We recently connected with Brandon Weinert and have shared our conversation below.

Brandon, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

The first time I recognized I wanted to play music professionally was relatively recently, a few years ago even. I was playing a local festival with a friend. Our first show together. A small pop up stage, and the maiden voyage of this little festival. Only a few songs, maybe a thirty minute set, but we practiced like it was the most important gig of our lives. The adrenaline, the sweat, the pain of the songs we wrote, they joy that lingered behind. How else could I describe such a sublime moment in time. I remember this little boy couldn’t have been more than four or five walking up and putting a dollar in our tip jar, afterwards he and his mother came to my friend and I and said you were really great! Even though the boy was shy, hiding behind his mother, you could see the excitement we brought him that September afternoon. Just that little complement was all it took and I was hooked. The sheer joy that came just to be able to get through to that child. Even though Ive played since I was a teenager this moment really hit me. All the work was paying off to something special, something beautiful, something precious. I don’t know that I would trade that experience for anything. I hope everyone gets to experience something so beautiful. I’m so grateful for that opportunity, and the group that puts that event together.

Knowing that I can make such an impact on so many people is what drives me to strive to be better each day. The willingness to give back what has so freely been given to me. A talent that is so often taken for granted, and a dream that I can help people heal, and grow with my music makes me want to be better daily.

I use music as an outlet to allow my soul to speak. To really express myself. I allow myself to speak to others and help them express their pain, their joy, their happiness. To reach to a loved one that’s been lost in time, or to remember a moment as a child. Music is funny like that, it can bring out the best in people that’s how I know I want to do this for the rest of my life.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I got into playing music when I was really young, thirteen or so. I bought a guitar from a local pawn shop. How typical right? first song I learned was smoke on the water, of course…. the guy who sold us the guitar was this shaggy haired twenty something who I was just amazed by. And the fella could play, and for those of you with a little more experience in the music field… he had “chops”. I played for a few months and eventually I put the guitar down. I wasn’t making any progress, I didn’t know what to do. No Direction, but I knew I wanted to. It ended up going into the closet, and collecting dust like all unappreciated toys eventually do. A few years roll by and a meet a couple kids who live down the street from me. I actually got into a fight on my first day in this new school with one of these kids. After that we were great friends, us and three others started a punk rock band, taking influences from Alkaline Trio, Rancid, The Ramones, Blink 182, you name it, if it was punk, we loved it. We loved the rebellion of it all. We loved the outfits, even some bands like Good Charlotte. They had catchy tunes, couldn’t hate on that (and all the girls loved them). The first show we ever played we played in the run down little hall (every band in town did that at the time). This hall was very small. You could fit fifty kids max in this place. We played every single song as a cover, but we didn’t care. It was what inspired us. It was what we loved. And they loved us, every person sand every one of the songs that night in that room. we played for fifty kids, and they sang for us. they sang with us.

We eventually went our separate ways, growing differences, drug use, kids. We still talk from time to time, each of us. But we still remember that band. We still talk about the good old days when things were simpler. I actually quit music because I got pretty heavy into drugs. I had to get out, I had to find something else but nothing worked, nothing else helped I fell deeper into my addictions. about two months before I finally quit using, I actually picked up my guitar, first time in years. It didn’t help, not at first, but I stuck with it. Eventually after going to treatment I was able to take my guitar with me. I could learn to love to play again, I could learn to be human again. Music was saving me, it was helping me express who I truly was to the world. I wrote my first song in years while I was there. I wrote it about a guy I was in treatment with, he had a really hard life, cartels, death, addiction. but my song, the song I wrote for him made him cry. I didn’t really understand at first, but he thanked me immensely. He eventually came over and told me why he was crying, he was so taken back by the fact that I wrote that song about him. He was so grateful. I knew that I needed to be able to do this for not just me, but for all people. maybe these stories I can write about can help heal people, can make them feel. Because what is a world without music, and what is music without feeling?

Have you ever had to pivot?

Im actually in a massive pivot point in my life right now, I recently broke up with someone and it’s really painful, I have to work a full time job to support myself, just to devote time to the music I play. With me being in recovery a very close personal friend of mine just relapsed. My band almost broke up because of interpersonal issues, things outside of my control. I’ve recently had to step back and look at all the problems, possibilities, and outcomes. I have really had to focus on what I want, and need. So pivoting to a different direction is essential. What I thought I was going to get I was unable to achieve, what I thought was going to be smooth has become rough, and worn. What will happen I have no idea, but what I do know is that something better is coming. Something inexplicably perfect for me.

With the relapse of my friend it made me question whether I wanted to continue sobriety (why I allowed someone to affect me in that manner I will never know).

With my band almost breaking up I’ve have to put a pause on playing shows and really direct my time into finding new people, and writing more. I also started another band to at least keep me creative and who knows what will come from this. We’re developing a new sound, something people have not really done. Its exciting to be on the forefront of something new!

With my ex, there will always be that lingering pain. Something you think you want, you think wants you turns out is not the best for you even if you dreamt and imagined a life that’s more than what it became.

I’ve gone through so many emotions dealing with these issues, wanting to quit music, not knowing where I was heading, consistent uncertainty and not being able to flow. But I know quitting music is not the answer, I know that if I quit I will never be able to attain what I truly want to do. And I would never be happy.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

Art in general is a pivotal aspect of society, from the first cave drawings where something explained what life was like, to telling the stories in pyramids in Egypt, to modern art, all of it tells a story. Even if that story isn’t something that you personally connect with at the time, someone may need that right in that moment. Share, share, share. There are so many amazing talented artists in the world, ninety-nine percent being absolutely unknown. If archaeologists didn’t share the information they found with those cave drawings, pyramids, pottery, etc. we wouldn’t know who we were today. It is only through sharing experiences that we can truly be the culture, and people we are meant to be.

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Image Credits
Gabriel Goulding