Speaking with Polyvinyl’s Chris Hassen about Fil-Am artist Jay Som, American Football & the rise of vinyl

Speaking with Polyvinyl’s Chris Hassen about Fil-Am artist Jay Som, American Football & the rise of vinyl

by rick olivares

Filipino-American indie artist Melina Duterte’s second opus, Anak Ko, (under the moniker of Jay Som) was released last August 23 to widespread acclaim and interest.

The lo-fi bedroom pop Jay Som recently relocated to Los Angeles from San Francisco, and Anak Ko reflected the changes in scenery more so living in the Joshua Tree area. Her first album, Everybody Works came out of nowhere in March of 2017 to top many an indie list in the United States and in the Philippines. That left indie music fans eagerly waiting for her second album and no one it seems is disappointed.

We spoke with Polyvinyl Chris Hassen, the label’s production manager on about Jay Som, recent Manila visitor American Football, and the direction of vinyl as a music format.

Polyvinyl has been one of the higher profile independent labels in recent years as they have put out some critically-acclaimed albums and bestsellers that includes Canadian band, Alvvays, American Football, British indie pop band Kero Kero Bonito, noise pop band Deerhoof that also recently performed in Manila, and American Football whose latest album, LP3 is sure to make many a year-end list.

“Jay Som is one where I honestly can't remember the first time their name came up,” Hassen discussed about how the Filipina-American landed on Polyvinyl’s sights. “But I do remember Matt Lunsford -- the person who started Polyvinyl with his wife Darcie -- really latching onto (the Jay Som song) “Turn Into”. I think it was originally released by Topshelf Records as part of a cassette subscription series they were doing, so that was an instance where some music was already out there and Melina had started to build up a pretty rabid following on Bandcamp. There were definitely other labels that were interested in working with her, but she ended up partnering with us because she really liked our values and our reputation, and we're so incredibly grateful that she's part of the family. She's so talented and it's really inspiring to see how much she's grown as an artist in just a few years as far as moving to LA and setting up a home studio to record not only her own music, but other people's albums as well.”

The Guardian called Anak Ko, “subtly impressive” while Pitchfork said the album “sounded exploratory and playful, like a jam session among friends that’s just hit its stride.”

The song “Superbike” is Anak Ko’s first single.

Illinois-based American Football which is on their second act as a band after breaking up following their 1999 debut album has seen their career sky rocket since their reformation in 2014. They since released two albums and the band has been a festival favorite. The indie post-rock band recently came off a successful Asian tour with Manila as one of their stops.

Hassen noted of the band’s meteoric rise, “The whole phenomenon of American Football is definitely not something that anyone ever predicted. They had basically broken up by the time LP1 was released so the fact that 20 years later they're still around, playing shows with two more albums under their belt, is really a testament to just how intense of a connection people have felt with that record over the years.” 

The third album, LP3, features guest vocals by Slowdive’s Rachel Goswell, Paramore’s Hayley Williams, and Land of Talk’s Elizabeth Powell, has been a solid best-seller.

“It's not the #1 best-selling album in PV's catalog” clarified Hassen, “but it's definitely the one that has sold the most consistently year-in, year-out. I think everyone -- us and the band -- felt some trepidation about the idea of getting back together because sometimes the expectations that build up over time are just impossible to meet. But honestly, I feel like they've done the best that anyone possibly could under those circumstances and I don't think their legacy has suffered at all. LP3 certainly feels like they've turned a corner and are comfortable with the music they're making now and the direction they're headed. I think having the guest vocalists and the different instrumentation on LP3 really helped solidify the idea that they're not the same band that they were as college students in 1999 and that's ok. In fact, that's a good thing! I'm excited to see what comes next for them.”

Regarding the return of vinyl as a format, the numbers have been good for Polyvinyl. 

“We've been making vinyl since day one of the label starting, so it was really just an added bonus when LP sales started to increase across the board. It wasn't like we decided to hop on a trend -- vinyl has always been integral to Polyvinyl (it's in our name after all) and it's even more so now that it's such a popular format. Vinyl really feels like the best opportunity we have to connect with people in a tangible way in an era increasingly dominated by streaming. I started out in mail order and I still love the idea of putting an LP into a cardboard mailer with an Airhead and some extra goodies and shipping it out in the mail -- knowing that the person on the other end is going to be really excited when they see the package and everything inside of it.”

The resurgence of the music market has also an effect on the company’s fortunes. From a small office space, the company moved to a much bigger building in Champaign, Illinois and now has satellite offices in San Francisco, Philadelphia, and New York. Their artist roster has jumped to 39 solo artists and bands.

“Before we moved to our current space, we rented a spot for 10 years in a multi-story office building that was not equipped to receive the kind of deliveries a record label receives,” recounted Hassen. “We were on the second floor and there was no freight elevator access on that level so every time we received a shipment of records, the entire staff would stop what they were doing, grab carts, head downstairs on the regular elevator, unload boxes of vinyl one-by-one by hand off the truck, stack them on the carts, go back upstairs, unload the carts, and then go back downstairs in a continuous loop until everything was unloaded. I cannot begin to estimate how much of my life was spent doing this and also figuring out places to store all of this product in various rooms and closets and auxiliary spaces we rented throughout the building.”

“We've always had a very DIY mentality where we work as hard as we can on behalf of our bands. I mean, Matt and Darcie started out putting together a fanzine and selling records at VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars) hall shows and we still do record fairs and make zines for some releases. It's funny how the more things change, the more they stay the same.”