<- read -> part 1 part 2 part 3

<- listen -> Never Let Me Down

“The band has to be competent to a level that the club would consider asking them back -- and that's all practice time.”

Starting Out

STARPOLISH: Let’s start out by talking about how you got your first gig. I know it was a long time ago, but how did you go about getting those first couple of bookings, and getting someone to take a chance on you?

BROWN: Well, if I can recall that far back, I would say that it had as much to do with getting the band ready and having enough tunes written. I started out playing covers like a lot of people. I played everything – I [was in] a punk cover band, I played with a violinist for a while. But the thing that holds true across the board when you’re beginning is that the band has to be competent to a level that the club would consider asking them back – and that's all practice time. So I would say get the band as tight as you possibly can, and the simplest way to get a gig to me is to befriend somebody who’s in a band that is already playing at the place, and get an opening slot. Or, if you’re just a fan of the band, you don’t really need to befriend them, you need to make a practice tape, or invite one of the members of the band who is playing at the place you want to play to come see one of your practices, and then offer to open for no money. Put some flyers up, and do some promotion for the whole gig, and before you know it you can play your own night at this place and actually make a little money. And that’s how it happens … that’s really the only advice I can give the people. You have to be tight, and not burn a bridge right away by going in with a band that’s mediocre at best.

STARPOLISH: Does it help to know what kind of music the club attracts, and to make sure you are playing in the right venue?

BROWN: Oh, absolutely, I think that’s definitely a factor. There are a lot of factors when it comes to that kind of thing. You have to take into account the crowd you want to play for -- you can probably get a gig playing in a coffee house much easier than you can at an established bar. And it would depend on … if you’re an acoustic duo, go play the coffee house, then maybe put a band together behind that, and when you have a band together behind that, go play your night at a club. But, mostly I would say it has to do with the situation that you want to be in versus the situation you are going to walk into. For instance, the band that you decide to play with should be compatible with you. You shouldn’t be a punk band trying to hook up with a funk horn band playing for fraternity kids. You’re not going to go over, and you’re not going to do a good service for anybody -- nobody is going to want to hear you, and so on. So that’s just logical. But sometimes people get so excited about music, and so excited about their band, that they forget all logic. (laughs) That’s something that happens at the early stages. It’s prevalent today, that when you go and see a young band, they are talking about being signed, and they are talking about labels, and touring, and its like, “You know, you guys should really work on your tempos, and you should work on your chords and harmonies, before you think about any of that.”

Outside Projects
STARPOLISH: A couple of the questions posted on our site related to Brian doing a movie – we probably should have mentioned we were speaking with you and not the whole band. But it does raise an interesting issue: Brian is already the front man, so he’s being singled out. Does that affect the band at all? Does it cause any devisiveness or dissention when one member starts doing side projects?

BROWN: You know, we try to keep anything anybody does outside the band, whether it’s A.J. doing a session as a guitarist, or me producing a band, or Doug doing a jingle for NPR in Chicago, or Brian acting, we try to keep everything as a positive for the band. We are all members of the band, and when we go out there we kind of have to represent. So no, it’s a good thing; visibility for Brian as a member of The Verve Pipe is only a good for me. And I think we all look at it that way.

STARPOLISH: It sounds like each of you have some outside stuff, so its not like you are all just waiting for him to get done with his thing.

BROWN: That’s very true, we all do. And in as much as that’s something we found that we needed more of, because when you get into a band and you tour for two years, it doesn’t always blossom. What ends up happening is because the tour is getting larger, and you’re playing more and spending more time together, things become more embryonic. And you forget about yourself as an entity.

STARPOLISH: So you can sort of being subsumed within the context of the band?

BROWN: Exactly, and that’s happened to all of us. We all have to break out in our own way, and I think the big thing for some people is to do something non-musical. For instance, Doug, our keyboardist, is a photographer, and he has had numerous exhibits in the Chicago area in different galleries; he does that and it’s a great outlet for him. And he is very good at it. A.J., our guitarist, is consumed by music alone. He has a couple of hobbies, but music … he’s very good at it, so he’s like a gun for hire. And he has played on numerous people’s albums, just going down to a studio and copping something. And Brian does his acting and has his label, and I write with other people, and have produced some bands. It’s all good, because everyone comes back more refreshed, a little bit more believing in themselves, a little bit more knowledgeable, ready to give more to The Verve Pipe.

STARPOLISH: I also think that just in terms of writing, the broader your experiences the more you can bring into your writing.

BROWN: That’s very true.

STARPOLISH: One StarPolish member wrote in saying that “Reverend Girl” is the standout track [on the first album] for your drumming, and asked if you had one from the current album, or if there was one we can look out for in an upcoming album?

BROWN: I think the reason I said that about “Reverend Girl” is because it was a chance to branch out; it had a time change in it and some other things. Now I haven’t been that adventurous in the drums because the songs haven’t had time changes. I don’t know, I think instead of looking at standout tracks for drumming, I think the drumming would be more in the sounds, because we’ve gotten more into sounds and less into chops. Like there’s a song called “Underneath” on the new album that has just a really nice groove that just coasts along. I really don’t change much in it, but the sound of it is great and the feel of it is great. So I've achieved everything I needed, you know, being able to emulate some of my heroes like Bunny Carlos from Cheap Trick. I put in a couple of Cheap Trick-isms, on a song called “Wonderful Waste” that’s going to be out on the new album. I off the last album, I would say, the “F Word” is a unique drum part, “Generations” is tasteful, and I think “Half a Mind” was played really pretty, well, very groove-oriented, so that would be it.

STARPOLISH: I noticed that your producer on this album was credited with doing some drum loops -- is that something new? And does that change how you’re doing songs live -- I mean, do you have a drum track that you actually trigger?

BROWN: Yes, absolutely. It got me into electronics for the tour, which was good and bad because when we would be playing a place and we would be drawing too much power and wouldn’t be able to hook up to an outside telephone pole, my gear would inevitably be the first to shut down. But I knew how to get around that always. Thanks to Doug Corella, our keyboardist, who has enlightened me to the world of samplers and thing like that, I think the band played better on the last tour then it ever has, because I was playing to a click, we were tight and consistent every night. We could get things tighter and work well within the framework of the tempo. And not just that, but learning to play with a click and really make it groove is not an easy thing when you are playing in a high-volume, high-energy situation, so I learned a lot and I think it made me a better drummer. And the band, I think, has never sounded better.

A Sophomore Slump?

 

"We are all members of the band, and when we go out there we kind of have to represent."

STARPOLISH: You had four hit singles with your first RCA album, Villains, which was produced by Jerry Harrison. For the second album you changed producers, and some people have called that album your “sophomore slump.” I don’t know if you agree with that or not, but it seems like it hasn’t been as successful as the first album. So the question is, what happened with the second album, and why change producers given the success of Villains? And how does having a different producer affect the album?

BROWN: I think that we had a good time working with Jerry, and that it was obviously fruitful. The song that was the biggest for us was a song called “The Freshman,” and “The Freshman” was actually produced by Jack Joseph Puig, who we originally…

STARPOLISH: He mixes for you, doesn’t he?

BROWN: He does. But he was going to produce the latest album, The Verve Pipe album; we began working with him and ran into scheduling conflicts. He wanted more songs, he wanted us to write more, and there were those in the band who felt we had written very good stuff and wanted to move forward. Unfortunately, after moving forward with Michael Beinhorn, the music climate changed more from alternative rock to more rap metal rock -- I think we were victims of timing. And I don’t know that we had an overwhelming smash hit single. I think had we had something like that, that was undeniable, at least for the sound of the time, the label would have been jumping up and down. But with the time and money that it took to make the album, and the time and money that we put into touring and everything, I think we gave it an incredible shot. And for whatever reason, it didn’t pan out.

STARPOLISH: There is a question related to that, about how the first album raised expectations, and sort of raised the bar for you guys in terms of how you look at an album. And yet it sounds like from all the press that I’ve read, you guys are really happy with how the album came out. Were you happy with how the album came out?

BROWN: You know, I have my happiness and I have my disappointment … whenever you are that close to anything… Villains, which sold 1.4 million copies, I still had my unhappiness about that album, and my disappointments, as well as my happiness. You know, success heals a lot of wounds, but I try not to dwell on the negative and try not to dwell on the disappointments -- only to learn a lesson from it, is what I really want to do.

STARPOLISH: Looking at your last album’s artwork [a surgically opened frog], I’m surprised you didn’t call it Dissection. It brought me back to 8th grade biology class.

BROWN: Yeah I really liked that layout. Our friend Brett Kilroe at RCA came up with that idea, and I remember having mockups of the album cover and putting things side by side and having friends look at it, and [I’d] ask, “What’s the most eye-catching, the most interesting thing that makes you scratch your head the most?” And every single one of them said the frog. And I liked it immediately.

next >>