AE: I feel like there’s a lot of sad-tinged songs on the album. Do you see them that way?
BC: Oh no, that’s always true, Trish. That’s always the case! [Laughs] That’s where it all goes. When I have it, it all goes straight to music. I just got through a weird couple of years for me and there were a lot of coming to terms with passings in my life, and so songs are just from that, the evidence of it. And they’re, a lot of times, how I worked out what I was sad about.
AE: Well they say it’s easier to write songs when you’re broken-hearted. Do you think that’s true?
BC: Yeah I find it’s impossible to write when it’s not, because I’m doing other things, you know. Like I’m fishing or playing golf with my friends. When I’m broken-hearted, that’s when I’m sitting at a piano for, like, eight hours a day.
AE: But it’s still not a complete break-up album, like Adele who wrote every song about this guy that f—ed her over.
BC: Yeah, and Alanis Morrisette did that with Jagged Little Pill. I think subconsciously I don’t write in that one vein. A lot of times when that door of sadness or contemplating gets kicked open, then all of the things that are in there fall out. It’s never just that one thing; just that one person or one situation. It’s about what’s happened in my family or in my life. They come all at the same time, so not just one kind of song comes out when that door gets kicked open. And the twins write too, you know, so some of the songs are their sadness as well.
AE: It seems like you’re really happy right now and in a good place, so is it not a good time for you to be writing music?
BC: Well I only write when it comes, when it happens to me. It’s not really a matter of something I sit down and set out to do. I know when it comes time to do it again. I start getting this feeling, I start wanting to be alone. And I start listening to phrases and things people say and making notes on words I like. My voice recorder on my iPhone gets full. It’s just something that starts to happen, you know. For some reason, it’s not happening right now. Because I just really feel like Bear Creek is a well-rounded representation of everything that’s happened to me.
Brandi Carlile “Bear Creek” EPK from Columbia Records on Vimeo.
AE: Now that you’re playing these songs live, have any of them taken on a new meaning or new shape? It’s been a couple of years since you’ve written some of them.
BC: Yeah, totally. And that’s funny too because that’s the completion of the cycle. Songwriting for me is not a solitary pursuit. It’s not like I write a song and I light a candle — it’s not some silly little thing I do like in my house by myself. When I get it done, to actually have expressed myself, I then have to perform for it to do me any good, it’s really weird. So the tour is like the final stage of my songwriting. So I think that they’re all going to take on a real significance once I hit the road ‘cuz I will change a lot of them.
AE: Just to keep things interesting.
BC: And to keep people engaged. It’s not really a performance and they’re just songs unless other people are involved, you know?
AE: You have such an interesting personal style on stage. What’s your everyday wear like? What do you wear casually versus when you’re performing?
BC: [Laughs] Awesome. I’ve never been asked that question.
AE: Well I’m just curious!
BC: [Laughs] Well, I don’t know, I mean. Some days I don’t get dressed at all. Some days I’m in my pajamas all day! When you live on the road you have a really funny lifestyle around getting up and getting dressed. People get dressed to go to work and when I’m at home and I don’t go to work I find it hard to justify getting up and putting on a pair of skintight black jeans. But, you know, half the time I do. When I’m on the road, I dress similarly during the day as I do to what I wear for my stage clothes at night. But when I’m at home I tend to be really comfortable and wear things that are fitting. I’m in love with James Perse. I have a whole closet full of James Perse clothes. I do feel, though, that for me, personally, I find it underwhelming and anti-climactic to wear the same clothes on stage that I do during the day. So I have to get into costume. I have to get into character before I go on stage. It’s part of that Grand Ole Opry mentality that I’ve been raised with. It’s a respect issue, for the audience.
AE: I know what you mean. I work at home so I’m frequently in yoga pants. I don’t need to get all dressed up for nothing.
BC: I’ve gone three days in a row without changing out of yoga pants.
AE: Would we ever see you in a dress on stage or is that not you?
BC: Oh I could never wear a dress on stage. Ever.
AE: Have you ever been encouraged to?
BC: No, I’ve never been encouraged to wear a dress offstage, I’ve never been encouraged to wear one offstage and I’d say in most situations I’d be pretty uncomfortable in a dress. But in a situation where it’s my choice and I have control over it, I do appreciate a very simple dress from time to time.
