Rule maker

Back-porch Dennis Brennan goes uptown

by John O'Neill

It's no surprise that Dennis Brennan was able to pull off this masterstroke album called Rule No. 1, but somehow it still managed to sneak up on us. And we have no one to blame but ourselves. You see, Brennan would show up on most Wednesday nights, squat down on his amp, and lay out several of hours' worth of quality roots music. You knew the guy was for real: after all, he wore ratty Chuck Taylor's, and he peppered his set with covers by Barry and the Remains, Arthur Alexander, and by Jimmy Reeves. And, while the draft beer slowly simmered in our brain pan, we'd cluck and nod approvingly because we were in on the references. For almost two years Brennan hypnotized us into thinking we had the flash on him. We'd show; he'd play; it was always good; and then it would happen again in a week. So spoiled and fooled were we.

When the new Rule No. 1 (Esca) showed up, we thought we knew exactly what we were getting, especially since so much of his live show is reflected in his recordings. His debut, 1995's Jack-in-the-Pulpit, and '97's follow-up, Iodine in the Wine (both on Upstart/Rounder), had already established him not only as a hidden, local gem, but also as the East Coast answer to Chuck Prophet.

Penning stripped-down, heartland-style odes to busted hearts, redemption, misery, and crimes of passion, Brennan, like Prophet, put a less-traditional, interpretive spin on Americana, beginning with Pulpit's opening number "I'm Falling Down." The album became an instant winner in the critic's circle; and it was easy to see that Brennan was heavily under the spell of '60s AM radio, honing his talents in the 30 years he'd spent playing in various bands (already a vet at 14, Brennan and his band opened for the Remains at Westborough Town Hall). Then there was Iodine, the working-class-stories album that showcased stronger lyrics and raised the bar with a sublime beauty that guys like Paul Westerberg are still trying to catch.

Live, we caught much of what would become Rule, knowing it was obvious this was to be his next step to a Dave Alvin-style of roots oblivion. Let's say, we thought it would be a well-crafted disc with smart songs that, except for a handful of fanatics and with an occasional mention on NPR, would gracefully spiral out of sight by late spring, leaving us lamenting how underrated Brennan is.

Instead, we got the shock of the year when those simple little ditties that were hammered out over a couple of years' worth of weeknight gigs emerged recently not as the Iodine sequel but as the next step in a prolific career. Back-porch Dennis Brennan has gone uptown, and Rule No. 1 is his most diverse, intense, and interesting album yet. It's less a classic, cohesive album than it is a collection of moods.

"The contrast is pretty marked, but I don't care. That's how they used to make albums," Brennan says. "I'm a singles guy, I lose interest. I didn't set out to do [the album] like that, but I have all these songs. I held some songs back because they were poppy. I wouldn't have put `Going Down Gracefully' on Iodine.

"I also had a co-producer [Paul Bryan] for the first time," he adds. "It's good to have someone else's opinion, and I didn't want to argue with myself all the time!"

Whatever his magic needed, Brennan's still retained a knack for storytelling: there are the expected out-of-love loners and social losers hitchhiking the road to down-and-out. Now, though, rather than make a sleepy bid for your attention, Brennan is just as likely to catch it with the aural equivalent of an elbow to the ribs. Where Iodine succeeded on its strength of restraint, Rule No. 1 does just the opposite. The epic-story roots rock that defined the earlier discs are supplemented with a variety of styles. Opening with the Hammond-powered grit of "Got My Own," Brennan quickly shifts gears into the bossa nova, "Going Down Gracefully" (with a great backing vocal by the soon-to-be-big Merrie Amsterberg), and then flips over to the R&B-charged garage rocker "Keep Me Standing." "Where Did We Go Wrong" finds him journeying to Muscle Shoals, Alabama, to take a second unmistakable stab at Arthur Alexander (his first being the great "Lonely Just Like Me" update, "Theresa," on the first disc). But where Alexander's heartbreak was a sad fact, Brennan turns it into a bad dream that makes you bolt upright with the gin sweats. "Dream in Six," the most adventurous of the songs, turns from a galloping rocker into a quasi-psychedelic pop rave with Brennan intoning `I can hear you,' while Duke Levine's guitar takes off for the horizon. It, like the rest of the album, is a result of what Brennan is able to accomplish with little more than an uncompromising passion and a stellar back-up band (besides Levine and Amsterberg, Boston legend Barrence Whitfield, Morphine's Jerome Deupree, saxophonist Tom Hall, and the Gravel Pit make guest appearances).

"I've been really, really lucky in that I've never had to make a compromise. I've never had a label guy come in and say, `I don't hear a single.' If a record company believes in you enough to sign you, they should get out of the way. [I'll] make the record and deal with it," says Brennan with a chuckle. "I know what I'm doing. Give me the money, get out of the way, and then sell the damn thing! Ray Charles is the classic example. It's the way I want to work, and I won't work any other way."

If Brennan sounds either a little bit arrogant or, at the least, totally naive to the ways of the record business, he isn't. He's just a guy who, after three decades in the music business, is sure of what he wants out of the game. He isn't rich, but he is well respected; and while many of his contemporaries would be considering Life After Rock, Brennan is still hungry enough to be putting out his best work to date. Compromise, after all, isn't a valid option.

"It's hard to balance daily life and a family and be a musician," he says during an interview at Vincent's, where he plays frequently, as he jerks his thumb toward the building across the street. "I used to work there at [David] Clark, and I'd come here for liquid lunch. It can be tough. I just decided not to give in."