dye

Daniel Ye, the Los Angeles musician and singer-songwriter who records under the name dye, takes inspiration from a powerful grip of influences to create his unique brand of art-forward rock. From the grunge tones and fiery fuzz of alternative legends like Nirvana, Nine Inch Nails, and The Cure plus the literate angst and melodic introspection of Elliott Smith and John Lennon to the bombastic, darker orchestral maneuvers of My Chemical Romance and Smashing Pumpkins, dye is the culmination of an adolescence spent falling in love with specific sounds, then learning to filter them through a unique sonic perspective in young adulthood and shaping the resultant styles into catchy three minute guitar-and-programmed-drums pop blasts. It’s impossible not to hear wisps and whispers of those landmark artists in a dye song, but at the same time it isn’t possible to hear a dye song as anything but that: a dye song. And for Ye, a self-described shy kid from LA who picked up a guitar as a 13-year-old after hearing a long-gone Kurt Cobain on the radio, a dye song is more than the just sum of its parts—it’s a window into who he really, truly is...at last.

Ye grew up in Los Angeles and attended school in North Hollywood, where his reticent demeanor placed him firmly on the outskirts of popularity. An avid gamer, it was only at his mother’s insistence that he learn an instrument that he began taking music lessons, focusing mostly on classical cello and piano. However, those failed to resonate with him in any way (save a still-standing affinity for Erik Satie) and Ye was back at the drawing board. It was 2009, and when Green Day’s “21 Guns” struck his fancy he asked for his first electric guitar—but the month of guitar lessons that came with it didn’t take either. Luckily, a fateful encounter of the FM kind would soon intervene.

“I was on my way to school on a Monday morning in 8th grade with dad driving, and ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ came on the radio,” Ye recalls. “It was my first time hearing Nirvana, I didn’t know who Kurt Cobain was, whatever. It fucking blew my mind. Up until that point, I didn’t have a strong opinion about music. But that song completely changed my perspective of rock and even what I wanted to do with my life, my sense of identity, everything. An idea just kind of formed in my head. I got to school for assembly and sat in the back corner of the gym just listening to ‘Teen Spirit’ on my phone on repeat.”

Following that eureka moment, Ye taught himself guitar, honing the power chords he picked up in the month of lessons and using them as a jumping-off point for Nirvana songs, classic rock covers, alternative, metal, and basically anything with a guitar solo. He worked his way up to a
Les Paul and decent amp, and suddenly “guitar player” had become his identity. “I was obsessed,” he says. “I was the guy that didn’t do anything else, didn’t go to school functions, semi-formals, proms, or anything, because I was playing guitar every day.”

While music was firmly his passion, he was still unsure of a practical career path, so Ye stayed close to home to attend the University of Southern California to test the waters of higher education. But as campus life proved just as confusing and difficult for his withdrawn artist’s soul, his musicianship, singing, and songwriting soon thrived, and he began to hone in on his craft. “I started writing for the sake of it, like, ‘I’m just gonna start singing,’ just trying to figure out what sounded good when I opened my mouth. I don’t sound bad when I sing high-up in a falsetto, so I started writing more songs that serve that vocal well. I wrote a lot of songs; there’s a ton with many different vocal styles. This entire project came from me clearing out my brain while trying to figure out a sound: ‘It sounds good when I sing this way and when I write lyrics and melodies that way, it’s this hybrid of Cobain melodies mixed with this weird, Sgt. Pepper’s era Lennon vocal with programmed new-wave drums.’ dye became this amalgamation of different styles that I’ve learned to love and I identify with; I write these songs with all those influences in mind and it all came together based off of what I love.”

If dye’s sonics are an amalgamation of Ye’s musical influences, then its subjects are a mix of his social experiences. His first release, the EP The Beautiful Empty, deals in those liminal spaces of emptiness and loneliness, and how only in a city like Los Angeles can a person feel alone in such a crowded place. Ye boldly looks inside to compose his lyrics, writing from an honest place of feeling and pulling from his past, even touching on the very real anxieties and depression he deals with on a daily basis. “It’s all very personal to me, and a lot of the songs are pretty dark and quite depressing, but I like to pull from those experiences. I have OCD and I’m getting treatment for it, but it’s very therapeutic to write about it. I take those notions and feelings and try to paint the picture melodically. I like to sing how I feel. And then I try to fuck it up as best I can and make it as abstract and open-ended as possible. It’s kind of a no-brainer for me to channel my own real emotions into my music.”

Recording dye songs is a collaborative process between Ye and two producers, Zach Jones and KJ Strock, who complement both Ye and each other. Ye is the primary songwriter, singer, and guitarist, while Strock plays bass and additional guitar and shares production and programming duties with Jones. A larger group of finalized songs began to take shape over the past year or two and began to attract attention from labels and industry. Songs like “Flyonthewall,” “Dirt,” and the Cobain-homage “Bleach” showcase the breadth of dye’s scope, with fuzzed-out, shoegaze-y chords, beats that recall early-NIN Reznor, and earnest but distorted vocals leading the way. As Ye continues to gain steam and experience, it’s clear that his songs will soon find a place in ears around the world—from those of influence and prestige but also those in need of them most, perhaps even another shy kid in the back of his parents’ car on the way to school.

“For me, playing music is therapeutic and helps me find my place in the world. I realized recently that it’s OK to be who I am—the uncool kid who’s kind of shy, still can’t talk to girls—but there’s nothing wrong with that. There’s a certain beauty in not being cool, and beautiful art can come out of that. I’m finally being honest for the first time in my life, which led to me writing these songs. I just want to be honest from now on.”

If we are what we love, then it’s safe to say that, as dye, Daniel Ye has truly come into his own. As the 90’s alternative icon Kim Gordon said, “People pay to see others believe in themselves.” Isn’t that really what being cool is all about?