Carter Brady Has the Real “Starlight” With His Pop-Flavoured Song Release
- BUZZ LA
- Feb 8, 2022
- 4 min read
Carter Brady has finally released his upbeat single, "Starlight," which hones right into the desire and dream to possess fame. Brady challenges himself by channeling all of his human-based desires surrounding his place in the music industry and crafting a song from it.
Carter Brady expresses his narrative through the art of imagery. Naturally with his song comes a music video that gives listeners the chance to understand Carter Brady in a completely different light. Watch it once. Watch it again. Then really think how every component of the video could represent the lyrics he thoughtfully sings. "Starlight" contains an array of messages with strong depth to them.
Brady adds a real twist to the current contemporary indie/pop music scene by articulating his impressionable vocal delivery. With his sense of tone, you can't question whether or not a song of his is playing, your senses will already know.
The music Carter Brady generates is meant for easy and relaxing entertainment. Brady was able to create this light-hearted, fun-loving, and gracefully energetic self with the release of "Starlight," which propels our curiosity for what his artistry will inspire him to release next.
Welcome to BuzzMusic Carter Brady, thanks for joining us to chat about your single, "Starlight." With such a powerful message behind the lyrics to the song, can you elaborate on the takeaway you were hoping your listeners experienced?
Sure thing, thanks for having me! This song is about someone trying to become a star ("seeing the light of stardom"), ideally a rock star, but it could be any star, depending on your definition of a star. They find themselves struggling to get there, with other people doubting them and the wrong type of fame getting in the way. The chorus tries to get across that desire and hope to get there eventually and the motivation and courage to keep going and never give up. Overall, I wanted listeners to recognize these struggles for artists so that they are almost more aware of the balance between big dreams and realistic goals and making music for yourself and not others or mainstream trends.
Would you say that your music is reflective of real-life events? Are you naturally one to share personal narratives through your music?
I think that all of my music is, to an extent, subconsciously pulling from feelings and experiences I've had, but I tend to take a music-first approach and keep the lyrics a secondary component. A lot of my lyrics are random phrases I think of, and then I'll simultaneously try to piece each of them together in a way that tells a story. It helps keep things less cheesy since they tend to be less straightforward and transparent, making my songs unique. In rare instances, I have an idea for something to write about going into it, but most of the time, it's more music than the lyrics.
Who was involved in the production of "Starlight?" Can you share more on the process behind choosing and crafting the production of the song?
This song is the second track off of my new album "Blue Reverb," which I released in mid-November. I wrote it around the fall of 2020, and at that point, I knew I was going to try to release a full-length album and was starting to generate ideas to potentially use the material for the album. For the recording of this song, which I think I started in early March of 2021 in my basement music room, I was trying to come up with a good quality bass line with an upbeat synth-pop feel while keeping those heavy guitars and drums a part of the sound. I demoed a bunch of different takes and finally found a bass arrangement that I was happy with, and from there, built the song up with guitars, vocals, synths I played on my computer keyboard, and a guitar solo towards the end. I spent a few hours one night coming up with the guitar solo and made a comp take that I was proud of. Matt Graff, a friend of my producer Joe DiGiorgi who also has his studio, plays drums on this track and six others on the album, but the rest of the instruments are played by me. I had originally envisioned this song at a much slower tempo when I first played it on acoustic, but I later decided that it fit better this way. Joe's work on the mixing and post-production made the song sound the way it does since it was a relatively simple track arrangement that needed to be built up through overdubs, live EQ adjustments, and reverb effects. The starlight echoes in the choruses were something he thought of and sent to me in an early mix, and I ended up liking it. The drums are mixed to be pretty thrashy sounding, but I think it fits well with the rest of the tracks. At the end of the day, I am pleased with the way everything turned out.
What was one lesson you learned from the writing and recording process of "Starlight" that you'll apply to future music of yours?
I think one takeaway from this song is that I am capable of writing songs with arrangements that complement each other in a way that makes sense, and also that I can blend genres so that it makes it hard to pinpoint who I sound like, which when I first started writing songs I found quite difficult.
What's next for you?
So I am releasing an acoustic version of my song Chasing Vampires in a few weeks. I also have a music video that I will be releasing on my YouTube channel shortly after the single goes live on streaming platforms. Also, believe it or not, this past fall, when I started grad school, I somehow found time to record 12-15 new songs for another record to follow Blue Reverb. I kind of already have an album name and cover art for it, and I've said what it is in a couple of recent interviews, but for the sake of suspense, I'll just wait to advertise it until it gets closer to being ready to release. Also, my friend Alex is currently working on editing music videos for "Running Out Of Time" and "Other Way" that we shot on a green screen in my basement at my house in NY the weekend before I came back to school. So excited to see those when he finishes editing them.
