Menlo is a six piece Salt Lake-based band that’s been around since at least the early 2000s. Their sound is reminiscent of artists like REM and Neil Young, and listening to them gives me a strong feeling of nostalgia. The band is in the process of releasing its first ever album, called A Meager Inheritance which will probably double as its last. The album was recorded over 15 years ago and was only completed recently.
It’s now headed to the vinyl press. That’s the unique thing about this album (in today’s day and age): it will only be available on pink vinyl for the first months of its release. Pink vinyl copies should be delivered to listeners later this year, and then the group will host a listening party, hopefully on a rooftop somewhere in Salt Lake. And then you’ll be able to stream it wherever you listen.
Until then, I sat down with four of the band’s members to talk about writing the songs, just after the stock market crashed in 2008. Each of them were navigating difficult times and they discuss how the album served them in ways they wouldn’t realize until much later.
The four of them, Hyrum Summerhays, Brian Scott, Gary Larson, and Anthony Fan, also reminisced about old projects they used to have. They and their bandmates Ray Childs and Pete Fermat evolved as musicians in the 90s and would continue for some 30 years. They discussed the different genres they found through different groups — Larson and Fermat’s group Patsy Ohio, and a group that Summerhays and Childs were in called Elsewhere, among others.
“Hryum and I did a band in highschool, and then Hyrum went on and did some really great bands, Elsewhere, which I loved, and Mona. And so I was sort of jealous that I hadn’t been in a cool band. And I did a couple of less successful bands,” Larson laughed. “But I was excited that Hyrum had the availability to work on a new project and so I started working with him.”
Visit EW Records to pre-order A Meager Inheritance, and look out for the listening party details when they arrive! –Mary Culbertson