Rising folk-pop singer/songwriter Brenn! takes us track-by-track by way of his intimate, stressed, and soul-baring ‘Upstate’ EP – a cathartic, road-forged report of reckoning and renewal that chases closure throughout highways and lodge rooms, turning heartbreak into movement and religion into ahead momentum.
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Stream: “Days on Finish” – Brenn!
And should you go, I’ll drive my means upstate simply to seek out you…
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Tright here’s an entire world packed inside that promise – certainly one of distance and devotion, of holding on and at last letting go.
Throughout his newest EP Upstate, Alabama-born and primarily based singer/songwriter Brenn! chases which means by way of movement, looking for closure in the identical locations the place love as soon as lived. These songs really feel like open roads and unstated prayers; the quiet ache between religion and doubt, heartbreak and therapeutic.
Constructed on the bones of people storytelling and the heartbeat of contemporary pop, Upstate is Brenn!’s coming-of-age in actual time – a report that turns heartbreak into honesty and movement into momentum. It’s much less about working away and extra about studying when to remain, and what’s value forsaking.
Heard you began consuming
Bought tattoos and a piercing
Yeah, you’ve been trying completely different at me
Took a flight throughout the nation
My first time on the airport
Misplaced my baggage in Chicago
like I misplaced you in Utah
Does it ever cross your thoughts?
I wanna know
Do the mountains name your identify
louder than I did?
Oh, I screamed
and I misplaced my voice for days on finish
– “Days on Finish,” Brenn!
Launched Could 23, 2025 through Darkroom Data and Westward Recordings, Upstate marks a turning level for Brenn!, increasing the world he first constructed on 2024’s debut EP County Line. The place that preliminary assortment launched a small-town dreamer with a knack for heartfelt storytelling, this six-track report finds him stretching past Tuscaloosa’s metropolis limits, each musically and emotionally. It’s the sound of an artist outgrowing previous seasons whereas nonetheless honoring the place he got here from – a mission born between lengthy drives, empty highways, and the gradual realization that some chapters shut in order that others can start.
For Brenn!, Upstate marks each an ending and a starting – the ultimate web page of 1 chapter and the quiet begin of one other. There’s a way of closure working by way of these songs, but in addition renewal; a recognition that progress typically means letting go of the very issues that first outlined you.
“This EP is about my life and every little thing I’ve handled over the previous two years,” Brenn! shares. “It’s a pivotal level in my profession but in addition exhibits me, personally, how I’m in the long run of this season of my life. I hope the individuals who care can really feel this shift as a lot as me.”
Earlier than writing Upstate, Brenn! had already lived a full artistic lifetime inside his debut EP.
The County Line period taught him what it meant to share his world publicly – and what it meant to maneuver on from it. “I imply, a music is a music. It holds a spot in a second. And after the second’s gone, the music loses its contact to me,” he displays. “I don’t have a tendency to carry on to issues that tremendous lengthy. I’m off to the following factor, however I’m very grateful that individuals have resonated with it for thus lengthy.”
That pressure between gratitude and progress hums on the middle of Upstate. The place County Line captured a small-town songwriter processing loss and old flame in actual time, Upstate paperwork what occurs after the storm – the reckoning that follows recognition. It’s the sound of somebody studying to breathe once more, to write down once more, to make one thing that feels true.
If County Line was about discovering his footing, Upstate is about discovering his fireplace once more. After months of artistic restlessness, Brenn! stepped into a brand new chapter surrounded by new vitality. “I went on a writing journey to LA, and I discovered people who obtained me,” he remembers. “I actually loved being round that. I really feel like after I stroll into the session, it’s not like, okay, we’ve got to get one thing, whether or not it’s good or unhealthy. There’s loads of stress on you. So what occurred was I took this demo round to a number of producers in LA and in Nashville, and nobody needed to do it. Not a single individual. They had been like, let’s simply do one thing new. They hated it, to say the least.”
That demo grew to become “Water” – the music that reignited every little thing. “I deliver it in and I’m like, okay guys, everybody’s hated this up to now. If you wish to do one thing else, we completely can,” he says. “Right here it’s. I present it to them and we pump out ‘Water’ within the first session. As quickly as I confirmed them the demo, Jeremy obtained up on his toes. He put his palms on his head. He was like, dude, I hear a lot for this. I’m so excited. And I used to be like, oh my gosh, lastly any individual who will get it. Who sees the imaginative and prescient.”
That spark carried by way of the remainder of Upstate, as Brenn! teamed up with Jeremy Fedryk (Sarcastic Sounds), Haid, and a small circle of collaborators who helped him rediscover his voice. “4 out of the six songs of the EP had been very new and new sounding, new feeling,” he shares. “Nearly like a shift into one thing new, which I really feel is an efficient turning level for this album as a result of it’s exploring loads. I’m going to take my time and see the place it takes me.”
There’s a looseness to Upstate – a freedom that comes from now not chasing successful, however chasing reality. “If I’m being trustworthy, I’ve not had a possibility to sit down down and take a look at a clean web page till proper now,” Brenn! admits. “I used to be caught up in some private stuff from day certainly one of releasing County Line, mainly, and it lasted till I wrote ‘Franklin Home.’ I wrote that, had a bunch of songs able to go, after which went on tour and launched the EP. And now I wish to write an album speaking about being the second decide and being thrown into every little thing and feeling that I’m clearly not adequate for this, however I obtained to do it anyway. So now that’s my idea album. That’s what I’m writing in direction of proper now. And I feel the title of will probably be referred to as ‘Novice at Finest,’ as a result of that’s what I’ve all the time felt like my entire life. I’m the smaller child on the sphere. I’m good, however I’m not nice.”
He laughs, describing his journey like a climb he’s nonetheless in the course of. “Take into consideration should you’re climbing a mountain,” he says. “You get to nearly the highest – what you assume is the highest – and also you’re nearly there, however you want just a bit bit extra to go. I feel that is that. I discovered my footing on this a part of the mountain, and I feel I’m on the prime, however I lookup and there’s far more mountain to go. However I obtained to the place I wanted to go proper now. The EP was the footing that I wanted to get to that subsequent stage.”
Upstate might shut a chapter, nevertheless it additionally clears the trail for the following one – a second of grounding earlier than he takes one other leap.
It’s the sound of somebody catching their breath, regaining perspective, and remembering why they began within the first place. It’s Brenn! regaining management of his artwork, his story, and his sound.
At the same time as he appears to be like towards his subsequent chapter, Brenn! continues to be processing the journey that obtained him right here. The identify Upstate displays each the miles he’s pushed and the teachings discovered alongside the way in which. “While you’re in Alabama, and also you’ve lived there your entire life, you go south to Florida for household journeys,” he says. “I’d by no means been upstate previous Alabama, actually, apart from Tennessee, which continues to be the Deep South to most individuals. And after I was lastly in a relationship and driving loads – plenty of 10, 12-hour drives for nothing, for completely no motive – I obtained to expertise loads of the Midwest, in direction of Michigan and Chicago. It was a great eye-opener for me that individuals are very completely different regardless of the place you go. Not every little thing’s going to be so ‘Alabama,’ and it was a studying expertise to satisfy new individuals.”
“Tradition is so completely different in every single place,” he continues. “I needed to name it ‘Upstate’ as a result of being from the South, lots of people don’t actually make it out of the South. They can’t, if that is sensible. I feel that having that chance could be very superior for me, and I simply needed to incorporate it in there.”
Upstate, then, isn’t only a place. It’s a state of turning into – the upward movement that defines Brenn!’s songwriting.
“Upstate encompasses all the narrative of the earlier EP, in addition to this one, as a result of all these songs occurred touring or after I was up there or making an effort to go up there or one thing like that. All these songs had been born on the street,” he says. “I keep in mind actually, actually, I did a day journey on Thanksgiving final yr to drop this lady off again house to finish the connection. And I wrote ‘Franklin Home’ in my automotive on the way in which house. Half the lyrics had been no guitar, no singing, simply poetry. So it was… most of those songs had been born like that. And I needed to provide a phrase that encompassed every little thing.”
That seek for belonging runs deeper than geography. As a songwriter from Alabama who doesn’t make nation music, Brenn! carries an outsider’s lens even in his personal hometown. “I really feel like there’s not loads of musicians from the deep South that don’t do nation,” he displays. “By no means in my life have I ever slot in with anybody from Alabama. And I really like Alabama – it’s my house – however when I’ve a view on issues being from Alabama, it’s in the end going to be completely different. Being a songwriter from Alabama that doesn’t do nation permits me to have a bizarre tackle issues.”
To him, Upstate symbolizes that distinction – and that drive. “For me, it’s like, okay, I actually drove up the state,” he laughs. “Yeah, I see all of it by way of a special lens.”
“Days on Finish” opens the EP with a rush of vitality that appears like the daylight lastly breaking by way of after an extended, overcast stretch. “I feel it’s a great high-energy music,” Brenn! says. “I don’t have loads of these. Not but, at the least. It bleeds just a little bit from the earlier EP. County Line was extra so about dropping certainly one of my mates – to not demise, they didn’t die or something – however dropping certainly one of my mates and them leaving and shifting, after which all my mates rapidly simply moved out of state due to school, after which I’m left on their own.”
That ache of separation nonetheless lingers in “Days on Finish,” however Brenn! transforms it into movement, discovering catharsis in melody and motion. When he sings, “Does it ever cross your thoughts? I wanna know do the mountains name your identify louder than I did?” he’s each confronting absence and acknowledging acceptance – how distance reshapes love with out ever erasing it. “I feel ‘Days on Finish’ simply grew to become one thing means greater than I ever anticipated,” he displays. “We ran with it, and it’s a high-energy music and other people like that. It was a great turning level.”
I don’t wanna watch you go
I don’t wanna see you permit
Possibly you’ve been cut up aside
Solely by the mountain peaks
Nobody’s gonna make you keep
However nobody else is telling you to go away
Possibly you’ve been cut up in two
Solely by the mountain peaks
Does it ever cross your thoughts?
I wanna know
Do the mountains name your identify
louder than I did?
Oh, I screamed
and I misplaced my voice for days on finish
If “Days on Finish” lights the fuse, “Upstate” is the explosion of feeling that follows. Written in thirty minutes in a lodge toilet in Koreatown, the music captures uncooked honesty at its breaking level. “I wrote that one in half-hour within the lodge toilet of the Line Resort down in LA,” Brenn! remembers. “I introduced it to Jeremy the following morning and mentioned, ‘Hey, I wrote this final evening, can we perhaps pump out a demo in the present day?’”
The observe aches with anger and give up in equal measure, its verses trembling with the sting of self-awareness: “I’ve all I want in you / However you’ve gotten all that you really want.” By the point he reaches the bridge – “And should you go, I’ll drive my means upstate simply to seek out you / You don’t know the way excessive I’ve climbed up simply to fall by way of” – the emotion crests like a confession. “It’s undoubtedly a music I wrote in a time the place I used to be being trustworthy and indignant at what had occurred,” Brenn! admits. “I feel it matches properly within the EP, and it feels like a people music, however the lyrics distinction the instrumental in a means that I feel it deserves the main focus observe title.”
And should you go, I’ll drive
My means upstate simply to seek out you
You don’t know the way excessive
I’ve climbed up simply to fall by way of
For you, oh-ooh, for you
And I don’t wanna watch you waste
Your entire life tryna discover a motive
I’m indignant
And also you’re simply bitter at your self
So cool down, dig your grave
Proper the place you had been advised to be, and
Don’t come again, simply depart me watching
I’ll die right here whereas I anticipate you
Whereas Upstate is about launch, “Franklin Home” is about reckoning. It’s the music that closes each the EP and the chapter of life that impressed it.
“I obtained again from a separate 20-hour drive that occurred two months after I dropped this lady off for Thanksgiving,” Brenn! explains. “She had texted me, was like, I don’t wish to see you. I don’t wish to speak anymore. I don’t wish to be your girlfriend anymore, no matter. So I drove up there 11 hours and I used to be like, please see me. Drove again after she didn’t wish to see me. I dropped every little thing off after which sat down after the drive and simply checked out all my notes app issues about what I used to be writing about after I was considering. That poetry factor I used to be speaking about from two months earlier than. I used to be taking a look at it. I used to be like, whoa. I simply begin strumming and I simply sing the primary verse of ‘Franklin Home’ right into a voice memo and the remainder is historical past.”
The music captures heartbreak in its purest, most unguarded type: “Thanksgiving was like Hell, however I give thanks that I’m alive.” The lyric alone appears like a thesis for Brenn!’s world – uncooked ache, met with reluctant grace. “I feel it’s a kind of songs that’s so trustworthy, so real, so for actual within the second,” he says. “You’ll be able to’t sit in a session and write one thing like that, or at the least I couldn’t.”
I’ve obtained tales to inform,
however no means to inform ’em
I’ve obtained phrases to get out,
however they’ll ship me to Hell
I wager you’re drunk on the Franklin,
blowin’ off all that grief that I gave you
It’s chilly whenever you’re right here
and it’s chilly whenever you’re not
It hit me like a bullet,
however I took it ’trigger I’m robust
And I’m the closest to the person,
the person I by no means was
And I’m drivin’ house
from the worst evening alive
Thanksgiving was like Hell,
however I give thanks that I’m alive
I don’t care that I don’t imply it
I don’t carе that I can’t cover it like I used to
What’s thе use to?
I’ll survive, however I’ll by no means get well
The ache comes and goes
like scars with the climate
I’m caught with the pains within the place
of all of the love I nonetheless have for you
I’m not mad at you
I assumed I might change you for higher
All I did was break you endlessly
You wanted saving,
and I couldn’t prevent this time
All I did was break you endlessly
The remainder of Upstate deepens the identical themes of longing, religion, and self-discovery by way of completely different shades. “Water,” the observe that reignited his artistic spark, stands as Brenn!’s religious core – an intimate dialog with God that bridges his religion and artistry. “I’m a very large Jesus freak,” he shares. “This music was a few level in my life the place I used to be going by way of a season of like, okay, I can not attain the Lord in any respect. I can not hear Him. I’m in the dead of night. I can’t see. I can’t hear. I can’t really feel nothing. And that’s what was particular about it to me.”
“iwbtotsy” – quick for I Wouldn’t Be the One to Save You – channels the identical emotional urgency by way of its pulsing drums and craving vocals, whereas “Pure Catastrophe,” one of many oldest songs in his catalog, provides a glimpse into his early songwriting years. “That’s one that individuals have been asking me for a very long time,” Brenn! admits with a shrug. “We lastly obtained it executed, and we didn’t have one other music to placed on the EP. So we threw that on there simply because individuals requested for it.” Collectively, these songs spherical out Upstate’s emotional topography – from religious drought to renewal, from heartbreak to therapeutic, from working away to lastly arriving.
At its core, Upstate is about studying to maneuver – by way of heartbreak, by way of doubt, by way of the quiet areas that come after one thing ends.
It’s a portrait of a songwriter rising into his personal voice, tracing the space between who he was and who he’s nonetheless turning into. Each music feels lived in, like pages from a journal left open on the passenger seat.
For Brenn!, that journey is as a lot about religion and forgiveness as it’s about self-definition. “I’ve taken away that I ought to by no means make one thing like Upstate once more and be a kind of artists that simply recycles their sounds,” he says. “So what’s executed in Upstate is completed, and I’ll by no means return to it. I’ll all the time proceed to develop in my creativity, hopefully.”
There’s a humility in that admission, but in addition a quiet confidence – the type that comes from figuring out the street forward will all the time be longer, and that the climb is what provides the view its which means.
Upstate captures Brenn! in movement: Bruised, grateful, and able to start once more. Expertise the complete report through our under stream, and peek inside Brenn!’s Upstate EP with Atwood Journal as he takes us track-by-track by way of the music and lyrics of his newest launch.
Just like the infinite climb he describes, Brenn!’s Upstate leaves us the place all nice tales do – someplace between the ache of what’s been misplaced and the quiet promise of what’s nonetheless to return.
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Stream: ‘Upstate’ – Brenn!
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“Days on Finish”
“I feel it’s a great high-energy music. I don’t have loads of these. Not but, at the least. It bleeds just a little bit from the earlier EP. Earlier EP was extra so about dropping certainly one of my mates. To not demise, they didn’t die or something, however dropping certainly one of my mates and them leaving and shifting after which all my mates rapidly simply moved out of state due to school after which I’m left on their own, no matter, blah, blah, blah. However this one specific pal was my greatest pal after which ‘4runner,’ ‘Rearview,’ blah, blah, blah. That’s all. It’s all about this pal. And I feel ‘Days on Finish’ simply grew to become one thing means greater than I ever anticipated. And though it’s no ‘moonbeam, ice cream’ large, however to me it’s large and I feel we simply rolled with it. We ran with it and it’s a high-energy music and other people like that. And I put that on the EP as primary as a result of it’s high-energy and it was common. I feel that’s it. It was a great turning level.”
“Water”
“Nicely, I’m a very large Jesus freak. So every time I’m not on the stage, every time I’m not touring, even when I’m touring, really, all you hear me speaking about is Jesus and the way He saved my life, how good He’s. And I really like theology. I really like church historical past. Jesus is simply my goat. And I feel that this music was a few level in my life the place I used to be going by way of a season of like, okay, I can not attain the Lord in any respect. I can not hear Him. I’m in the dead of night. I can’t see. I can’t hear. I can’t really feel nothing. And that’s what was particular about it to me is as a result of it was concerning the factor that I really like probably the most. All these different songs are about oh, this lady, blah, this different lady, this… Oh, this example. However that is about my valuable, my every little thing. And I wish to do extra songs that aren’t fairly on the nostril about Jesus and the Lord, however nonetheless give an authentic really feel. And that’s one thing that I’m actually working in direction of and praying in direction of that I’m capable of articulate these issues. When you’ve ever heard the music ‘River’ by Leon Bridges. I really like that music. It’s nice. And it has loads of Christ-like undertones. I feel that’s why I used to be so excited when somebody was like, whoa, this music is so good and we should always do it. So I kicked it off and I began selling it and it did its factor. So I’m very grateful.”
“iwbtotsy”
“I wouldn’t be keen to save lots of you. That is one I wrote all on my own. Nobody helped me. I organized it and clearly I had assist, however every little thing closing was me and man, I don’t know, I simply produced this demo out on my pc. I took it to the studio. They had been like, yeah, this sounds sick. And it’s sort of simply the identical vibe as ‘Franklin Home’ simply advised just a little in a different way and just a little extra of an pressing really feel. I really feel sonically, it sounds very craving and pressing. It’s one which didn’t get as a lot love as I needed it to, however on the finish of the day, that’s not likely what issues. Nevertheless it’s undoubtedly a enjoyable one to play stay as a result of when the drums are available in, the entire crowd is like, ‘Oh, okay, wait a minute. That is really cool.’”
“Pure Catastrophe”
“That’s one that individuals have been asking me for a very long time. I wrote it across the identical time as I wrote ‘4runner,’ perhaps like just a few months after. And it simply sat within the demos for a very long time. After which we lastly obtained it executed, and we didn’t have one other music to placed on the EP as a result of I don’t write loads of songs. And we threw that on there simply because individuals requested for it after which we had it.”
“Upstate”
“I wrote that one in half-hour within the lodge toilet of the Line Resort down in LA in Koreatown, and it turned out actually good. I used to be like, ‘Yo, Jeremy, I wrote this final evening. I needed to see if we might perhaps pump out a demo in the present day or one thing.’ He was like, okay. And the primary demo, the 2 verses are utterly completely different. They’re completely different phrases, completely different melodies and every little thing. And I used to be like, I’m not really feeling this demo, blah, blah, blah, so I’m going to go work on it once more. So the following day I deliver it over and I lastly discovered a verse that caught with me just a little bit. So we recorded it and we had been dying to get a bridge in there. So we write the chords for the bridge they usually gave me some ideas and I used to be like, guys, simply go downstairs. We went to Goal and I purchased a Change so we might play Mario Kart. So that they went downstairs, arrange the Change, they usually gave me quarter-hour on my own, and I wrote the bridge and we recorded it that evening and all of the lyrics and the harmonies and every little thing. So yeah, it simply got here collectively actually properly. And I can keep in mind listening to it again on the audio system with them, they usually had been like, ‘Dude, that is certainly one of your largest songs.’ It’s undoubtedly a music I wrote in a time the place I used to be being trustworthy and indignant at what had occurred. So I feel it matches properly within the EP, and it feels like a people music, however I feel the lyrics distinction the instrumental in a means that I feel it deserves the main focus observe title.”
“Franklin Home”
“I obtained again from a separate 20-hour drive that occurred two months after I dropped this lady off for Thanksgiving. She had texted me, was like, I don’t wish to see you. I don’t wish to speak anymore. I don’t wish to be your girlfriend anymore, no matter. So I drove up there 11 hours and I used to be like, please see me, blah, blah, blah. Drove again after she didn’t wish to see me. I dropped every little thing off after which sat down after the drive and simply checked out all my notes app. Issues about what I used to be writing about after I was considering. That poetry factor I used to be speaking about from two months earlier than. I used to be taking a look at it. I used to be like, whoa, I simply begin strumming and I simply sing the primary verse of ‘Franklin Home’ right into a voice memo and the remainder is historical past. All of it got here to me so cohesively, and I feel it’s a kind of songs that’s so trustworthy, so real, so for actual within the second. You’ll be able to’t sit in a session and write one thing like that, or at the least I couldn’t.”
“Yeah, and I feel it’s means more durable to duplicate feeling with data of the sensation than simply with the ability to really feel it out within the second when it’s occurring. So whenever you go right into a session and also you’re like, ‘Oh, let’s write a music about this.’ All they’ve is data of that second. Whereas whenever you’re within the second, you should seize the second and write with the sensation that you’ve. Don’t even assume. When you’re in a second like that and also you’re considering like, oh, properly this verse must go right here and perhaps a pre after which reduce the pre in half after which perhaps double the refrain. That’s data that doesn’t even work in a second like that as a result of what comes out in a second like that’s simply so… That’s what individuals need.”
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