Merv xx Gotti brings powerful music of Guitar Songs on the road North

Marvin T. Chan (aka Merv xx Gotti) released the EP Guitar Songs, just a year ago in 2024 and in that same year the record earned the kind of popular and critical acclaim most artists can only dream of. The song “Jiujitsu” off that EP was named one of CBC’s top 100 Canadian songs of 2024, but actually comes from a place of struggle. And if not for a chance encounter at a concert and the encouragement of his pals, the groundbreaking, gorgeous music of that record may never have seen the light of day.

Chan was in town playing at the Folk On The Rocks festival and took time to speak with True North FM about his work.

Making the EP Guitar Songs, which is a guitar based solo project, was a first for the musician. Chan shared the story of how that record came to be.

The story starts with the song “Soju,” a song about a special person Chan met while on tour with his hip-hop band Samurai Champs.

“We toured quite a bit from 2016 to 2019. Actually right up until 2020 when the pandemic happened,” said Chan.

The band was what some people might call a “party-band” and when Covid hit that meant they could not do live music or tour, which meant the end of their shows. Right before pulling the plug on touring, they played a show which ended up having an unforeseen impact on Chan.

“One of the last tours we did was to Singapore and we played a festival called Music Matters and I had a really special experience with someone there and the song is kind of just about that,” he reflected.

Chan explains “Soju” was a part of that but is also the first song on guitar he wrote in over 10 years.

“It’s really special to me because without that song, I don’t think all this would be happening now. There’d be no album, no me performing at these festivals like Folk On The Rocks,” reflected Chan.

“And that kind of was the first one that bled into all these other songs that became this album and led into everything now,” he continues.

The song also holds special meaning because of the way it was recorded.

“It’s the one song that I couldn’t really record it properly. It was just a one-take thing that I don’t even remember happening. My engineer Walt just luckily, he was there to capture that moment, and it’s just one take. He was like, this is it, this is what we have to release it as,” remembers Chan.

Chan says taking those songs and performing them live on the road feels good.

“At first I was just happy to make the songs. I felt with me writing them. it really healed a lot of things, but then the process of actually turning them into recordings that felt really nice because (I thought) okay, I can have these and I know they exist and that was enough for me.”

The artist’s friends played a big part in the release of the record, because they really encouraged Chan to get his music out there.

“So once I started playing these songs really, slowly with one maybe one two song sets, maybe just on open mics, I slowly felt gaining more confidence in them now that I’m playing these festivals. These songs only started coming out a year or two ago so it’s still really new to me” said Chan.

As a practitioner of martial arts since youth, Chan still feels this is his “first art form” and not music. The song “Jiujitsu” on Guitar Songs is about being a martial artist. “Jiujitsu” was named as one of CBC’s top 100 songs Canadian songs of 2024. The EP has received rave reviews all around and hundreds of thousands of hits online. The song has been a huge success, but Chan explains the song actually comes from a place of struggle and even defeat at times.

Chan grew up practicing Chinese martial arts, and later started to learn other martial arts forms such as kickboxing.

“More recently, I’ve been more into Jujutsu and the song is kind of about grappling with issues in yourself, whether it be struggles with your ego or your need for competition, or where you fit with people,” said Chan.

“And I remember in Jujutsu, you kind of go through those things, but almost in a physical allegory, you have to face how frustrated you get when you get defeated by something. So
“Jiujitsu” was kind of my physical parallel comparison to what I go through as an artist,” continued Chan.

The song “Second Wind,” was first written when Chan was just 14, and he says the song’s meaning and textures have become more clear through the creative process but also with the passage of time.

“I recorded it a few different times with different people, but it just never really felt right and I kind of forgot about it for a while. And this version is on the Guitar Songs EP and it’ll also be on the album. This is the first time it felt right and I don’t know, was it because I needed to grow as an artist or I needed to be a better singer, but it felt right,” said Chan.

“And I think it’s because when I wrote it in high school, I didn’t really know what the lyrics meant, but now I think I know what they mean. They mean way more to me now and it was almost like when artists talk about a younger you sometimes makes art that you don’t understand, but it’s because it’s a gift for your future self. It kind of felt like that,” added Chan.

Merv xx Gotti’s full-length album, which is kind of a continuation of the EP, is scheduled for release in September.

“The title is a pretty long, obnoxious title, it’s called Guitar Songs: A Thesis on Low Efficienty Emotional Excavation,” said Chan.

“It’s kind of a reference because I wrote it shortly after I wrote my master’s thesis and all engineering theses have a large obnoxious name like that, but it’s kind of about just how I had to grow and process a lot of emotions that I couldn’t do with my past project and I’m doing that with this project and for me it was honestly just to help me sleep.”

Chan said that at the same time, the album was difficult to make for the same reason, because sometimes while listening to it he would become so relaxed he would drift away and even fall asleep. Fortunately for music lovers, Chan found that perfect place between ‘sleep and awake’ to create what promises to be another groundbreaking album.

In the process, Chan also earned his master’s degree in software engineering and creative technologies. The focus of his research while earning that degree, led to the founding the Trifecta Music Festival in Saskatchewan. That action based research also led to the Trifecta Sound Co., the label he runs in Toronto.

For Chan, the projects he undertakes have been “hand in hand.”

“My music has been parallel to my stuff in community building and the academic side,” says the artist.

On the road to get there, there was a lot of discrimination and when he graduated, he didn’t want to wear his graduation ring, but slowly that was able to change.

“When they say art really is the best form of healing… once I finished writing this album and I was done, I saw the ring again and I was like, oh, this feels safe to wear now, for whatever reason. And so since I finished the album, I’ve been wearing this engineering ring, I’ve neglected for so long and it was like, wow, maybe this part healed itself.”

Seeing people respond to Guitar Songs, the artist said he feels content with the way many people seem to be resonating with the music. People have approached Chan and told him his music has helped them to channel their emotions and express in words things they had not been able to say – a testament to the power of music.

Chan will be touring across the country and internationally over the summer into November.