Barrett Martin

Barrett has travelled the world perfecting his craft and exploring other musical cultures for many years. Best known for his stints with rock groups Screaming Trees, Mad Season, and REM, Barrett is releasing his third solo album, titled "Zenga", this July.

Interview by Randy Mallett

June 2009

BP: Barrett, you've definitely got a dynamic sound behind your music, and you're playing

really stands out from the pack. Where did you learn your style?

BM: I think my personal style is really an amalgamation of all the drum styles I have absorbed over the

last thirty years. I am 42 now, so I grew up in the 70s and 80s when Jazz, Soul, Rock, Latin, Fusion,

and Brazilian music were all still popular. And certainly Afro-Latin-Brazilian drumming has become a

big influence over the years. At this point, my drum set is a really hybrid consisting of a standard Jazz

kit with African, Brazilian and Cuban drums added on. A couple of African iron bells too. In the studio I

use everything (where appropriate) but when I play live or on tour, the kit is a bit more stripped

down to create more space. My way of actually playing the drums is a physical, but relaxed

approach. I use controlled power, something that I learned in Jazz drumming, where you play

powerfully and with focus, but without being unnecessarily loud or out of control. This approach

to drumming is almost like a martial art, which I have also studied over the years. In this approach,

you play with a focused precision, but you also stay loose and flexible, like a prize fighter. When

I was a kid in the 1970s, Muhammad Ali was my idol. I always loved his fast, dancing footwork,

so I try to play drums the way Muhammad Ali boxed - fast and light, but with one hell of a punch

(drum fill) when necessary. Fly like a butterfly, sting like bee.

 

BP: You're constantly travelling the globe, experiencing other cultures and

immersing yourself in them. What are you currently doing, or what is your next project?

BM: For the last few years I have been in graduate school, so I was not able to travel as much as I would have liked to. My last big trip was to Jerusalem in 2005. But over the last ten years I went to five of the seven continents, to several different countries, and often for weeks or months at a time. I think I'm still processing it all, its just now starting to come out in my music. But I think my next trip will probably be to Indonesia and Bali, and maybe Japan and South East Asia as well. Gamelan music and bronze/gong/metallic percussion are my new interests and I have added some of those instruments into my collection already. I need to return to Brazil too, as I have some really good friends there, and I just absolutely love Brazilian music, the Samba Jazz stuff in particular. And I'm always thinking about Africa - she's really in my blood now. The thing I have learned, is that when you go to any country of musical origin, you get a very different realization about their whole approach to music - and life for that matter. When you live in their villages, eat the local food, hold the babies and watch over the little ones, and generally participate in their daily routines, you feel the music in a very different way. That's the only way I can describe it. You have to LIVE the music to really absorb it, and that just takes alot of time.

BP: Tell us about your work in the early Seattle scene. Specifically, with Screaming Trees and Mad Season.

BM: Well that is a very long story and too much for one interview! But basically I moved to Seattle in about 1987 and immediately met, and started playing with, Jack Endino (the Sub Pop producer). I was soon playing in his band, Skin Yard, and I was in that band from about 1988 - 91. We made a couple records for SST Records, touring most of the US, Canada, and Europe in a a very beat up old Dodge Sportsman Van. It was all very DIY, "do it yourself" as they say, which was the SST motto back then. When Skin Yard broke up in 1991, I almost immediately joined the Screaming Trees, about a month later. The Trees made three albums for Sony and pretty much toured the world until we were totally exhausted, mentally and physically. And then that band broke up too, in about 1998, although we didn't make the official announcement until 1999. Mad Season was an offshoot from our touring with Layne Staley/AIC, and Mike McCready from Pearl Jam was already a friend of mine from the early Seattle scene. Mad Season was a natural collaboration from the start, and we had great chemistry right off the bat. We could have formed our own band, and left our other bands if we had chosen to, but we didn't. It was kind of like having an exotic mistress, when we were still married to our respective bands. The "Above" album is one of the proudest moments of my life, and I still get emails from people around the world about how much they love that album. I miss Layne and Baker every day, they were such great guys, but they succumbed to a very bad habit. I try to live my own life in a way that would make them proud, and every now and then when I am at a low point in my life, I just think about them and they kind of give me a boost from the other side. Music is alive, its a living thing, and so are the spirits of the men who made it.

BP: I was huge fan of both bands, but especially MS (that's how I came to know of you myself years ago). Tell us more about working with Layne Staley. You two were friends for a long time right?

BM: I loved working with Layne in a setting that was not the high pressure, major label rock and roll drama we were all used to. And I was friends with Layne from the early days of Seattle, but I did not see him or speak to him much in his final years. He was kind of missing for a long time, so we just let him be. But the "Above" studio sessions were really quite magical, highly creative, inspiring sessions, and we all just grooved together. Layne was reading alot of poetry books at the time, and I remember that Khalil Gibran was one of his favorites. Baker was always kind and polite to everyone he met, a really wonderful guy to hang out with. And so was Mike, of course, he;s still that way. We made the "Above" album in about 2 weeks and I think the natural chemistry of the band is what made that album so magnetic, so powerful. You know, Mad Season was essentially a blues band, that was the secret of our sound. We just played the blues, Seattle-style. I don't know if anybody really got that. Mad Season was essentially a blues band.

BP: ...and R.E.M. and Tuatara?

BM: Tuatara, and later, REM, came out of my ongoing collaborations with Peter Buck of REM. Peter moved to Seattle in the early 1990s and we became fast friends, and still are to this day. We played in the house band at the Crocodile Cafe, Peter's wife's night club on 2nd Avenue in downtown Seattle. Its still there, although it has been sold to new owners. If you were a singer-songwriter on tour and you couldn't afford a band on the road, you could always call ahead to the Croc, and me and Peter and a few other guys would be your back up band when you got there. You couldn't get that kind of band anywhere in the USA.

Peter and I started Tuatara in 1996 to make some film soundtrack music, and that evolved into making actual studio albums. We've made 7 albums at this point, 5 of which are on my label, Fast Horse. Tuatara is really a loose collective of musicians that we assemble for various projects as needed, whether it be an album or a film soundtrack. We just released an album that we did with the famous Sufi poet Coleman Barks, which came out in January. And in June, we are re-issuing the double album "East of The Sun/West Of The Moon", which has been out of print for a while. That album features several well-know American singer-songwriters, with Tuatara as their back up band.

My work with REM happened in 1997-98 when they were recording the album, "UP." I filled in on drums, upright bass, and percussion, in the absence of Bill Berry, who had just quit the band. I actually played more upright bass and vibraphone on that album than actual drum set, but everyone seemed to think I had become the new drummer for REM, which was definitely not the case. And truthfully, I was never in REM, I just helped them record that one album and I've played a couple live shows with them. Tuatara is really the thing I do with Peter Buck, and that is really alot of fun when we do it.

BP: ...and Queens of the Stone Age, Stone Temple Pilots... the list goes on and on. What were some of the favorite rock albums you did?

BM: I really only played marimba on that 4th Stone Temple Pilots album, and then I played vibraphone and percussion on QOTSA's "Rated R" album. I also played vibraphone for the French band Air and the great New York band Luna. And then I played drums/

upright bass/vibes on countless singer-songwriter albums that you have never heard of. But I enjoyed

working with them all, because good music is good music, whether you are famous or not.

I did the whole LA session thing for about 4 years, but truthfully it became boring after a while. And I think

that's because that kind of work really becomes routine after a while, and you kind of become a mercenary,

which is not the kind of person I am. But it does become more like a job and less like an art form, which is

why you see people try it for a few years and then leave, and then you can say "I did the LA Sessions."

I'm glad I did it, I learned a great deal about record producing, but I would rather make my own albums and

enjoy the creative process with my friends, rather than just being a hired gun.

BP: Tell us about your new album "Zenga," and the inspirations behind it.

BM: Zenga is my third and newest solo album, and it comes out on July 21st. For this album, I used a traditional Jazz quintet, with piano, upright bass, drums, sax and trumpet. I played all the drums of course, as well as vibraphone and all the African, Brazilian, and Cuban drums/percussion. Its a very open and expansive record, and the themes are really about God, Love, Life, Childbirth, Death and Old Age! I wrote the compositions during my last year in New Mexico, when a lot of very heavy personal things were going on in my life. I was also finishing my last year of graduate school, so we could only record when I had breaks from school. We recorded the basic tracks in Santa Fe and then I did additional overdubbing and mixing up here in Seattle, after I moved back home in December. I think in actuality, I tend to compose more like a Jazz composer than a rock musician, and that is just my natural way of writing. But I am equally influenced by the American modernists like Steve Reich and John Cage, as I am by Miles Davis, John Coltrane and Led Zeppelin. I think technically they call my style "Post-Modern Jazz", meaning that is contains elements of all musical styles up to the present. But it is actually very deep and meditative music, which unfolds over the course of time. Its very Zen actually, and that's why I titled this new album "Zenga", which means "Zen Painting. " Because really, I feel like my music is just that - a sonic sound painting.

BP: When/where are you touring to promote the album?

BM: Well, provided that I can find a booking agent for this new Jazz group, I hope to be on tour by the fall. But its a tough market out there right now with the economy the way it is. And even if you have all the credits and accolades of a successful rock musician, it is hard to book a Jazz group, period. Charlie Watts can pull it off, but hey, its Charlie Watts! He can afford to write some big checks!

You see, Jazz is still a very small genre, and its a hard sell no matter who you are. And Jazz bands on tour are notoriously expensive, the players demand a high salary, so when I am responsible for that, I have to have a really good tour booked. We are starting to play some regional shows in the greater Seattle, Portland, San Francisco area, and I expect we will at least do a West Coast run. But if I can't book a world tour on the strength of this album, I'll just keep making solo albums until the winds shift in my favor.

BP: You mentioned the meaning behind the name of your album "Zenga," and you're actually offering your original Zenga paintings with the album packages right?

BM: Yes, I have been doing Zenga paintings for some time now, about ten years actually, and I finally decided that they were good enough to display publicly, perhaps even sell. A Zenga painting is a spontaneous expression of spirit, a flash of color on paper. Its the painted expression of spirit, in the same way that a song is. My paintings tend to be Ensos, the Japanese word for circle, because this is the symbolic representation of the Zen tradition. I painted the album cover for my new CD (a first for me) so I decided that I would use the album as a bit of a doorway into presenting my paintings as well. So if you buy the CD, you can see some examples of my work in the CD booklet. And then if you want to buy the real thing, an original Zenga painting with my Zen "hanko" stamp, then you can buy one through my website. Each painting is done quickly, in a matter of seconds, after a period of deep mediation. They are all different colors with different brush techniques, because that is the nature of Zen - a spontaneous expression of spirit.

BP: So you're actually an ordained Zen priest in the Soto tradition? How did that come about?

BM: That came about during the 4 years I lived in LA, in the late 1990s, when I was doing all that recording session work. Honestly, I got bored with the LA party scene fairly quickly (is that called "growing up"?) and I was looking for a deeper spiritual meaning for my life. I found a Zendo in my neighborhood and I just started going there every night to meditate, rather than to some party up in the Hollywood Hills. I did this for about four years straight, and then I was offered the ordination process, which was actually a fairly rigorous training in the philosophy of Zen and its application in life. But Zen is an ongoing process, a lifelong practice, and ordination is really more like getting your black belt in meditation, and then you just keep meditating, refining your way of life, strengthening your spirit, and perfecting your life. I am supposed to go back to the main monastery in Osaka, Japan for further training, but I just have to make the time to do it. I am procrastinating on that a bit... much to the dismay of my teacher.

BP: And to add one more thing to the resume, you've also recently undergone work on your first book. Tell us more about that.

BM: The book is a collection of essays that I wrote while I was in graduate school, about my musical experiences in Africa, Brazil, Cuba, the Peruvian Amazon, Australia, Alaska, and a few other places.

I have rewritten the essays to be more like readable chapters in the book, so that each country and culture has its own section. I talk about how music in other cultures is inherently a part of their environment and their daily lives, it is in their ceremonies, and indeed, it is their life story. It is only here in the West where it has been turned into a cheap commodity, an item for sale (or to steal), and as a result, we have kind of lost touch with what the real power of music is. I feel like we need to look back at the indigenous cultures first and learn from their example, and then rebuild our own musical-cultural systems back up from there. That's why I love Jazz so much, as well as all the Latin/Brazilian/World music, because that is the indigenous music of the World.

BP: Well, you've certainly got an impressive resume and your work has spanned the globe. What are some of things you're most proud of in your career?

BM: I actually feel most proud of the non-rock and roll things I have done. Like producing the CD "Woven Songs Of The Amazon", for the Shipibo people in the Peruvian Amazon. That CD is completely all of their music, their story, their cosmology. I just helped record it on location and then produced the CD for their benefit. It feels really good to help other people when you have the power to do so.

I am also very proud of my solo work, because that is my personal voice as a composer, and I am getting better with each album. At first it was a bit daunting, to make a solo album of my own music and then release it under my own name. You can't hide from that! But now I feel like I am finally hitting my stride, especially with this new album "Zenga." When I play drums for other bands, I am giving them my "drum powers" so to speak, which helps to make their albums all the more powerful. But when I make my solo albums, I get to really be myself, the percussionist/composer/ethnomusicologist. Its hard work, and I am probably more critical of my own music than other people are. But I feel pretty compelled to do it, so I have already started writing album #4.

BP: And given all your experiences across the world; the faces you've met, the hands you've shook, the music you've shared... what have you taken away from it all, and what have you learned about life that you would like to share with the rest of us?

BM: Humility and Humbleness are the greatest qualities a man can have. You can be strong and confident in your abilities, but even that will fade over time, so you must maintain a great humility in the eyes of the Creator. Always show great compassion to your fellow man, because you really have no idea what he or she has been through in life. You can't even believe how most of the world survives outside of the United States until you see it for yourself - you will be shocked to your core. So be thankful for what you have, rather than what you wish you had. Be generous to others when you can afford to be. Most importantly, never back down from a good fight. I'm not talking about bar room brawls (although sometimes it manifests like that). I'm talking about the big life challenges. Meet them head on and attack them, because these are the tests of character, the great gifts of an authentic life.

These are lessons I have learned directly, and believe me, I have been humbled to my core, in ways I could never have imagined. I am always reminded that I still have enormous work to do on myself, both spiritually and artistically, because life is just that - it is enormous work! And I always remind myself that there is always someone out there who is much better than me, somewhere in the world, on any given night. I am good at what I do, but there is always going to be someone better than me, someone more talented and expressive, more evolved as an artist. I just try to be a good person first and foremost, and a great musician second to that. The two things are really one thing actually, because you can't be a great musician if you are not a good person at your core. The two are inseparable, and that is the most important thing I can pass on to your readers. That, and to just follow your heart and give it your best effort. That's really enough, and the Creator will be proud of you if you do just that.

BP: Thanks so much for the interview Barrett! And good luck with the new album!

BM: Thank you Randy, for asking some very good questions.

Visit Barrett at www.barrettmartin.com, www.myspace.com/barrettmartin

Photos Courtesy of MySpace

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