It’s hard to believe Brandi Carlile isn’t from the South. Her songs can’t help but have that country-way about them: The storytelling narratives, the themes getting through hard times and missing someone so much it threatens to consume you all together – even her speaking voice has a bit of a twang. But mostly it’s her charm. She is warm and friendly, like she’d give you a ride home if she saw you in the rain or offer you a cup of tea as soon as you walked into her house. That genuine charisma is why so many fans have become smitten with her over the course of career. Well, that and her voice. After Brandi signed with Columbia Records and released her second album The Story in 2007 she became well-known in circles of music-aficionados for her brand of yodel-pop-folk that she took on the road with the likes of The Indigo Girls. As her songs were used in ad campaigns and Grey’s Anatomy, more of the world grew accustomed to her way of making contemporary music that is almost decade-less: A song that doesn’t reflect any specific time or event, but could remain relevant at any time in your life or hers, or whomever you think about when you hear it. That’s what makes Brandi Carlile such a rarity in music, and why she can play with a symphony orchestra backing her up or in front of a crowd that came to see Dave Matthews and attendees leave as fans if they weren’t already.
Since Brandi’s 2009 album Give Up the Ghost, a lot has happened. The singer/songwriter turned 30. She broke up with her long-time partner. She secluded herself with her songwriting partners, Tim and Phil Hanseroth, and producer Trina Shoemaker at a recording studio where they created Bear Creek, which is out today. Bear Creek (named after the Pacific Northwest studio it was recorded at) is just as timeless as the rest of Brandi’s albums, with tracks like “Keep Your Heart Young” and “Hard Way Home” that already sound like campfire classics. Then there’s “That Wasn’t Me,” her first single which has an accompanying video starring Kris Kristofferson. It’s a heart-wrenching piano-driven tune about losing oneself and, in turn, losing everyone and everything else.
We talked with Brandi a few days before she turned 31 about songwriting, how she keeps so fit and if she’ll get married now that her home state of Washington is in the process of making same-sex marriage legal.
AfterEllen.com: It seems like you took turning 30 kind of hard. How do you think 31’s going to go for you? Brandi Carlile: I think I’m pretty settled into it. I’m happy with it. My brother turned 30 last night and I had his birthday party at my house and I was kind of thinking “Well I’m glad I didn’t have to face that one again.”
AE: [Laughs] Yeah! I have to tell you I love the video of you taking a whiskey shot with Kris Kristofferson. That video shoot must have been fun. BC: So much fun! It was so much fun, it was pretty exciting. That shot of whiskey was like one of four that we had that day. That one was really big.
AE: [Laughs] Can you tell us anything about the concept? BC: Totally. But one of the things about working with Kris on the video was that we sang songs together, we sang Hank Williams songs. It was really really cool. So the video concept is about a guy who gets out of prison, sort of like a Shawshank Redemption scenario where he doesn’t know quite how to assimilate back into the real world. He tries but he hasn’t figured it out yet. And he goes back to the place where he used to live. He uncovers this old guitar in this old house where he lived before he was locked up. So he thinks he’s going to be able to do those things again and he’s never seen an iPhone or any sort of contemporary distractions and nobody really wants to hear what he has to say. Nobody cares about the kind of archaic lifestyle that he’s trying to bring into this generation. He ends up getting discouraged and tries to rob a bank. So that he can go back to prison.
AE: That’s kind of sad! BC: He turns in a bank slip to the teller that says “Please give me one dollar of your bank’s money. This is a robbery.” And you’d think it would be sad but, for some reason, he wants to go back so bad that you’re happy for him, like he won some game or something.
AE: Sounds like it’s going to be awesome. BC: I planned it to come out around the album release because it’s a very special video.
AE: I feel like there’s a lot of sad-tinged songs on the album. Do you see them that way? BC: Oh no, that’s always true, Trish. That’s always the case! [Laughs] That’s where it all goes. When I have it, it all goes straight to music. I just got through a weird couple of years for me and there were a lot of coming to terms with passings in my life, and so songs are just from that, the evidence of it. And they’re, a lot of times, how I worked out what I was sad about.
AE: Well they say it’s easier to write songs when you’re broken-hearted. Do you think that’s true? BC: Yeah I find it’s impossible to write when it’s not, because I’m doing other things, you know. Like I’m fishing or playing golf with my friends. When I’m broken-hearted, that’s when I’m sitting at a piano for, like, eight hours a day.
AE: But it’s still not a complete break-up album, like Adele who wrote every song about this guy that f—ed her over. BC: Yeah, and Alanis Morrisette did that with Jagged Little Pill. I think subconsciously I don’t write in that one vein. A lot of times when that door of sadness or contemplating gets kicked open, then all of the things that are in there fall out. It’s never just that one thing; just that one person or one situation. It’s about what’s happened in my family or in my life. They come all at the same time, so not just one kind of song comes out when that door gets kicked open. And the twins write too, you know, so some of the songs are their sadness as well. AE: It seems like you’re really happy right now and in a good place, so is it not a good time for you to be writing music? BC: Well I only write when it comes, when it happens to me. It’s not really a matter of something I sit down and set out to do. I know when it comes time to do it again. I start getting this feeling, I start wanting to be alone. And I start listening to phrases and things people say and making notes on words I like. My voice recorder on my iPhone gets full. It’s just something that starts to happen, you know. For some reason, it’s not happening right now. Because I just really feel like Bear Creek is a well-rounded representation of everything that’s happened to me.
AE: Now that you’re playing these songs live, have any of them taken on a new meaning or new shape? It’s been a couple of years since you’ve written some of them. BC: Yeah, totally. And that’s funny too because that’s the completion of the cycle. Songwriting for me is not a solitary pursuit. It’s not like I write a song and I light a candle – it’s not some silly little thing I do like in my house by myself. When I get it done, to actually have expressed myself, I then have to perform for it to do me any good, it’s really weird. So the tour is like the final stage of my songwriting. So I think that they’re all going to take on a real significance once I hit the road ‘cuz I will change a lot of them.
AE: Just to keep things interesting. BC: And to keep people engaged. It’s not really a performance and they’re just songs unless other people are involved, you know?
AE: You have such an interesting personal style on stage. What’s your everyday wear like? What do you wear casually versus when you’re performing? BC: [Laughs] Awesome. I’ve never been asked that question.
AE: Well I’m just curious! BC: [Laughs] Well, I don’t know, I mean. Some days I don’t get dressed at all. Some days I’m in my pajamas all day! When you live on the road you have a really funny lifestyle around getting up and getting dressed. People get dressed to go to work and when I’m at home and I don’t go to work I find it hard to justify getting up and putting on a pair of skintight black jeans. But, you know, half the time I do. When I’m on the road, I dress similarly during the day as I do to what I wear for my stage clothes at night. But when I’m at home I tend to be really comfortable and wear things that are fitting. I’m in love with James Perse. I have a whole closet full of James Perse clothes. I do feel, though, that for me, personally, I find it underwhelming and anti-climactic to wear the same clothes on stage that I do during the day. So I have to get into costume. I have to get into character before I go on stage. It’s part of that Grand Ole Opry mentality that I’ve been raised with. It’s a respect issue, for the audience.
AE: I know what you mean. I work at home so I’m frequently in yoga pants. I don’t need to get all dressed up for nothing. BC: I’ve gone three days in a row without changing out of yoga pants.
AE: Would we ever see you in a dress on stage or is that not you? BC: Oh I could never wear a dress on stage. Ever.
AE: Have you ever been encouraged to? BC: No, I’ve never been encouraged to wear a dress offstage, I’ve never been encouraged to wear one offstage and I’d say in most situations I’d be pretty uncomfortable in a dress. But in a situation where it’s my choice and I have control over it, I do appreciate a very simple dress from time to time.
AE: What is it with you and social media? You don’t do your own Twitter or Facebook. Is it something you’re not interested in or have you ever thought about it? BC: [Laughs] Yeah, I’m such a Luddite, right?
AE: Well, it’s just obvious when the post is “Brandi’s doing this today!” and I’m like “That is not Brandi.” BC: You’re right, you’re right. But, check this out: I’m getting into it right now.
AE: What? Are you gonna be on Twitter? BC: I think I might. I’m starting to get into it. I’m acquiring from my friends who are doing it, you know. I’m a little bit slow to that whole thing. I’m like Elton John. I’m always ten minutes late to everything cool, from clothes to food to music to technology. But I’m starting to really get into it. And the reason, Trish, is I’ve been on the road forever and being a bus is like being on a timecapsule – it really is. There’s no air, there’s no light. There are a lot of things about me that haven’t, that have been neglected over the last ten years. So I’m totally out of touch. I don’t have a single app. Even things that have to do with my personal life and my family and facing up to stuff because being on that bus is like being on a timecapsule and it gets really comfortable after a while. Waking up at 2 p.m., going straight to sound check, have dinner, play a gig every day for the last eight years has made me not notice a lot of things. So I’ve been off the road now since Christmas – so that’s like six months I’ve been off the road and it’s the longest break I’ve ever taken in my career. My being off Twitter is the result of that.
AE: Are you bringing your girlfriend on the road with you? BC: Oh yeah!
AE: What is your fun when you’re bored on the road? BC: Well it’s cool that she’ll be with me because she’ll get me up and off the bus, you know. She won’t tolerate sitting around. She’ll absolutely have me out going on walks and going to find a lake or a pond to fish in in something like that and on days off I go fishing. But I’m going to start getting up earlier and getting out in the towns that we’re staying in and just keep my head right. I don’t want to be in just band-tour-focus mode. AE: You seem like you’re very fit – do you work out? BC: Yeah, yeah. Thank you for saying that, Trish.
AE: [Laughs] Well, I’m just saying. BC: I focus on the core stuff because I think it has to do with vocal cords now. I think when people have vocal problems, nine times out of ten – it has been this for me, that’s how I know – is that the problem isn’t singing to hard or volume or singing wrong or straining, it’s affectation, which is trying to make your voice sound like something it naturally isn’t. And it’s overcompensation for a weak core. So if you’re going to push and have volume when you don’t have a strong abdomen, diaphragm, you’re going to lean heavily on your throat and your sort of head-chest. And if you have a strong core, it naturally comes from there, so I try to work out my core as much as I can before I go on tour.
AE: Do you do anything on the bus? BC: [Laughs] Some days. Some days you might catch me in my yoga pants working out.
AE: What are you looking forward to about touring with Dave Matthews? it seems like it’ll be a little bit of a different crowd than typical Brandi Carlile show. BC: The crowd is absolutely – it’s so diametrically different than my crowds that it’s an absolute pleasure. I opened for Dave the first time, properly, last year in New York and his crowd was, literally, unbelievable. They were so kind, they justt constantly yelled out encouraging things and listened to the songs. They almost give you instant feedback, they just sit there and yell feedback, like “That was really good – you should do more country tunes!” “I like what you did with your hair!” It’s really sweet. They’re awesome. And I think that’s because Dave, himself, is a compelling and engaging person when he’s on stage, they really feel like they’re part of his family.
AE: In all fairness, I feel your fans are always yelling out marriage proposals and things so it’s not like you don’t get that, too. BC: Yeah, you’re right. My crowd is the same in that way, they’re just as encouraging and things like that. This crowd – I don’t know how to say it. They’re really different from my crowd. They have this traveling Grateful Dead mentality. They remind me of what it would be like to be a deadhead.
AE: Do you consider yourself a country artist? It seems like you’re not positioned that way, but a lot of your songs, if not full-on country, have a hint of it. BC: If I am, then it’s only what it should be. Country music, aside from being a genre, I think it’s naturally just a lifestyle. People call country music, country music like it’s just something on the radio or the way people dress, but it’s just rural music, really. Anything that has rural themes falls into that category. So I basically live on a farm with chickens so I don’t know how I couldn’t be a country artist. AE: So now that Washington is in the process of legalizing gay marriage, do you think you’ll ever get married? BC: Yes, absolutely.
AE: You’re that kind of girl; you’re the marrying kind? BC: Yeah, I am! I’m that kind of girl. For sure. And I’m doing a video tomorrow for Musicians for Marriage Equality and I’m doing a lot of work within channels of Washington state to make sure that passes this time. I’m so aware of this issue and I’m really pleased about what Barack Obama said and I do believe that this is a civil rights issue and that humans can move on past it.
Bear Creek is out today. Follow her on Twitter and tell her @afterellen sent you.
