Published on April 01, 2009.

After meeting in high school and playing musical chairs through a couple of different bands, the pop-rock group The Blue Effect is doing everything in its power to start leaving a mark on the music scene with its piano-based melodies and tunes.

Composed of five members, including two MSU students, the band offers some alternative instruments to the standard bass, guitar, drums and vocals setup.

Making up the band is political science and music education freshman Brian Burgoyne (piano and vocal harmonies); psychology freshman Will Jones (saxophone); international business freshman at Lansing Community College Drew Machak (lead vocals); music and engineering freshman at Stanford University Peter Livesey (bass); and Detroit Country Day High School junior Alex Burgoyne (drummer).

The State News What are your inspirations?

Drew Machak We love kind of older rock. The Doors, The Beatles for sure, Donovan, The Zombies.

Brian Burgoyne ’60s- and ’70s-based rock, and then me and Drew, we co-compose the songs and when I’m looking to write a song and I need a more modern pop influence, I’ll start to look toward Ben Folds, because he’s really the only piano-based person of our generation who has pulled off the “no guitars” and actually made a name for himself out there.

But, that being said, we also have more of a retro feel and our influences are based more on the ’60s.

Will Jones John Coltrane, Sammy Rollins. These are the biggest ones for me.

SN Who is an artist you hate and why?

DM Jonas Brothers.

BB We really dislike them, and most of the Disney characters in general — we don’t like them. Miley Cyrus. Just because they don’t really exhibit musical talent or ability, especially nowadays, when trying to get a record deal is so difficult with the declining industry, and you’ve got these people that just, musically speaking, may not be up to where we feel the competition is. That’s a really arrogant way of putting it, but honestly there’s so many better musicians out there. So basically — anyone at Disney is an enemy.

SN What do you love about playing music?

WJ It’s really an escape from everything else. You can really put your heart into it and let the creative juices flow through you. It’s a really nice escape from the hum-drumming, from school and even people. (These things can be) frustrating and life’s pretty hectic, but music gives us a way to get away from it all.

BB Yeah, you just get to escape from anything that is going wrong — or well. And if things are going well, then that’s going to be expressed through your music. So if things are not going well, you’ve got an escape and if things are going well, you get to really show it. I really do think your character comes out when you play. How you’re feeling that day is going to affect your performance because you never perform the same thing twice. You may play the same notes but the way you articulate it is going to be based on a multitude of factors — how you feel that day, are you excited to be here — and along with that, we’re very lucky that we are a close band. So, you’re playing music and creating something that you love to do with some of your best friends, and I think that’s really what’s kept us together these three years.

DM We’ve become a family, really.

WJ Yeah, we are definitely a family.

To hear music from The Blue Effect, check them out on their Web site at myspace.com/theblueeffect5.

You also can download their songs from iTunes, or e-mail them at theblueeffect@gmail.com.