Brett Dennen Interview
Brett Dennen will play The Trocadero Theatre tonight with Grace Potter & the Nocturnals. He’s been working non-stop all year and shows no sign of letting up. I had the opportunity to catch up with Brett earlier on this week for a quick interview. He’s a really nice guy who does a lot for others and the community. More people should take inspiration from him and help out others in need. Interview below.
Colin: So what have you been up to this year? I know were on a headlining tour and you made a few stops at festivals. I actually saw you at Bonnaroo.
Brett: Oh, great! I’ve been touring a bunch, I’ve been touring pretty much straight since the album came out last year. Did a couple tours in the US, both headlining and opening for OAR, a bunch of festivals, been touring in Europe this year. I’m touring straight until the end of the year and at the top of the year I go back to Australia then another tour in Europe. In between those two tours, I’ll be making another album to release next summer.
Colin: Damn, you’re keeping yourself busy and working hard. Non-stop. Does that ever get draining?
Brett: It does. It’s really tiring. It takes a lot out of you. You expose yourself to a lot of different germs and sicknesses that can be really taxing on your body. You also know that doing what you love, you know? It makes it easier. I think anybody would give up if it wasn’t something they loved to do but I absolutely love doing it.
Colin: Definitely. I know you are involved with a bunch of different organizations that help out different communities and stuff like that. Have you done any work with that lately?
Brett: Yeah, I mean we do what we can. In some cities we bring out non-profit organizations to partner with. I’m involved with the Mosaic Project which is a non-profit organization that I started with a couple of people about seven years ago. I keep myself pretty busy with that and music and other things.
Colin: Very cool. You’ve been touring so much, have you had any highlights?
Brett: Yeah, we’ve played some really big shows. We’ve played some incredible festivals. I had a lot of fun on this last tour that we did in Europe. Just playing to crowds I’ve never played to before and meeting people and seeing beautiful cities. To me, it’s all great, whether I’m playing some town I’ve been to a million times or some place I’ve never been before. You know, I sing the songs every night but I learn something new about them every night. It just gets better and better.
Colin: So if you weren’t playing music for a living, what would you be doing instead?
Brett: I probably would be doing something that involves community work. Something hopefully in education. Working with children and community. Maybe not a school teacher but in something more community oriented, community driven.
Colin: When you were growing up did always have a strong sense of community or helping out others?
Brett: Yeah. I mean it’s just the way we were raised. My parents pretty good at teaching us that early on. That that’s important, you know? The work you do, it’s not just for yourself but for others.
Colin: On your tour right now, who’s going to be opening for you in Philadelphia?
Brett: Well, in Philly, we’re doing a co-headline with Grace Potter. The opener is Robert Francis. He’s this guy in LA or he’s based out of LA who has an incredible voice and he’s kind of straight ahead 70s anthemic rock. He’s pretty cool.
Colin: Awesome. Have you played in Philly before?
Brett: Yeah, I played the TLA and other venues. I’ve played all of them. The World Café…
Colin: What do you think of the city?
Brett: I love Philadelphia. I think Philadelphia is a great east coast city that’s maybe not as crazy as New York but people still like to have fun. There’s a lot of great singer/songwriters who’ve come out of there. I have a friend named Amos Lee who is one of my favorite singes/songwriters out there and he’s based there. I think it’s a good city for music.
Colin: I agree. Earlier on you said that you were working on a new album for next summer. Have started writing and planning for that? Or is it just in the early stages?
Brett: The songs are already written and feel like they’re pretty much done in terms of writing and arranging. Now it’s time to just record them. I’m looking into studios. Hopefully it will be a studio somewhere far away from where I live, where me and the band can go live there for a couple weeks and camp out in the studio and work late into the evening, Wake up there, work some more, drink wine and just have it kind of be a retreat.
Colin: Is that how you normally record your albums?
Brett: No. Normally I make records in LA, use players from LA and everybody just comes to the studio, spend all day there and everybody goes home at night. Then come back the next day. This time I want it to be more of like a everybody lives together and works together and that’s all we think about is the record for two weeks.
