Danny
Brooks - In his first Rockin' Camel Music release, No Easy Way Out, Danny
Brooks takes the listener on a musical ride through the pages of his own
life. From a father who told him music was evil down a path of
self-destruction, the emotion in Danny's songs tells the story of a man
who has been to the bottom and found his way back up. Rockin' Camel Music
More than anything else, Danny
Brooks is spiritual, but Danny Brooks is soul, too, and deep South gospel
tinged with haunting blues. And if you listen close enough you’ll even
hear a touch of raw, chilling, Ralph Stanley style mountain music, too. In
addition, Danny Brooks could easily be the most sincere man in show
business today simply because he has discovered the key to touching his
audience’s heart, and there is no smoke and mirrors involved.
His
strength is his simplicity and sincerity, the power of which comes from
his ability to inspire belief, and to compel every member of his audience
to believe that he is singing to him or her alone. Brooks is, according to
friend and producer, Johnny Sandlin, “The genuine article,” and his
authenticity comes from a deep well of conviction and purity that most
singer/songwriters can only pretend to understand—and pretend to
convey.
Born and raised in Toronto, Canada, Brooks began his
musical odyssey by watching his hero’s from the balcony of the Colonial
Tavern in Toronto. After a showdown with his father, and leaving home at
fifteen, Brooks moved into a “wee tenement house” around the corner from
the Colonial Tavern. The management allowed Brooks to watch Taj Majal,
Muddy Waters, Otis Rush, Howlin’ Wolf, John Lee Hooker and many more blues
legends from the upper balcony—just so long as he promised not to drink.
“I
saw all the blues greats when I was only fifteen,” Brooks remembers, “and
that was a major influence in the blues end of my music.” Brooks also
looked south from that upper balcony, to Macon, GA and the Allman Brothers
for inspiration during his early days. “I really loved the Allman
Brothers,” Brooks recalls, “and I think some of their points of reference,
who inspired them, would be similar in some regard to mine—I liked that
old school country, soul, and blues right from a young
age.”
Brooks’ family attended a predominately white church “with a
black attitude,” while he was growing up in Toronto, where he was
encouraged musically by a lady at church that was the pianist. She took
him under her wing and allowed Brooks to bring his guitar to church where
she would teach, and encourage him.
Years later, as
Brooks battled personal demons, and successfully clawed his way back from
a deep spiral of alcohol and drug abuse, much of his strength and
conviction came from that early church upbringing. It would be hard to
listen to anything that Brooks has written, or talk to the man himself,
without concluding that he has a strong faith, and an unshakable belief
system. Today, his faith and his family are the foundation and inspiration
for Brooks’ life and music, and there is a tiny glimmer of redemption in
every one of his songs. Hearing Brooks play, it is obvious that he can
easily take his band to the Sunday morning service at the Ebineezer
Baptist church, and then take the same band and the very same set list
down to the local blues hall, and rock the very foundation. The term
crossover is terribly overworked and does not accurately describe the
universal attraction of Brooks’ music—for him it is a way of life; like
two roads that wind around the same mountain, coming to an end at the same
place.
Armed with a powerful new CD, No Easy Way Out, that was
engineered and produced by legendary Capricorn producer Johnny Sandlin,
and backed by the most renowned musicians in Muscle Shoals; Brooks is
ready to take his show on the road. No Easy Way Out is an intimate look
into Brooks’ life. The feeling exists in this CD that Brooks is giving us
an emotional autobiography in every song he sings—singing himself into his
music, and the material of his songs is the material of his life. The CD
is musically steeped in the spirit of classic Memphis soul, but it is
lyrically up-to-the-minute, featuring Brooks’ powerful, emotional vocals
over a blistering band with horns punching in at all the right places. No
Easy Way Out is a tour-de-force of rock, soul and blues. The list of
musicians that Sandlin called in for No Easy Way Out reads like the
charter members club of the Muscle Shoals Musicians Union—David Hood on
bass, Spooner Oldham and Kevin McKendrie on keyboards, Scott Boyer, James
Pennebaker, and Kelvin Holly on a multitude of guitars, Bill Stewart and
Roger Hawkins on drums, and the lady herself, Bonnie Bramlett on duet and
backing vocals, along with Tina Swindell. The nucleus of this amazing
backing band goes by the name, The Decoys, and Sandlin was a founding
member.
Highlights of the CD are almost too numerous to mention,
but include the sullen, but driving pulse of the title song, “No Easy Way
Out” a beautiful, but painful description of broken relationships and the
bruised lives that epitomizes Brooks’ sense of flying on borrowed wings.
“Ain’t That The Truth” recants Brooks’ musical baptism, and spins a
narrative account of his early hero’s passionate, energetic live
performances. “Miracles For Breakfast” and “Keys To My Heart” wrap around
the listener with familiar, soulful ease, and at the end of the day,
there’s nothing more comforting. In “Bama Bound” Brooks communicates an
astonishingly genuine homesickness for the south, with it feeling
lyrically like an itch that needs scratching.
The overall texture
of Brooks’ CD is gritty and driving, blending Memphis and Muscle Shoals,
Delta and Appalachia, gospel and hillbilly. Brooks’ persuasive,
broad-shouldered voice weaves together the varied material—and he delivers
what he promises.
Brooks is anxiously putting together the final
pieces of the big music business puzzle. However, a few of those final
puzzle pieces have eluded Brooks for years. “I’m still ‘Danny Who?’ to a
lot of people,” joked Brooks, “so it is hard to accurately convey the
importance of working with a group of musicians like the ones that
recorded my CD, or having Johnny Sandlin and Carl Weaver in your corner.
It gives me instant credibility, as an unknown person, and it is an
incredible selling point. Hopefully, with this new credibility, I’ll be
able to nail down a really solid booking agency.”
For a multitude
of reasons, securing the right booking agency can be an enormous help to
any musician’s career. Obviously, the right agency can help to fast-track
Brooks’ career, and book him into premium clubs and venues, but there is
another, not so obvious reason that a Canadian citizen needs a top shelf
agency. Because Brooks is a Canadian citizen coming into the U.S. to work,
he will need proper papers, and the larger booking agencies have in-house
people that can deal with the mountains of INS paperwork, and help
streamline the visa process.
“Without proper papers, a Canadian
musician working in the U.S. illegally can be banished for five years,”
explained Brooks.
That would be a devastating blow to his career at
this point in time. The level of frustration for Brooks is unimaginable,
knowing that a great record has been made, and in a few weeks time,
legalities would make it impossible for him to come into the U.S. to
perform. To properly promote his record, Brooks feels that he must be
living in the U.S. “I can’t be an absentee landlord, in a sense. I need to
be down there in the south where that music can break out of—because my
music belongs there.”
While waiting to unearth the final pieces of
his music puzzle, Brooks is living on the Niagara Escarpment, forty-five
miles west of Toronto in the small rural town of Milton with his wife,
Debra, and daughter, Caitlin. Living in a farmhouse in the country has
been a blessing according to Brooks because his writing has picked-up, and
the beauty of the Canadian wilderness has set a watermark for the family’s
imminent move south.
“We’re hoping to move south next year,” said
Brooks “I want to have all my ducks in order so that the move will be a
fair chance for all of us. The main thing is to move my career to the next
level. With some hard work, the new recording, and a book coming out the
first of next year, I think that we’ll be heading
south.”
Brooks has drawn a circle around Nashville, TN with a
radius of an hour and a half drive, and he would be happy living anywhere
in that circle. “Nashville’s a songwriting town and I am sure that is
going to play a part in it, but I’m also looking at either northern
Alabama, or southern Tennessee.” Brooks also likes the Muscle Shoals
area with its great musicians, as well as Decatur, and Gadsden with Johnny
Sandlin, and Carl Weaver’s Rockin’ Camel label becoming a modern day
Capricorn Records. “They have Jimmy Hall from Wet Willie, the Capricorn
Rhythm Section, Cowboy, and Bonnie Bramlett who is currently doing a
record with Johnny,” said Brooks, “so they are doing a pretty good job of
reviving the spirit of Capricorn Records.”
According to Brooks it
takes an irritated oyster to produce a pearl, and over the years that
irritation has allowed him to come up with the songs and music that have
led him to No Easy Way Out. There is a place in the U.S. for Danny Brooks
and his music, and it is here in the south, where audiences will
appreciate and understand his unique perspective. When Brooks finds that
last piece to the puzzle, and turns it over, it’ll most likely read,
“Sometimes you have to hang your hat a long way from home, Lord
Halleluiah, I’m Bama Bound!”
No
Easy Way Out is a tour-de-force of rock, soul and blues. 'It is obvious
that he can easily take his band to the Sunday morning service at the
Ebenezer Baptist church, and then take the same band and the very same set
list down to the local blues hall, and rock the very foundation." Bill
Thames/Writer/Photographer.
"In the 21st Century, Brooks is a
breath of fresh air. Wonderfully written songs...great production...will
take you back to the glory days of Muscle Shoals. Southern Soul at it's
best. John Donabie/Broadcaster/Musicologist/CFRB T.O..
"Danny
Brooks is the real deal. He brings the best of the likes of Delbert and
Stevie Ray to mind. A true soul man." Kyle Lehning, Producer/Randy
Travis.
