Exclusive Interview: Pop Culturalist Chats with OK MAYDAY

Brothers David and Kelly Bollmann, Stephen Lee, and Matthew Osborn are the dynamic quartet behind OK MAYDAY, a rising indie pop-rock band who should be on everybody’s radar. The Virginia Beach-based group are bringing much needed hope to the industry (and the world) with lyrics that uplift the soul. Pop Culturalist had the pleasure of chatting with David, Kelly, and Stephen about their journey and their latest single, “Blossoms.”

PC: How did you each discover your passion for music?
David: Kelly and I grew up in a very musical family. My mom taught me piano probably when I was six or seven. I really didn’t fall in love with it probably until I was like eleven or twelve. I always tell anyone who’s learning an instrument, learn a song that you love and that sparks the passion. Instead of learning—

Kelly: Two or three chords.

David: Yeah, or learning how to read notes. Sometimes, it’s just great to learn a song that you love and that sparks it. That’s what started for me.

Stephen: I play bass and my dad’s a bass player. He’s an upright bass player, and that’s why I started out with classic bass—classical-style upright bass. I was fortunate throughout all of middle school and high school. All of my symphony and orchestra instructors, they were all upright bass players. I had a lot of one-on-one instruction. It just happened to work out that way. Some were crazy, some were awesome, but I learned a lot. I learned a lot about temperament and being a musician. That’s how it happened for me: being around some inspiring players.

David: I didn’t know that, bro.

Kelly: Mine was way more selfish. I was offered a hundred bucks to learn “Flight of the Bumblebee” on the violin.

Dave: You never learned it through, bro.

Kelly: I couldn’t play fast enough though, man. I moved to classical guitar.

PC: Who or what has had the biggest influence on your careers?
Kelly: Personally, since Dave and I grew up and we had multiple family bands. We have nine other siblings, and all of us played different roles. We met Steve Lee really young. Since we were introduced to playing for people really young, there was this excitement that we were able to bring out of people. I know what happens to me when I go to a show. I love seeing someone perform a song I love. Then to have people reciprocate that towards us, we were like, “This is a really cool thing.” We would write in our bedrooms. We performed it on a stage and people were happy. There’s not a lot of downside to that, you know?

Growing up in a gospel area and feeling the weight of what a chorus of human voices can do to an atmosphere with no music playing, I fell in love with the whole vocal structure of harmonies. We were brought up in a multicultural environment. There was no second choice for me when it came to a career path. There really wasn’t.

David: Growing up with Kirk Franklin and then Coldplay, people ask us who inspired us first. It’s like we have so many inspirations from so many different artists, even now. Every time I turn on the radio, there’s a new artist that inspires me. That’s the wonderful thing about creativity, man. You can go back in your history from tons of rock bands, artists from the UK to now. Justin Bieber’s newest album just came out. The pop is so good. We can draw inspiration from our past and from what’s currently happening.

Stephen: I don’t know. It’s sort of overwhelming. There are so many different influences. Even in this day and age, I’m still finding artists from the ’60s and ’70s I’ve never heard of. I’ll watch a documentary and hear a podcast and go down a rabbit hole for weeks. It doesn’t do justice to someone’s lifetime of music to consume it in a week. There’s different people that I like for their technical ability. There are people who really wrote and spoke to their times, which they wrote within the pop song structure. That inspires me.

David: I’ve noticed that too. It doesn’t matter the genre. A good song is a good song. If it’s country, pop, R&B, hip-hop, rock, even metal. I appreciate a well-written song. I truly understand how difficult it is to get out of your own head when you think something is really good, then you show somebody and they’re like, “Eh.”

I really understand it’s difficult to write something that’s very good that isn’t too annoying but catchy enough. Something that’s tasteful, not tasteless. The list goes on and on.

PC: You guys grew up playing in other bands before you came together to form OK Mayday. What did you learn from those experiences that you’ve been able to apply to this chapter in your life?
Stephen: Write good songs. [laughs]

David: [laughs] That’s so true, bro. You can think you’re the sh-t, but if you don’t have a good song, it doesn’t matter. Even if you have a hundred people that love you, you want people that have never heard of you before to like you. We’re laser focused on cutting the fat in our songwriting. We’re like, “Let’s get down to this. Is this a good song? Is it a good melody? Is it a good message?”

Kelly: In previous groups, if we heard the slightest glitch, we would have to redo the whole thing. Now I like hearing a little imperfection. I like hearing a little bit of a shuffling—adding the humanity into it. Since we’ve gone so far on the electronic side where everything is super quantized and mathematically perfect.

David: Human imperfection in songwriting.

Kelly: We’ve given ourselves a little more freedom to enjoy that.

PC: Tell us about your new single, “Blossom.” What inspired the song?
Kelly: I generated that in a seventy-two-hour no-sleep process and the origination of some of the beginning production. It took a couple different shapes. It’s funny. I have these friends. I wrote some original things based on my view of their relationship. It was pretty cute. I went down to New Orleans to shoot the visual for this with my friend from South Africa.

David: She’s actually in the video in the bridge of the song. You can see her when she cheers in her cup and her brother’s taking off his hat.

Kelly: I shot the entire music video for it and came home. Steve Lee was laying the bass on it and his wife read the lyrics. COVID hit while I was in New Orleans. She read the lyrics and she’s like, “I think this song is more of a song for the times. This resonates.” I was like, “I got crazy visuals from New Orleans. It’s super romantic. Oh my God, it’s already done.” Then I sat on it for a couple of days. Dave and I talked. I was like, “She’s absolutely right.”

All the lyrics were done by then. It was more like piecing together some of the musical layers. We kind of worked like that pre-COVID anyways. Dave and I work on a song. Steve would originate a song. We send it to each other. We do our parts. By the time it became evident that the lyrics demanded a bigger visual presence, we already had it in our heads what to do. We just didn’t understand how long that process would take in the middle of a worldwide pandemic.

David: The song came to real completion a month into the pandemic and everything shutting down. Lauren Lee was like, “Hey, these lyrics really apply to what’s going on right now.” The postchorus is, “You still love me like I love you. You still love me like I love you.” There’s this whole thing like the world is shutting down and family, friends, and couples are coming back together and spending a lot of time together. It was crazy. We were like, “Whoa, this really applies.” We wanted to emphasize that while also being sensitive to everything going on. Kelly, Steve, Matt, and I were reaching out to our friends from all over.

Kelly: I went through three bottles of tequila in the first week FaceTiming friends from all over the world. I was like, “Are you okay? Do you have a roof over your head? Do you have a job? How are the kids?” They were like, “We’re good. What do you need help with? I’ll send you a thirty-second clip.” I was like, “Perfect. That’s awesome.” Since I’ve been able to live in some pretty cool cities in the last decade, having transient friends all over the world, I’ve been able to collect some amazing friends and I’m so grateful for how generous they are with their time and being vulnerable and open, like “This is what life is like.”

David: It’s pretty humbling. Kelly and I downloaded Final Cut Pro and we pieced everything together ourselves. We were really humbled by all of our friends and family sending this footage. It was very raw, very emotional. No one else was helping us edit the video. We were like, “Let’s do this ourselves.” Even recording the music. We all performed it individually. We all had to do that while in quarantine. It’s crazy, but we’re really blessed. Everyone was very honest with their footage and we put it together.

PC: Like you were just saying, the song has taken new meaning during this pandemic. As songwriters, what is it like knowing your words are so universal and it can be interpreted in different ways by different listeners?
David: It’s validating how much people need art. I was just reading your bio. You love binging on shows. People are going to Netflix, Hulu. They want to see something that moves them, right? For us, we feel extremely honored that we get to play a part. Like Kelly was saying, even if it’s just for four minutes and thirty-two seconds, if someone feels a little bit better, dude, it’s so worth it, man. It took us months to do, but even if it’s just under five minutes, that’s awesome.

Kelly: That’s a similar thread of DNA through all of our songs. It’s life, hope, and optimism. The world has tons of other narratives. It’s a beautiful thing because I go toward the arts when I’m in a dark place. For people to see that they’ve come to a record that we produced in our respective bedrooms, across this country, it’s pretty humbling. We don’t take that for granted at all.

Stephen: I think what the guys are saying is, and what you’re asking about with people taking the lyrics or the meaning of the songs and applying it to their own situation, it’s sort of like what happens when we put our songs out—or anyone does—it’s no longer just our song. It’s interesting to see people take it. They might make it seem more romantic or more about COVID or more about something in between there. It’s awesome. It’s how I consume my art.

PC: Of all the songs you’ve released, if you had to pick one that best encompasses who OK MAYDAY are, what would it be and why?
David: Oh my gosh, dude. When we put out one song, I feel like it’s completely encompassing of who we are right in that moment. When we put out our EP, Conversations, two years ago, that felt like this is who we are right now. It’s one of those questions: what do you take on a desert island—right?—if you only have a couple things? That’s so hard. I feel like who we are right now is “Blossoms.” That’s who we are. We’re working on another song to put out shortly, and that will be who we are in that moment.

Stephen: For me, I think the time from “Blossoms,” our newest song, and “Feel It,” our oldest song, they both have got a little bit of a DIY to it. We’ve always sort of had that vibe in our music or aesthetics. Sonically, there’s a lot of similarities across between guitars and the electronic stuff, and David’s voice sounds great on vocals.

David: Oh, stop. Keep going, keep going.

Stephen: That’s what it is for me.

David: When we perform “Good” live, it resonates so well with people.

PC: As we look ahead to the rest of 2020, what does the year hold for you guys? How have you adjusted, given the COVID-19 situation?
David: We want to put out more songs while live shows are on hold. Just as this song is resonating with people, we’d love to put out another song in a couple of months. Instead of shutting down emotionally and shutting down as everything else is, it’s given us a sense of purpose. We could be like, “We can’t see each other for a couple of months and disconnect, or we can choose to create together. We can choose to bring hope.” I want to be creating. I want to be sharing the art that I’m feeling.

Kelly: Just even moving forward, David sent me five songs that we had the shell of in the last couple years that we’re going to start working on again. We had a bunch of songs that are ready to come out. It’s about the timing. We’re building, creating, and understanding that even though we’re in a worldwide pandemic, creativity does something to all of us. We have had to be patient with the process because of the mental side of operating at full creativity when the world is going to sh-t, which isn’t the easiest thing. We’re giving each other that grace.

We’re bummed for all of our friends who depend on tour life. I feel for them because that’s where they made all their bread and butter: all the engineers, light techs, and front of house—all these millions of people that survive on that. It’s devastating. We’re really looking forward to when that whole industry opens back up. But in the meantime, we’re going to create and do what we did with “Blossoms.”

Pop Culturalist Speed Round

PC: A band or artist that fans would be surprised to learn is on your playlist?
Stephen: Nick Drake. He’s a singer-songwriter from the late ’60s, early ’70s that I just discovered. He died relatively young. Super sad, super melancholy, and you’ve got to take him in slowly, which I think is one of the best ways to take in art.

David: I love good pop, man. I love a good Katy Perry song.

Kelly: “Roar.” I scream at that song. Max Martin smashed that one. I don’t know, my favorite artist that I’ve played the most since 2017 has been Kendrick Lamar. I play Kendrick Lamar more than any other artist. I grew up a die-hard Radiohead [and] Coldplay fan, and I just love good hip-hop. Kendrick’s hard to beat.

PC: First album you bought?
David: This Christian band called DC Talk. I think I was ten.

Kelly: The first album that I ever stole was Backstreet Boys in 2002. That’s when I fell in love with good melodies.

Stephen: Nelly Furtado.

PC: First concert you attended?
Stephen: For me, it was in a little town called Chesapeake. They had this carnival that would come through when I was in middle school. They had a bunch of hardcore bands. I don’t know who they were or anything, but that was my first show.

Kelly: The first concert I remember, besides big festival gospel stuff, I remember the first time I was ever really enamored was at the NorVa in Norfolk, Virginia. It was B.B. King. He was the first guitarist I ever fell in love with. I saw him there in a pretty intimate venue.

PC: An album that changed your life and why?
David: For me, it was Kid A by Radiohead. “Everything In Its Right Place” has gorgeous melodies. I love the repetition in the melody by Thom Yorke and how the song keeps growing, growing, and growing. I don’t know if I’ve ever heard anything like it.

Kelly: Mine would be Parachutes by Coldplay. “In My Place” with the repetitive guitar line that Jonny Buckland does. My three favorite guitarists: Jonny Greenwood from Radiohead, John Mayer, and Jonny Buckland. These boys can play.

Stephen: I used to go to the public library and they had a CD section. I used to come for albums like Stanley Clarke. I don’t know which album it is. But I remember listening to it and feeling like I was in another world. This was the first time music took on a new meaning for me.

PC: A venue on your bucket list to perform at?
Kelly: Hollywood Bowl.

Stephen: For me, my dream gig isn’t a venue. It’s more like an outside thing, but it would be doing it in partnership with something like an art installation, where something’s done that’s beyond lights and sounds professional. Lights and installation that’s in proximity with us and interacting with music that we do in real time.

David: Red Rocks in Colorado.

PC: A must-have on the road?
David: Personal space. [laughs]

Kelly: A constant sleeping environment. On the last tour, I brought my own air mattress. I was going through some really gnarly sciatica, so I needed to have the same sleep. I had my headphones.

David: These Sony headphones.

Kelly: The noise-canceling headphones.

To keep up with OK MAYDAY, follow them on Twitter, Instagram, and Spotify. Pick up or stream “Blossoms” today.

Photo Credit: Megan Reily