The Sess

The Sess interview conducted January 2006 by Vanessa Chalmers.
The Sess is:
Sam Rivera: Vocals/Guitar
Jeremy Rojas: Guitar/Vocals
Mark Rivera: Bass/Vocals
Andrew Montoya: Drums

It's Friday the 13th when I join my friends from The Sess on the cold, hard pavement of the Coffe House on Broadway parking lot. We are sitting crossed-legged and passing around a bottle wrapped in a brown paper bag, talking over the sound of planes flying directly over our heads. I ask them to mention the top five things I should

 Sam of the Sess
know about their band - Loveable, Creative, Universal, Delinquents, Attractive - and find that it's hard to disagree.

Vanessa: Ok. Ready? Why do you play music?
Andrew: It's all we know how to do!
Jeremy: It's the only thing that interests me.
Andrew: It comes so natural. I don't think any of us here were taught how to play our instruments; it just sort of came natural.

V: What were some initial goals you had when starting this band four years ago?
Sam: I think it was more personal. Just creating. No real goals or anything.
(Everyone agrees)

Andrew of the Sess

V: How did you get into music?
Andrew and Sam: Family!
Andrew: Both of my parents are musicians and their brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers are musicians too, whether it be singers or guitarists or bassists or really kick-ass tambourine players. My mom can play a killer tambourine. Jeremy's mom can play acoustic guitar.
Jeremy: This is true. When I was little my mom started playing guitar because my dad was starting to to pastor and teach so she had to

learn guitar so she could play worship. She used to take secular songs and convert them to Christian songs (laughs).
V: So your parents were pastors?
Jeremy: Yeah, my dad was.
Sam: My dad was too.
V: Are you guys spiritual at all?
Jeremy: Spiritual, but not religious.
V: Is it reflected at all in your music?
Sam: Yeah I think so.
Jeremy: I'd say so. Definitely.
V: In what ways?
Andrew: Once you hear it, you'll feel it. You'll understand what we mean. I'm serious!
Mark: It's an energy. It reminds me of church, when we're doing worship music or we're praying and there's a sort of energy that everyone can feel. That's what we call it. Who knows what it is.

V: So "The Sess" is short for…
Andrew: The Session.
V: Which refers to…?
Jeremy: A group of good friends getting together and having a session of some sort, be it musically or …
Andrew: It may have even started longer than years ago.
Vanessa: The session?
Andrew: Yeah. I was interning at a recording studio from 1999 to about 2001. It started with Sam and myself, just recording the songs we were writing. We just started getting together and writing songs in my room. We started going to the studio where I worked on the weekends and having recording sessions. So that name was just kind of born when that was going on.

V: What former bands were you in before forming The Sess?
Jeremy: I played in a band with Yonny (brother) for a while called Verbal Kent.
Sam: I played one show for Verbal Kent!
Jeremy: I did a brief stint with As I Lay Dying.
Andrew: Yeah, he was in As I Lay Dying for a while. They kicked him out for being too creative!
Jeremy: They wanted me to do a lot of the writing and they just didn't like my writing style pretty much.
Jeremy of the Sess
V: How was it different?
Andrew: It was too creative!
Jeremy: Because…my personality is just ingenuity. They were trying to go for a set sound and I wasn't into trying to be a set sound at all, or something that's already been done at least.
Andrew: Logos?
(Everyone Agrees)
V: Tell us about Logos.
(Loud Plane flying overhead)
Andrew (yelling): It was Samuel! Myself! Mark over here! (points to Mark) And my brother! And we played punk-style music. That was circa 1997…To about '99.
Sam: It started with them (Andrew and bro), they were playing in a worship band together…
Andrew: It was mainly Sam and Mark's writing. My brother wrote a few songs, and that's about it.

V: Do you guys all speak Spanish?
Jeremy: More or less.
Sam: I do.
Andrew: I do. It's my second language, I'm fluent. I can read it and write it.
V: Well lets do the interview in Spanish!
Everyone: Uhh no…..
Andrew: Andale pues! Otra pregunta por favor! Por favoRRRRR! (rolling his R's)
(Everyone laughs)

Mark of the Sess

V: So this is kind of a family affair for you guys. Mark and Sam are brothers, Andrew a cousin, and Jeremy a close family friend. Are there ever any major fights or sibling rivalry?
Andrew: Mmm, no.
Sam: No.
Mark: No.
Jeremy: Not really.
V: At all??
Andrew: We're all too passive!
Sam: We don't like to push buttons.
Andrew: And if we do push buttons,

it's not enough to piss us off. I think that's what keeps us together though, is the fact that we talk all this shit to each other and we either accept it or take it the wrong way. Sometimes its accepted and sometimes it gets taken the wrong way, I don't know. I can't speak for everybody.
Jeremy: We're all so close that its kind of impossible to have any beef with anybody.
Sam: We don't want to step on each other's toes.
Andrew: It seems like I don't even have beef with anybody else, not just them, but anybody else. Like I told you earlier, I'm not a violent person. In fact, I'm quite the opposite, I want to "de-hurt" people, if its possible, you know?
Everybody: Awww!
V: You're a lover, not a fighter.
(Sam laughs)
Andrew: There you go. Yes. "Come here, I'm gonna de-hurt you, gimme that wound!"

V: As musicians, what are some of the things you consider to be priorities?
Sam: Probably the music itself.
V: Like the songwriting aspect…?
Sam and Andrew: Yeah!
Sam: Especially the songwriting.
V: How long does it take you to write songs?
Sam: It depends.
Andrew: Average…about a month.
Sam: Sometimes we'll take old stuff and put it with new stuff.
Mark: There's really no specific time or set. Some songs take months to write, other songs we'll write in a day. It just really all depends.

V: Somebody mentioned being creative as one of the top ten things that best describes The Sess. What is creativity to you?
Andrew: Something that strikes interest…
Sam: Or expression…
Andrew: Through expression! Something that strikes interest through expression. Musically, or artistically or visually.
Jeremy: It's just an extension of all of us.
V: Who are some musicians you consider to be creative?
Andrew: Roy Orbison. Herby Hancock.
Sam: Iggy Pop.

V: Is there something specific you want people to take away after watching your shows? Anything you want to instill in your audiences?
Andrew: I think they're giving more than they take, really. Because without people watching us we'd just be playing for ourselves. Whatever they want really, I don't know. I don't think we're here to give anything away. We're just doing what we like to do, they can take it how they want, whether it's good or bad, they can take it.
Sam: Hopefully it affects them.
(Everyone agrees)

V: You also mentioned being very lovable. Why is love such a prominent theme in songwriting?
Jeremy: Because love is what matters most.
Andrew: It's what people find important, whether it be their relationship with God or relationship with their mother or girlfriend or boyfriend.
Sam: Or their friends!
Andrew: Or their friends. It seems to be a prominent fixture in our daily lives. Whether we want to believe in it or not, it's there. It seems like the less people believe in that kind of shit, the more bitter they seem to be, and the more someone embraces it the more they seem to be neutral.
Jeremy: More positive.
V: Do you write love songs?
Jeremy: In some senses we do.
Andrew: Maybe musically, but not lyrically.
V: Do you have a favorite love song?
Andrew: I like that one by The Damned, it's called "Love Song" (laughs).

V: A love song called "Love Song", that's brilliant. So what do you write about?
Mark: Stress.
Andrew: The stress of daily life. It seems, in this modern day, there's a lot of stressed out motherfuckers out there, shooting and killing and shit, taking their guns to school and fucking shooting a boy. Because they're stressed out you know? People are tired of taking shit! Nobody wants to take shit anymore so they're doing what they know best, which isn't necessarily the best. But they're taking a strap to school and capping some guy who called them a faggot or something…or whatever! You know what I'm talking about and so does everyone else who's going to read this. They know what I'm talking about. You drive in traffic for 15 minutes, 30 minutes, maybe even an hour a day just to go to work! You're gonna come home a little bitter, a little angry, you're gonna lash out on the people you love. And it's not because you're mad, it's because…it's crowded in this city, things are expensive, living isn't easy! And I'm sure everybody knows that!
Sam: That's what we write about. Every song.
Andrew: Every single song is about that!
Sam: There's no big theme that we write about. I think it's just a lot of play-on words.
Jeremy: I just use words to add to the music.

V: What do you do when you're not playing music?
Everyone: Work!
Jeremy: Work. I paint houses.
Mark: I build letters.
V: You build…what?
Mark: Letters. Yeah, I build them, make them.
V: Like for signs…?
Mark: No, like letters you get in the mail or on the computer. That's all I'm gonna say. It's a long thing I have to explain…computers…fixing letters…word processing.
Andrew: I'm a "Sparky." An electrician.
Sam: I sell equipment parts for Bobcats. That's what I do.

V: Are you into any local music?
Sam: The Powerchords. The Atoms. John Reese. Rocket From the Crypt.
V: Any favorite venues?
Andrew: I like the CHOB (Coffee House on Broadway) because it's free and it's all ages. And it's two minutes from my house. And there's always people here. A lot of the people here don't want to pay those goddamn venues, and I don't blame them!
Sam: $9 shows?
Andrew: It's ridiculous these days!
Sam: It's so bad for San Diego.
Andrew: Money-hungry motherfuckers.
Sam: Money is the last thing to us.
Andrew: Yeah, we don't care about fucking money. Money is like the last thing on my mind.
Jeremy: It's not expected (to be paid), it's non-existent.
Andrew: For the love of music! Money is stupid!
(Everyone laughs)

official website: http://www.thesess.com
mp3s: http://www.myspace.com/thesess
Interview by Vanessa Chalmers
Photos courtesy of myspace.com/thesess

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