Brad Hammonds is an acoustic guitarist/ singer/songwriter from New York City. His debut album, Through It All, is the sound of an artist discovering another enormous facet of his talent. The Brazz Tree guitarist has earned a reputation as a great and inventive player, and now he has created a body of work that will add another distinction to his portfolio – that of “songwriter.” On Through It All, Hammonds has simplified his music in the best sense of the word, letting the distinctive power of his songs and voice shine through, and what has emerged is the utter soulfulness of his artistry.
Through their genre-defying hybrid of percussive acoustic, jazz, world and folk, Hammonds, along with his partner in Brazz Tree, vocalist/violinist Mazz Swift, have earned the band a devoted fan base touring extensively throughout the country playing colleges, theaters, club and cafes. They received accolades from prestigious press outlets like WNYC/NPR, where they were named one of 2007’s Best Live Performances; a recommended band mention from Paste Magazine, and have played shows at venues such as Joe’s Pub, the Blue Note, the Symphony Space, The Whitney Museum, BAM Café, and the SXSW Festival.
Hammonds has over twenty years of experience as a guitarist in numerous bands in Virginia, Chicago and then New York. And in addition to his involvement in Brazz Tree, Hammonds has concurrently been studying jazz guitar, always looking to expand his vocabulary as a player. It’s resulted in Hammond getting raves from greats like Vernon Reid, who has said of Hammonds, “Brad is a strong player in the Richard Thompson tradition, with a beautifully hypnotic approach.”
But while Hammonds has become known for his guitar work and his instrumental composition prowess, until Through It All, he had never been a lyricist. He explains, “I had never written lyrics, and I was on tour with Brazz Tree, and I wrote ‘The Story Of The Man That Lost Everything’ and had Mazz sing it. It went over really well, and when we got of the road, I wrote about thirty songs in about two weeks”
Hammonds’ songwriting explosion caused a tremendous amount of excitement for him, he got a band and went into the studio. He recounts, “I got great feedback on the results, and as more people heard the songs I was writing and singing, the more confidence I got. I just got into the zone.”
Working with bassist Jason DiMatteo (Chocolate Genius) and drummer John Bollinger (Antony and the Johnsons), Hammonds took a different approach to writing and performing. “I wanted to record more accessible music. In the last six years of Brazz Tree, we’ve done a lot of complex things, and I just felt the need to make it as organic, stripped down and simplified as possible. Jason and John helped me develop a lot of the arrangements; Jason’s love of r&b brought a lot of groove to the songs, and John has a complex style that brought a lot of unexpected elements. We had a great time.”
Brad is planning solo shows to showcase Through It All and he’s assembled a team to promote and market the album, pushing it for film and television opportunities in the fall of 2009. But most of all, Through It All is a document of a musician’s unexpected expansion into new and powerful terrain; retaining the best of his musicianship while going into more accessible and commercial directions. Brad concludes, “Making this album, I had a very clear idea of what I wanted to do, and it shows in the music. It came out exactly the way I wanted to.”