Senior cinema and media arts major Ryan Jachetta, also known as 2 The Sun, released his debut album “Meudon Drive” on Nov. 18. His audacious genre blend distinguishes him from other artists in his class. Jachetta progressed his sound in this last record past the one-off singles of his previous work into a concept experience that wows. He spoke about the beginning of this process in an interview. 

What sparked the beginning of this album?

Ryan Jachetta: “I remember the exact moment it happened. I was in my house and my parents were having a party downstairs. And I had just been talking to all these people and they were talking all night about, ‘Oh my god, you were such a cute child. Oh my gosh, you had such a great childhood. Your mom’s so sweet.’ All these things that were just reminding me of my childhood and I was just kind of tired of the party. 

So I was just like, screw it, I’m just gonna go upstairs… [to] make something new. This was the start of the song ‘seasons 2002.’ It just flooded me and I was just like, ‘You know what? This could be an album.’”

There are many moments on the album where it felt like sound bites from your past. Could you speak on that? 

Ryan Jachetta: “With this one, I really wanted to make it my own. And so what made it my own was really incorporating the things that inspired the album, which is my childhood in Long Island, New York… Being able to use those video clips and those audio sound bites throughout the album was a way to weave it.”

Collaboration: what does that mean to you?

Ryan Jachetta: “This whole album is basically a collaboration with everybody. That process is really interesting to just be able to sit with other artists and be like, ‘listen, here’s my vision. Let’s see what your vision is.’ You know, you got to listen to the artist, but in a lot of senses with this album, I was listening to my producer voice over my artist voice. This was crucial to completing all the songs.”

Would you say that collaboration was the same experience for specific feature artists like Kat Baguio or Noel Sassoon?

Ryan Jachetta: “Kat‘s style of music and mine aren’t exactly the same. But the song ‘bitter’ was a perfect merge of our styles. We were on an Instagram Live. I was making beats that night. And nobody was in the stream, there were maybe two people. And Kat was like, ‘You know what, I’m gonna join your stream and let’s make something.’ So we were on this Instagram Live and we just created the whole song right then and there. With Noelle, I [said], ‘please, I think your voice is perfect for this feature.’ We spent a lot of time in that session actually writing what she was going to say because she wanted to mimic the same imagery that I had described previously in the song.”

How has this album progressed you as an artist? What change did it bring in terms of what you want to do for your musical output?

Ryan Jachetta: “I really think it was kind of an excruciating process, if I’m being honest. I had to sit there and engineer when I just wanted to watch a show after working all day or I’d come home from set and I’d be like, ‘I’m really inspired to have to do something even though I’m dead tired.’ It was just a lot of chaotic emotions that went into this thing. And I think my development was embracing the chaos. With every new release, you always get better. So I think this is my best one yet. So we’ll see if I can develop this new style of music, this fusion genre of music together and really make it my own.”