We were lucky to catch up with Bart Bryars recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Bart, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
My most recent meaningful project has been publishing a memoir last summer. I say “recently” because over the years I’ve also written and produced several albums, musicals, an opera, videos, and illustrated a children’s book. But, writing a book is the most impactful project I’ve undertaken and accomplished lately.
My creative path pretty much began when a nun noticed I had a penchant for drawing when I was in elementary school. She gave me individual attention and taught me the basics and encouraged me to develop my artistic ability. She told me I was a special person with a special talent, and I believed her. Thereafter, in my early teens, I taught a children’s art class in exchange for formal lessons at an art school. Although I excelled in all the classic mediums (oils, acrylics, watercolors, charcoals, pen & ink, etc…), cartoons were my main concentration. I loved the “funny papers”, especially the Sunday in-color editions in the local newspapers.
Then my dad, a youth football and baseball coach, and the most non-musical person I’ve ever known, bought me a set of drums from a pawnshop one Christmas. He did so because he felt sorry for me. My big brother, Brent, had blown up in popularity for his outstanding sports achievements (football), while I toiled in mediocrity on the same team. I was 12 years old.
I taught myself how to play and quickly moved on to guitar, thinking it would allow me to show off my moves and would get girls better than being cooped up sitting behind a kit. This, against the backdrop of simultaneously discovering marijuana (it was the 70s), beer, and girls, led to me quitting my beloved sports altogether…football, baseball, boxing, etc…and art, too.
I had a rock-and-roll band all throughout high school called “Captain Schmedley & The Deadly Medley”, and we played at local rock clubs, skating rinks, keg parties, Mardi Gras parades, school assemblies, and basically anywhere that would have us. I was, of course, Captain Schmedley.
At that time, I had no real professional ambitions or realistic expectations regarding music. It wasn’t a bonafide, realistically attainable profession or pursuit growing up in a small city like Mobile, Alabama. I wrote a few locally well-received campfire comedy ditties, but after high school, our band dissolved and everyone went in their separate directions.
A few years later, in 1985, I was stationed at a lifeboat station in the U.S. Coast Guard on Lake Michigan. I was arrested for cocaine distribution (it was the 80s, and who wasn’t?), and posted a $75k bail. Six months later, and three days before my scheduled trial, I faked my death in an ice-fishing “accident” and went on the lam. I was re-apprehended four months later in backwoods Louisiana and subsequently spent seven years in prison.
It was there, after years of reflection and introspection, that I decided to be a musician. To be true to thine own self. To pursue music for real. Forever and ever. Amen.
So I developed my guitar playing and songwriting skills under the glare of very harsh critics…angry male convicts with nothing but time, popcorn, and Coca-colas on their hands looking to be entertained by my rag-tag prison band. It was a tough go in the beginning, but I eventually learned how to successfully tailor my style to the “Big-Three” (the blacks, browns, and whites).
Within a couple of years after my release, I had a band and have been making music ever since.
Ever since I became a free man upon release (1992), my friends had urged me to write down my crazy stories from those wild seven years.
During the Covid pandemic, I finally did. It’s a prison memoir titled, “The Rabbit In Me”. I wrote the whole book (327 pages, 85k+ words) in ten months and all on my cellphone. After all, a cellphone is essentially a “portable typewriter” these days. The memoir begins with my arrest and ends with me walking out of prison. Chronologically told.
I wrote it during my regular daytime routine…wake up, write a little while laying in bed…watching TV, write a little while laying on the couch…at work, write a little while waiting for customers to arrive. All those years of thinking, “I would if I had the time”, turned into, “Well, I do have the time now, because of Covid downtime, so now there’s really no excuse”. So I did it. And now I’m an author. So, even though I’ve written and recorded hundreds of songs, I would have to say that my most “meaningful project”, at least at the moment, is the writing of my my memoir/book.
Additionally, as I was nearing the end of the book writing, I was also wrapping up production of my Nashville band’s debut album. It’s a blues/jazz/rock/funk outfit, THE FEELS, that my wife sings in and I play guitar in. We’re both writers and producers on this project.
Lastly, I was also ready to release a “Nashville-inspired” solo EP that I had also written and produced, and played most of the instruments on.
In saw a coincidental date approaching, and took advantage of it…publishing/releasing all three (the memoir, band album, and solo EP) all on the same day. July 6, 2022. Which is the 30 year anniversary, to the day, that I walked out of prison after seven long years (July 6, 1992). It was quite a momentous occasion and carried obvious sentimental value for me.
It has been a long journey and a circuitous path, but I have done exactly what I decided in prison. I have spent my life as a musician.
I actually made a great living doing it for 15 years in an 80s cover-band, a college fraternity-sorority band that gigged on the SE United States college frat-house/nightclub circuit. Although we made a ton of money, playing over 1,000 shows, and our chops were thusly sharply honed, it ultimately proved artistically constricting and unfulfilling. The bands that make the most money on that circuit perform “note-for-note” renditions, which we did. The drawback to that is that there is no room for creativity or spontaneity. After playing “Jessie’s Girl” 1,000+ times (exactly note-for-note), my creative soul shrunk to the size of a peanut.
My wife, Jen, who wasn’t a singer/musician when we first started dating, had by then joined the band for it’s last few years. And one day, she told me, “If I have to sing Come On Eileen one more time, I’m going to kill myself”. Basically, it was time for both of us to move on from that life.
She had spent her whole life in Atlanta, and picked New York City for us to move to. So we did. We haven’t played cover songs since.
In NYC for 10 years (the West and East Village), we had two bands. A rock band called Sunday Night Social, and a funk band called Sugar Beat, of which each made an album. I also wrote two musicals and the libretto to an opera while there.
Fast-forward to now.
The publication of my prison memoir, the release of my Nashville band’s debut album, the release of my solo EP, the publication of the libretto (Book & Lyrics) to my prison musical, and the re-publication of my mother’s children’s book which I illustrated is sort of everything wrapped into one.
I did a press tour after the publications/releases, which included magazine and newspaper articles, and tv interviews and book signings, which can all be accessed on my website, “bartbryars.com”, as well as links to music videos, old band albums, and musicals, etc…
If you would like signed copies or personalized copies of the books and/or albums, shoot me a message through my website and I’ll make it happen. The books are on Amazon and the music is on all digital download and streaming platforms (250+), like Spotify, Pandora, iTunes, Google Music, etc…and available on my website for SoundCloud free listening and download (bartbryars.com).
Cheers!
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I am Bart Bryars and I grew up in Mobile. Alabama. I am a musician, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer, author, illustrator, playwright, and librettist. I was a creative kid that naturally gravitated to all things artistic. Art, music, and theater. Even poetry. Love me some word-play. What sets me apart from most creatives is that I was a jock, as well. My dad was a legendary youth city and parochial league football coach in my hometown, who I ecstatically played for. I also excelled in baseball and made the All-Star team on the reg. Lastly, I was also trained in the local Optimist Club boxing league.
But I was always struck by the creative arts bug. I was fascinated by it. I couldn’t help myself. All I wanted to do was create, with drawings and paintings and music and words. It challenged me, interested me, and made me happy and fulfilled.
I have lived my life accordingly. I write songs. I make albums, band and solo. I illustrate children’s books. I write musicals and an opera. I continue to challenge myself as a creative, even at my age (61).
Several friends have asked me, “Hey, Bart. Why do you still continue to chase that dream at your age? You’ve never hit the big-time, and probably never will. So, why do you keep wasting your time?”
I can only answer, “Because I can’t NOT do it”. It’s what I do. It’s who I am. It’s what makes me happy. It’s what makes me feel good about life on this earth. Jen and I mutually decided against having children, so there’s no familial legacy to leave behind. Hopefully, my art and literature and our music will transcend.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
Much earlier in my journey (mid-twenties) I faced a lot of difficulties, mostly self-inflicted. Not just from distributing cocaine in the 80s (I mean, who wasn’t?), but from faking my death in an ice-fishing “accident” three days before my scheduled trial and going on the lam. The circumstances resulting from that irrational behavior meant one of two things. Either you continue down that self-destructive road or you rise above it.
Four months later I was re-apprehended in backwoods Louisiana and then spent seven years in prison.
It was a “tough” lesson to learn, but I found a way to rise above it all and create a lifetime of happiness and joy through a commitment to making music. My resilience wasn’t a quick recovery, it happened over several years of incarceration, but it’s been a persistent one.
Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?
Growing up in Mobile, Alabama, I was raised to think that it’s an unrealistic pursuit for people from small towns to think they can have a full life as a musician, a songwriter, a playwright, an author, an illustrator or artist. All of which I’ve done.
While in prison under the harshest of conditions, I had to convince myself that my dream was attainable. I began to obsess about the idea of being a musician. A performer and bandleader. A maker of songs. A songwriter. An instrumentalist. A engineer and mixer and producer. A recording artist.
When I was released, I had a few fitful musical starts while living in the French Quarter, before a tragedy put me on my current path.
Post-New Orleans, while living on a houseboat in Perdido Key in 1995, a hurricane sank it. I took the FEMA and Red Cross money and went to Nashville and made my first album (Dogs & Cats).
I moved to Atlanta because four guys in an existing band agreed to back me and my new album up. And it was during Olympics and gigs were uber-plentiful.
I had to teach myself that I could do it, and basically unlearn being taught that I couldn’t.
That’s also where and when I met my beautiful, smart, and talented wife, Jen. We’ve now been together 26 years. She was a teenager when we started out, but she has been my teacher since day one.
She has taught me all I know about love, kindness, patience, wisdom, strength, knowledge, and above all…humor. Lots and lots of laughter.
My rock. My soul. My love.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.bartbryars.com
- Instagram: @bartbryars
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bart.bryars
- Twitter: @bartbryars.com
- Youtube: https://youtu.be/uuXVTXgZ0Ck *(video from most recent band album)
- Other: Recent Television Interviews FOX10, Mobile, AL https://www.fox10tv.com/2022/08/12/author-bart-bryars-book-signing-rabbit-me/ NBC4, Nashville, TN https://www.wsmv.com/video/2022/09/26/rabbit-me-nashville-author-new-memoir-details-time-prison/