The concept of ‘home’ can often be a complicated thing to navigate. Hailing from the Rio Grande Valley in deep South Texas, that’s definitely true for Riley!.
Now settling into their new label home at Pure Noise Records, their high-energy, emo-infused sound is shaped by everything that comes with growing up far from the centre of things. From the boredom and isolation to the desire to escape, and the complicated affection that remains for the people and places that made you, the trio have already begun cultivating their own community within the scene, steadily evolving from a low-stakes DIY project into one of modern emo’s most exciting rising names.
As an openly queer, progressive band operating within a deeply conservative state, they’ve swiftly learned the importance of building the spaces you need when they don’t already exist. And, on Pure Noise Records debut EP ‘To Live And Die In The American South’, they’re figuring out what it means to carry home with you wherever you go. Recorded with producer Phil Odom, its five tracks sharpen Riley!’s scrappy foundations without sanding away their personality, tackling isolation, anxiety, grief and the sacrifices that come with chasing purpose.
Having shared stages with the likes of Hot Mulligan, Arm’s Length and Saturdays At Your Place, as the band step into their biggest chapter yet, Rock Sound caught up with Ryan, Kris and Izzy to talk about the places that have shaped them, finding belonging through music, and making sure that Riley! never loses the magic that started it all.
Rock Sound: The title of your latest EP To Live And Die In The American South feels like it contains a few different things. There’s this love for where you’re from, but also a frustration, isolation and this desire to escape. Where did that phrase come from?
Ryan Bluhm: We had landed on a different title initially. As we were getting more into the writing process though, we started homing in on the lyrical topics and overall vibe. We spit-balled some ideas, and we were standing outside of the van at a stop when that title came up. We were like, ‘That rocks!’ It really fit what we were shooting for thematically, and we never came up with anything better, so it just stuck around.
Kris Gallardo: Also, it helps that we’re from South Texas!
RS: You’ve talked about having this love-hate relationship with South Texas. Having now travelled so far beyond the Rio Grande Valley through the band, has leaving home made you understand what it means to you differently?
Ryan: Everywhere’s got its quirks and its pros and cons. It’s definitely shaped who I am though, and all of my friends and family are here too. The first song on the EP is pretty much just about that love-hate relationship with your home.
Izzy Izaguirre: I grew up in Mexico for most of my childhood, and when I moved to the U.S, I didn’t travel outside of Texas for over 10 years of my life. As soon as I left the Rio Grande Valley, it made me appreciate how culturally rich it is down here. It’s a microcosm of a community, and it’s beautiful. Leaving and getting to see a little more of the world has definitely made me appreciate it more.
RS: As a queer band coming out of a deeply conservative state, you’ve essentially had to create your own version of belonging. How has the process of finding your community been?
Ryan: I think that’s kind of what draws you to this type of music to begin with. It’s the same with all music, but especially emo and more general alternative stuff. It’s a much more accepting community to be in, and you don’t get that anywhere else. At least here, that only exists in these niche subcultures, and that’s how it all begins. You get drawn to it pretty early on once you are exposed to it.
Izzy: Also, coming from our small-town area, we don’t actually have a lot of room for those very opposing opinions. We know what we lean towards ethically and politically, and because we’re from such a small town and such a tight community, there’s not a lot of room for those people who disagree to stay there. Those kinds of people tend to just fade away and not really stick it out. It’s been an adjustment, but everyone in our community is so sweet and understanding.
RS: You started this as a pretty low-stakes project, recording in your bedrooms and doing everything DIY. Now you’re signed to Pure Noise and touring internationally. What part of that original Riley! mentality are you most determined not to lose?
Ryan: Nothing, dog. I’m selling out as soon as I can! Honestly though, as stressful as the band becomes, and no matter how much higher the stakes get… I don’t want to lose the fun that comes with being in a band. There’s give and take, and you have to give some of that away to get to where you want to be, but I never want to fully lose the fun parts of writing music. When you’ve got deadlines and contracts, it can get too stressful and start feeling like a chore. I don’t ever want it to get to that, though. I want to always enjoy writing music with my friends, and I never want to lose the magic of it all.
Izzy: I also want to make sure that whenever we take a band out on tour, we make sure that their experience is as comfortable as possible. We’ve been on the receiving end of some rougher drives and rougher tours, the kinds where you’re not getting your money or meals, or where promoters are trying to get you to do ‘pay-to-play’. We’ll always put our foot down whenever it comes to that shit. Coming from DIY, we deal with it all, but those shitty people tend to get weeded out over time. I want to make sure that the people we take out with us are always taken care of.
RS: This is your first Pure Noise release and your first time making a record in a proper studio environment. Did stepping into that world make you approach yourselves more seriously as musicians?
Ryan: Yeah, dude, we’re doing vocal warm-ups before our sets now! Anyone who’s writing music or recording it deserves to be taken seriously if they are talented, but it definitely does feel different. Going from writing in a bedroom to being in a studio and working with a producer has been a huge change for us. Writing together with a producer definitely makes it feel a little bit more polished too.
RS: Working with Phil Odom seems to have helped you find that middle ground between the scrappier and more polished sides of your sound. What did he add to the process?
Ryan: When we went into the studio, we had some songs ready to go, and a couple where we had a baseline idea for them. It’s really helpful to have somebody outside of the band lend their ears to those parts we were writing in the studio. Phil would suggest different things to try and add his own flavour when it came to some of the percussive, piano and synth stuff, but he didn’t overstep. It was cool to have somebody involved in the making of it, and it’s the first time we have had a producer involved. He’s also a good friend of ours, so it was very easy to work with him.
Let’s talk a little bit about ‘Two Bucks’, because that feels like an important song when we’re getting into the band’s growth. It essentially asks whether all the touring, missed birthdays, anniversaries and moments at home are actually worth it. How have you been reckoning with the growth of Riley! In that sense?
Ryan: Feeling like you are progressing in your career in music definitely does help ease a lot of the anxiety that comes with it. When you look at everyone else’s lives around you, they’re all married with kids and have a full-time job. Once you get to a certain age, you start to look at your career in music and wonder if it’s as emotionally rewarding as a ‘standard’ lifestyle. That’s definitely something I’ve had to battle with, and there’s a lot of anxiety that comes with doing this, especially as you get older. It does get easier when you feel like you are progressing in your career, though. It feels a lot easier than it used to.
Kris: You get more accepting of it over the years. At the beginning it’s hard, but eventually you learn to just roll with it.
Ryan: At some point, it just becomes all you know.
RS: Something that spans across the EP is this idea of home, and whether the grass could be greener somewhere else. Really, it boils down to the idea that home doesn’t have to be a physical place, it can be about the people around you, and the communities you build. That being said, it feels important that the EP closes out with ‘73 Summers’, which is such a heartfelt rumination on the people we love and the impact they have on us. Why did that one make sense as the final song?
Ryan: There were a few things that went into that decision. Obviously, that’s the more sombre song on the EP, and we typically try to go a little bit softer as a record ends. I don’t know why, but that’s just how we’ve always landed. Also, that song talks about grief and death, and in a sense that signals the end. Thematically and sonically, it just fit as a great closer for a record. It felt right to stop it there.
Izzy: I also really like that the first line of the record is “If I died right now // Would my soul haunt this house?”, and then the last song is all about coming to terms with that. It’s about the impact of grief, but death can symbolise a bunch of different things within that.
RS: There’s a lot of isolation across these songs, but since you’ve started getting out on the road – touring alongside bands like Hot Mulligan, Arm’s Length and Saturdays At Your Place – it feels like the community around Riley! is really building. How has that been from your perspective?
Izzy: We’ve always been close to that scene, but getting to tour with those bands has definitely strengthened that. It feels like we have a family away from our family back home. It’s like a family reunion every time that we meet up at a festival or play a show together.
RS: Whether it’s people coming out to your UK shows with Ben Quad this autumn, or people just checking out this latest EP through their headphones, what do you hope people understand about Riley! once they listen to these songs?
Ryan: I like to think that whatever it is that we are writing about is relatable, in the sense that everyone can find what they’re looking for in it. Not to be cheesy, but you’re not alone in any of these feelings. A lot of what I write about is just things that I have anxiety about, and it’s almost like my outlet for it. I hope that people feel like they can go through things with us.
Izzy: However you may stumble upon this EP, we’ll probably never do the exact same thing again. We’re always trying to expand the Riley! sound, and we do already have this broad sonic palette. For those people who are hearing the first EP and then going back to check out everything else, I want them to take away that this band can do a little bit of everything.
