popwreckoning

So I survived my first year at SXSW. I learned that it is possible to live off a diet of alcohol and Zone energy bars. I learned that it is almost ridiculous to make a schedule for SXSW and the best things happen when you are being spontaneous. I learned if you act important enough, you can get into almost anything–backstages included. I learned it is possible to get sunburn in Texas even if you had spent most of your time inside venues. I learned that it is a good idea to carry a power strip, water and batteries in your bag. With all these lessons, I think it is safe to say with all these lessons that my trip to Austin made up for my skipping a week of classes.

I can’t wait to go back next year. By now you’ve seen many of my individual show reviews from the debut of Tinted Windows to the possible finale of Explosions in the Sky. Soon you’ll start seeing some of the many interviews that Joshua, Jessica and I conducted at the festival. But before the interviews I wanted to share a segment I like to think of as “SXSW Scraps”. Essentially, the PopWreckoning team saw a lot of shows and took a lot of photos. I didn’t think I could do some of these bands justice with full reviews, but I still thought we should share the photos.

In “SXSW Scraps” you’ll find many band photos. Jess and I caught some of Omaha’s Beep Beep in the Radio Room. Then Josh snapped a few shots of Brooke Waggoner, who played piano as a part of a mostly string quartet. I saw legendary Daniel Johnston in the equally legendary Emo’s. He had security on either side of the stage and he was tone deaf, but he was classic. Josh caught some of The Elms.

We all made sure to see Kevin Devine play an electronic set with The Goddamn Band. The new songs sound brilliant and we were beyond impressed. I wandered off on my own and caught The Kin play on the top floor of a hotel. It was really sweet when the guys went out into the middle of the audience and made everybody gather around for a ballad. At a small bar called Jackalopes, several of us PopWreckers gathered around a too-small stage for Kitch and the catchy Miniature Tigers. Another time, I found myself at some harder rock shows featuring Louisiana’s The Vettes and Mother’s Anthem, which you may know better as a side project of Blue October‘s guitarist.

I caught some of my favorite artists that I learned about from TV commercials: Landon Pigg and Lights. I also found myself checking out some of my favorite aussies, Youth Group, whom I became familiar with through their cover of “Forever Young”, which they did play. If you haven’t had the chance to check out Von Bondies, I recommend you do. Though they have a male lead singer, they have two rocking females in the group. Finally, Josh and I snapped a few shots of the phenomenal New York Dolls. I felt a little out of place without a leather jacket, but I’m glad I got the chance to see these rock legends.

In addition to leftover band photos, we snapped a few random shots and pics of the street. In these photos, I’ve included a picture of the fascinating port-a-potties, which Austin is kind enough to designate for males and females. In the Convention Center, we found a pile of legos and people were pretty crafty with what they made of them. You’ll see the busy 6th Street that was filled with people, vendors and even more bands that couldn’t fit in the venues. The streets were pretty wild. One day, while I was waiting in line, a pillow fight broke out. That’s right. A pillow fight. Feathers were everywhere. Here, you’ll even find your PopWreckoning editors walking to the festival. Finally, you’ll find a few pictures of our unofficial mascot Gig Pig. Basically, we have a little pig figure that we took to shows and a few bands played around with.

So here they are–these are the leftover photos, or the scraps, if you will. Enjoy.

SXSW: website

Brooke Waggoner is something of a musical prodigy. She first started tapping the ivory keys at the youthful age of 4 and composed her first song at the age of 10. Still young in her early 20s, which is felt in the lightness of her musical tones, Waggoner has released her debut album, Heal for the Honey. The record follows on the heels of her first EP, Fresh Pair of Eyes.

The music, beautiful and soft, is crowned by her use of the piano, which Waggoner plays as a delicate extension of herself. It stands far and above any other piano compositions of other bands today: isolated, strong and complex. Because of this, Waggoner’s voice never takes control of her songs; it is secondary to the piano, which resonates as a distinct character of its own. Her voice is a hushed, afterthought that sleeks in comfortably.

The album delivers a melancholy, pensive feel. The kind of record you’d throw on in the evening while the rain splatters on the city streets below and you introspectively peer out the window, observing the storm outside. This seems apt, as according to Waggoner, the album is about healing and renewal.

The use of instruments is diverse and creative in her work. The touch of horns lends a power and control to otherwise soft and forlorn tracks. Violins add grandeur to numbers that otherwise lack depth. Yet, the bouncing piano keys remain the most joyful and calming part of each song.

The only aspect that hurts the album is that many of the songs blend into one another and lack a distinctive feel. Because of this slight repetition, some tracks lose their originality and individual character, making the album a musical piece you’d put on in the background rather than listen to intently.

“The Wrong” is a soft, soulful emotional ballad that is reminiscent of Elton John‘s “Your Song”. Its strength lies in Waggoner’s tender and inviting voice. “Colorbloods” is a potent, introspective song where each piano note drives deep enough to reach into any hidden emotion. “Beaut” is a faster track that is propelled through the delicate pressing of piano keys that feels like a rainy English afternoon, eventually revealing Waggoner’s lighthearted and coquettish side.

Heal For The Honey was released on September 9th by SwoonMoon Music.

Tracklisting:
01. Lung Speed, Lung Sped
02. Beaut
03. Heal for the Honey
04. Young Friend
05. Tender Mending
06. Daylover
07. Live for the Sounds
08. Colorbloods
09. The Wrong
10. Come Love, See My Hands
11. Fresh Pair of Eyes (Eyes o’ Eyes Remix)

Brooke Waggoner: website | myspace | interview with | Fresh Pair of Eyes review

Written by: Ali Hussain

I must admit that my interview with Brooke Waggoner started out slightly rocky due to a bit of mis- communication. I was under the impression that she would be calling me at two o’clock Central time, while she was informed the interview would be on Eastern time. So, while I was writing her questions in an Omaha coffeeshop called Caffeine Dreams, she was repeatedly getting my voicemail. However, when I returned her call at 1:30 (central time), Brooke showed just how polite and thoughtful she was but just accepting the situation and pleasantly doing the interview as planned. It went as follows:

Brooke Waggoner: Hello?
Joshua, PopWreck(oning): Hey Brooke, It’s Josh. My apologizes. I actually didn’t get told Eastern time.
BW: Oh! It’s totally okay. I wondered if we had gotten a mix-up or something.
PW: Yeah, It’s cool. I was actually working on your questions about the time you called.
BW: (Laughs) That’s awesome. Well, do you want some more time?
PW: No, I think I’m good. Let’s get this going, though. You’ve been playing piano since you were four and took classical lessons for something like, seventeen years. How do you feel that this training has set your music apart from that of other singers and songwriters?
BW: Maybe how I approach it… I don’t know. I try not to get too bogged down in the structure. I know that can be a worry with a lot of training, especially on the classical part.
You start with a lot of training, especially on the classical part. You start to pick it apart so much. I really try to stay clear of that. I don’t know…I think…I started writing music when I was eight or nine years old and experimenting on my own. That always went hand-in-hand. I don’t know. In fact, I’m meeting a lot of singers, songwriters and artists that have grown up with some form of formal training, so I doesn’t seems as uncommon.
PW: I can see that. The first time I heard your Fresh Pair of Eyes EP I picked up on the classical training. I don’t really know how to describe it, but compared to a lot of piano based bands, your work sounds a little more… fresh. I don’t really have words for it. More, um… properly written than someone who simply sat down at a piano and plunked out six notes with one hand, and barely put any time or thought into the part. I certainly enjoy yours more.
BW: Oh well, that’s awesome. I agree. It’s really easy for piano players to overplay when they’re in a band. It will border on cheesy really quick. Or it will be so sparse, it’s just, you know, a little more textual.
PW: Fair enough. You’ve recorded in bathrooms, basements and bedrooms, as well as full tilt recording studios. So which do you fancy; the lo-fi, do-it-yourself home recordings or sounding in a studio?
BW: It’s funny, I go back and forth, when i did the EP, that was when I first experienced a real studio and I really loved it. It was amazing, you get to play on a beautiful Grand and do it right. But at the same time it was also a bit nerve racking, kind of feeling the time crunch and all the pressure to get in and get out.
It was also kinda of striving on that, you know, do it now or never kinda thing. Ever though everyone owns a ton of home studio equipment and stuff its like there is still something magical about being in an old studio and kinda approaching it that way.. I guess it depends on what part of the records we’re making. I like to do vocals in a friends bathroom as opposed to a fancy studio it’s just way less sterile a little bit more… I don’t know, able to be related to?
PW: Where did you record your albums Fresh Pair of Eyes and Heals for the Honey.
BW: On Fresh Pair of Eyes I did piano and drums in a place in Nashville called Emerald Studios. We did all the strings at the violin players home studio, which is an actual true studio with like crazy acoustics that’s couple stories high and pretty amazing. It’s set up to do a lot of string stuff. So we did the strings there at his place and everything else was done at Ched’s house, which was the guy that produced it. So yeah we did that and pretty much followed the same pattern on Heal for the Honey but we used a different studio that was also on Nashville.
PW: As I was reading, I noticed that a lot of people had made the assumption and accusation that your music has a slight lack of direction, which I completely disagree with. Just for the fun of it, go ahead and take a second and explain the directional and angle of the music you are creating.
BW: I think it’s funny that that’s what’s said about direction. The point of a lot of the songs is to really stretch it, not to feel so tightly wound or compact. Or like a 3 1/2 minute thing. It’s really like embellishing on a few ideas. Maybe some of that comes from training and going into the composition world and kinda experimenting with that.
I don’t know, I feel like maybe specific on the new album Heals for the Honey there’s more of a … it does feel a little bit stronger to me as opposed to the EP where as i still feel like the EP was very much needed for me. I didn’t have an overall direction with the project, I wasn’t like “here’s what I want to say with the whole album. It was just songs i really felt good about and enjoyed playing and musically felt like I needed to get out as opposed to maybe lyrically.
PW: On your new EP Heal for the Honey it seems as if you’ve taken a pretty different feel than Fresh Pair of Eyes and what inspired this change?
BW: I’m actually glad to hear you say that because I wasn’t sure, still wasn’t sure, how to separate the feel from the EP for me. There’s defiantly a few songs that feel like kinda back each other up if you where to put the two albums side-by-side. But I did know that I had written most of those songs on
>Heal for the Honey when I
was doing Fresh Pair of Eyes and had toyed with the idea of doing a full length then but decided to wait.
So some of that is carrying over from a year ago. I really wanted to try to make something. I wanted the EP to stand on it’s own. But they are definitely like little niches I have and thing that are so very dear to me that are also on the album that will probably carry on through all of my work.
Lyrically it is deeper; it was recorded and part of the album was written at a time that was kinds a rough time for me emotionally. I was touring a lot but going through a lot of personally. I think maybe that carried on over to the recording.
PW: That was a very good answer. I didn’t expect it to be so complex but I’m glad it was. Tell me a little about being indie in the Nashville scene. I’m kinda curious how artists like you and Landon Pigg have dealt with and gain exposure in a service generally dominated by a country sound.
BW: I feel like the country thing is just… there’s just as much independent music going on as country there, it’s just kinds on a different scale. There’s just a lot more money that goes into the country scene. Really there is just a ridiculous amount of people there doing pretty amazing stuff. I feel like there is an influx right now of all these people moving in from all over the country and trying to brake into something.
What you find there is a really great since of community. People support you forever, it’s not just “oh you’ve had your time, it’s short-lived.” If they connect with your music, they’re there. It’s a great city to get started and play in and there’s a ton of venues and they really give artists a chance. You have to prove it to them on your first try ’cause there is just so much to pull from. There is just a ton of independent artists there. Some pretty cool stuff.
PW: You made the decision to give your last EP away free of charge. How has that choice helped your career and where did that idea stem from?
BW: I felt like it was something that I toyed with doing a little bit before Christmas and I thought it would be a nice gesture to do for Christmas. I felt like being some one new to the scene, just now getting started on my solo stuff… I felt like the response and people that were buying were so generous and I just wanted to give back.
I had already gotten everything out of the EP financially and felt at least it wasn’t a ton of money to make. So to make that back wasn’t something I was expecting. I just like the idea of giving it back and it was definitely something that more famous artists are doing.
Yeah, you want people to hear your music, that’s what it comes down to, over and above money. I know it’s a business but you write these things for other people. It’s becoming an idea, sorta build a mailing list and build a base for the full length. and have more time to plan how to market that project. Why not, really? The cool thing is that people are still generous. A really great amount of digital fails each month and people still want to contribute to the cause and support. It’s kind of remarkable.
PW: That’s wonderful. I think it’s really good way to go about things cause step one is about getting people to hear you before they are like ‘okay this is an artist I need to go see or support.’ A lot of times it’s really hard to do that if you are trying to sell yourself to somebody, it’s like, ‘I don’t know who you are, I’m not going to buy that. ‘ I think you’re doing it the right way. And, on a side note, that’s it for me. I’m out of things to quiz you on!
BW: Well thanks for calling! I had a great time.
PW: Me too, Brooke. It was my pleasure.

Brooke Waggoner: website | myspace | Fresh Pair of Eyes EP review

If the six tracks on Fresh Pair of Eyes are any indication as to what is in the future for Brooke Waggoner, we should just reserve her life time seat at the musical table now, because she isn’t going anywhere. Sporting a mixture of piano skills that sample both Regina Spektor and Johannes Brahms, and a voice that would make both Maria Taylor and Alison Krauss proud, Waggoner has a lot of weapons in her corner. Add swirling strings and flawlessly written storytelling, and you’ve got the makings of a future legend.

This is all but too obvious in each of the songs samples on her EP. “Hush if You Must,” the albums opening track sets the tone for the album, by featuring strongly expressive and intelligent lyrics over beautiful piano and strings. Waggoner reveals both her balancing insecurities and strengths within the lyrics, “I’m not very adequate, not very merry / Oh I try… / I’m not very tempting and not very pretty / but I get by.” The heavy handed lyrics seem somehow charming within the song. They come off less like whining and more like self discovery. And anyone who can make co-dependency seem appealing and romantic through their beautiful writing, as Waggoner achieves in “Wonder-Dummied,” deserves a gold star in my book. Furthermore, within this song, her ability to combine alt-country composure with musical structuring based off samples of eastern Asian culture, is impressive on it’s own. Her classical riffs, which border on theatric at times, come and go, adding new life and fresh angles to paths that might otherwise seem previously traveled.

Shifting styles from Asia to Nashville, “So So” and “I Am Mine” visit more of Waggoner’s storytelling roots. The songs remain less busy that those that proceeded them, sticking mostly with piano and comforting strings to set the tones. Topics ranges from being homesick and songwriting with a new friend, to learning how to begin and experience relationships. Brooke’s expressive voice shifts through her stories, exuding the much needed emotions desired of the listener in order to grasp the true plot of the story. Waggoner’s shaky, almost frantic voice exposes her struggle with change flawlessly.

In “Fresh Pair of Eyes,” and “My Legionnaire,” Waggoner beautifully expresses a feeling I’m sure every one of us has desired: a longing to be noticed as an individual, and embraced for our abilities to stand alone. Over a growing collection of cello, piano, and soft hums, she refers to herself as, “a single white tree in a black woods of disguise,” in what I consider to be the line of the album. It’s honesty is absolute and converts to tape as well as any album I’ve experienced.

You can catch Brooke Waggoner expressing herself live, as she finishes up her current tour. If she seems to be missing your town, you can check out her Myspace, or website, where you can currently download “Fresh Pair of Eyes,” free of charge.