Flexing the Mind: Steve Grand

If Steve Grand had a corkboard full of his inspirations, there would be screenshots from the graphic Netflix series Bates Motel, the ambient sounds and popular melodies from Zayn’s PILLOWTALK, a lifesize cutout of James Dean, and lastly, in the corner, Springsteen rocking out to his Born to Run album.

“I’m very visually stimulated” Steve says. “I’m taken by a beautiful image.”

It is these aesthetics that currently inspire Steve’s songwriting. He’s constantly pursuing a timeless feel in his lyrics, melodies, and appearance. All of these are present in his debut viral sensation All American Boy. The well-known video showcases abiding hairstyles and enduring fashion: denim, white t-shirts, and flannels — top buttons open to the sunny day, of course. The car on display is a vintage convertible and labels are removed from beer bottles. Here, Steve and director Jason Knade tell a tale of unrequited love in a washed-out, lightly hazed filter. The video has just reached 5M views.

“I have a real fascination for things that never go out of style,” he says. As I talk with Steve, he is wearing his go-tos: dark Levi jeans, a moss shirt, a brand-less heather grey zip up, and a black letterman jacket as his final layer.

“I buy simple stuff that works and looks great, and I get a bunch of it,” he says. “I like solid-colored shirts. I don’t like bright things; I like earth tones. It’s about keeping a very basic wardrobe, nothing too trendy.” His wardrobe changed very little when he took the stage at Tracks on Valentine’s Eve.

In his newest music video, We Are the Night (Dave Aude Remix), he sports a bright red jacket and is elevated on dusty hills above the California city below him. He is a gunmetal-black-haired James Dean, but instead of dueling in knife fights at Griffith Park Observatory, he’s revealing with a diverse crowd of characters like genderfluid YouTube actor Jason Greene and plus-size model Dexter Mayfield. Here is Steve’s touch of modern, his rebel with a cause.

I waited to talk with Steve a Tracks while he warmed his vocals and found the right levels for his keyboard during sound check. Of course, he sang snippets from his own album, but more prominently he played around with various pop songs like Taylor Swift’s Style and Justin Bieber’s Sorry. Steve doesn’t deny that he enjoys a catchy melody.

Many of Steve’s songs apply the simple pop song structure of verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus. In songs like Stay, Say You Love Me, and Time, he relies on catchiness to make his songs memorable. He says, “I”m not necessarily the most gifted singer naturally; I’ve had to work on my voice. So I have to create melodies that stand on their own and it’s made me a much better song writer.” By fine-tuning his lyrics to strong, almost ballad-like chord progressions, he’s found a formula that millions are responding to.

His videos and songs also seem to have similar and popular themes within them. The first is the bright-eyed days of summer that remind viewers of long afternoons, freedom, and new beginnings. Steve admits a certain fondness for summer and all of its possibilities. “It’s something that creates a warm feeling for me.”

The second prevalent thread in so many of his videos are “phantom men.” In his Christmas cover video of Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas, Steve is intimate with another man in a reclusive and festively decorated house in which they cuddle, kiss, and joke. But, at the end, the man dissipates and Steve is left alone with his piano. Similarly, in Stay, his handsome companion seems to exist only in a daydream state where everything is too perfect and fantastical. And in Time, the structure of the video obscures the moments and realities he spends with his green-eyed lover. None of the men are attainable.

“It’s my pushback to the happy ending,” he says. “Things don’t always tie up neatly, and that’s not always bad. It’s just that happily ever after doesn’t exist.” The day after his performance at Tracks, Steve posted a goofy vlog to his YouTube channel denouncing Valentine’s Day and jokingly claimed he wasn’t “bitter” for his singleness. These phantoms still seem to exist in Steve’s life, just out of reach, inducing him to consume full tubs of ice cream.

“I’m inspired by a lot of rigidly intellectual thinkers, like Sam Harris,” he says when we talk about his creative crushes. “And I’m influenced by Lady Gaga — beyond just her music. She took the rules, she learned the rules, and then broke them in every way possible. I like people who break the rules.”

Steve doesn’t mind breaking the rules himself, choosing to forgo record deals to start his own label, Grand Nation, after raising over $300,000 dollars from a Kickstarter campaign. He wanted 100 percent of control over his album and poured his heart and soul into it, spending a full year finessing every tune.

“I’m inspired by a lot of rigidly intellectual thinkers, like Sam Harris,” he says when we talk about his creative crushes. “And I’m influenced by Lady Gaga — beyond just her music. She took the rules, she learned the rules, and then broke them in every way possible. I like people who break the rules.”

However, after a stressful year striving for a perfect debut album, Steve learned his first great lesson in producing and creating. He gives advice to any creative whether they be poets, painters, or entrepreneurs: “Let whatever you are creating or working on be a snapshot in time, then move on — don’t ruminate in it forever.” Steve explained that while putting together his album, he constantly went back to finished songs to augment the lyrics with his current feelings. After many delaying drafts, he wished he would have moved on from the work and let it stand on its own. “I should be three records in now!”

With his first big project complete, he’s learned his lesson and says he’s spinning together a new project he really loves. “I’m just beginning.”

For Steve, being creative and producing are top priority in his life. “I forgo a lot of other things so I can create. I care much more about making something beautiful that will live on forever than buying a new car. I think in ten years, I’ll look back and be glad that I did that.”

Steve is living to be remembered beyond the wild blue yonder. He doesn’t want to be just another snapshot of the 2010s — he wants timelessness. Lucky for him — without the dangers of owning a new car, like Dean’s Porsche barreling down California freeways — we’ll get to see the young man develop maturely as an artist.