Ones2Watch Home

Photos by Emily Krisky

One of the most exciting things that can happen to a dedicated listener is finding an artist early on and watching them gain the resources to bring their elaborate ideas to life. Making dark side of the sun had indie-rock artist brookelen creating in different ways; recording with a live band, shooting stunning visuals with her talented friends, and expanding upon themes that allowed her to face hard truths head on. The process was freeing in many ways, resulting in six tracks that draw inspiration from shoegaze to hard rock, while priming brookelen creatively as she steps into the debut album phase of her life. We caught up with the prolific singer, songwriter, violinist, guitarist, bassist and now creative director about the eye-opening journey of dark side of the sun: 

OnesToWatch: I absolutely love dark side of the sun, which is the perfect October listen. What have you learned in the two years since releasing your last project, Time to Go?

brookelen: I recorded dark side of the sun live with my band. Until then, I've been working with producers or self-producing, bringing my music to the finish line with one other person. This time, the sound is not only different and louder, but captures a moment of my life that had a bit more intensity. It was excavating the internal, personal things I was exploring. That's why it's called dark side of the sun, because it's the underbelly of something beautiful that shines very brightly. Recording the music live with my band was just such a new jump for me, and something I really enjoyed. 

What’s changed about your process?

I enjoyed that we had to be extremely prepared when we went into the studio. I got to be a lot more involved with how I wanted everything to sound because we could only afford two days in the recording studio. The vocal training had to be way better. We had to do all six songs in one day, which I will not be doing again...[Laughs] but it was fun. The preparation was different. I started recording my debut album last week.

Congratulations!

Thank you. I learned a lot from recording live for this EP and I now feel more seasoned in a recording studio. The ability to not waste time and be intentional in every moment is so important. I mean, I've had sessions in the past where I pop in, we don't know what we're writing and sometimes nothing happens. But the intention and preparation for recording these songs live, it was like preparing for a show. I really like that the songs sound exactly how they would sound live. 

I always talk about how much I love imperfections in music, so it’s cool that you captured the realness of live music. 

That's what I wanted before the major album [process], to just do something raw and something that a lot of artists I look up to have done, like The Riot Grrrl movement in the 90’s. It was really fun.

What influenced the sound of dark side of the sun?

I grew up an orchestra kid, so the strings and epic sound is something I've always gone for. The first CD I ever owned was Celine Dion. I was listening to so much Fiona Apple, and although I don't think we're in the same sonic space, I’m really inspired by her honest, self-reflecting lyrics. I've definitely attempted it in previous music and recordings, but this was me fully reckoning with myself and saying things out loud. It definitely took courage to write, but it definitely prepped me for the album process. 

It’s perfect timing to release this to the world and hone in on your debut album.

I really wanted it out this year and I also felt like it was like a fall record. I'm exploring themes like angels and demons, which works well during spooky season.

Have you always been drawn to those themes?

Definitely. I grew up in a very religious family from Jackson, Mississippi. When my parents divorced, I started to come into my own ideas and questions about the Christian faith. It was confusing, seeing my devoutly Christian parents get divorced after being taught that divorce was this giant thing. 

I was on a plane back from home to LA and I watched the film Constantine, which I hadn't seen in a while. While watching it, I just saw my band members as the individual cast members. The film has this quote about how people walk around on earth as half angels and half demons, which get glimpses of, but Constantine sees the whole thing. It was exciting to connect that to a song I wrote about an exorcism metaphor. I also wrote “shadow” about the story of Icarus. It’s a song about ego death, but the themes remove it a little from myself. 

Those stories and themes have been around for so long and it’s crazy that people can still relate. Like, The Odyssey.

It’s interesting to bring it up in a modern context. What themes still ring true?

I love the concept of turning the darkness into something light, which I heard a lot in “shadow.” The instrumental is so stunning. What was the process of that song?

Thank you. I’m really happy with the guitar parts that were written. This is the first time that my cellist composed the string arrangements for the EP. I play violin, and typically what I’ve done in the past is just kind of freestyle and don’t arrange it specifically. This time, I was really focused on the songwriting and guitar, and he basically came up with a score. There were two violin parts and a cello, then we overdubbed strings. We recorded everything live in the studio in 2 days and the next week, my friend Elisa, who’s a phenomenal vocalist and violinist, came in and played with us. I love artists like Björk that have dramatic string moments. I really want my music to be seen in an orchestral rock space. 

What other instruments do you play? 

Violin is my first instrument. Then I picked up guitar when I was in 8th grade. I had no idea how to play, but since I had a classical violinist background, the theory helped me pick up guitar and bass.

The visuals for this album are so stunning. What’s your process for creating visuals?

It started with capturing the cover. I knew that would be a good start to building the stories and the visuals from that. I've been working with my friend Emily Krisky, she took all of the photos for the rollout. There were a lot of intimate moments where we would hang out and just capture things that weren't super contrived, but very organic. I have this tattoo on my neck, which was one of my first tattoos because my mom was not into tattoos and I can hide it. Which ties into the idea that the sun is in one of the darker places on my body because my hair always covers it. The cover of the record is my neck with the sun tattoo, it’s red and black to represent that darkness. We built the world off that. 

I like bringing literal ideas into the visuals. When I wrote an exorcism song, I wanted to play with the visual of having an exorcism done to myself, but I didn't think it was feasible. I am lucky to have a lot of creative director friends that had been wanting to work with me for a while and I finally got to the point where I was like, I want to do this. I want to jump in. Like I said, I had this digital download when I was watching Constantine on the plane ride and I hit up a director friend and was like, “I have this concept. I don't have a lot of money. What do you think?” They took it and ran with it, and even wanted to add their own story to it. Then with “shadow,” I wanted it to be the contrasting video. 

That was the visual plan the whole time, just those two videos. Then, I ended up signing a small record deal and the label suggested we do another video. I was like, “I have plenty of ideas!” I was introduced to a now dear friend Jessica, who was in this band called Jack Off Jill and has this insanely beautiful black tower that she let us shoot in. The floors and walls are painted red and it was so perfect to match the visual story. 

I can tell these ideas have been inside of you for so long. It’s a beautiful thing when you have the opportunity to actually make the things in your head come to life.

Yeah! If someone gives me a bone, I will take it and build something. That was my favorite onset experience because it was organic and last minute. This whole cycle has made me remember how exciting it is to be on set, exhilarating but exhausting. I was able to elevate my visuals because I have awesome directors and DPs in my life that were like, “We’ll work with what you got.” I learned so much. I think moving forward, I want to be more involved in the directing.

What was the tracklisting process?

I wanted it to feel exactly like the dark side of the sun, with moments of brightness and darkness. I think the strings tell the story. The first thing I think of is the very intentional last track, which is called “skeptic”. For most of the track it's just me playing guitar and singing, then at the end it creeps and builds into this catastrophe. The song is another analogy about the big bad wolf, about somebody coming in and just wiping out a family or a life. Some of that is reckoning with my feelings about relationships and family dynamics. It’s about how hard it is to not connect with a parent, but then to see a lot of yourself in them, how hard that is to confront. 

It seems like a lot of these lyrics were addressing things in your life, maybe to free yourself from them.

“omen” is, a really great way to open the EP. It’s like a warning, a crow that comes and sits on the ledge and wakes you up. It’s saying “start recognizing the signs and the things happening in your life.” Then it goes straight into “enemy”, which is a song about feeling like you're fighting against yourself. A lot of that has to do with my exploration and questions about gender identity, queerness, and autonomy in general. Then it goes into one of the more beautiful songs on the tracklist, which is “undo”. That one represents wanting to reverse something that happened, but acknowledging that it’s ultimately a part of you. It’s my version of a love song, not being able to imagine someone that's in your life now with a past version of yourself. I wanted to place “hide” right in the middle, because it's about not hiding and it’s a guttural track. When I listen to it now, I'm like, there was some sort of possession going on. [Laugh]

What was your process for singing like that?

I definitely had to just learn how to do it. I watched a lot of YouTube videos.

I was gonna say! Slayyyter also learned how to scream on YouTube.

I did vocal lessons last year, for the first time in my life. It was so emotional to learn that. It felt like therapy. I definitely have been doing a lot of vocal training, but I also smoke cigarettes. [Laughs] Courtney Love is definitely inspiring to me. She has an incredible range. That’s something I want to consider moving forward, having someone teach me proper technique. 

Who are your OnesToWatch?

I would say girl jockey. Also Adriana McCassin. I'm recording my record with Ryan Pauly, who made her debut album called See It Fades. I'm really inspired by the women around me. LA is just brimming over with so many incredible musicians. 

Listen to dark side of the sun below: