Benjamin Del Shreve Interview
What led to the development of your new sound?
When did you start writing these songs?
BDS: While GS Megaphone and I were in the studio with
our second record, Beautiful World, I was beginning to
record the music that I am now considering very much
"My focus." In the evenings and off days I would go
over to my brother Randall's apartment to record. We
would place mattresses in his bathroom so as to deaden
the sound then I would play in front of a condenser
mic while Randall had his pro-tools set up humming in
the living room. In some of the early recordings you
can actually hear people talking, and guinea pigs
squeaking at times. At first I was just going to
record a song that I had written for my mothers
wedding in 2000. The song was called "Hear with You
Now". It was going to be a Christmas present for the
whole family. Chris Freeman asked if I had anything
else similar to this song. I thought maybe I did. I
ended up recording a full length record called "Enjoy
Me While I'm Here". The family liked it and told me
that I should do more of the same. Chris and I toured
around playing for peanuts for some time.
Some of the songs were written as early as 99/2000.
A song called "Different Sort of Tear" was actually a
funny answering machine message in it's first life.
If I wasn't home the machine would sing "Roses are
red, Violets are blue, if you don't leave a message
you can rest assured, we're gonna kill you". And all
of this to the melody of the chorus for what is now
called "Different Sort of Tear". I caught myself
hitting play on the answering machine when ever I
would walk through the dining room, so I knew that it
was a keeper. Another song called "Dream of Reality",
is a funny story I suppose as well. I had gotten rid
of most that I owned in the spring of 2003. I decided
that I needed more time to think and read and be an
artist. I bought a three bedroom tent and set up camp
on Lake Monroe in Indiana. I'd found some totally
primitive camping spots there that didn't require any
pay or at least that to my knowledge. I would pack up
camp whenever we would have a show and set up in the
off time. One night when sleeping on the floor at a
friends house after we'd just gotten home I was
listening to a song in my dream. It was beautiful! I
remember waking up and thinking about how much I loved
that song, but then I slowly realized that I had never
heard it before. There was a guitar and one of my
journals just near me of course so I wrote down all
that I could remember before it went to that place
where dreams go that you are sure you will remember by
the afternoon. The song kept on saying "I prefer your
dream, as to my reality."
Since Enjoy me while I'm Hear, I have recorded
three full length independent records, all before what
is called The Lighting Inside. Some of the songs
were rerecorded and added to the new record. But
there were too many songs to put on one record,
including some Sinatra, and Ella Fitzgerald covers.
How would you describe your sound? Who are your
musical influences? What sort of things (or artists) inspire you to make music?
I refer to it as "Folk, Folk rock", but I realize
that I am calling it that for a complete lack of
better words.
I find that Hollywood Jazz artists are a huge
inspiration. Dean Martin, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis
Armstrong, Sinatra and Nat King Cole. They are a good
combination of sophisticate song writing and
arranging, and some very talented poetry. I love how
Love and romance are so often spotlit, and that in
such a classy way. I find that alot of modern writers
may be able to convey a degree of talent, or passion,
but seldom a sense of class.
I love Nick Drake, Iron and Wine, and Jeff
Buckley... I kind of suck at naming influences
because there are so many that I know I'll forget so
let me make up for all of that by saying that I
learned how to play the song that Steve Martin played
on a ukulele on the movie called the Jerk. Honest! I
did, you know when he was walking on the beach with
that blonde bird. I think the song is called "But
Tonight, You Belong to Me."
What sort of audience reaction do you hope to conjure/evoke/get? What age of audience do you think you are shooting for?
I should answer the second part of that question
first. I think that the college age crowd will get
this if anyone will, and then the cool people from
both older and younger crowds.
In regards to responses from our audience however I
should say that I believe that the real art isn't the
song but the response of a person to the song being
sung. Art is not the "Mona Lisa", it's what happens
inside of a person in the Louver beholding such an
artifact with their own eyes.
I write songs and poetry. For me my poem is
incomplete should it be observed but fail to serve its
purpose. For me; I wish to make "longing stares"
abbreviated things. So that a man would not only gaze
from afar the damsel, whose eyes constantly manage to
ruin him. But that he would rant and yell at the
heart in his chest until it either became a heart that
was wild enough to approach something so fine as she;
(regardless of what "composure" would want). Or, that
his yelling would manage to scare it into her very
arms. It's when someone hears my words and
understands how short life is. Or, when they realize
that existence is a temporal commodity that my work
has served its purpose. But not just to become
depressed and sure of death. "Death is certain no
matter how sure of it you are, No one needs my help to
die they'll manage that on their own". No! Your
mother is there to invoke an avoidance of Death; but
God saw fit to put poets in our lives to invoke an
unbridled pursuit of "Life!"
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