Tiffany Hanssen: This is All Of It. I'm Tiffany Hanssen in for Alison Stewart. Up next we have a listening party.

[Can I Call You Rose by Thee Sacred Souls]

Can I call you Rose? (Can I call you Rose?)

'Cause you're sweet like a flower in blue

(Can I call you Rose?)

Tiffany Hanssen: That's Can I Call You Rose? from the band, or should I say the band, Thee Sacred Souls, off their debut self-titled album that came out last August. The band was formed in Chula Vista in Southern California and is made up of three members, vocalist, Josh Lane, bassist, Sal Samano, and drummer, Alex Garcia. They got together in 2019 after playing just a few club gigs together. They signed for Daptone Records, and they are with me now in studio to listen to some songs off of that debut self-titled album and preview their show tomorrow night in Brooklyn. All three members of the band are here, Josh Lane, Sal Samano, and Alex Garcia. Welcome to All Of It.

Alex Garcia: Thanks for having us.

Sal Samano: Thank you.

Josh Lane: Hello. Thanks for having us.

Tiffany Hanssen: Before we get into the music specifically, I want to talk a little bit about how you guys all came together. If I have this right, Sal and Alex, you two were making demos together back in 2019. Josh, you're from Sacramento. How did this all come together? Josh?

[00:01:50] Josh Lane: I'm probably going to butcher the first part of the story because I wasn't around, but Alex and Sal were both playing in different indie bands in the city, and they were playing at the same show. At a certain point, they were drinking a little bit of whiskey, talking about the soul music they were vibing on and grew up on, and I think they decided at that point to get together and try to cut some covers and maybe some originals. I had moved to San Diego from Sacramento, had been there for two years, and I was doing a solo thing trying to make music happen.

Somehow me and Alex had been following each other on Instagram and liked each other's music. I think we both were like, "We should jam," and he invited me to his garage to just jam. We jammed for about an hour, and then at the end of our session, he was like, "I have some demos I was working on with a friend if you want to hear them." He showed me them. Then that day ended up cutting Rose, I believe, right? Yes, in one session.

Alex Garcia: Yes.

Tiffany Hanssen: You guys were all vibing on the same type of soul music at that point, and you had all heard each other, is that right? You had heard what they were doing demo wise and you, Alex, you'd heard what Josh was doing at that point as well and you were in the same lane. Is that--

Alex Garcia: Really what brought us together was the instrumental for Rose, because I had recorded that in just a little demo in I think July of 2018. Through that, I met Sal, and we just so happened to play a gig together. That's what brought us together was just this song.

Tiffany Hanssen: Got it. We're going to listen to it again just in a minute, but I want to ask another question about this soul sound. Sal, for people who don't know what we mean when we say Southern California Sweet Soul, what is that sound? I can hear it when I hear that song, but how would you describe it to someone who may not know what we're talking about?

[00:04:09] Sal Samano: I think that different people might have different takes on it, but I guess coming from me and probably Alex too is we just grew up with it. For us, it was considered classic soul or low rider soul because it was just part of the culture, part of growing up. It was always playing. Our parents were playing it, our grandparents were playing it just classics like Billy Stewart, Brenton Wood. It just became the soundtrack to your upbringing.

Tiffany Hanssen: Is that where you started?

Sal Samano: Yes, definitely. My dad was a big record collector, so he was always surrounding me by [unintelligible 00:04:45].

Tiffany Hanssen: What was in that record collection that caught your attention?

Sal Samano: Oh, man. Well, everything the style of soul that we play now, just every group that we were inspired by.

Tiffany Hanssen: Josh, was that your upbringing also?

Josh Lane: Not necessarily. I grew up in a religious household, so the music was that way. When I did hear soul just in my community it was more the pop-soul stuff like Motown.

Tiffany Hanssen: Is that a lot of gospel for your growing up then?

Josh Lane: Not necessarily. It was an American church that just had some gospel, some contemporary.

Tiffany Hanssen: Got it.

Josh Lane: It wasn't really where I would say a lot of my music-

Tiffany: Your influence comes.

Josh Lane: -that came from. That was later in life. When I did listen to soul, it was more of the classic Motown stuff, Marvin Gaye, Al Green, Aretha Franklin. I did have some of that too, but culture-wise, it wasn't as deeply rooted.

Tiffany Hanssen: Alex, this Southern California soul to me sounds sunny, laid back. Why do you think that sound strikes a chord with people, no pun intended, and also why now do you think?

[00:06:36] Alex Garcia: I don't know. I feel like people especially more these days are seeking music, whether it's music or even supporting of a restaurant that really has passion towards what they do. I feel like you can just hear it in soul music, no pun intended, but I don't know. It's just hard to explain why I like it, but it's just what we do and what we dig.

Tiffany Hanssen: I want to listen to this again, just for a quick second. This Can I Call You Rose? just to refresh our memory on this.

Can I call you Rose? (Can I call you Rose?)

'Cause you're sweet like a flower in blue

(Can I call you Rose?)

Can I call you Rose? (Can I call you Rose?)

'Cause you're fragrance takes over the room

(Can I call you Rose?) Darling

I wanna plant you in my heart,

Tiffany Hanssen: Mostly that was just an excuse for me to hear the song again. I just love that song. How did you come up with that? You said you, Alex, you had a guitar riff for this song already and then you reeled them in with this or no?

Alex Garcia: No, I had the whole instrumental.

Tiffany Hanssen: Oh, you did? All right. Then you brought--

Alex Garcia: Pretty much everything was already there in every inch.

Tiffany Hanssen: You brought Josh and Sal and said, "Here's my idea, and let's go with it," or how'd that go?

Alex Garcia: I remember posting a little clip of the demo and Sal had hit me up and was just like, "Yo, this is really good. We should get together and do something." Like I'm saying it's just I don't know what this song had to do with us meeting each other, but it was some special thing that just ended up falling into place. It wasn't a complete song yet because there was no vocals or lyrics. For the longest time, I wasn't really sure what to do with the song, and I didn't even want to use it for this project, but Sal really pushed the fact that, like, "Yo this is a good instrumental, we got to use it." I was like, "Okay I think I have just the right guy to sing over it."

Josh Lane: Well, the interesting part about that too was that he didn't lead when he was like, "Come over for the jam session." He's in lead with like, "I have a track that you might, like." We just did a legit jam. I was showing some of my songwriter ideas playing along with him. Then at the end of the session he was like, "I got this track."

Tiffany Hanssen: He swifts it in. [chuckles]

Josh Lane: I personally, hit all the chords that I look for. It struck all the chords that I looked for in music. It had really strong core progression with the dynamics of-- the structure was nice and it was all there. It just needed vocal melody and lyrics.

Tiffany Hanssen: Is that why you put it first on the album?

Josh Lane: I don't know.

Tiffany Hanssen: Because it was your first--

Josh Lane: Good question.

Sal Samano: That was the first completed song, right?

Alex Garcia: It was, yes.

Tiffany Hanssen: It had some special meaning, right, Sal? Because it brought you all together.

Sal Samano: Yes.

Tiffany Hanssen: You've signed with Daptone Records. Daptone for folks who don't know is a label behind funk soul sound like Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings. Gabriel Roth, also known as Bosco Mann, is the co-founder of the label. He worked with you on this first album, so how was that, Sal?

Sal Samano: It was pretty crazy meeting him. I think it was our second or third show we were still trying to figure everything out, get a set, set list that was long enough to perform. Through a mutual friend had let us know that Gabe wanted to come check us out. He just sat there and watched us perform and as soon as we finished, he just walked up and just said that he liked what he heard and asked if we wanted to cut a record. From there we just went with it.

Josh Lane: Legitimately, he was like, "Y'all want to cut a record?"

Sal Samano: It was so casual.

Alex Garcia: So casual.

Tiffany Hanssen: This is the stuff dreams are made of. Come on you guys.

Alex Garcia: Yes, we were very nervous that our first day in the studio because we had never actually recorded onto tape. We've recorded in studios before, but recording on the tape it was different.

Tiffany Hanssen: Sure. Here you are. Interesting, wait, you recorded onto actual tape?

Alex Garcia: Yes.

Josh Lane: [unintelligible 00:11:18]

Tiffany Hanssen: Oh, I love that, oh, right. That's where this fantastically warm sound come from. I was going to ask you about that. Back to that collaboration though with Gabriel Roth. He said you guys want to cut a record, you didn't have really a fully formed album yet in mind. Did he help you flesh that all out, and how was that collaborative process once you guys all agreed that this is what we're going to do? Alex, why don't you take that one?

Alex Garcia: Yes, I don't think we really had a specific plan with him at that point. It was just, we had a few singles, and we ended up taking it from there. COVID hit and we were supposed to have a tour with the Penrose showcase and it just didn't happen. That whole time during COVID, it gave us a lot of time to figure out what we were trying to do with this record and write some songs.

Tiffany Hanssen: Josh, it sounds like a pretty fluid experience.

Josh Lane: Yes, it was. I feel like--

Tiffany Hanssen: Did you feel at home there?

Josh Lane: Yes. There's a familial, is that the right way to say it, energy with Gabe. I think what we all can agree was fun working on this record with him was that he was really good at carving space for us to be creative. He did give his input and every once in a while we brushed against it, but for the most part it he respected that we had an idea and songs were flowing out of us. He wasn't really there to write the songs with us. He was more there to be in the room and give his advice. His main advice that we followed was maybe cutting the songs a little shorter.

That's one thing that we-- He wasn't really there to give us core progressions or like, "Say you should go this way," which was really, I don't know, at least for me it was a fun experience because we got to learn from a great. It was like-

Tiffany Hanssen: He wasn't heavy-handed.

Josh Lane: -a secret masterclass because he wasn't like, "This is a masterclass, you're going to do this and that." It felt at the end of the record we're like, "We just got to-"

Alex Garcia: Level up a little bit with our skills as musicians.

Tiffany Hanssen: Nice that you recognize that. All right. I want to listen to another track here. Let's go to Once you know, then you'll know.

[Once You Know (Then You'll Know) by Thee Sacred Souls]

Once you know, then you'll know

Once you know, then you'll know

Baby (Baby)

What we have, (What we have is pure)

It's no child-play, make-believe, baby

And once I (once I) get the chance (get the chance, I will)

I'ma make sure this whole world knows that this love is for real, it's no fool's gold

This love is for real

Tiffany Hanssen: I do want to get to the background singers, but first, Josh, your vocal melodies, do those just come to you out of the ether? Do you collectively spend a lot of time on the vocal melody or that's what you bring to the table when you guys are all collaborating on a song like this?

Josh Lane: For the most part. This specific track though, I had wrote the skeleton of the song. The core progression, the lyrics, the melody were all there from beginning to end, but it was a skeleton. It was dry, it didn't have a lot of-- There was no leading parts, no really distinct lines. Then Alex reinterpreted the core progression in the guitar and gave it life, I think. For the most part, yes, I contribute the most with melody and lyrics. I like to sit on songs for a minute. Every once in a while it'll be while we're all together, but I like to sit on something so that the core progression is living inside of me so that the melodies flow easier.

I like to sit with my phone and come up with a lot of melodies and pick the best one before I present it to the group. That's my favorite way of doing it, but sometimes we're in the same room together. Alex also has come up with some, I think he did the chorus for-

Alex Garcia: Will I See You Again? and Weak for Your Love.

Josh Lane: -Will I See You Again? and Weak for Your Love.

Tiffany Hanssen: Got it. Before we take a quick break, I just want to ask you, Sal, about those backup singers. My dream is to come back as a backup singer in my next life. I'll look you--

Sal Samano: It's never too late. [laughs]

Tiffany Hanssen: It's never too late. Well, if you heard me you might think differently. It's a fantastic layer that's added on here. It's pretty typical for soul music. Was that the choice, was it your choice, was it Gabriel's choice, how did the evolution of the background singers in this come to be?

Sal Samano: Well, I think we all had this, at least the way I heard it, it had a very theatrical James Brown feel. Yes, that was Jensine on vocals. You were on vocals and who else?

Alex Garcia: Tatiana.

Sal Samano: Tatiana, but also--

Tiffany Hanssen: Someone else whose name we forgot. That's all right. We still love her. If you remember it you can just chime in with it as soon as you remember it.

Sal Samano: David Paul.

Josh Lane: David, yes.

[crosstalk]

Tiffany Hanssen: There we go. All right. [chuckles] I do want to take a quick break and when we come back I'm going to talk about baselines, and I want to talk a little bit about the album itself and the artwork, which I just love it so much. Anyway, we're talking with Thee Sacred Souls. They're a San Diego-based trio, playing what they call Sweet Southern California Soul. We'll return to our conversation and our listening party with them just after the break. This is All Of It.

[music].

Tiffany Hanssen: This is All Of It. I'm Tiffany Hanssen in for Alison Stewart. Happy Friday. We are in a listening party with Thee Sacred Souls, af San Diego-based trio playing what they call Sweet Southern California Soul. Sal, we talked with Josh about the musical evolution of his vocals. I want to talk a little bit about your baselines, which admittedly are quite groovy. Let's talk about your process. How do those come to you as you are listening to a song? Are you just noodling around? What's happening there?

Sal Samano: I would say that it depends on which song we're talking about. Because every song was written differently. Some of the songs, Alex would turn in as a demo, which already has bass on, which might change just a little bit when I perform it live or in the studio. Other than that, some of the other baselines it's just taken inspiration from other songs that I listen to. I feel like I'm just trying to, I don't know, play like what I like listening to, but I don't really have a much deeper concept of playing baselines.

Tiffany Hanssen: Alex, this album cover that I mentioned, so to me, it's got like a Soul Train Vibe to it-

Alex Garcia: Kaleidoscope.

Tiffany Hanssen: -and the puffy font, very rounded font. A warm yellow like the old kitchens of the '70s, that kind of warm yellow, with images of you guys dotted all over. Who came up with that concept for the album cover?

Alex Garcia: My girlfriend and I designed pretty much everything for the band. It was a long process to design the album cover. There's a lot of different versions of it that we did. My personal favorite is the [unintelligible 00:19:46] edition that we did, which is a different image that we chose. We were just taking inspiration from a lot of '60s soul records, and she specializes in typography-

Tiffany Hanssen: Nice.

Alex Garcia: -so she naturally has an eye for all that. It was a long process, but finally it got down one cover.

Tiffany Hanssen: Everybody has an opinion, right?

Alex Garcia: Yes, everyone has an opinion for sure. The label has an opinion, the band has an opinion, we have an opinion.

Tiffany Hanssen: Josh, at a certain point, you didn't go into the studio with a fully formed album. Presumably, obviously, you hashed out some more tracks, some more songs you liked. Was there a point where you had to whittle down from a larger set of songs that you were all vibing on or--

Josh Lane: Yes, we whittled down from maybe 20-something songs-

Alex Garcia: Yes, we had 20.

Josh Lane: -and we had to decide which ones to make the record, which ones would be possible singles for a seven inch, and then the few handfuls that might be scrapped and used down the road, or maybe never see the light of day. It's hard to know. I think Daptone was pretty adamant about no more than at the very maximum 12 songs. I think ours was --

Alex Garcia: I think it was 10 songs. Yes. We wanted to keep the record shorter.

Tiffany Hanssen: By half? You cut it by half, basically.

Alex Garcia: Yes.

Tiffany Hanssen: You said you had about 20 songs, so you cut--

Alex Garcia: Well, you also have to think about the time per side.

Josh Lane: Infidelity.

Alex Garcia: Yes, exactly.

Tiffany Hanssen: We talked about the album cover. We're talking about picking songs for the album. In this process of making an album, there are a lot of creative touch points from you guys just getting together all the way into the mixing booth and beyond. Each of those creative touch points, as how I think of them, are opportunities to maybe see something a different way, think of something in a way you hadn't thought of before. Those those interactions don't always go smoothly either. I understand that, but Sal, how would you describe those creative touch points throughout the process?

We've heard a little bit about when you first got together in the studio, but then let's fast forward a little bit into how about mixing?

Sal Samano: Well, for mixing, it's when we're in the studio, again, working with Gabe is pretty casual. Things stay pretty open. A lot of times we'll reference songs that we like or production style from certain records that we're listening to. Sometimes Gabe will literally just, "Wait, oh have you heard this song? You might like the production of this," or we'll pull out a record, and we'll just start listening to records just to pull inspiration or ideas for mixing and I don't know, just talk to everybody in the room what everybody's hearing.

Tiffany Hanssen: I want to listen to another song here. I want to listen to Easier Said Than Done.

[Easier Said Than Done by Thee Sacred Souls]

She said, "Be honest with how you feel"

I said, "That's easier said than done"

I said, "Don't worry about the future"

She said, "That's easier said than done"

Well, it is

'Cause true love, it ain't easy, no

(Ah-ah, ah)

She said, "Just show me this love is real"

Tiffany Hanssen: True love it ain't easy. Josh, love is a theme on this album, I think. Do you think so?

Josh Lane: Yes. This album for sure looks at the three-dimensional vantage point of love maybe. Heartbreak, new love.

Tiffany Hanssen: What is this Southern California Soul style lend to that exploration of love?

Josh Lane: Good question. I don't know. I feel like when you listen to the music of the '50s through '70s, although there were different touch points like political music later on and music about togetherness, a lot of it was about love. You look at Marvin Gaye, at least the early part of his career, he was singing about love.

Tiffany Hanssen: Al Green.

Josh Lane: Al Green, a lot of the yearning love songs. I think Al Green touched a lot more on the humaneness of love and how hard it can be and some of those things. Soul music is an emotional music, and I think it just lends itself to all the strong emotions. I just grew up a hopeless romantic, and even before this band, unfortunately, or fortunately, all my music touched on love and romance so at least for this first record, it just landed itself to the whole project.

Tiffany Hanssen: Well, I know that you just gave birth to this first record, but looking forward, are there other themes that you can foresee yourselves maybe moving toward in the future, Alex?

Alex Garcia: Yes. Whatever the inspiration strikes, and whatever it takes us to, we're going to write about it and that's the way it's going to be. We don't really like to block ourselves as far as themes. Just keep an open mind [crosstalk]. Yes.

Tiffany Hanssen: When you talked about recording this on analog, was that your decision? Was that the decision at Daptone? Who made that call, Sal?

Sal Samano: That's just the way that Daptone has been doing it since the '90s. It's always been all analog, always true to the culture of soul. I think that's why the record came out the way it did. Listening to any record Daptone has put out, I think that's why it lives up to that standard.

Tiffany Hanssen: I'm wondering how you're thinking about this show coming up tomorrow night in Brooklyn. I'm assuming folks were going to hear quite a bit of what's off of this album, right?

Sal Samano: Yes.

Tiffany Hanssen: If not the whole album. How do you want folks to come in? If you could make it happen, what mindset would you hope folks would come into that show with?

Josh Lane: Just an openness to feel emotions and maybe more of a familial energy with everyone in the audience. Music is one of those really strong connecting points. It's one of the strongest forms of escapism. I think it's a healthy way to remind ourselves that we are all human here doing it together. I personally just hope they come with an openness to feel those kinds of things.

Tiffany Hanssen: How do you expect them to leave?

Josh Lane: Hopefully full of good music and some conversation pieces, maybe new friends. I don't know. Yes. Before we close, I do want to give a few shout-outs. I just want make that happen.

Tiffany Hanssen: Let's do it. Go for it.

Josh Lane: Okay. I wanted to thank Jensine Benitez for lending her voice to the record on some of the duets, and Tatiana also for lending her voice on the background vocals. I'd like to give a shout-out to our road band who makes this all happen live. We got Riley on the keys, Riley Dunn. We have Shay Stulz on the guitar. We have Aston for the first time on tour with us on vocals. We have Tatiana on vocals.

Tiffany Hanssen: Takes a village.

Josh Lane: We have Josh [unintelligible 00:28:49] on the soundboard making the sound good. I give them a shout-out.

Tiffany Hanssen: Yes, absolutely. You're playing tomorrow night in Brooklyn, at Brooklyn Steel. It's a sold-out show. Thee Sacred Souls, thanks so much for joining us. Josh Lane, Sal Samano, Alex Garcia, Thank you. I want to just end quick on one last song that we have before we head out.

[Love Is The Way by Thee Sacred Souls]

Love is a way of being, baby

Love is the way, ah, ah

Love is a way of being, baby

Love is the way, ah, ah-ah-ah

When I was ten, I thought love was holding hands

Couples on the swing (that's what made it last)

I hit 16, thought it was kissing underneath the tree

And saying, "Baby, you go with me" (baby, you go with me)

But love has no limits and it has no name

It's every hour and it's day by day

Love has no gender, and it has no creed

Love is, love is a way of being

Love is a way of being, baby (love is a way)

[music]

Tiffany Hanssen: You're listening to All Of It. Up next, more music on the way. Electrophonic Chronic, the second album from Dan Auerbach-lead band, The Arcs. It comes out today after an eight-year wait long. Continue our listening party.

 

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