Run to Listen to your New Favorite Artist, Brenn! (but don’t break your ankles!)
Interview by Lindsey Dadourian
Photo by Hayley Mikell
Rising artist Brenn! has made an impact on many people with his most recent single, 4Runner, reaching over twelve millions streams in the first month of being out. His folk-rock sound carries beautifully in this song and puts him on the map as an artist you should definitely be keeping your eye on. Pleaser got the chance to chat with Brenn! about “4Runner” and what's next!
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Pleaser: It's been about two months since you released “4Runner”, how has the response been so far?
Brenn!: It was unreal, almost. It felt like a swarm of bees, like harmless bees. That's what it felt like. Or like flocking birds.
P: Did you pull from any inspiration when working on this song?
B: That song specifically everyone says sounds like Noah Kahan, which is fine, but the song itself I wrote after listening to this one Briston Maroney song, “Small Talk”, and I wrote the first verse of “4runner” in reference to how he structured the verse of his song.
P: He was actually just on the cover of our second issue!
B: Oh awesome! We just pitched to open for him in the spring.
P: That would be an incredible show.
B: I'm looking more for like Zach Bryan or The Lumineers though, but I definitely wouldn't be upset if I got to open for Briston.
P: I noticed you've been teasing another song on TikTok. Do you have more stuff in the works or is it just that one?
B: That one wasn't even the one that I wanted to do when I got to “4runner”. I wanted to do one called “Miss Utah” and it looks like “Miss Utah” isn’t gonna make the cut this time, but we have like four different songs we are working on. We have an EP in the works and then we have a roadmap of what we want to get done by X amount of time.
P: Do you have any specific goals you have set for yourself?
B: So I love doing music and I love all that's happened and I'm very grateful for it, but I really- my biggest goal in life is to have a daughter. That is probably my biggest dream, but in terms of music, just getting to a point where I can put something out and people will resonate with it. And I don't have to worry about promotion and all that because that's the hard part.
P: I personally found your music through TikTok, how has that promotion aspect been? I know people have a lot of different opinions on it.
B: Yeah, I wish I could stay off it more, but it's like an addiction, you know? I like TikTok, and it's a lot of fun when your stuff is blowing up. It's fun reading the hate comments, it's fun reading the good comments, it's fun seeing the other videos and I think overall it's a good tool for me, obviously because its pushed my music out there, but it's also brought a lot of cohesiveness to the sound of my music. I think a lot of other artists- if you've seen other artists do the whole set your phone down and run kinda thing? That was me, I started that. People can debate me on this all they want or whatever but since I started doing that I've seen so many, even bigger artists, like Jeremy Zucker’s been doing it, and other smaller artists too. Like, I did that, and seeing a lot of other people pull inspiration from me is very cool because I'm just me, you know, I'm nothing crazy or anything. I just hope they don’t break their ankles, that was my issue. I got it on video too.
P: Oh no! That's crazy!
What are your thoughts on playing your songs live? Or even doing a tour in a ton of different cities? Hearing 4runner would be such a good song to experience!
B: I've definitely thought about it and I've had my little contemplations of it and what not but I've never done live music. All of it has always been in my room, like yeah live in my room but not in front of other people. I think the idea of being able to perform the music as it is currently live would be so cool. The only issue I have is that I'm afraid it won't sound full enough. A lot of the stuff we track there's like fifty guitars and fifty mandolins and fifty banjos, so I would love to play live and I love the idea of running around on stage and singing and having everyone sing to me, but it's a very nerve wracking thought for me.
P: If you could pick anybody, past or present, to do a song with who would you choose?
B: Hmm, I don't know. I'm not a big collaboration guy, I'm like Batman, I like to work on my own. I think doing a song with Zach Bryan would be cool. He's very southern like me and I feel like we'd have a lot in common. We could make something cool. Everyone wants to see me and Noah Kahan work together but, I don't know, I feel like his story shouldn't really be touched by me. But Zack Bryan I think would be fun to work with.
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Find Brenn! Here!
