Drew Danburry: The King of Breakfast Foods’ Independent Quest For Balance
By Dean “Hash Brown Lap Dance” Bonzani
6.26.05
When independent filmmaker and singer/songwriter Drew Danburry isn’t onstage leading sing alongs or answering emails for eight hours at a stretch, he loves to whip up a big batch of peanut butter and banana pancakes for his many friends.
“I’m the King of Breakfast Foods,” he declares.
Originally from Huntington Beach, California, Danburry attends Brigham Young University’s film program, where fellow art types know him as Drew Barlow. Fans who pick up his Fiona Apple-esquely titled sophomore album release, “Besides: Are We Just Playing Around Here, Or Do We Mean What We Say?” and play it on a computer will find a secret music video that Danburry self-made on the disc.
They’ll also find a solid collection of thoughtfully wrought tunes whose honesty and forthrightness defies commercial convention, and whose intelligent language and quirky arrangements provide relief from the dumbed-down fare so common on the Clear airwaves. To Danburry, what’s important is being real, and challenging his listeners not to accept things at a surface level.
“I think that, as an independent artist, that’s something that people want. I think that people want intelligent art. Not to say that pop culture isn’t intelligent, because obviously they push their numbers amazingly. But at the same time, I think that if people had easier access to a more in-depth kind of music, rather than ‘Baby, Bye, Bye, Bye’ or ‘Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine,’ they’d eat it up.”
When told that his singing bears a strong resemblence to Stephen Malkmus’, Danburry replies, “I love when people give me that comparison, rather than Bright Eyes or Elliot Smith. I never really listened to Pavement, but they seem like a really independent band that hasn’t caught on on a big scale, but people like them a lot. Anybody who knows Pavement— ‘Oh, he sounds like Pavement!’— they freak out, and they’re really into it. But with Bright Eyes it’s like, (in a disaffected goth/emo voice) ‘…oh, yeah…cool…’ “
Known for the exuberance and positive energy of his live shows, Danburry’s lyrics are poetic nutcrackers, forcing the meat of human interrelational tensions out into the healing light of day, and offering beautifully phrased observations of how bright life can be if we’d only allow it.
“I made this album hoping that people would learn and grow from it. I know that’s an idealistic way of looking at it. All the songs are the same, in one sense. On a very personal, grounded level, every song is about taking on responsibility. That’s the whole theme of the entire album. We have a tendency as human beings to internalize everything, then point it out as everyone else’s fault and never take responsibility for anything. It’s a really fine line between being the abused and the abuser, and being fair. Finding that balance is, I think, a quest everyone should have, and I don’t think people try hard enough.”
Living perpetually, intentionally on the brink of financial disaster, Danburry draws on a well of confidence and faith to keep pursuing his artistic visions, and hold to his “small is better” do-it-yourself ethic. The making of his latest CD was a skin-of-the-teeth experience.
“It was pretty hectic and pretty crazy, because I had a CD release date and I was trying to find someone to mix it. Typically for me, I had one of those experiences where everything is going wrong, but you know everything’s going to work out. And it works out last minute, super down-to-the-wire. I lost a few songs while I was taking it into mixing. They just disappeared. All of it was (made) on computers in these little beat up rooms. I took it to the people who pressed and printed it— give it to them with a week and a half to do 1,000 copies, and they got it done by the afternoon of the show. Then I left right on tour with $1,000 of debt. I made $4,000 on tour, and I was getting out of debt, but when I came home there were all these magazine ad payments and school payments and all this stuff. So, I’m $8,000 in debt again, with no room to spare. So the goal this tour is to get out of debt. It always works out.”
Danburry tours and lives cheaply, in his car, so that he can slightly afford to get his music out, but he wouldn’t dream of giving up his independent status.
“Every musician should have the goal to be an artist, and not get bought up. Once you aren’t pushing the numbers that they want you to push, then they have the power to change you. They own you. I never want that.”
The hardships of the artist’s life don’t dull Danburry’s enthusiasm or dim his hopes.
“Everything has a happy ending. It just matters when your ending is. A lot of people give up before they ever get to the end.”
________________________________________________________________________
Drew Danburry, Thursday, July 7 th at 6:30 P.M., Macy’s European Coffeehouse.
More at: www.drewdanburry.com
©2005 by Dean Bonzani. All Rights Reserved.