He has been writing music since he was ten, picked up a guitar at the tender age of fourteen and began receiving airplay from radio stations at sixteen years old. Any other music artist with those sort of credentials would be forgiven for being slightly arrogant and pompous – but the modesty of the gently spoken Brennan Dylan is somewhat refreshing. “I would describe myself as a hard worker, very dedicated and I love what I do. I have to play guitar every day and if I don’t I just go crazy, it’s something that I just love to do y’know”. The element of hard work and graft is evident just talking to Brennan, his passion for music and especially playing the guitar is mind blowing, however there is a certain amount skill involved not just to play an instrument, but to take it to a new level and there are very few people who can get to this level, Jimi Hendrix, Slash, and Eric Clapton are a few who have reached the pinnacle and made it possible for others to succeed in their footsteps. “What I do to practice usually to practice is to first warm up then I play some classical and a few scales or read some sheet music. From there once I’m warmed up I would usually go on to playing other stuff. It is fun but I find after a couple of hours it starts to get a bit boring, it’s kind of like a workout really. Also if I’m playing a gig that night I don’t tend to play [guitar] at all that day, I’ll just warm up for an hour or so and then I’ll leave it until I play the show. If I’m not playing show though I can play all day with different scales and practice all my songs. It is quite a lot to do but it is a lot of fun”.
Although the technical ability and skill is thanks to all his hard work constantly playing guitar, what baffled me most about Brennan was how young he started receiving recognition and success for his work. I was curious about just how Brennan caught the music bug so early on in his life. “When I was ten I used to watch the Simpsons and you would see Lisa playing the saxophone and when I heard that for the first time I was like blown away. The sound was just so cool, I just felt I had to do it y’know. So I went and got my parents to rent a saxophone for me and ever since then I was playing up until I was fourteen. I think that’s what really helped me with the guitar because I learned how to read music at such a young age and I’d go and play in stage bands, so somehow everything just worked, y’know?”.
An early age viewing of the Simpsons meant Brennan’s parents bore the brunt of his artistry at that young age. Nonetheless the transition from saxophone to guitar for Brennan was an effortless one, as the young songsmith had already learned to read music from playing the saxophone and as his interests matured a new instrument entered his life. “Well, when I was fourteen I started to listen to rock music. Before then it was mostly jazz, classical and big band music really. Then I really started to get into bands like Blink 182 and Sum 41 and I thought it would be fun to try this. So my dad had an old guitar lying around in the basement so I just picked it up and tried it when I was about fourteen. So I put the saxophone down because all I wanted to do was play rock music. Saying that though, it was around that time when I used to write a lot of classical songs and I would go to bars about three times a week when I was in high school to these inprov gigs which played jazz, blues and rock. So what I would do is just get up on stage, not knowing any of the songs and just play them by ear. A lot of this came from playing the saxophone because I was doing a lot of melody [on the guitar] and playing in a band at that age just felt kind of natural”.
With Brennan being an electronic artist it was quite hard for me to see where he fitted into the scene, because the majority of electronic music uses sampling, looping and computer software to achieve its sound. Only a handful of bands are able to create the same effect on a live stage, and even fewer of these bands are recognised by the mainstream press. However, he tells me how electronica got his pulse racing and he decided to leave rock music dead and buried. “Well, in 2007 Tommy Lee and DJ Aero toured in the summer and they brought Deadmau with them. Now I had no idea who they were until I went home and googled one of their songs because I remembered hearing it in the club. So in 2007 I went to Montreal to see them because I wasn’t old enough to go the show in Iowa. And, well it was the craziest thing I’d ever seen because I was just so used to a rock concert, so when I went in there and they had giant speakers and dancers on stage, and people were just going nuts! I thought that I could defiantly do something with this style of music. The beats and the rumbling bass was the starting point where I thought I could put my guitar in here and see if this works. So really ever since then that’s what I’ve been doing”.
Brennans creativity incorporating his guitar into electronica records and making music from it has effectively paved the way for a new genre to exist and new bands to break through to the mainstream and follow his lead. His new album focuses heavily on the sub genre of electroinca named dubstep which is much more bass driven sound and allows greater freedom to sample instruments and layer guitar parts in the form of loops.
“About a year ago I got into dubstep which is slower than electronica, so you can do different things with it and create different vibes. Also when I’m playing live I have DJ gear so I can run all the electronic and dubstep tracks off that, but when I’m playing guitar it’s exactly the same as on the record. So it is a lot to do but it’s a lot of fun. I think once you’ve practiced it all and it eventually comes together it’s very cool”.
The live process of putting an electronic show together can be stressful but with a new album for imminent release Brennan talks through the difficulties he experienced creating all the different parts to his record in the studio. “Well, the last record was recorded in about two weeks in a studio in West Hollywood and I think that was in the summer of 2010. When I started I didn’t know how to record any of the electronics, so when I went into the studio and the main thing the guys taught me in there was structure. When I used to record a song I used to just add lib and play anything for the entire song. The trouble with this was that I couldn’t remember what I’d played when it came to recording individual instruments. So I’ve learned how to put my songs into a verse, chorus, verse structure and I’ve really just kept it the same for this record. Making this record I also learned how to do all the drum programming and the Eq so I could put the effects I wanted onto the album, so it made it a lot easier to manage myself on this album”.
As a musician the influences you take on board can ultimately make or break your career as an artist. If you cite the same influences continuously throughout your career this stifles you, makes each record sound like the last and fundamentally you loose the creativity and individuality that once made you who you are. “Well there are a lot of people really, Deadmau5, Skrillex, Wolfgang, and obviously Tommy Lee and Dj Aero those guys really started this whole journey for me. Those guys are really great live as well, so if they ever come to the UK you should go and see them! I think the thing with Tommy and DJ Aero’s shows is that they have a lot more visuals now then back when I saw them, it’s really cool. I guess I’m also influenced by a lot of drummers, just because it’s a bit more interesting then having a looped drumbeat, y’know? People like Tommy Lee, Travis Barker and Dream Theater’s drummer Mike Mangini, he’s just a monster! I can’t even remember half the people that influenced me, there are just so many of them”.
The British dubstep scene is thriving in tents, at festivals and in underground basements at present. So I wondered, like any person would, was Brennan aware or maybe even influenced by the raging dubsteb scene taking place across the pond while making his forthcoming album?
“Yeah I mean the British dubstep scene is really cool, like there is this guy called Gemeni and he is awesome. But there are a lot of really good British dubstep artists out there and even the British music scene is very different and I think it’s really cool. I think some of the British dubsteb scene is just brutal though, I think some of the stuff is crazy”.
With an in-depth knowledge of the British dubstep scene that baffled me I could already see with the obvious change of genre that Brennan had progressed, but was there more freedom to actually produce a record than on previous albums he has recorded, or was that focus and drive what he needed to produce something different.
“Well, [with this album] I didn’t have another guy telling me that you can’t do this or you can’t do that. So for example, when I was recording everything was structured but it wasn’t strict, y’know? But on this record I took everything I’d learned from recording my previous albums and because it was just me on my own, I didn’t have someone telling me ‘no’. So this meant that I could just create, let it happen and flow naturally, y’know”.
Dylan felt that over previous albums his most recent offering had more of a personal edge to it. This was largely down to the creative process being a lot more relaxed and he was in command of which songs made the record and which didn’t.
“I’ve recorded a lot of demos in the past and every album that I’m doing is progressing in a way. I feel that the more albums I produce the more extreme my work is getting, y’know. I find that when I’m in the studio there are some parts of my guitar playing where I think instead of having one solo I could have three and it doesn’t sound like a mess on the record. I felt like it was almost a conversation with music and it worked having three guitars in there instead of one. But I’d listen back to the record and think ‘it could do with another part in here actually’ and I had to stop myself from getting carried away because it can just end up sounding like a mess”.
Touring an album has become more paramount then producing it in some cases. Mainstream acts such as Red Hot Chili Peppers are away from their native country for sometimes years at a time. The constant drag of a tour can tend to sap the life out of an artist, so it is refreshing to see someone come along now and then who has unbelievable mental strength and the charisma and energy needed to wow the crowds. “Well I haven’t really toured yet, but I’d really like to with this record. I know that in Europe there are tons of festivals so playing some of them would be a really good experience. The thing is I love playing live, that is my main thing, I think everything else is fun but I really live for playing on a live stage. It feels like the best feeling in the world to go and play for a bunch of people, it’s very rewarding and the feeling you get is indescribable”. I mean I would really like to try and make it out to the UK this summer because they have some really cool electronic festivals going on”.
After winning guitarist of the year at the LA Music Awards and a forthcoming album due for release what does the future hold for Brennan Dylan and will he ever pick up that saxophone again?
“Well, to tour, I think I defiantly need to do that. I think I need to figure out what type of venue to play, which suits me best. I’d love to find like a dubstep night that I could play regularly. But it takes time to find the right audience and I need to think carefully about who that’s going to be. An electronic festival would really put me on the map to get the right audience and exposure that I’m looking for.”
Brennan Dylan’s new album Broken Glass is out April 17th.
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