Brooke Barrettsmith

It’s been a busy year for Brooke Barrettsmith, but you just know from the giddy sound of her voice that it’s like she’s been a kid in a candy store since Day One. First there was the tour with Pillar in the spring, then she got engaged in the beginning of August and her self-titled debut releases on August 19th. It’s been a rocking good time…a whirlwind, dream-come-true, I’m-having-so-much-fun-I-can’t-stop-headbanging good time. Not bad for a woman who first came into the spotlight on season 5 of American Idol.

Brooke recently took time to talk with Soul-Audio about what music means to her, how much fun it is to be a Christian rocker chick, how her family’s music background essentially forced her to pursue music herself, and how a show like American Idol can do surprising things for a person’s faith in God.

Soul-Audio: So I’ve read that your dad’s mom was a singer on Broadway…

Brooke Barrettsmith: Mm-hm.

SA: And your mom’s mom was an Italian opera singer, and your dad did session drumming for the likes of B. B. King?

Brooke: Yeah. (Laughs.)

SA: Holy cow.

Brooke: It’s pretty crazy, yeah. But I guess music was like a no-brainer for me—it’s in my blood. (Laughs.) Yeah, my grandparents on both sides were very musically talented. It was their passion; it was what they did for a living. So naturally my dad developed a love for music and moved into making it a profession. And he session drummed for all the Blues greats in the city (Chicago) when he was young and when they were all starting out: B. B. King, Muddy Waters, Buddy Guy. And you know, it just sort of took off from there. Years into the lifestyle it all just kind of caught up with him and the rock ‘n roll lifestyle, you know, the drugs, alcohol and being away from his wife and kids.

So God called him out of that and led him to a personal relationship with Jesus and from then on he used music to glorify God. And actually he became a pastor after that, so we watched him redeem all his gifts for the glory of God, which was life-changing for me .

SA: Wow. Now how long ago did this happen?

Brooke: This was…my dad became a Christian when I was 4, so I was just starting to get the age where I would really remember the bad things if something didn’t change quickly. So I don’t really have too many memories of him in his lifestyle before this, but my brothers do. And he has one of those radical salvation stories where God just delivered him of everything all at once because my dad cried out to the Lord and said, “Hey, Your Name’s at stake in my life and I know that, and I barely know what it means to have a relationship with Jesus, but I want to represent you well. I don’t want to be a hypocrite. So please take all this out of my life.” And then and there, God just took away the whole lifestyle all at once. It was a radical salvation and change for him.

SA: That’s awesome.

Brooke: Yeah.

SA: So what was it like growing up in such a music-oriented family? How did you end up getting so fascinated by music?

Brooke: Well, I definitely grew up around music. My dad still had several bands going strong after he became a Christian so I grew up listening to them rehearse in our basement, going to the shows and doing music in church. We got very involved in the music side of our church and singing on the worship teams and doing special music whenever we could.

I think my first solo in church was fourth grade, you know, where I got up there and grabbed the microphone and I think I sang a Twila Paris song. So just from a young age, I was surrounded by music and like I said earlier, I kind of feel like I had no choice but to do music because it’s what I used to express myself to the Lord and creatively. So, yeah. (Laughs.) Music equals Barrettsmith.

(Both laugh.)

SA: Everyone’s new favorite equation.

Brooke: (Laughs.) Yeah! Forget e=mc2!

SA: No doubt. It’s time for a new equation for a new generation.

Brooke: Totally. (Laughs.) I’m all about it.

SA: So you were also on the fifth season of American Idol…

Brooke: Yeah, I made an appearance on that show. (Laughs.) My parents are still horribly addicted to it. They got addicted by watching my sister and I make it through the Hollywood rounds and all that, and they haven’t been able to not watch a season ever since.

SA: Oh no…

Brooke: So whenever I’m home from tour I walk into the house to say hi to my parents and they’re like, “Oh yeah, yeah. Just sit down and watch the rest of the show and we’ll catch up after it’s over.

(Both laugh.)

SA: So if your schedule allows, do you ever watch any of the new seasons as they come out?

Brooke: Well, TV’s never really been one of my things. I’m not huge on watching television especially being on tour. And this year I’ve had a very busy tour life for the first time, so I haven’t been able to watch even if I was a TV-watcher. But when I got off the Pillar tour in May I got to catch the finale for this season. And it just brought back all these weird feelings. You hear the theme song and you see all these people up there all nervous and I’m just thinking, “Thank you Lord, you took me out of that when you did,” because it’s still nerve wracking to watch them go through that. I know what it’s like being up there on that stage, so yeah, it’s kind of a relief.

(Both laugh.)

SA: So how did the AI experience help shape the direction your musical career was going to take? What kind of impression did it make on you?

Brooke: That’s a good question. You know God really used that experience in my life to encourage me and to give me courage to finally pursue a solo music career, because all those years leading up to that one on American Idol, I had been doing music with my siblings, and especially with my sister. We had been a singing duo together in a band for a lot of years before that. We had just decided to part ways before we tried out for American Idol together, but we tried out sort of as a last hurrah.

And when we both came to the point of the competition where we had to leave each other’s side, when one of us moved on and one of us went home, for me that was life changing because I had to become my own identity, my own person again, and find the message God had given me to share with the world, and find the music identity that God wanted me to begin my career with. For me that was always rock music. I knew that the passion I feel when I sing rock ‘n roll-driven music like I grew up with, just matches the passion that I have and the message that I want to share of Christ’s love with the world.

So American Idol didn’t mold me in any way but it did encourage me and give me courage to finally pursue this dream: getting signed to Essential Records and making my own album and putting it out in stores everywhere, and trying to share with the world His essence through music. It gave me the courage to do that.

SA: Well that’s good.

Brooke: Yeah, I needed that! God works in mysterious ways. I definitely needed something that extreme for God to be like, “Do you believe me now that I am calling you to do this?” (Both laugh.) So that was very cool.

SA: Yeah, God does that. He knows our passions and what’s in our hearts and He’ll give us those opportunities sometimes. And if He isn’t using the hook to reach out and pull you off stage, then He’s telling you something right there.

Brooke: Totally. And for me, I was in a little bit of denial at that point because how much He was blessing me in that competition, it was just filled with so many blessings and the people there who didn’t know the Lord were encouraging me and saying that they saw something special in me as a Christian artist. So to hear that from people in the Christian world and in the mainstream world, that they believed in me as a Christian artist, as a Christian rock artist, just blew my mind because for so many years I was crying out to God and asking Him: “Am I crazy? Am I just losing my mind? Are you really calling me to do this on a professional level? Or do you want me to be okay with doing this locally? Because that’s fine too.”

But I was like, “Lord, you’ve got to settle this in my heart for me. And he did! (Laughs.) It took some time for Him to finally reveal it, but when He did–and when He finally does for those who’ve been there—sometimes your response is: “Whoa, wait a minute…I don’t know if I’m ready for this.” And then He says: “Remember all those years you were crying out to me? Well here you go!”

(Both laugh.)

SA: Be careful what you ask for.

Brooke: Totally! And really mean it, you know? Spend some time searching your heart and asking God if you’re going out of His will by asking for things, or if doors keep shutting in your face—as much as it hurts, that aren’t His will, and opening the right doors wide open and pushing me through the ones that are His will.

SA: And sometimes it just takes a while for us to get to that place where we’re ready to be used the way He wants to use us.

Brooke: Absolutely.

SA: So tell us a bit about this first CD of yours.

Brooke: Well I’m very, very proud of it. I think we made a great-sounding album. It’s an album that has three powerful underlying messages in it. For me it sincerely is a dream come true because it’s everything I always prayed for and hoped for. And having made it at twenty-six years old, I had some time to kind of think and dream and pray about what my first album would look like, what it would sound like, what the messages would be and its…it’s verbatim everything I always hoped for. So I’m very excited to share it with the world.

Let me share the three underlying messages that are involved in the album and why they’re there. The first one is that’s it’s okay to admit that you’ve been hurt in relationships. And I think being a youth leader all these years in my dad’s church in Chicago, I’ve seen a lot of girls suffer because they’ve held in the pain and hurt and the fact that they feel like they have to have a perfect exterior. So for me and for the girls, it’s been important for me to be real with them as well and admit, you know, I’ve been hurt before and it’s OK to talk about it and get real with it and it helps us heal from it. And in the end, the perfect relationship we’re looking for is found in Jesus Christ, so they should embrace him in that way.

The second point is to never be ashamed of your faith in Jesus and to never apologize for being a Christian. I’m very evangelistic from the stage, and whether it’s a secular venue or a Christian venue I’m not ashamed to speak the name of Jesus, and I will never apologize for being a Christian artist either because I believe the two go hand in hand.

SA: Right.

Brooke: So that is also a very important message in the CD, you know, just shouting it in the streets that you love Jesus with all your heart.

And the third is kind of a personal testimony of how God has continued to capture my heart and make sure my dependence is always on Him and not on myself, and that is about how He has helped me to work through an anxiety problem. The third theme is casting our anxieties on the Lord because He doesn’t want fear. And feelings and emotions can be more real than we know his promises to be, more real than we know him to be. He’s bigger than our fears and bigger than our stress and our anxiety. And that’s been a huge part of my testimony—God bringing me through that—and I owe those hard times some credit because God used those to make me the woman of God—strong in my faith—that I am today.

SA: Right.

Brooke: So those are the three main points that I wanted to hit on, lyrically and message-wise. Sonically, it rocks! (Laughs.) Crank it up!

SA: Totally. It’s all about drums and amps and cranking it up to 11.

Brooke: Totally. Distortion is awesome!

SA: Power chords and everything—it’s awesome.

Brooke: Oh yeah!

SA: I’d like to follow-up on something you just mentioned. Your third major theme for the record is straight out of I Peter 5. Was this passage the inspiration for your song “Paper Tigers?” You talk about your enemies really being paper tigers because they aren’t as strong as they at first seem to be.

Brooke: Right. Definitely. That song was very important and kind of a turning point in my life, I think, because it was such an important analogy to me. It summed up years of trying to visualize what it looks like when God takes a fear and makes it surrender to himself, to his lordship. And to him it’s like, the paper tigers look vicious on the outside and they can be threatening and they can be screaming at you and telling you all these lies.

And the Lord just comes down…grabs it…by the throat…crumples it up…and just tosses it out the window. It’s like all he’s doing, and all he’s waiting for, usually, is for us to cry out to him in our anxiety and ask him to have victory in this situation, to show us and remind us how powerful he is and that he’s still the same God he always has been. He loves to protect his children and make us feel safe and secure in his love. So that song was definitely a great reminder for me.

SA: That’s awesome. Songs like “Farewell” and “Quiet Streets” are representative of your album’s “Do something, and do it now,” theme.

Brooke: Yeah!

SA: Did you try to bring that theme out intentionally, or did it reveal itself to you throughout the recording process?

Brooke: That’s a great question. I noticed that too, but it was very unintentional because that’s just who I am as a person, as a Christian. I think I’m more on the evangelistic side. I grew up in an evangelistic home. My dad is my pastor, but he’s also an evangelist and we did a lot of that growing up, just doing a lot of street evangelism and letting people know the urgency of the day, because we’re not guaranteed tomorrow.

SA: Yes.

Brooke: I just grew up in a Christian home where there was always a sense of urgency for today, to make a difference for Jesus today, to make your life right with the Lord today. Don’t wait for tomorrow. And so it’s interesting that you noticed that. It’s kind of cool, actually. It was unintentional on my part, but I guess it just reflects who I am as a Christian.

SA: That’s cool. It’s almost better that it was unintentional because that means it’s coming from God, rather than from you trying to specifically infuse that sort of mentality into your songs. Not that that is necessarily bad, but I think this way the music is almost purer as a result.

Brooke: Thank you. I appreciate that.

SA: You’re welcome. You mentioned the rock ‘n roll sound of the record—and it rocks quite a bit, by the way.

Brooke: Yay! Thank you.

SA: The energetic, powerful tone of the music underscores the sense of urgency found in most of your lyrics. Did you write the music first and then respond lyrically based on what came out, or was it the other way around? Or was it something different every time?

Brooke: Well, for me the process is usually a concept first which follows with a lyrical idea, and then I will get together either with a songwriter or I’ll grab a guitar at that point and start working on melodies. That’s just always the way it’s worked out for me. Before I started writing music, I was writing poetry and stuff. So for me, concepts and lyrics always came first, and then the music naturally worked its way around it.

So I was really blessed to have found and been able to work with some great co-writers who kind of understood where I was at musically , which was a blessing because this kind of album in the female market, in the Christian genre, hasn’t been done a lot. So they understood where I was trying to lead them, musically , lyrically and concept-wise, and we crafted a great-sounding album.

SA: It must have been a breath of fresh air for them to see you weren’t trying to be another Amy Grant.

Brooke: Yeah! (Laughs.) They’re like, “You’re not a singer/songwriter with an acoustic guitar?” And I’m like, “No. I like to do that when I’m at my dad’s church leading worship, but I want, the full band. I want to grab my Fender Telecaster and do some headbanging. (Laughs.)

SA: Nice!

Brooke: So yeah, it was fun writing it and it’s definitely been fun performing all these songs this summer on tour.

SA: That’s cool. So what does it mean to you to be able to make music?

Brooke: Wow, that’s a deep question. What does it mean to me to be able to make music? I am like…I am so floored that my dream came true because…I don’t know, I feel ridiculously stupid sometimes and ridiculously blessed sometimes that God picked me out of all the people in the world who have this passion to be able to do it on this scale. Music is why God created me. That’s what I’m here to do. I’m here to speak the love of Jesus and the truth of his word through music. And that’s what I’m gonna do while I have breath. It might not always be on the scale that I’m doing it now, but I will certainly always use this gift to glorify his name. So to me, music’s just a dream come true to me.

SA: All right, time for the bonus question!

Brooke: Okay. (Laughs.)

SA: Of all the musicians—past or present—who would you most like to meet, who would you most like to record with and who would you most like to tour with?

BB: Wow, cool! I like this bonus question! (Laughs.) Let’s see…I’d like to meet Bono. U2’s my favorite band of all-time. I’m not like a lot of other people who worship Bono, but I do think he’s trying to contribute to making the world a better place and he’s made consistent, great, relevant music for twenty-plus years, so I would like to meet him because I love U2.

Let’s see…record with…gosh, man…that’s huge. Past, let’s see…there are so many icons from the past. I don’t know, I think…just something crazy like to record a song with Janis Joplin would have been sweet. John Lennon.

SA: Yeah.

Brooke: You know, one of those sweet icons of rock ‘n roll music.

SA: Mm-hm.

Brooke: Tour with…I don’t know, that’s a hard one. All the people I just named! U2. We’ll just throw that one in there. (Both laugh.) Because you said this was a bonus question and bonus means think big.

SA: Exactly. Think big.

Brooke: So yeah, U2 or Jimmy Eat World or Silverchair. That’d be great.

Editor’s Note: Be sure to check out Soul-Audio’s review of Brooke’s debut album here.

• www.brookerocks.com
• www.myspace.com/brookebarrettsmith

Does it Resonate with you?

Name (required)

Email (will not be published) (required)

URL