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Photo: Alice Baxley

For a band like Liily, who have been playing together since the tender age of fifteen in the heart of the San Fernando Valley, there’s bound to be roses, thorns, roadkill, and anaphylactic shock along the ever-winding interstate toward their present triumph. Riding high on the release of their independent, self-titled EP Liily, their recent tour alongside fellow Los Angeles contemporaries Together Pangea, and their headlining show at the Roxy, Liily is now, more than ever, a band who knows what they want and intends to get it.

Just like Dylan Nash (vocals), Charlie Anastasis (bass), Sam De La Torre (guitar), and Maxx Morando (drums), Liily has endured a rampant imposition of changes from adolescence to adulthood. From esoteric and abstract to direct and saturated song titles, from growing up going to shows to performing alongside their idols, and from a backyard in the valley to touring across the U.S., Liily is bringing the kids they started out as along for the ride.

OnesToWatch: We’re here with Liily at the Roxy. How does it feel to be headlining in your hometown?

Charlie: I always get super nervous before hometown shows, but they usually go well. My mom is coming, you know.

Maxx: It just feels like there’s a lot more pressure even though there’s technically less pressure.

Charlie: We opened for a band here once in 2019, but this is our first time headlining the Roxy.

You’ve recently been on tour with Together Pangea. Can you give me a rose and thorn from tour thus far?

Dylan: Hi, uh my favorite moment, my rose, was that I think we played some of the best shows that we’ve ever played, in my opinion. My thorn was that I had a sinus infection, but I got rid of it.

And you’re the vocalist?!

Dylan: Yeah, I thought I got rid of it before, and then it came back halfway through. There were like maybe five or six shows where it was prominent, but I’m still dealing with it right now. “

Did it give you a little rasp on stage?

Dylan: No, I was just choking on mucus. That’s what was going on.

Charlie: Rivers of mucus.

 Sam: I think my rose, this is kind of what everyone is saying, but we had some of the best shows we’ve had and some of the most fun people at the shows. I think Portland and San Francisco had really fun people. Then the thorn; well there was one drive we did where we hit a bird in the middle of the night.

Charlie: Oh, fuck.

Sam: And I just keep thinking about that bird and I don’t know, I want to see if it’s okay.

Charlie: We really hit him.

Sam: We hit the fuck out of him.

Charlie: He was just sitting in the middle of the highway?!

Did he make a sound when you hit him?

Charlie: Yeah!

Sam: I mean, like a hit the van sound, it didn’t make like an auhhh!

Charlie: Sam made a sound.

Dylan: It woke me up.

Sam: It sounded like someone threw a bowling ball at a moving van. It was a big bird.

Charlie: Giant bird.

Sam: It was a man-sized bird.

Together Pangea is a band from LA. You’re also a band from LA. Tell me about how growing up in a city with such a vast expanse of music in the palm of your hands brought you to this moment tonight.

Charlie: Well I think bands like Pangea are the reason why we’re a band from LA.

Did you grow up going to see them?

Charlie: Yeah! We all grew up seeing Pangea and FIDLAR and Meatbodies, all those bands back in the day.

Maxx: Nirvana.

Charlie: Yeah, we grew up seeing Nirvana. But, I think because of bands like them, they gave us the confidence because they were so tangible. Like, you could go to a Pangea show in 2014 and meet them and hang out with them and we all did and it added a level of grasp to us being a band and we get to play with them now, so it’s amazing.

Yeah, how does that feel to be playing with a band that you grew up watching?

Charlie: It’s a little uncanny.

Going back to I Can Fool Anyone In This Town, your first EP, tell me about the title and tracks like “Sepulveda Basin” where LA and the Valley have a direct impact on what you're writing about. Why do you think you can fool anyone in this town?”

Charlie: We all grew up in the valley. We’re all valley boys. The valley is intrinsically tied to this band no matter what, forever.

*Pulls up shirt to reveal Charlie’s 818 tattoo.*

Maxx: Showing them your abs?

Charlie: Yeah, I’m showing them my washboard abs.

Jumping off another one of your titles, "I Am Who I Think You Think I Am." Who’s that person? What do you think people think of you?

Charlie: Such a stupid song title. I resonated with that super heavy when I first read that a while ago. We’re all like this, but I was so paralyzingly obsessed with my social image. It became really debilitating. I mean, we all experience it. I feel like I experienced it in a way that was super self-destructive for a second. And so, I think when we were writing that record, it was kind of the ethos of where I was coming from. I was trying to call it out with that title. I don’t feel like that about myself anymore.

Dylan: As they say, music is a snapshot into many years of your life.

Maxx: A lot of the songs on that EP have the most ridiculous names. We’re really terrible at naming songs, so we just kind of give them throwaway names until the eleventh hour and we’re like...what do we name it?! What do we name it?!

Charlie: We were naming songs chapters in books. We went a long way around the block. It’s a damn good song.

Dylan: But to that point, the new EP, every song on the EP is one word. We learned our lesson.

Let’s talk about your new EP Liily. Why was now the time to put out a self-titled EP and why were these the songs to do it with?

Maxx: For some reason, it’s really hard for people to find our band. So, by naming it Liily and self-titling it, it’s A: easier to find and easier to remember. It’s seamless, whereas before I think we got a little esoteric with what we were doing, so we’re trying to streamline it. Also, I think it’s probably to date, a combination of I Can Fool Anyone In This Town and TV or Not TV. It’s fitting in that thematic way where it feels like the amalgamation of both the things we learned from our last projects.

Sam: This is probably not on purpose too, but we’re also quite independent now and this release happened within that and was only able to happen within us being in charge of ourselves. So kind of accidentally, this EP is what we are right now and not like, something that needs to be approved by other people.”

Charlie: It’s a benchmark.

It feels like this collection is the most defined, cohesive project we’ve gotten from you to date. Is this sound something we can expect to hear more of as you keep making music or are you gonna keep us on our toes?

Charlie: Shit always changes.

Dylan: But, we will not do a country record like everybody’s doing. Everybody’s going country. And, no indie sleaze.

Charlie: That’s your opinion dude.”

Dylan: We are not going to do indie sleaze. All respect to indie sleaze, but we’re not doing it. And if we do it, I will give everybody my home address and you can come beat me up.

Charlie: I’ll give everybody Dylan’s home address right now...

*Band Roulette: Liily reaches into a hat to each draw a name of one of their band members to answer questions about. Charlie selects Dylan, Dylan selects Maxx, Maxx selects Sam, and Sam selects Charlie.*

Pick a song to describe your bandmate.

Maxx: Imma hit em' with a classic. "Emergency Contraception Blues" by Bombay Bicycle Club for Sam.

Sam: I’m gonna say "Can’t Stop" by the Red Hot Chili Peppers for Charlie.

Charlie: Well, you got me.

Dylan: For Maxx, "French Open" by Foals.

Charlie: "Let’s Get it Started" by the Black Eyed Peas, Dylan Nash.

What’s something that would surprise people about that person?

Charlie: Oh, I got one for Dylan. He knocked his front tooth out at a show we played in Buffalo, New York. I saw it happen too! He fucking, cluck (sound of clicking tongue), and dude, I saw it on the floor.

Dylan: It was the second time I knocked that same tooth out.

Sam: *ruminating*

Charlie: You better behave.

Sam: Everything I’m thinking of is not okay.

Charlie: I feel like this is giving the impression that I have some really dark secret.

Dylan: I have one, I have one! Maxx haș a deathly peanut allergy. He’ll go into anaphylactic shock, and he has in another band he was in in a foreign country.

Wait, during a performance?

Maxx, Dylan: Yeah.

Oh my god.

Maxx: Mid-song. I was choking.

Sam: Do you have one Maxx?

Maxx: Yeah, but, there’s something I’m not gonna say, there’s something (unintelligible noises)...

Charlie: You guys are thinking too hard about this.

Maxx: Alright, Sam makes a really mean fried rice.

Charlie: He does, he does.

Maxx: You made me fried rice like ten years ago and I still remember it.

Charlie: You still think about it.

Sam: Um, Charlie excels at reading. That’s about the most appropriate thing I could think of, is Charlie likes to read books and I like to make fun of him for it.

Dylan: This is not a thing about Charlie, it’s more adding onto what he said...

Charlie: This is against the rules, but whatever.

Dylan: It’s not because I’m just emphasizing it. He absorbs books better than anybody I know, but reads slower than anybody I know.

Charlie: I sound out every word in my head.

Who are they putting on aux?

Maxx: Parquet Courts.

Charlie: Dylan’s probably putting on Frank Ocean.

Dylan: Frank Ocean... Frank Ocean...

Charlie: You’ve gotta do Maxx.

Dylan: What? (Realizes) Oh, I have to do him. Oh my god, I thought I was doing myself.

Charlie: Run it, Dylan.

Dylan: I’m dumb. Um, I don’t know, like black midi or something? (Silence) No?

Maxx: I mean, yeah, I guess?

Dylan: JPEGMAFIA?!

Maxx: No, what?! Ah, you don’t know me that well.

Sam: I have a cop-out answer. Besides the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Charlie has listened to everything that’s ever been put on Spotify. So, whenever Charlie’s on aux, nine times out of ten, it’s some shit I’ve never heard of in my life.

Charlie: Yeah, it’s either Anthony Kiedis or some stupid bullshit.

Sam: Yeah, is that a band? Some stupid bullshit? That could be a band he’s been listening to.

Dylan: Maxx would put on Megamind Reefer or Big Big Fish.

Maxx: Hell yeah.

What’s the most embarrassing thing about that person?

Maxx: This is off-limits.

Charlie: Okay, dude you are pushing it right now.

Sam: Aw, I could do this all day.

Charlie: God, dude. I could do such a fantastic one for Dylan. So one day, we’re at rehearsal and Dylan comes up to me and he’s like, can I tell you what happened to me last night? And I’m like, of course, you can, you can tell me anything. And he says, I was at a restaurant and I was peeing in the urinal and I shit my pants.

Dylan: On a date.

Charlie: Yup.

Dylan: No, that’s the kicker!

Maxx: And she never found out.

Dylan: She never found out and she gave me a kiss on my cheek.

How did you dodge that?

Charlie: I feel like it’s really best for everybody’s sake if that’s all we say.

 Dylan: Let’s just say I didn’t throw my underwear away.

Charlie: Oh my god.

Dylan: I feel like we own most of our shit. I don’t think there’s anything that we're embarrassed of.

Sam: Sometimes when we’re driving through certain areas of the country and we’re in a van together, we’re not that far away from each other. It’s a pretty small van and it’s usually pretty obvious if it’s an outside smell or an inside smell. Like, if someone rips one or if it’s just like we’re passing by a bunch of manure, but Charlie kind of blurs that line.

Charlie: Yup, thank you. 

Maxx: (Shrugs) He’s a farter.

Sam: I don’t need to say much more.

Maxx: In my opinion, the most embarrassing moment for Sam was when I beat him in FIFA, so bad. Historically, he has kicked my ass and he was talking shit. We were in a foreign country and he thought he was on his game and (smacks lips) I beat him like 4-1 if I remember correctly. That was pretty embarrassing, that’s all I’m sayin.’

Dylan: Maxx is gonna kill me for this one.

Maxx: Uh-oh. Ah, be careful, be careful. Please tread lightly.

Dylan: He, uh, chews with his mouth open.

Charlie: My boy doesn’t know how to chew his food.

Maxx: What’s crazy about this is there’s nothing and they’re digging and you know what, there was a period of time where I’ll admit, I was chewing with my mouth open.

Charlie: Was that what, last week?

Maxx: Alright, we got a comedian over here, we got funny guy. All I’m saying is I fixed it, I’m way better about it, but sometimes, I do do it.

Dylan: I didn’t have anything and that’s all I could think of. I’m sorry.

Maxx: There we go.

My last question of band roulette is what do you love most about that person?

Charlie: I got mine. I think Dylan Nash is probably one of the most kind and considerate people I’ve ever met in my life.

Sam: That’s kind of vague dude.

Maxx: (Mocking) He’s so genuine.

Charlie: This is what it would sound like if Maxx was doing Dylan right now...(Chews with mouth open). Now you go, funny guy.

Maxx: My favorite thing about Sam is a couple things. I’m digging deep. I like Sam’s perspective on art. I like his perspective and his vision artistically in music and in the visual arts. I think he has a very unique...

Unless it’s FIFA right?

Maxx: Unless it’s FIFA, yeah he sucks, but I just like his perspective. I think you have a very unique perspective. I haven’t met anyone who has the same unique perspective as you.

Sam: Alright, that’s enough. I’m gonna cry.

Charlie: That was good. It wasn’t as good as mine about Dylan, but it was good.

Dylan: Maxx is really funny. No, I think Maxx was, is, and will always be the best drummer I’ve ever known.

Charlie: True.

Dylan: Period, period.

Sam: Your favorite thing about your friend is that he’s good at drums?

Dylan: Yeah. No, no, like creatively and the chops as well. They always say a band is better as the drummer gets better and I’ve never had to worry about us collapsing because we don’t have a good drummer.

Maxx: Thanks Dylan. Sam's gonna be like, oh Charlie has good hair.

Sam: (To Charlie) Did you already go?

Charlie: Yeah, remember I said Dylan’s great?

Sam: (Disappointed) Oh, yeah. (Mocking) I really like Dylan.

Charlie: My favorite thing about Dylan is Dylan.

Dylan: I’m the nicest angry person you’ll ever meet.

Sam: I almost don’t want Charlie to hear this because I like giving him shit so much. Genuinely, I think that Charlie is the glue that holds the four of us together.

Charlie: Aww. Get out of here.

Sam: I think that’s a good quality.

Charlie: Like gluten, gluten which I cannot have.

If you could tell your fans one thing, what would that be?

Dylan: Buy our records. Come to our shows.

Charlie: We love you all.

Maxx: Rest in peace, Takeoff.

Charlie: Every single one of you that has ever bought a ticket to come see us play, we love you.

Dylan: We love you.

Charlie: We’d do anything for you.

Sam: Anything.