Adam Brand: Getting Personal

23 August 2010

by Rebecca Belt

Speaking with The Music Network while waiting for a plane at Atlanta Airport, Adam said he’d always wanted to produce his own album, and with spare time in Nashville this opportunity arrived at the right time.

The country singer produced the album with good mate, guitarist, songwriter and artist in his own right, Sam Hawksley who is also living and working in the US with Adam.

“It seemed like a natural thing to do,” he said. “Sam and I work on songs together all the time and on the road we’re always playing around with different treatments of songs so we thought ‘let’s just do what we do live and bring it into the studio’.

“This seemed like the perfect opportunity because I was in Nashville with a little more spare time than I thought I’d have,” he continued, “so I rang Compass Brothers (his Australian record label) and Graham Thompson was like ‘hell yeah!’. I had a bunch of songs and said ‘how about we do this.’”

Adam chose a small songwriter’s studio at the production company and a tightknit group of players, producing the most personal of all his ten albums. “I know what I want and I’m in control of what I want my music to sound like,” Brand explains. “I wrote 12 out of the 13 songs and [therefore] this album is very honest. It’s very much me and exactly how I feel about things. It’s a very personal album because I want people to know about how I’m feeling about my journey.” Adam said the first single and title track, It’s Gonna Be Okay sums up the whole feel of the album, and where he is in life right now.

“We stress about lots of things in our life but this song says ‘don’t stress too much, the sun is shining, it’ll be alright’ and that’s a very calming idea,” he explains. “This album is the most calm and peaceful I have been in my life because I’m content. I hope the listener will get that and by the end of the album I hope they feel it’ll be alright.”

Although currently on a promotional tour of radio stations in the US, he’ll be back on Australian shores on December 1 to start his 25-date Australian tour, taking in the Tamworth Country Music Festival and getting the word out about his new album. “I don’t want people to think I’m deserting my home country,” he said. “Nothing will ever replace home, which is why this tour is called the Coming Home Tour.”

The release of his album and subsequent tours will wrap up a momentous year for the star, with him marrying his Dancing With The Stars partner, Jade Hatcher, earlier in the year and setting up home with his new bride in Nashville. She can be seen playing various instruments and playing on the children’s toys in Adam’s latest clip, It’s Gonna Be Okay. “I’ve done 20-odd film clips but that was the most fun,” he said. “I’ve loved having my wife in everything. We clowned around for hours.”