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Photo by Gabe Nava

We know music is subjective, but some music hits different, a sound so intense it has a mineral quality to it, a taste that you can hear, layers of texture that deliver softness one note and grit the next. Bren Joy produces the latter, a multidimensional talent that we confidently predict could elevate to stardom whatever the era or the genre. On his latest album SUNSET BLACK, we are fearlessly cast into a sampling of his immense talents, over a range of soundscapes most artists fail to cover in a career. Stunned into action after listening to this album in full, we reached out to dive into Bren’s life force, views from post-fires in LA and everything between in SUNSET BLACK:

OnesToWatch: How are you?

Bren Joy: I am good, man. Busy day, but I'm good.

Classically busy. good. How do you feel about the upcoming album release? Happy with it? You excited? Nervous? All the things? 

Yes. I think all of the above. I feel like it's the weirdest thing like you work on something for so long and then it comes out and then you're just like, “Okay… what now?” You know, or it's kind of the opposite where like, the work starts when it's out. But I'm very very very excited it's just been a long time coming so yeah, it's gonna be good.

Let me say, that’s some great insight into the life of an artist right there. There’s the the recording life and then the “get out and promote and perform" part of being an artist. Between the two what's your favorite part of being an artist?

Oh easily making the music slash touring is, I feel, the the sole reason I do this. The promotion and stuff is fun, but making the music comes so easy and then I think the hard part is, “okay how do you get people to pay attention to it?” Essentially, we as artists have this job, but the music is definitely the most fun part. 

I always love to dig in why an artist is an artist – and I find there's always a few types – but number one is the “it chose me, I had no choice, I was forced to be an artist, there was something within me that made me want to perform or express myself, etc.” And then there's always the the reluctant one, the one that had to be coaxed out, encouraged, all that kind of stuff. What makes you an artist? Why did you settle on what is already described as a very difficult career?

I always say, I was going through so much in life and I felt like I started singing before I became an artist, about two years before. I think I found that people listen to me sing more than they listen to me talk and that was a huge epiphany for me. I was like, whoa, I could literally sing the ABCs and people will listen, but if I'm trying to talk or explain my life, or you know explain why I'm depressed or whatever, it takes a lot to get people to pay attention. So I think for me, it felt like a superpower, I was just able to say what I wanted to say. Maybe it started selfishly for me, but then it kind of elevated into actually helping people. I think I had no choice but to be an artist. 

I love that for you, but I hate the fact that nobody listened to you.

There's just this attention you grab when you perform, and you know, that's why it's one of the most sought after careers in the world. There's this energy that you are able to omit when you're on a stage. And I think for me, that was the point where I really felt like I was being the most seen. And I felt also that it was the easiest thing for me. It just came so effortlessly. And it was my choice if I wanted to get better or not, but I chose to keep going. 

Love that. Also love the artwork behind you.

Oh, thank you. I made it.

Is that you? That's interesting. Is it on canvas – it has kind of a wood look?

Yeah, it's a canvas and then we painted some stuff over it. There's a few different mediums on here. But yeah, there's a little wood in there. It's all over.

But it's beautiful. I love it. And then, in the reflection of your glasses, I can tell like it looks like you have a beautiful view of some kind there.

I do. I'm in Los Angeles.

Okay. Yeah, so am I, but I'm in the basement of Beverly Hills office.

You know what? Close enough. I'm looking at the Valley. So it's a pretty good view. 

I love it. Getting into Sunset Black, I got to say, the artwork for the album is gorgeous. It's a beautiful shot of you. Whoever did that creative direction, that was well done. There's something in the album title, Sunset Black, that's very different from a black sunset, whatever that is, poetically. What made you settle on that? It definitely feels like an invitation. There is something about that title that kind of pulls me in – I guess sunsets and blackness are so tied together, right? One follows the other in some fashion and what a change to our perspective and our day and our just rhythms, right? End of day, light into night. But please, tell me, how’d you settle on that?

Sunset and black. They’re two opposite meanings, right? There's one that expresses this huge, golden hour-order moment. It's really warm. Then there's one that can be associated with coldness. A lot of the album is back and forth, it's left and right. It's my interpretation of this journey through Blackness, this journey through Americana, R&B. I’m a piano. It's my interpretation from someone that has only come from the background of R&B. How do I emit folk music? How do I emit Americana? So when I was thinking of what I wanted to say, I had the title before I had the album. It felt very inviting, like you said, but it also felt a little avant-garde. Very Eastern coming, like a lot of the art now.

I'm very inspired by European culture and European music and fashion and everything, and I feel like Sunset Black just felt like this push and pull that I really needed to get out in the album for people to understand. And it's also a double meaning, I was really inspired by black skin and how people looked during golden hour. The title means a lot, but the biggest takeaway from the title is being open to two things that contradict themselves, and welcoming that kind of awkwardness, and that unfamiliarity, I think the album does that very well – hopefully.

That's a beautiful sentiment, and this is why I don't think AI will ever win, because that is an extremely nuanced and textured sort of approach to humanism. How old are these songs? Has this been finished for a little while, or is it fresh?

We turned in the album December 28th and the last song was written December 18th.

Oh, wow. 

It started with the song “Skin” and then it unfolded from there, but this isn't the first album I've made since my last record. I made a whole other album and nothing just really clicked. And when I started this one, I went and very unapologetically and everything just really started to fold. "El Dorado” was the last one that we wrote that made it onto the album and I think it's one of the best, too, so it's been a minute.

This is not a common response so I love this, because this is more like how I end up creating things, you know? Like last minute, that's sort of the nature of being a writer sometimes. I am curious though, what made you put that other record to bed? Did it just not represent you anymore or what happened?

I think I was trying to make music I thought was cool instead of realizing that my style is cool in itself, you know? It’s kind of like AI – trying to replicate modernism dates the replication, like by the time you successfully replicate what is a trend right now, it's not a trend anymore. And me, like, I was doing that and I just felt like I was a little behind on everything. So the moment I kind of leapt back into it, these songs kind of unfolded. I think those songs still are some amazing songs, but they just don't hit me right now. So maybe, maybe in a few years though.

Would you give those songs away? Are you gonna hold on to them or? 

I definitely would, but there's a few that I have a plan for in the future. But I love writing for artists, I love writing for people that have as much of a nuanced vision as I do. So we'll see.

I always find self-editing as an artist so fascinating, especially on the outside. So one, you had the courage to give up on a piece of work that's already kind of completed. That's never easy to do. Now that Sunset Black is out and completed, I’m curious what you think makes an album? How do you include something or un-include something? Is it thematic? Is it that you need a cohesive vibe, narrative, story? The record feels very symbiotic, so I'm wondering was there a lot you cut out or was the writing very intentional? 

I think you said it right. It's self-editing. An album can completely change the entire thematic landscape. If there's more R&B on a record, it becomes a you know, deeper R&B record. If there's more folk. And as meticulous as that sounds, it also was just a feeling thing. I was just missing elements that I think make up my favorite albums. I was missing this humanism. A lot of the music is kind of the opposite of what is trendy right now. So everyone's using, you know, massive amounts of reverb and distortion. You know, from the likes of mk.gee, Dijon, Frank, whatever. And a lot of this music, like the vocals here, it's unapologetically dry. A lot of the vocals, we didn't put anything on them – they’re very in your face and it's exploring that sense of like, how does it feel to be confident in our rhythm? I think it took a lot of confidence out of me to be willing to say, okay, we're going to screw all the gimmicks, let's just have it here, and I think that it is a strong enough song that people love it.

“El Dorado” was a catalyst moment. We wrote it so fast, but it felt like this lullaby almost. I always call it a celebration of guitars. That song is like six guitars, seven guitars that we layered and that's the entire track. I just needed that on this album. So it just took a minute. We wrote a lot of bad ones before we got a good one.

Well, I love that it came together like that. That's a dramatic almost movie like ending to something, right? You've hinted at sort of some of your process, including something I often do, which is having a concept or an idea before the narrative or the ending and the beginning and all that. Do you have a established process? Do you start with ideas, melody, or just an experience?

Always, always melody. I wish I was one of those people to like pre-meditate, right? But I just can't. One interesting thing I do, which is where a lot of these songs came from, is at the end of every writing session for the last 15 minutes we switch the vibe. So we completely like scrap everything, make a new project, new everything, just for 15 minutes. Let's see what we can get without thinking. And in those 15 minutes came “Never Want To Let You Go,” and those 15 minutes came “Wandering,” and those 15 minutes came my favorite moments in my music. I still haven't found why that works so well for me. It was something that I did once and the success rate of it has just been really high for me. So that's a tradition that I feel like I try to do with my personal sessions with friends. That 15 minutes is the best, sometimes. 

That’s awesome. I feel like you have a lot of understanding of history and lineage, and clearly this album was a little bit about that, right? Putting yourself in context and bookmarking a lot of influences? Do you go back to that kind of music while you're writing, or is it something where it's already in your head?

I have to go back. The thing is, I don't think we should disregard or discard blueprints. I think the blueprint of Ella Fitzgerald and Aretha are some of the most profound pieces of history we have in music, and so I study like a dog. I study, because although classic styles are represented in the music of today, you’ve gotta go back. Like a lot of people look at Frank Ocean for inspiration, right? And I love Frank. But Frank looks at people older than him for inspiration. So I'm like, I'd rather look at the people Frank looks at, then gain the same sort of creativity in my music versus, you know, looking at the outcomes.

You know, as an older millennial, I feel like, generationally, there was a shift there where understanding your forbearing, the precedence, the history was sort of expected, and maybe even in a snobbish elitist way was kind of a way of separation, right? You really appreciated what was the origin of some of these traditions. One of the things I like about Gen Z is that there's a certain sort of agnostic fearlessness, it's almost like they have no sense of time or history. And I think maybe the consumption is so different, just being able to tap into every generation of music, there's no, it's not linear in any way, right? You can just stumble into anything. Are you okay with that? If your audience doesn’t know all these references, know the history, is it okay that your music can just sort stand alone as something unique? And that to that one person doesn't have to be part of, in their mind, a larger collective?

I think that's the point, you know? That's the point of being an artist is we educate and we introduce to circles that aren't as familiar, you know? A lot of music is big in China and they don't really necessarily have the same references in the same history that I do. And so I think it's really beautiful that when we get a chance to be the first of that world that someone’s introduced to and then kind of do the studying back from us. But yeah, I think it's cool. At times, we as a generation erase things that don't need to be erased. I think the concept of respecting your elders and honoring your elders kind of goes a little bit over our heads. But for the most part, it's really cool being the first in a lot of people's eyes. I'm honored.

Okay, I love that. I’d also love to learn about you as an individual. What do you do to relax? I can tell painting might be in it a little bit. But if need to sort of ground yourself, if you hit a creative block, what do you do to relax?

Yeah, any medium that is art is like my bread and butter. I've tried to to do the whole not-art thing, it just doesn't work for me. So I stick to what I know. But there's other forms of art that are so abstract and so off-guard and so ridiculous to me that I am obsessed with. Like candle making is a thing that I started doing and that's so ridiculous, I love it. Going back to like something as simple as like macaroni art or like paper machete or things just feel different than making music but still involve art. 

I also want to mention that you're born in the South, because obviously that's an enigmatic place for a lot of people. I think people hear a lot about the South but very few people actually spend a lot of time there, especially Los Angeles and New York industry people.  So do you think that there's things people misunderstand about the South? 

I think people misunderstand a lot. I always say Nashville and LA are very different in a sense of how art is perceived, right? Nashville is a very intellectually profound city. So you don't really have the stylists and the people that express art physically, but you do have those that express art mentally. So you have the poets, the writers, the musicians, just a lot of the intellects are there and I think that's something that I kind of grew up with – this respect to the game. It's something that Nashville really values and it's kind of embedded in. Even in the South, there’s this respect to everyone's peace and comfort. It’s huge there and it's just very different than anywhere else, but I love it. My whole family is super southern, I'm born and raised in Nashville, but now I’m here in LA.

If you could invite a future listener of this record to anywhere in the world, where would be the best place to appreciate Sunset Black? 

Wow that's a great question. London, maybe. I love London. I have been out there a good bit and a lot of my favorite visual creators are from there – also in Paris and South Africa. But I think London has a very small community of R&B and a lot of this album is based upon European art, dating all the way back to old UK jazz. So, London fits. 

I love it. Bren Joy and London. It sounds like a good night. Last question, are there any artists you’re loving that you’d like to give some flowers to? Who should we be hip on?

Oh there’s so many. Royal Otis is great, man. There’s this artist named Chloe Keisha, I recently discovered her music and it’s banging. It's such a different way of writing than I do which I really really respect. I'm also a huge Ethan Gruska fan. He's just a beast – in my opinion one of the most prolific songwriters of our generation. From Indian Lakes is also one of my favorite bands. 

Those are all awesome. Thank you so much for your time and congrats on the album!

Thank you guys so much, appreciate it. 

THE SUNSET BLACK TOUR

3/17 — San Francisco, CA — Brick & Mortar

3/18 — Los Angeles, CA — The Roxy

3/25 — Atlanta, GA — Center Stage - Vinyl

3/26 — Nashville, TN — The Basement East

3/28 — Washington, D.C. — Union Stage

3/29 — Brooklyn, NY — Music Hall Of Williamsburg

3/30 — Cambridge, MA — The Sinclair

4/01 — Toronto, ON — Velvet Underground

4/03 — Chicago, IL — Lincoln Hall