we creating? What else can we do? But I think every band goes through that. If you don't write great new songs, you don't grow as an artist. I want to continue to do that, but I definitely have an appreciation for what we have done. There's something special about those songs. They will go the distance.

TODD MATTHEWS: Did Dan write 'Twins,' or did you write that song?

BRIAN MARSHALL: I wrote it with the bass player at the time. Dan came in and helped us with the very last part: It's always recess / Time to play / Between tomorrow / And yesterday. It's a great use of words. That's the poet in Dan. He was digging the idea that we were running with. I love that tune. I wish we played it more often.

TODD MATTHEWS: How many new songs are you guys working on right now?

BRIAN MARSHALL: I would say close to ten that we are actually actively playing. I have about four. There are two we did post-album. Dan has two. Jim and I have developed two songs. Dan has a third one. I have three more that I'm just needing to finish up lyrics on. There's a lot of stuff. It's exciting. Sometimes you get into a rut, and get so focused on the business and where the band is at, and all that crap -- when you let go of that, what about writing songs? That's what I do. I'm in a band. That's great. I'm also experimenting with my sound. Sometimes I fluctuate back and forth with wanting to go really organic with my guitar tones. Sometimes I want to do something unique or ethereal sounding. I think, ideally, I would like to have two different guitar rigs. Vintage, tune-driven, analog delayed. And then a really modern, high-game amp with digital signal processor where I control the sound.

TODD MATTHEWS: When I try to describe Mayfly and the band's sound to friends, I simply describe you guys as one of the greatest pop bands that nobody has ever heard of. Would you agree with that?

BRIAN MARSHALL: (laughing) I would definitely agree with the 'nobody has heard of us' part.

TODD MATTHEWS: I hope you don't take offense to that. But I think it's kind frustrating, as someone who genuinely enjoys your music, to watch Mayfly not get the attention that some other popular, local bands receive.

BRIAN MARSHALL: I don't know if you are a spiritual person at all, or in terms of the universe and when it's time. I was in the wrong place. I wanted it for all the wrong reasons. I think now I am really enjoying the craft, whereas before I just wanted to make it happen. I think that was the manager side of me. The business guy. It was me saying, 'I'm awesome. This band is good. It's worth listening to. Listen to it. Fall in love with it.' That's not my role, and I realize that now. That's why it's finally nice to get back to what it is and what it's all about: writing songs and music. I think this music will reach its audience, and only because people like yourself found out about it, and told other people about it. That's what I would do if I found a band. If the tables were turned, I would do the exact same thing. If it's not on, say, Epic Records or played on the radio, you're never going to know about it. I hope that we rise above the point where we are respected and loved by more than our immediate family. Because it's not the Brian Marshall solo project, and so many people are working hard on this -- both in the band and in the support network -- they all deserve the honor of having these efforts brought to the attention of a larger audience. Even if it's not a financially successful endeavor, I still think it's valid for people to hear this. This may sound strange and egotistical, but there was a while there where I was listening to a lot of other records, like Coldplay -- I liked a few songs off that. I listened to some Black Crowes records I never heard. The Doves. After a while I would just get irritated. Then I would go back and listen to the Immersion record, which is very strange for me because it's very rare that I will ever go back and listen to From This Point On, but I would pop in Immersion and say, 'Wow!' One of the reasons I got into doing this was that I found it difficult to find the music I loved on someone else's record. I'm not very good at building a chair or a table or a house. But I think I have the ability to make a record that I would love to listen to. This is the first time in my life that, to this day, I still pop in Immersion as a record that I like to listen to. I think I finally did it. It's not the best record I will ever make, but I know we did a really good job. Everybody worked really hard. I can hear it in there. I can appreciate it on so many levels. Even if it was someone else singing the songs, I would still like the songs. Maybe I don't like my voice all the time, but I like the record a lot. I think everyone did a great job capturing the essence of it. That's the most compelling part of it to me. That I can sit there and be a fan as well as a participant.

TODD MATTHEWS: Twenty-something years from now, where will you be?

BRIAN MARSHALL: (pause) I really hope that we are playing the best stages in the world. Not to say that we will be the most popular, richest, and most sucessful MTV kind of band. I want to be on the stages that all the greats are on. I think it would be the best thing in the world to get to play with all my heroes. Just to participate in what I consider a great artform. Twenty-something years from now, I want to still play music for people, because that's what I love to do. Unobstructed and somewhat recognized for it. And that I'm doing it for a living and primarily for the love of it. It's that strong of a passion in me. I don't think that in twenty-something years from now I want to have a family with lots of kids and grand-kids, or whatever the case may be. I don't think that way. I hope I continue to have an output creatively, and that I still have ideas that come to me. That I can tap into that collective unconsciousness or whatever it is that means you are creative. I want to maintain that link. I want to get better at being a songwriter. There's no reason to stop just because you're not young and pretty. I don't think we're very pretty right now (laughing).

TODD MATTHEWS: How often do you rehearse? What are your rehearsal sessions like?

BRIAN MARSHALL: When we get together now, we don't really have a strong showcase agenda. Our focus is to work on new material, polish up newer songs. That way we aren't treating it like a rehearsal. We are treating it like a workshop. Sometimes you hear other bands say that they practice three to five times per week. I'd like to do that where some of the times are designated to jam and try out non-solidified musical ideas. And other times, say, 'OK, here's a song idea that I have. Let's play through it once. Dissect it a little bit. Figure out what's working and what's not.' Basically working on songs. And then we get to a point where we have a rehearsal with a set-list designed for a showcase.

TODD MATTHEWS: When you went to Europe, did you perform at any clubs?

BRIAN MARSHALL: I played at a wedding. I went over there primarily for a wedding. And when I went to Ireland, there was a Galway Arms in Galway Bay, in the town of Galway. They invited me up to play. It was a big thrill for me because the Galway Arms in Seattle was the first regular gig we had as a band. They gave us Wednesday nights. That was about the time we were doing that coffee bar gig. The coffee bar place gave us sandwiches, and the Galway gave us seventy-five bucks and all the beer we wanted. That was painful. It was Wednesday nights, and there would be these blank faces sitting in the bar. It was such an education: what do you do to be a performer? Even in the most adverse positions. I'm not bummed out about any of it. I'm thankful that we went through all of that and sort of defined who and what we are. The band that has gone from the ground up -- through coffee bars and little smoky pubs -- they do it for the love of it. That kind of heart and soul, it comes through the music. There are going to be scores of people saying, 'I remember seeing those guys in an Irish bar in Seattle for free.' That's a great thing. I wish I could do that with all kinds of bands. I wish I had known any number of bands back when they started. I love to see the evolution. That's cool. They didn't give up, they kept up with it. They played their cover songs, but eventually they got past it and were respected for what they did.

TODD MATTHEWS: Do you think that four and a half years is a long time to be doing this without much commercial success?

BRIAN MARSHALL: It's the longest that I have ever been in one band. I don't believe in quitting. I'm very stubborn. I was doing it for different motives. Thank God we got past a lot of real annoying stuff -- bad issues. Coming out of that we were like, 'Here we are. Dan and I are working together positively for the first time, probably since before I moved to Seattle, and we have a manager who believes in our record.' She took us on before we knew Dan was going to come back. We were a three-piece, and she believed in us that strongly. Along the way, there's always some little sign. Like the shittiest gig you played, one person will come up to you and say, 'I really enjoyed that. That really hit me.' You weren't meant to get a big head about it. Most of the time nobody gives a shit about what you are doing. But somewhere somebody wanted you to keep going. You're getting there. There's still a lot to learn. You've got to keep going. That's how it's been since the first day. There has been progress. I don't know what drives me, other than loving what I do. I've never been in a band that has played for a year, saved money, and produced a record that cost fifteen grand. That's phenomenal. We could have pocketed that money, gone on vacation, bought some great equipment, whatever.

TODD MATTHEWS: The song 'Empire' was used for an episode of MTV's 'Road Rules.' Tell me a little bit about how that happened.

BRIAN MARSHALL: They licensed the whole album and used three different songs on three different episodes. We were kind of excited. It wasn't a big money thing, but it was exposure. And it lead to us getting our CD on Internet distribution with CDNow. They used 'Empire.' We were all excited. We went to watch the show. It was classic MTV. We were watching the show, and they just had the intro. And they didn't play it naturally. They looped it. I couldn't believe it. It was like 'Reality Bites,' where he's watching the documentary and they chopped it all up. I never got to see the other two. They licensed 'Memories of Virginia' and 'Dirty Dozen.' I don't really understand the point of why they did that. I think the lyrics are part of our songs. I don't know what they were doing. It was one of those things where we put it on the resume and people said, 'Wow, you were on MTV?' It's not what you think. They did a little sample of the music. They probably had about twenty bands per episodes. But I would love to get a music video made. I have a degree in film. That was my background. I've always wanted to blend the visual. That's why I've been inspired to write story songs because I envision one day making a great music video that illustrates the story.

TODD MATTHEWS: How much of an impact does your visual background have on you when you sit down to write songs?

BRIAN MARSHALL: It's huge. I'm so visual. I don't know how to describe it. I imagine what the notes look like, not on the page, but when you are hearing a chord go this way and this thing diverging this way, I'm literally looking at beams of something, or some sort of illustrated version in my head. And when I start to put in the lyrics, especially the character-driven songs, I'm always visualizing it. I think that makes for a much more believable representation. If you are not engaged in it while you are doing it, why will anyone become engaged while listening to it? The best part about making music for me is when you get that point across very powerfully through the elements that you have to work with.

TODD MATTHEWS: Tell me a little bit about the song 'All Or Nothing.' That's about as 'rock' as you guys get.

BRIAN MARSHALL: Yeah. That was a fabulous evolution in terms of being in a band, writing songs, and having all this stuff that you think you have down. We had played that song through, but it just didn't sound right. Something was missing. We recorded a basic track. We were all in the room. They captured the drums. From there on out, it was a total deconstruction. We wanted to try out having a lot of space between the bass, so that it wasn't constantly going all the time. There's a track on Radiohead's OK Computer where the bass isn't there all the time, but when it is there, it's really striking. We were borrowing on that idea. Then Dan suggested a drum loop. It's real drums, but coming in heavy. That was exciting. It was a new way for us to record a song. We deconstructed everything we played together, created a drum loop, and our producer sat down with the bass player. Literally, note by note, it took half a day to get that bass recorded. He didn't really have the idea formulated in his head as he was playing it. Section by section, they went through the whole song. By the end of the main part of the song, the bass player couldn't take it anymore. I knew it needed something different at the end of the song. I was hearing something like Achtung Baby meets Radiohead. If you're familiar with the song, it takes a dramatic turn. I came up with a distinct outro that is in a different direction, but was intense. The producer/engineer started wailing on the bass through the rest of the outro. The way he was standing at the console, he was rocking out! It was exciting to have that kind of energy on a record, because it just wasn't there anywhere else. It's a different vibe from song to song on the record. But that was the most rock-and-roll recording experience I ever had. That song took forever to complete. I just love the way that tune came out. I wish I had given the vocal a little more dynamic. But it has this almost 1984 vibe to it. I really wanted to have that kind of hopelessness in there. I thought it was a great tune. I would love to do a couple songs like that each time, where you're not sure how it's going to evolve. But when it's done, it's super-collaborative -- very exciting and unique.

TODD MATTHEWS: That song really comes out of nowhere, deep into the album.

BRIAN MARSHALL: They were worried about that. In terms of the song order, we thought it would be a great way to start the record. But it was so unlike everything on the record. If you didn't like that vibe, and listening it to the first time, but you might think, 'That album is not for me.' That was a huge debate. We had the song order, and it felt very natural -- except for the first and the thirteenth song. Initially, 'Twenty-Something Years From Now' was going to be the lead track. But I thought it was too good. I thought we should open with 'Reminder' because it lifts you into the song gradually. It has the harmonica. It's a great first track. It's very rare that the very first song on the album is the best song. After making Immersion, I started to appreciate what bands go through in terms of how they put songs in order on a record. It means a lot to people. A lot of times the work is meant to be listened to on a whole. So when people hit 'random' on a CD player, you are missing the point of how they made the record. The songs work together in certain ways.

This article originally appeared (in slightly different form) in The Tablet.