This Local Band Is Bringing Denver Americana to the Masses

It's not often that a local group gets to rock with members of Lana Del Rey's and Chris Stapleton's bands. It's even rarer when that group has barely played a stage in Denver, let alone anywhere else. But Bryce Menchaca and Kellen Wall — who make up the local Americana duo Marfa — aren't taking the typical route to stardom.

"Yeah, it's certainly not a traditional way for a band like us to make it," says Menchaca, reflecting on the rapid success of Marfa's first single, "66," which was released in August. It didn't hurt that ace retro-rock producer and singer-songwriter Nick Waterhouse invited Marfa to a studio in Los Angeles to record the song, after he had seen the duo performing covers on TikTok and received a raw demo of "66." Or that the backing band Waterhouse assembled included musicians who have played with Stapleton, Sam Smith, Brandi Carlisle, Marcus Mumford and Roger Waters.

Granted, A-list credentials aren't the main reason "66" hits the heart so hard. Oozing dreamy melancholy, the song tells a dust-shrouded story of a young woman wandering through the mythology of America. More of a country-and-Western tone poem than a pop banger, it nonetheless caught the ears of Waterhouse, who insisted he capture Marfa's twangy mystique at L.A.'s famed EastWest Studios — in the same room where Menchaca's favorite album, the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds, was recorded.

"Kellen and I felt like kids in a candy store," Menchaca says. "Walking into that particular room was like walking back in time. We used a tape machine to record the song, and they still have the piano Brian Wilson played on Pet Sounds in there. And this is just our first single. We have nothing out yet, and we're like, 'What are we already doing in our dream studio?'"

Wall adds with a laugh, "This is our first rodeo."

When Menchaca and Wall met in 2021, it wasn't a case of mutual admiration as much as one of mutual intimidation. Both were music students at CU Denver, and on the first day of songwriting class, Menchaca took a seat in the back of the room.

"It was during COVID, so we were all wearing masks, so I couldn't see the face of the guy sitting next to me," Menchaca says. "I could just tell that he was really tall and he had long hair and he was wearing earrings and a beanie. I was a super clean-cut guy back then. I didn't want to talk to him. He looked pretty intimidating, I'm not going to lie."

Eventually, the two wound up in a songwriting circle together. "When I first heard Bryce playing guitar, I was the one who was intimidated," Wall recalls. "He was just so solid. When we started trying to write songs together soon after that, it was very, very awkward. We didn't have any chemistry yet, and I think that was maybe due to that intimidation."

Wall's taste ran more toward contemporary indie folk, like that of Colorado's own Lumineers and Gregory Alan Isakov. Menchaca, meanwhile, favored classics from Bruce Springsteen and the Beatles. They met in the middle, somewhere near the ’70s country-rock crossover of Glen Campbell and America.
While working on their own songs and honing their harmonies over a six-pack one night, Wall and Menchaca decided to have fun by filming themselves covering America's 1972 hit "Ventura Highway." They posted it on TikTok in November last year. Within days, the video had attracted hundreds of likes. Pleasantly surprised, they recorded a few more covers of favorite songs. The success of their first video, it turned out, was no fluke. Each subsequent video they posted snagged them scores of new fans without any kind of promotional push.

One of their teachers at CU Denver, Bart Dahl, began picking up on their buzz. A Denver music veteran who once managed a pre-fame Nathaniel Rateliff as well as indie-rock legend Dinosaur Jr., Dahl had retired from the music industry in favor of education. But the newly minted Marfa — named after a small Texas town Menchaca recalls fondly from his childhood — yanked Dahl out of his hiatus. To manage the duo, he joined forces with industry titans Ryan Ramos and Joel Klaiman, of the management company and imprint Ascend4M. Attention from record labels and producers followed almost immediately.

Within four weeks of posting "Ventura Highway" on a lark, Menchaca and Wall were in Los Angeles with Waterhouse and Brian Wilson's piano. "There was no game plan," Wall says. "I thought we were just having a good time, drinking some brews and jamming and posting it. There was no, like, 'Let's try to get famous.'"

After releasing "66" in August, Marfa returned to L.A. in September to record its second single, this time with producer Josh Block — best known for his work with platinum-selling soul singer Leon Bridges — at the helm, as well as Charley Damski of Lana Del Rey's touring band on bass. Titled "Daisy" and released on November 1, it has a more pronounced country feel than its predecessor. But the lonesome harmonies and atmospheric guitar remain.

Menchaca and Wall haven't taken their feet off the pedal since. Marfa's third single, "Little Miss Two Time," is slated for a November 22 release, and the fourth, "Run for My Money," drops on December 13. Both boast production by Jonathan Wilson, who has collaborated with Jackson Browne and Billy Strings. Yet with all these accomplishments and associations under their collective belt, Menchaca and Wall haven't assembled a flesh-and-blood band to back them up. Not that they've had much free time.

That will change on December 14 at the Skylark Lounge, where Marfa will celebrate the release of "Run for My Money." Unbelievably, it's the first time the group has headlined a stage. That full group is still being assembled, but Menchaca and Wall are in talks with yet-to-be-announced local musicians ready to jump on board the Marfa train as bassist, drummer and keyboardist. Counterintuitive, maybe. Then again, Marfa doesn't do anything the traditional way — unless you count its actual music.

"Every song is a representation of ourselves. Now we actually get the opportunity to go out there and embody that," Menchaca says. "In my mind, Marfa is the most authentic thing we could do. We've put in the hours and the effort to get to this place musically, and now we have the opportunity to be creative, to be storytellers, to be writers."

"Bryce and I have been playing together for the last three and a half or so years," Wall adds. "I don't feel like we're losing points by doing things the way we have. It's always been about the two of us having fun, not making it big."

The band's growth spurt, though, is as dramatic as it is unexpected. Menchaca admits, "I got recognized here in Denver yesterday because I'm in Marfa, and that's, like, blowing my mind. Kellen gets recognized a lot, too. I didn't expect that; I didn't see that coming. I don't feel famous at all, and I'm not. But our TikTok traction is weirdly strong.

"A few labels have reached out to us because of all this attention," he continues, "but we're not going to sign on the dotted line until we make sure that it's the right fit. Right now I think we're going to try to stay as independent as possible for as long as we can. But there might come a time when it might make sense to sign with a big label."

If Marfa's trajectory holds steady, that time might arrive sooner than he thinks.

Marfa, with Extra Gold, 8 p.m. Saturday, December 14, Skylark Lounge, 140 South Broadway. Tickets are available at the Skylark's website.