`BIGGER THAN THE WORDS' SINGER-SONGWRITER BRANAN IS BENDING EARS
THE COMMERCIAL APPEAL
Date: TUESDAY, June 26, 2001 Section: Appeal Page: C1 Illustration: photo (4) Source: By Michael Donahue donahue@gomemphis.comEven though he made D's in her class, Cory Branan thanked Evelyn Sims, his Southaven High School creative writing teacher, in the liner notes of his recently released CD, The Hell You Say. "I did well in there sometimes," Branan said. That seems obvious after listening to the lyrics to his songs.
"Crackerjack Heart" begins, "It's the way you always did those little things that set me up and tore me down. When you raised hell in the Burger King 'cause they stopped making those cardboard crowns."
In "Jolene" he writes, "You're a stained glass window on a back door screen. You're the things you say and the things you mean. You're a New York doll and a Mississippi queen. And you're each sweet mile between, Jolene."
The D's Branan now gets stand for "dynamic" in music circles. Branan, 26, recently received the Premier Newcomer Award at the Premier Player Awards presented by the Memphis chapter of the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences.
"He's one of the bright new up-and-comers on the scene here, a very talented singer-songwriter," said Jon Hornyak, executive director of the Memphis chapter of NARAS. "He really has come from being an unknown to someone that everyone's talking about, just within the last year." What sets Branan apart is "the hard-to-define charisma that all the great artists seem to have," Hornyak said. "He just has a lot of charisma. You're just drawn to him and what he does. His songs, his performance of the songs and his voice and his personality all just draw you in to what he's doing.
"The guy's really good. He's someone who really has the potential to become a nationally known artist."
Wayne Leeloy, creator and host of Memphis Troubadors Acoustic Showcase, a songwriting showcase at The Flying Saucer Draught Emporium, described Branan, a frequent guest at the events, as "the genuine article. His music is interesting and poetic and that's the way he lives. He's a modern-day poet.
"On our Web site I said, `If you took Kurt Vonnegut and Paul Simon and put them together, you begin to get an idea about the way Cory writes."
"He's honest, and his emotions come through in the song," said Nancy Apple, a Memphis singer and musician who hosts songwriter nights at The Blue Monkey Pizza & Potations and Kudzu's.
A native of Southaven, Branan grew up with music. His father, a musician, would "always have instruments in the house," Branan said. "He would have a steel guitar he couldn't play. He's a drummer. He can't play anything but drums, but he would always have instruments around." When Branan was about 14, he picked up a guitar and began playing it.
As a teenager, he was in "hair bands," including one called Roadkill, but his hair wasn't poofed out like the better-known rockers of the time. "We just looked like country kids." Branan went from playing heavy metal to performing country in Southbound. "They used to do some pretty, pretty harmonies. They were actually the first guys I started singing with. We'd try these three-part harmonies, and I couldn't do it."
Branan majored in music education at Northwest Mississippi Community College. "It had to be voice or piano to be a music major, and I couldn't do either at the time. I wasn't even singing a few years ago. It's like I was too petrified of it. So, I went under the guise that I was going to learn it all and teach it back later. I never planned on teaching. I just wanted to get the theory classes."
About four years ago, Branan discovered singer-songwriter John Prine. "Somebody gave me a John Prine anthology or something. I was like, `Wow.' There was just something about it that was bigger than the words. I liked it a lot." From Prine, Branan went on to discover singers Tom Waits and Leonard Cohen. He also got up enough nerve to sing in coffeehouses like his balladeer heroes.
He began his solo gigs at the Daily Planet, which wasn't a scary place to sing because it's small. People liked him, but Branan didn't think much of his voice. He still doesn't. "It's not seasoned. It gets away from me."
Branan wrote his first song three years ago. "Just a little goofing song about police. Just a silly little song. It was con, but nothing too venomous. Actually, I've got a lot of friends that are cops now. They're always like, `Play that song.' I'm like, `I don't remember that song.' " Branan doesn't recall the title, either. "The Policemen in Heaven or something. The chorus is like, `There's no policemen in Heaven. Maybe God didn't have any use for them. Maybe he found a lower place for them to fill.' It was silly. Very Lyle Lovett. I was listening to Lyle Lovett at the time."
Branan began seriously writing songs after he discovered Prine. One of Branan's first was "Hell Bent and Heart First," about meeting a girl. "Actually, most of them are about girls. Most of them are based on them, some are composites of girls and some are completely just characters. It's random."
"Crush," one of his popular songs, was based on a high school crush. "There's a line, `Remember that Halloween when I went as Jimmy Dean. You were a princess, or a gypsy, or whatever. I was James Dean. And I had a crush on you."
That song is included on Branan's CD. The lyrical titles include "Pale Moon on Paper Town," "Whiskey Grove" and "Green Street Lullaby (Dark Sad Song)." The latter is "a Memphis song. (It's) kind of how comfortable you can get in this town." The song goes in part, "The copperheads fill all the ditches. The kudzu chokes the trees. Mosquitoes hum like window units. But you gotta move if you want a breeze."
"My melodies are definitely weaker than the lyrics. I pride myself, actually, on the lyrics. It's obvious that my melodies are substandard."
Some of Memphis's best musicians perform with Branan on the CD. They include Anthony Barrasso on drums, Richard Ford on steel guitar, Andy Grooms on piano and organ and Brian Venable on mandolin. Singers include Apple, Ben Nichols, Jimmy Davis and Kim Richardson. " 'I don't really like musicians' is something I always say because they generally strike me as self-absorbed. They don't think about anything but their own little world. But there's so many exceptions in this town. Just good, honest, great people that are really upfront with you."
Memphis, unlike Nashville, isn't the type place where producers hang out in clubs trying to sign somebody. "You see people (musicians) in there just doing it (performing). There's something kind of lazy about Memphis musicians, but there's something kind of honest because there's no artifice or anything." As for Memphis audiences, Branan said, "Boy, they are fickle: `Show me something I ain't seen.' "
Branan likes to roam around Memphis. If he finds an interesting bar in a rough part of town, he'll stop. "I like to go places where I have no business being." People might see him composing a song at Wolfchase Galleria's food court. One of his favorite writing spots is a park at Oak Court Mall. "All the walls have mirrors on them, so the sun will shine down, and it looks like you've just got nothing but trees and mirrors as far as you can see. It's brilliant. It's great architecture. It's right smack in the middle of the mall. There's hardly ever anybody there. They've got little silly dog sculptures and stuff in there."
Branan is a night person, too. "I'll play a show, and I'll be done. Everybody starts leaving. `Wait. I've been up here. I haven't been hanging out. Let's hang out some more.' I've got to think of ways to keep them after the show."
Entertainer Jason D. Williams is one of his running buddies. "I've hung out with him a considerable bit, and, actually, I feel he's one of the premier songwriters," Williams said. "Cory is the type guy that deserves, as any great artist does, somebody to sit and listen."
Branan wants to move to New York and pursue his music, but he doesn't plan to stay away from the Mid-South too long. "I don't have any illusions about what I do. Even like the pinnacle of what I could do with this music. Say, John Prine. You could ask five people and maybe two out of five's going to know who John Prine is. And maybe one out of five. It's not that huge kind of fame. I really just want to be able to keep making records. "Here's my main goal: not to have to wait tables any more. I don't want to shoot too big."
- Michael Donahue: 529-2797 Caption: Photographs by Alan Spearman (Color) Cory Branan, 26, recently received the Premier Newcomer Award at the Premier Player Awards honoring local musicians. (Color) During a practice break, Branan shares the porch with his ex-roommate's dog. Like many canine residents, Branan likes to roam around Memphis. (Color) A hot tub and some friends help Branan unwind after a show at The Flying Saucer Draught Emporium, where he is a frequent guest at a songwriting showcase. Branan can be seen at various spots around town jotting ideas in his scrapbook/notebook/songbook.
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