|
 There’s
a fascinating back-story to the career of New York songstress, Nell
Bryden. After ‘burning the candle at both ends’ with a self-financed
tour across the states, the well-travelled singer returned home to stay
with her dad, where she stumbled across a painting that would
effectively change her life. Hidden away in a box in her dad’s studio,
Nell took the painting to auction and walked away with a cool three
hundred grand.
Using the cash to get her fledgling career on track, Nell recently
embarked on a tour across Europe, were she knocked up support slots with
LINC favourites, Counting Crows.
Returning to these shores in October in support of new album, Second
Time Around, Nell took some time to chat with The LINC’s Chris
Skoyles about her past, present and future.
What first drew you to the world of music?
I’ve been around music my whole life. My mom was a singer so I used to
go out with her quite a lot. I was talking to her the other day about
how I took my first bow when I was something like three years-old.
Both my parents worked in creative fields, as well my mom’s singing, my
dad was a painter, so I was always encouraged to be creative and pursue
those avenues.
So your parents were pretty supportive of your decision to get into
music?
Yeah for sure. I’m really lucky; not only that they’re so supportive of
what I want to do, because it can be hard enough already out there if
you don’t have anybody supporting you, but also, because they’ve both
made a living in the arts, so they understand where I’m coming from and
that’s really useful.
You’ve been out on the road across Europe earlier this year, but
we’re told that your first touring experience was something of a
self-financed jaunt across the States. That sounds like a pretty brave
move…
Yeah, well. I mean, it was that same ‘wonder lust’ which took me
travelling to Australia in the first place that got me out on the road.
I really love travelling and seeing all these parts of the world. It’s
the best way to get inspiration for songs. There’s only so much you can
tap into in your own life before you end up with all these ‘diary entry’
songs like ‘oh my god, my boyfriend is this and that…’ I find those
songs really boring and I don’t want to hear songs like that.
It’s really, really hard to make a profit when you’re out on tour like
that, so my answer was to always keep my overheads low; it was just me
and my guitar, I’d travel as cheaply as possible, sleep on people’s
couches, and just spend as little money as possible.
Any money I made from CD sales was just enough to carry me through, but
you get to a point where you can’t ever come out ahead because you’re
always just trying to get back to zero.
I did something like 350 shows in two years, just really out there
burning the candle at both ends.
So you came back home. Would this be the same time you discovered the
$300,000 painting?
Yeah. When I first came back off the road I worked as a waitress and did
a few other things, but it was just completely transparent that I didn’t
care.
I realised that in order to really make something happen I’d need to
have some sort of capital to get out there and do all the things that a
record label would normally do.
I’d moved back to New York and I was living with my Father and I was
looking around, trying to work out what the next step would be when I
happened upon this cardboard box that was hidden away at my Dad’s place.
For some reason, I still don’t know why, I decided to open it up and
there was this painting that wasn’t one of my fathers.
It turns out that my step mother had gotten it for me like twenty years
ago, but my dad didn’t want any work on the walls that wasn’t his. So it
had just been put in a box was forgotten about.
Before then, all I could think of was ‘what am I going to do [to get
back out there] and then I found this and it was like ‘oh my god,
perfect timing’. I took it out to see what it was worth and sold it
auction earlier this year.
 You
must have been over the moon?
I was, it was like one of those miracles that just drops from the sky.
What’s so cool about it is that it’s not dirty money. When you get money
from a record label or from a corporation or from any sort of investor,
it always comes with strings attached.
Artists have always had patrons, they always support what your doing and
help you get out there, but that always comes with a lot of baggage, but
here was this thing just dropping out of the sky [to me] and it afforded
me the chance to take this to the next step.
I was able to do what I was doing on a much broader scale, I was able to
bring my band over to Europe to be able to have people working for me
and stuff, which is what I really wanted, but it was so innocent and
pure because it just came from a painting sitting in an attic. It was
perfect.
Obviously you’re a pretty well travelled gal’. Is there anywhere you
haven’t been to you that you’d like to visit?
I was just talking to my manager about going to Iraq to play for the
troops in late October. I mean obviously I can’t be even remotely
political over there, but it does just seem like the opportunity of a
lifetime.
Talk about wanting to travel, when is an American citizen every going to
see Iraq otherwise? It doesn’t like it’s going to be possible in the
next ten years, and that’s a part of the world I’ve always wanted to
see.
I’d love to go back to Australia and play shows, because that’s where I
started writing my songs. That’s a territory I’d really love to go to.
After spending so much time on the road, do you ever feel restless
once you’re back home?
I don’t know; as much as I really like being on the road I really like
being home and being in my apartment too. I’ve lived alone since I was
seventeen so I can go for several days without talking to anyone, just
doing my own thing and not having to answer to anybody.
My love affair with New York is like one of the longest relationships in
my life has lasted longer than any other relationship, and I just feel
that every time I land in JFK and I see the New York sky, it makes my
heart race.
Having said that, it’s never been clearer to me that this is what I want
to do with my life and having the opportunity now, and with the painting
and my band being able to come out and do shows with me and things kind
of happening, I just don’t want it to stop.
It feels like a dream, like if I stop the dream will stop too.
Any advice you’d give to aspiring young musicians?
I’ve sort of thought a lot about this because there are lots of people
who’ve given me advice, and I think the number one thing is that there
is no perfect or orthodox way to do this, and anyone who tells you that
there is, is lying.
Every single person who has made it has made it in a different way.
There are a few things that you can do that are in line with other
people, such as touring. If you play night after night, your technique
will get better and the way to perform when it counts.
I had this moment a couple of years ago where I just sat thinking that I
had to go out there and tour. So I just started e-mailing people and
getting random gigs like in Ireland and places like that. It just worked
out and things started happening.
Was it easy just going out there and booking your own shows?
It was surprising that it was just as easy as it was, because a lot of
times you have it in your head that ‘oh, to do this I need a booking
agent I need a manager and a record label’
No you don’t, you don’t need any of that, you just need to decide to do
it. I think more than ever now that’s possible because you can reach
anyone through the net and there’s all these social networking sites and
people are generally receptive…
So if you have all those options to reach people out there, all that’s
required is to actually do it.
There’s a Woody Allen quote where he says “80% of success is just
showing up,” and I think that’s true.
Even the people who’ve done it and are very successful at it, they know
it’s a game of trial and error. You just go out there and figure out the
solutions along the way.
Recommended links:
www.nellbryden.com
www.myspace.com/nellbryden
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