Ryan Meeking Endless Run Interview

Melbourne's newest indie pop master Ryan Meeking has shared his fresh cinematic single Endless Run. An evocative work, set within the joyous bloom of festival party culture, Endless Run is rich with euphoric abandon. Its visceral, multi-layered rhythm celebrates a summer to end all summers, its engaging lyrics highlighting the intense relationships that follow.

Meeking has released a stunningly bold video to accompany the track, inspired by human movement and directed by filmmaker and photographer Rick Clifford (Ainslie Wills, Bad Pony, Tori Forsyth). After having his music featured on massive television shows such as Suits, So You Think You Can Dance USA and Teen Wolf, Ryan Meeking (Whitaker, Gossling) is moving from one musical world to the next with this standout pop gem. And he'll be celebrating the release with a launch show at Small Time (Brunswick) on August 12, tickets are available now.

Endless Run feels like just like its namesake – an infinite, beautiful journey into the unknown, characterised by an undeniable groove; Meeking's cool, calm voice; clever melodies; and sharp, concise production. The track has influences of Jack Garrett, Gotye, and Benee, but feels particularly unique to Meeking and speaks to years spent intently, passionately studying pop writing. Co-produced and engineered by Sam Swain (Josh Cashman, Obscura Hail) and mastered by Randy Merrill (Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber), Endless Run is a heady, all-encompassing track. Meeking explains: "You're in the festival crowd. Drink it in. Your friends, thousands of others, the music, the party, the complete loss of any sense of time and space - and who cares: the community in that. Everything is now, everything is amazing and its just the beginning. Welcome to your Endless Run."

The video for Endless Run is a brilliant spectacle of light and movement, somehow both nostalgic and futuristic all at once. Meeking dances alone in this colourful world, and the result is hypnotic. Speaking on how the clip was developed – Meeking explains, "We knew we wanted to place the clip in a 'nowhere' space, an unnatural world created especially for the audience – like all my new music to come – so we took a risk on a rare new piece of lighting tech to get us there and it totally paid off. In fact, it really took on a character and life of its own. This is also the first time I've worked on music and really thought about how it sat in my body, so we went through a bunch of ideas on how to put human movement at the centre of the clip. In the end, nothing made more sense than what you see. A peppering of strange sci-fi vibes, some Rick Clifford magic, and we had a clip for Endless Run."

Endless Run is another stellar addition to Ryan Meeking's glowing and diverse discography, one which demonstrates his lifelong pursuit of music and art, and dedication to his craft, as he describes, "I talk a lot about music production because it's something I'm incredibly drawn to, but nothing matters to me more than the song. So making music is always a balance between these two elements. My affinity with music started with my grandparents' piano and took root in the theatre, watching family perform in musicals like Les Misérables. Something about that art form stuck with me - the bare, honest storytelling set to intricate, clever composition - music that doesn't hold back. I don't write for the theatre, but those qualities are something I've never escaped chasing in my own music. I guess I always think, 'Why limit anything if the song can carry it?' Making Endless Run was no exception."

Interview with Ryan Meeking

Question: How would you describe your music?

Ryan Meeking: I make Indie-pop music, which is similar to 'mainstream' pop - think up-front vocal, modern instrumentation and production - but with an edge of experimentation. My music does whatever it needs to express the meaning of the song. So sometimes it bops, sometimes it soars and sometimes it surrounds you with sound. It's always to-the-point. Songs that become clear distillations of remarkable moments in time.


Question: What inspired Endless Run?

Ryan Meeking: Endless Run is about burning everything down for 'right now' - as though the moment will last forever. It's about losing yourself in the microcosm of the party, that intense sense of belonging and the brave acts of honesty that rise from the euphoria. When I wrote Endless Run, I had a memory of being in a festival crowd running through my mind. These days I really think about how the music I'm writing makes me feel physically, so I came up with a beat and the music pretty much took control.


Question: Can you tell us about the music video?

Ryan Meeking: The video takes place in an unnatural space created specially for Endless Run. Rick Clifford (the clip's filmmaker) and I wanted to treat the audience to something bold and other-worldly, highlighting the punchy rhythm of the song with human movement. What we got was a feast of colour, light and motion. The best description I've heard is that it's futuristic yet nostalgic all at once. Check it out!


Question: Is there a particular message you hope listeners take from your music?

Ryan Meeking: Every song has a message of its own, but I think overall my hope is that people are able to lose themselves in my music and let go of whatever's been dragging them down - even for a moment. I hope they remember that we're all human, we all experience this stuff - joy, anger, anticipation - and that they find a feeling of connection there.


Question: Do you prefer performing live or recording?

Ryan Meeking: They're two very different things. The electricity between crowd and performer(s) at a live show has a flavour of intensity about it that doesn't exist in many other places, if anywhere. The same goes for the energy between musicians on the stage. There's a subconscious recognition between everyone that whatever this is, it'll only happen this way once and we're the ones here to experience it. Having said that, for me there's nowhere more magical than a recording studio. When I step into a space like that, filled with the tools for creating something so incredibly powerful out of literally nothing, the whole world melts away. From there I'm consumed by one of the most challenging and engaging exercises of engineering that exists, all in the name of presenting a song in its best light.


Question: What should we expect from your upcoming show?

Ryan Meeking: The Small Time Group stage is unique in that it's basically a recording studio with an audience. Picture the stage you'd expect in a smaller Melbourne music venue, then put double-glazed studio glass across the front of it. That's Small Time. So the audience, who could be anywhere, given the show is also live streamed, gets treated to studio-quality sound at a live performance. There'll be three of us on stage triggering samples, playing keyboards, guitars and drums. You'll be engulfed in music designed to move you and I'll be singing you some truth.


Question: What motivates you most when writing music?

Ryan Meeking: The mission to share experience and find a connection between us.

Question: Which music/artists are you currently listening to?

Ryan Meeking: I'm currently producing some new music for Whitaker, another act I write and perform with, so I'm listening to a lot of that! I'm also still enthralled by every song Dua Lipa releases, that stuff is P-O-P, POP.


Question: What or who was your inspiration to go into the music industry?

Ryan Meeking: Looking back, I realise I pretty much fell into it. If you make music for a living you generally started doing it before leaving high school, so it's sort of a part of you before you realise an industry exists. That's fairly unique to the creative arts I think. I don't know many surgeons who've operated on people prior to tertiary education. So I think the inspiration is just music itself. Not to say I haven't had a lot of people back me along the way, to whom I'm eternally grateful.


Question: If you could collaborate with another artist, who would it be?

Ryan Meeking: Beck. He pushes boundaries, blends genres and he's been doing it for ages. So much I could learn.


Question: Did you have any pre-conceived ideas about the music industry?

Ryan Meeking: I think any preconceptions I've held have mostly proven to be true. I'm not the only one making music. No one is going to do anything for me. Choose carefully. Collaboration is the key to happiness.


Question: What has been your favourite part of becoming a music artist?
Ryan Meeking: The friendships made sharing a journey on the live circuit, in the studio and writing songs.


Question: What's a typical day like?

Ryan Meeking: If I'm not out writing or recording with someone, I'll be found in my own studio doing the same. It's that or tinkering with some old drum machine or synthesizer, or buried in cables hooking up a bunch of effects pedals to different things. Sometimes there are strings of days filled with just writing or just recording. I live near the water so I often take a minute around lunch time to look at the waves and remember what's important.


Question: What's next, for you?

Ryan Meeking: Endless Run is the first of a string of new releases I can't wait to have out there. Live shows too. More everything ahead!


Question: Can you share your socials? (links please)

Ryan Meeking: Instagram 
Facebook 
Twitter 
TikTok 


Interview by Gwen van Montfort