"Time" Video Premiere & Interview with Songwriter Brenna Manzare

               From the opening shot of "Time" (Dir. Michael Hogan) Brenna Manzare crafts what feels and functions like a gorgeous musical short film about family, sense of place, the memories that accrue to the spaces we have passed through and perhaps left behind, how every encountered shape, sound and color of our lives informs us then and now, as if "we're alive in two dimensions" as Manzare sings. As if, in the taking, time also gives something back. It is a rich, multi-layered song, and where Manzare's strengths come to bear most are in her poetic approach to song structure, to lyricism and the depth, the utter aliveness of the picture being painted. Through a single track it feels as if a whole universe has been constructed. A photo album of memories lost and reclaimed. Although Manzare has yet to record a full length album, there can be no doubt, as "Time" itself is proof of, that when she does it will be an album to be reckoned with. After all, the most worthwhile labors, well, they take time. "The most important lesson I’ve learned" says Brenna, "is that you have to surrender yourself to the unpredictability of creating." But, when it does come, the songs that it leaves us are proof that both the surrender and the waiting were well worth it.


AHC: What has this journey in music, so far, been like for you, the highs and the lows, and what life lessons do you feel you've picked up along the way? 
 
Brenna: My creative muse is like a sweet but skittish cat hiding under my house. Sometimes I’m able to coax her out with treats and she lets me pet her, but other times she just hisses and crawls deeper into the darkness. I’ve been writing songs for the better part of a decade and I’ve grappled with a lot of self-doubt. Often times I’ve had to just push forward and accept that everything isn’t going to be perfect.
 
The most important lesson I’ve learned is that you have to surrender yourself to the unpredictability of creating. Music writes itself whenever you’re doing other things. I tend to find melodies in moments when my mind isn’t paying attention – while I’m driving, showering, folding the laundry. I think in a way, all of life is like that. We spend so much time mapping out how we want things to go, but reality always has other plans.

AHC: What first drew you to music and what was your early musical environment like growing up? Were there pivotal songs for you then that just floored you the moment you heard them?
 
Brenna: I always sang as a child, probably before I even started using words to communicate, I sang. When I was in elementary school, I had a friend who played the piano and I was just drawn to that. I asked my mom to sign me up for lessons, which she did. I started out on a casio keyboard, then later my dad bought me an upright piano. My piano teacher taught me how to read music and keep time and all the basics of music theory. Then later in middle school I joined choir. Both of those things gave me a good base from which to operate, but I wouldn’t say I really got into music until later.
 
I took dance lessons growing up as well, and I participated in a lot of talent shows. The first talent show I did in high school turned me on to the very active punk rock/garage band scene at my school. We had a pretty huge music scene with a lot of different bands and musical genres. There were these two brothers, Casey and Colin Colby, who both played in bands. Since we were all under 18 and couldn’t really play in bars, their parents would rent out the clubhouse in their neighborhood on weekend nights so that bands could play shows. This was in the late 90s/early 2000’s, so on Friday at school we’d get these handmade Xeroxed flyers for the clubhouse shows. A few bands would play and then afterward a few musicians would just jam, and it would turn into a huge dance party.
 
There was another songwriter named Joey Kendall who would host open mic nights at the local coffee shop. There was always a band playing at whatever house party was happening, and our school had a lot of battles of the bands. Suddenly I was surrounded by all these kids listening to and playing and writing music and it was like somebody turned the lights on for me. Music became a scene - something I could be viscerally involved in, as opposed to just something other people did that I could listen to on the radio or pay a bunch of money to go see at a big stadium.

I picked up the guitar during that time and started slowly teaching myself to play. It would be a few more years before I would start actually writing songs, but that environment and those people are I think what really lit the fire for music inside me.
 
I remember hearing Radiohead for the first time. A friend loaned me ‘Amnesiac’ and I was listening to it late at night in a hotel room on a school trip. Everyone else was asleep and I remember getting kind of freaked out, laying there in the dark thinking it sounded like aliens were talking to me in my headphones. It blew me away. I’d never heard anything like it before. I think I’d just been listening to whatever was on Top 40 radio at the time. To this day it’s still one of my favorite albums.

AHC: Do you remember the first song that you ever wrote or played? Or that first moment when you picked up a pen and realized that you could create whole worlds just by putting it to paper? 
 
Brenna: I was in college. I lived alone at the time and I’d bought a cheap stand-up bass and was teaching myself to play. I was painting my apartment walls back to the standard white before I moved out the next day, and I started humming a melody. I put down the paint brush and picked up the bass and dove in. It just sort of happened. It’s amazing what you can create whenever you’re supposed to be working on something else. I was elated and didn’t sleep the rest of the night. It felt like I’d discovered I had a super power.

AHC: Which musicians have you learned the most from? Or writers, artists, filmmakers, teachers/mentors etc? What are the works you could not possibly live without?
 
Brenna: I played with a band for awhile whenever I was living in Fort Worth and I felt like that community really took me in and mentored me in a big way. My band-mates, Adrian Hulet, Jed Barnett, and Seth Brewton had been playing and touring for years. They lent a lot of wisdom and were patient with me while I was sort of learning to be a bandleader. Chris Johnson (who produced “Time”) had been playing with his band Telegraph Canyon for several years when we met. He taught me about the writing process, introduced me to Matt Pence and got me into the Echo Lab to record with him, rounded up band mates to flesh out recordings, advised me against things like wearing shorts and sandals on stage. He helped me level up in a lot of ways.
 
I don’t think I could live without most of Tom Waits’ back catalog. I’m a huge fan. I like how diverse he can be with his sound. He’s got all of these different voices and points of view that he writes from. Of course I’ve already mentioned Radiohead. Crosby, Stills & Nash’s ‘4 Way Street’ (I am a sucker for four-part harmonies), and Neil Young’s ‘Harvest,’ Elliott Smith’s “XO,” Bon Iver’s “For Emma, Forever Ago,” Sufjan Stevens, “Illinois,” Iron & Wine “The Shephard’s Dog,” Outkast’s “Aquemini,” Dr. Dre’s “The Chronic 2001.”

AHC: What do you think makes for a good song, as you're writing and composing, is there a sudden moment when you know you've found the right mix, that perfect angle of light, so to speak? 
 
Brenna: Probably not. I could literally rearrange things forever. I work on it until I turn into a complete jerk to the people closest to me, and eventually I decide I can’t let this thing take hold of me like this anymore. Then I give up and that’s where it ends. It’s a terrible process. I’m trying to learn to be more intuitive about it. Somehow it’s always like birth for me though. Fraught and painful until finally I just pass out and hopefully the baby made it.

AHC: Do you consider music to be a type of healing art, a slightly imperfect vehicle through which to translate a feeling, states of rupture/rapture, hope lost and regained? Does the writing and creating of the song save you in the kinds of ways that it saves us, the listener?
 
Brenna: It’s easiest for me to write whenever I’m a little sad and need a distraction. Someone has passed away. I’m heartbroken but starting to heal. It is a way of processing emotions and closing a chapter in that way.

​I think songs can mean different things for the listener and the writer. The song has it’s own life that I don’t entirely get to dictate. You’re really just channeling. It comes out however it wants to come out.
 
It definitely saves me. Creating things that didn’t exist before out of nothing. That’s powerful. You have to be able to trust yourself enough to call something into existence and then also get out of the way and let it be what it wants to be.
 
Even beyond writing, just singing and playing music has saved me. In this super logical culture we live in, music isn’t viewed as a commodity. There’s no practical reason to make music. We do it because we feel it. It makes us feel things. It’s one of the few ways humans can make magic in the modern world.

AHC: What are your fondest musical memories? In your house? In your neighborhood or town? On-tour, on-the-road?
 
Brenna: Some of the most memorable moments are when you’ve got a bunch of people gathered around quietly listening to people playing acoustic with no amplification. There is a kind of strange magic with that level of focused attention. The line starts to blur between player and listener and it can be a really powerful, shared experience.
 
And then of course there are those times when it’s late and everyone’s had too much to drink and people just break out into loud, mostly tone-deaf singing together. Those are like the yin and yang of my favorite musical moments.
 
AHC: When you set out to write a song, how much does 'where the world is' in its current moment, culturally, politically, otherwise, influence the kinds of stories you set out to tell?
 
Brenna: I can’t say I pay too much mind to what state the world is in when it comes to songwriting. Although lately it is politically and culturally uncomfortable enough as to drive me to write more. What else do I do with all of this pent up aggression and sadness I take on while watching the news? You have to make lemons from the lemonade. 

AHC: Do you have any words of advice or encouragement for other musicians and singer-songwriters out there who are just starting out and trying to find their voice and their way in this world? What are the kinds of things that you tell yourself when you begin to have doubts or are struggling with the creative process? Or what kinds of things have others told you that have helped push you past moments of self doubt/creative blocks?
 
Brenna: Everybody has an inner critic that lives in their head. The closer you get to accomplishing your dreams, however small they are, the louder that critic’s voice gets. That is actually one way to be certain you’re on to something. The voice starts shouting. Don’t listen to the voice. When the voice tells you that you can’t write songs, write bad songs intentionally, just to mock the voice.
 
And while we’re on the subject, whenever people try to compliment you by suggesting you audition for ‘The Voice,’ just thank them enthusiastically and find a way to cleverly redirect the conversation without them noticing.
 
AHC: Do you have any new projects you'd like to tell people about?
 
Brenna: I just released a single called “Time,” which I recorded with a full band. You can check that out on my website www.brennamanzare.com, and the song is also up on Spotify, iTunes, bandcamp, etc. I’ve also got a second single coming out in the next few months as well, and I’m going to be playing some shows in and around Austin pretty soon. You can find me on Facebook under “Brenna Manzare Music” if you want to keep up with what’s happening!
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