Q&A: AV Club Talks Crafting Debut Single & the Double-edged Nature of Desire
INTERVIEW
INTERVIEW
☆ BY NICO CHODOR ☆
ALY VELASCO IS FOCUSED ON GETTING HER NAME OUT THIS SUMMER—as she gears up to follow debut single “All I Dread” with her first-ever show at Hotel Ziggy next week. Influenced by indie rock sluggers like Mannequin Pussy and Momma, together with smaller artists who push her to continue signing up for every open mic LA has to offer, Velasco promises nothing short of queer flourishing under her stage name AV Club.
She worked closely with Gavin Valladares on this track, which opens slowly; a percussive rattle behind Velasco’s guitar lends to melancholic reflection, perhaps steeped with bitters. These lyrics have come a long way, after all, brought to you by deep-seated feelings that Aly has kept close to the vest for several years now. “All I Dread” is resentment flushed out, the Situationship’s Lament.
Velasco speaks on the physically transactional nature of being with someone who wants you for one reason only. Tension builds and then ebbs, interspersed with shredding that will surely become her distinctive trademark by the next single’s release. She has years' worth of journal entries at her fingertips, itching to be released from the AV Club vault in final indie-rock form. Gritty and distressed, “All I Dread” is certainly worth the listen, and Velasco speaks more on the early days of her rise to gay, local indie girl repute in the interview below.
LUNA: You’ve been sitting on this song for two years now. Does having the single finally realized help you reflect on the unrequited love you’re unpacking in the lyrics? Are you still working through it all? Where are you at?
VELASCO: When I originally wrote this song two years ago, it was something that happened to me two years before that. So, yeah, writing the song and having it come to its full glory definitely helps me process those emotions. I think writing about things that have happened to me in the past allows me to give myself grace for mistakes I’ve made, explore my feelings further, and then turn them into catchy lyrics.
LUNA: I wish I had that superpower. Being able to really workshop your feelings across four years total is probably the most thorough way to go about it.
VELASCO: Yeah. I mean, I feel like, if I were to write about something that’s happened to me currently, it would just be messy, like not put together at all.
LUNA: You’re taking your time with it. Really sitting with the emotions. I admire that a lot. Do you have a favorite lyric on the track? I think mine has to be “fetishize, romanticize your desire.” Desire is so interesting to me. It can be such a double-edged sword, truly all that you want, and then all that you dread.
VELASCO: Exactly, yeah! I think my favorite lyric is “read between my sighs. Trade a couple lines. You want me, you want me, you want me.” Because at that point, I was just like, whatever, at least this guy wants me. I had convinced myself that that was enough.
LUNA: By trade a couple lines, was that you saying, ‘let’s talk’? Like, let’s have more of a conversation?
VELASCO: Totally. Yeah. I got stuck on loop with this person. We just developed this routine of talking for one second, before things pretty immediately became physical.
LUNA: Transactional almost.
VELASCO: Yeah, desire really is such a double-edged sword. That was a really good way to put it.
LUNA: How does writing solo compare to playing with Something and the Ronnies?
VELASCO: I started AV Club before I was recruited into that band! I joined it because I really wanted to collaborate with other musicians. So with AV Club, I obviously take the reins a lot, and then Something and the Ronnies is much more of a collaborative process. Everybody puts in their input. We all kind of play with each other’s ideas and bounce off one another. I guess I also do that with Gavin, my producer, in AV Club. He’s really great.
LUNA: It must be nice to tap into both worlds.
VELASCO: Yeah, I’m so excited to do more things with both. I’m going to be playing some summertime backyard shows and doing a lot of cover songs with Something and the Ronnies. And then for AV Club, I just finished recording my second single that’s coming out by the end of the summer! It’s called “Like it Starts.”
LUNA: Congrats, that’s so exciting!
VELASCO: This one gravitates more toward shoegaze. I had a really fun time creating the song with Gavin.
LUNA: Super cool that you’re extending into shoegaze. That’s also going to be fun live, in combination with “All I Dread.”
VELASCO: Speaking of live shows, I am performing for We Found New Music at Hotel Ziggy, on July 14.
LUNA: That’s huge!
VELASCO: I’ll send you the flyer!
LUNA: Would love to see you shred live. Your guitar skills really weave the whole track together. Tell me more about your relationship with that instrument.
VELASCO: Yeah, I take guitar lessons every week. At Guitar Ninjas - shout out. I am currently learning “Heartbreaker” by Pat Benatar. It’s a crazy, crazy solo, but I get to shred a lot in Something and the Ronnies. I’ve been playing since I was 12, beginning just with YouTube videos. It wasn’t until this past year, actually, that I started taking guitar lessons. It’s definitely improved my skills.
LUNA: That’s awesome.
VELASCO: I’m so excited to keep playing guitar on my songs. It’s literally the baseline of all of my songs. I write the melody on the guitar, and then the lyrics come after that, and everything else. I have a demo in the vaults - a finger-picking song. It’s going to be pretty simple, stripped. Not really much more than my guitar and my voice.
LUNA: Open mic-style.
VELASCO: Exactly.
LUNA: You’ve also co-founded a queer arts and crafts club in LA. How does your music intersect with the art club’s mission of finding community?
VELASCO: That’s such a good question! I feel like just being a queer artist represents that, in a way. Writing songs about queer experiences and providing a safe space for queer people to meet up and express themselves through art feels like the best way to provide everyone with a sense of belonging and community. That’s something that is really important to me, and I’m continuously looking for new ways to keep meshing the two together. It’s kind of unfortunate that my only song right now is about a guy.
LUNA: [Laughs] That’s okay.
VELASCO: As far as my art goes, though, I’m actually working on these patches right now. I have been hand-painting a bunch of them. Hopefully, I can move on to T-shirts.
LUNA: DIY, I love it. It means more. What other crafts are you working on? Like, just for yourself?
VELASCO: I am trying to get back into painting…
LUNA: Me too!
VELASCO: I feel like before you start doing it, you’re like, oh my god, this is so stressful. I don’t know what to do with this blank canvas. But it really is therapeutic. And paint is such a forgiving medium. I love to work with it. Room for mistakes.
LUNA: I also have pastels that I want to work with more. I just want to get more into crafts in general.
VELASCO: Yeah, you should! You should come out to our queer arts and crafts meets!
LUNA: True! Next time I’m in LA. Craft and then go to the show.
VELASCO: Perfect.
Be sure to RSVP for her debut performance at Hotel Ziggy on July 14. It’s entirely free, and “All I Dread” is out now.
