An Interview with Brandi Carlile
by Kim Ruehl for NoDepression.com
Kim Ruehl: Tell me about your new record, the title, and where that all came from…
Brandi Carlile: Well, it’s called Give up the Ghost… and it’s our third record. Basically we’ve been told for as long as I can remember that it takes your whole life to write your first record and then you have to write your second record in a matter of months. Which is totally the truth. You don’t do anything from the time you put out your first record to the time you put out your second, except for tour. So it’s really impossible to incorporate any real-life, tangible experience into your songwriting except for the road. I think we have enough records about the highway and the mountains and missing someone in the crowd...I think we have enough of those records in the world for right now. We went into the songwriting process really conscious of that. I realized I need to do some deep-stretching to remove myself from the smallness of my unrelatable situation and write about bigger things outside myself, aside from what was happening on the tour bus.
KR: Where did you start?
BC: I started writing about a year and a half ago.
KR: I assume you’ve clocked more hours onstage than you have in the studio. Is it still a little weird in the studio? Are you comfortable yet, or are you still working that out?
BC: I’m not comfortable. I don’t appreciate being there. I feel like we can’t breathe in there, we feel like caged animals. Somebody’s always pushing their agenda. Somebody external from the band has always got something else to prove. We just don’t appreciate it. What we end up doing is bringing our live band-ness, our essence of live performance, into the studio and we do it that way because that’s who we really are.
KR: What’s the difference for you, as a performer and a music fan, between recorded music and live music? Do you look at it as two separate things or is it two sides of the same thing?
BC: It doesn’t have to be. The one thing that’s difficult to capture in a recording that’s so easy to understand in a live performance is dynamics. You might have a slamming drum solo live that drives the audience crazy every night. You try to do it in the studio and it ends up sounding limp. You may have to [add] another electric guitar to elevate it. There are little nuances you can add to elevate the experience of the song, but the differences don’t have to be that vast. People can still record live vocals and live performances, they just don’t.
KR: How do you think it changes the song? I was thinking about “Dying Day”…it’s a completely different vibe on the record than what you do live. When you record something like that, does it change the way you do it live, or is that something you leave behind in the studio?
BC: We don’t leave it behind, for the most part. It’s interesting you think that song has a different vibe [on the record] because my perspective is that it would be the exact same vibe. That’s what I love about the way people hear things differently, it’s the same way we taste things differently. That song was recorded with two arch-top guitars and a kick drum. Then we all grabbed percussion instruments and went into the room and recorded what’s known as a party track - where we all played percussion at the same time so it sounded like live people playing percussion - and then we opened up the bass. That’s how that song was recorded. To me that’s the same vibe, but I guess I’m not part of the audience. For me, a better example would be a song like “Pride and Joy” where, live, it’s a rock and roll song with electric guitars, bass, and drums. In the studio it’s two acoustic guitars and a string arrangement.
KR: That was an interesting tune...you got Paul Buckmaster for that song, who did an incredible job. Did you get him from the Elton John connection?
BC: Yeah, that’s been a dream of mine since I was a kid to have Paul Buckmaster do a string arrangement for one of my songs. I know that sounds a little bit advanced for a 14-year-old, but when Elton John put out those early records, he would include a picture of the producer and a picture of the arranger on the record packaging. So I had a picture of Paul Buckmaster on my wall and I was able to associate his face with all those wonderful string arrangements we were hearing in the early 70s. So when I started writing songs I thought it would be amazing to hear Paul Buckmaster to do strings.
KR: How did you get him?
BC: I asked him. I called him on the phone. It was amazing. We had some of the longest conversations. I went over to his house and listened to him work on it with this program he has. He cooked for me twice. It was amazing. The man’s gotta be in his 60s. He’s a total genius, an amazing Englishman.
KR: Where do you go for the next record? How do you top the dream of singing with Elton John and getting Paul Buckmaster to arrange for you?
BC: I don’t know. I think about it every time I get in an airplane. I’m sure it’s going to crash, you know. I’m positive this is it, I must be done. The only way I can top it is to keep living my life and be open to whatever happens to me.
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