Formative years

Five years ago, post-hardcore/prog foursome Hail the Sun was part of the sonic panorama of Chico’s eclectic music community. Along with that came a slog of networking, show-playing, self-promoting and creative one-upping you might expect from any band trying to get noticed. The first show was in the side room of Woodstock’s Pizza, where drummer/vocalist Donovan Melero worked for some five years while he and his bandmates—guitarist Aric Garcia, bassist John Stirrat and guitarist Shane Gann— fortified their musical chops.

“Chico holds a special place in my heart,” Melero said during a recent interview.

Since those salad days when the band members penned songs in cozy Chico State dorm rooms and Zoo apartments (the four are now spread out around California), Hail the Sun has toured the country and is now on the cusp of its fourth release—and first for Equal Vision Records—Culture Scars (out June 17). To boot, the band is playing a string of dates on the venerable Warped Tour this summer, and making a stop this week (June 14, at 1078 Gallery) in the city where it all started.

Or, as Melero explained, where the idea of the band first gained some ground.

“Believe it or not, Sacramento is more of what we’d consider our roots because that scene just thrived on this style of music,” Melero said.

Hail the Sun deals in technical hardcore anthems that shift rhythms on a dime, melding the progressive rock of fourth wave post-emo crews like Coheed and Cambria and Circa Survive, and the aggressive-minded rage of bands like Every Time I Die. The novelty of Melero as frontman, while also the band’s drummer, engenders its own energetic spectacle alongside the strength of the group’s manic songwriting.

And while the band’s musical explorations have focused most notably on melodic prog, compositions of much deeper influence pock the soundscape of Culture Scars. One standout track, “Never Kill a Mouse; Let It Kill Itself,” reverberates as a sort of dreamy pop heartbreak song, contrasting the thrust of the band’s often aggressive approach. “Never Kill a Mouse” is steeped in the band’s early days in Chico, having been recorded several times now, including on Chico Demo around 2009.

Similarly, “Doing the Same Thing and Expecting Different Results” dabbles in free-jazz jitters amid the band’s wide-ranging quiver of inspirations.

“There isn’t any deliberate move to try to do this or that. It’s all been very organic the way it’s progressed,” Melero said.

That happenstance extends to the thematic arc of Culture Scars.

“The overall theme is just the scars that culture can leave on us as people in different societies,” Melero said. “Our themes have always been a little dark, but we’ve never tried to think ‘let’s write an album and have this be the concept.’”

Still, Culture Scars does tackle societal ills, addiction and growing pains in linear lyrics rife with imagery. Recorded by Mike Watts at VuDu Studios in Port Jefferson, N.Y., the album is a polished, explosive snapshot of a young band coming into its own.

And even though the band may have migrated away from Chico to make that all happen, Melero is only too happy to gush about his former stomping grounds.

“Whenever I can, I like to send cool bands to Chico and play there myself,” Melero said. “I made the absolute point to make the overnight drive from Portland to Chico because I wanna eat at the Bear, and I want to go to Woodstock’s. The food points are always so crucial to me.”