Eddie Berman’s forthcoming album, Broken English, due for release on January 21st 2022, is a suite of cosmic folk rock songs. Written before the pandemic it explores the precarious state of a world sinking deeper into isolation, and its effects on our relationship to work, family, technology, and community. Jason Barnard speaks to Eddie to find out how his songwriting has continued to evolve since making his debut with the Blood & Rust EP, featuring his now famous Dancing in the Dark duet with Laura Marling.
Hi Eddie, firstly, what was the inspiration behind your latest track Water in the Barrel?
The title of the song came from an Alan Watts lecture I was listening to while biking around Portland. He was talking about the concept of “mushin”, the sort of zen state-of-mind that’s totally still (like water in a barrel) but ready to react immediately when necessary (like when the plug is pulled). But the phrase also made me think of the especially precarious state of the world at the moment and how it feels like so many different things are reaching a boiling point.
Around the same time when I heard that Watts lecture, I had been hiking with my older daughter around these reservoirs in southeast Portland — and then this song came out about a father and daughter living on the lam under these vaguely menacing circumstances.
Your forthcoming LP Broken English, seem to have a more ethereal/psychedelic feel to your earlier work. Was that shift a conscious one?
I think it was completely linked to the material. The songs that leaned in more abstract directions lyrically seemed to warrant somewhat more abstract instrumentation. So I think it was less conscious and more going-with-the-flow of the writing and recording process.
Some of the lyrics have undercurrents of isolation and the state of society.
Ironically I wrote this album – which is very much about isolation and living in quite atomized times – months before rumblings of covid hit any headlines. Large swaths of the world have been living in increasingly isolating ways for decades, isolated from their communities, their families, and themselves. A lot of the album is about exploring my relationship to isolation, solitude, and an overall feeling of rootlessness.
Given the restrictions did you record at home or were you able to record in a studio?
In early 2020 I had the studio time booked for that summer. I was planning to record this album the same way I’ve recorded all my other ones: down in LA with my band, totally live, all together in the same room. But when Covid hit (and with something like 10 kids between all of our respective families) recording that way wasn’t feasible. So I moved my 1 year old’s crib into our 4 year old’s room and I turned the little nursery into a recording space. And I made the whole album there. My bandmates recorded their parts in their respective studios in Santa Monica and Long Beach, CA. And the brilliant engineer/mixer Pierre De Reeder mixed it all remotely at his studio in Highland Park, CA.
Did you collaborate with anyone for the recording process?
I was lucky that some of my bandmates are producers themselves – multi-instrumentalist Gabe Feenberg and drummer Max MacVeety. So I was able to send them tracks and they could lay their parts on top of it. It was the complete opposite from the organic, live way we normally record. But because we were working around all the constraints of quarantined family life, we couldn’t be too precious about our performances. So strangely the album still has all those great imperfections that you get from playing live.
As I mentioned, our longtime mixer/engineer/producer Pierre De Reeder was so key in helping shape the sound of this album.
What is your usual songwriting process?
The guitar melody always comes first for me. I’m always messing around on the guitar and whenever an interesting melody arises from fingerpicking or flat picking – I turn on a recorder and sing something over it. Sometimes it’s fully formed words and thoughts and sometimes it’s just sounds. Then it could be days, months, or even years later when I try to turn the gibberish into more coherent thoughts.
What led you to link up with Laura Marling?
I met Laura in one of those great serendipitous ways. Back in 2013 my (now wife, then) girlfriend’s friend’s boyfriend’s brother (an incredible photographer named Justin Tyler Close) had recently become friends with Laura. He brought her to one of my shows in Los Angeles and then she and I struck up a friendship after that. Forever grateful to JTC!
Why did you choose ‘Dancing In The Dark’ and ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ to remake with Laura?
I was rehearsing with my band for a show in LA a little before we recorded Dancing in the Dark, and between songs my bandmate Gabe Feenberg was playing this familiar sounding melody on the accordion that none of us, Gabe included, could peg. We finally realized it was a somber sounding Dancing in the Dark.
So after I sat with the lyrics and realized how powerful they were, I turned the song into a kind of sad, John Prine fingerpicking song. I think we ended up playing it at that first show Laura came to. So when we were all putting together a tracklist for songs we could perform for that Blood & Rust EP recording session, a Dancing in the Dark duet was a no-brainer.
After covering such a hugely popular track, we had originally thought about doing a more esoteric follow-up. I remember a Bonnie Prince Billy deep cut was a potential candidate. But then I had the thought that maybe instead of going the esoteric route, why not go for an even more popular and untouchable song with Like A Rolling Stone. In hindsight I sometimes wish we had
gone the more esoteric route, but Laura’s singing on the track is just so incredibly sublime that I’m happy with the decision we made.
Where are you from and where are you based now? What is the music scene like?
I was born and raised in Los Angeles and then I moved up to Portland, Oregon with my family about five years ago. Portland and the Pacific Northwest has been an incredible source of music of every genre for decades. And there are some really amazing artists here now. With the move, having had another baby, touring, recording, and then covid – I still haven’t been able to fully immerse myself into the local scene here. But I’m hoping to, as the world returns to some level of normalcy…
How has your music evolved over your albums?
For me, my music evolves at the same rate that I evolve as a person. As my life deepens and becomes more complex, I think that that depth and complexity are reflected in the music. Also I think I’ve become a somewhat better editor – I don’t need to jam 14 syllables in a line that can only hold 8 anymore. Now I’ll cut it down to 12.
Do you have plans to play live?
I’m playing the Portland Folk Festival in January ‘22. Other than that I’m slowly forming my touring plans for the future. I should have dates to announce in the not-too-distant future.
Finally, how do people find out more?
Go listen to my music – it’s available to listen to just about everywhere. You can follow me on social media for new music and tour updates (@_eddieberman). Or you can sign up for our mailing list at www.eddiebermanmusic.com
Eddie Berman’s new album, ‘Broken English,’ is out January 21st via Nettwerk Records.
