Photo Credit: Todd Cooper
It’s easy to forget that our favorite musicians and artists are also human. As consumers of their work, we only see the polished end result of an album or a performance on stage that came on the heels of hours hitting the shed. So when one of our heroes actually opens up and talks about his/her insecurities, it usually comes as a surprise. What could someone who is at the pinnacle of their profession be unsure about? It’s hard to fathom. But as mentioned, our favorite artists are also human and are also subjected to the same conditions that we are.
While some may be better at hiding it than others, Oracle founder and leader Kendrick Scott doesn’t mince words about his doubts, instead he used it for inspiration and has become one of the central themes of his forthcoming album A Wall Becomes A Bridge. Backed by Oracle’s evergreen line up of saxophonist John Ellis, pianist Taylor Eigsti, guitarist Mike Moreno, and bassist Joe Sanders, A Wall Becomes A Bridge also gets a helping hand from Derrick Hodge who is listed as the album’s producer.
“Derrick said, ‘We need to tap into your fears and insecurities and make some art about them,’” Scott shares. “That was amazing to me—that he got me out of my own head.” We recently sat with Scott over the phone to discuss what the process of getting out of his own head looked like and how his latest Blue Note album came into fruition.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity
Congrats on the new record. You mentioned that you hit a bit of a wall when coming up for new material. Can you talk a little bit about that?
It’s funny because the thing wasn’t one of those writer’s block where I couldn’t come up with anything. It was just that I never finished. It was one of those things where I would get up, go to work, but I would never follow through. My head got to me and one of the songs (“Voices”) is actually about that. It’s about the voices in your head telling you it’s not good enough and the voices that say no. For better or worse, this record is partly about me trying to get out of that mental state.
A lot of folks also contributed compositions in this album. What’s the benefit of getting compositions from your peers versus releasing an album of all Kendrick Scott originals?
It goes to the theme of the record. That’s what the wall was. It was my insecurity of feeling like I have to write every note and feeling like I had to be a genius. That’s what stopped me from continuing because I felt like I was comparing myself to other people and other friends of mine. The crazy thing is that I have so many friends that are amazing writers and when you start to compare yourself to anybody, you lose yourself. At that point, I lost myself. What’s the best thing to do when you lose yourself? It’s to get around people that you love. People contribute to your life in so many different ways.
People see the end product and people see the band contributing music to the project, but those guys contributed so much more and really helped me with my mental state by encouraging me. Even something like calling me and asking, “Hey, you alright? It’s okay, we can do this thing. We’ve done it in the past.”
Also, when I’m bringing in my songs… Well, first of all when I bring in my songs I’m always like, “This is terrible, but let’s try it.” But they put life into it and that’s the height of what I think my band does. Everyone takes a certain ownership of the music and they all do it in a different way. Taylor [Eigsti] knows how to lead, Joe [Sanders] knows what to leave out, Mike [Moreno] knows how to create the vibe, and John [Ellis] knows how to get the point and get straight to the melody. You know what I mean?
Then there’s Derrick. I have to talk about him more because he knows how to capture that vision because he’s been inside of the band and is a wonderful musician and producer. He’s probably the main reason why I came out of my shell and decided to do the record. It was because he encouraged me.
I think it’s safe to say that a lot of our readers are musicians and artists also and from the outside looking in a lot of would of them love to be in the position you’re at. So to hear that you still have insecurities can come as a surprise. But I’ve also done a lot of these interviews now and I’m coming to realize more and more that feeling less than is just part of being human.
A metaphor for this is like playing the drums. When I teach my students I tell them that when we’re in the practice room we’re learning to feed the mind and the muscle memory. But when you get on stage, it’s about playing your heart. One thing I tell them is that is that there are two hinderances when you’re performing. First thing is the instrument itself. We have to know the instrument and we have to know how to get around it. The second thing is the ego. The ego is telling you that you suck at every moment and the ego is telling you that you’re killing. And you’re constantly up and down.
One thing in my life that I feel like I’m pretty good at is that when I sit at the drums, I listen to music. If I listen to the instrument then I’m not in the moment. If I focus on this bass drum sound or this cymbal sound, then I’m not in the moment and it takes me out of that. And if I listen to my ego, I’m totally out of that moment. I feel like I reach a state of nirvana when I push those things and thoughts away. Those thoughts never stop, but I get to look at them and laugh at them.
For a musician, if you’re sitting behind your instrument and practice something for two hours and play it 10,000 times you’re going to want to use that. I feel like if you step out of the room with the motive to use that, you’ve already lost. If we take this out of music, the biggest word is balance. For me, the voices are actually what drive us. Kanye has said some crazy stuff, but he said some true stuff when he said, “All of my faults are my superpowers.” I squinted a minute and was like, “Oh shit! That’s right.” They are your superpowers, but do you know how to balance them? The key word is balance and I think I have a good balance when I’m playing the drums. That’s why playing the drums is my refuge. There are other parts of my life where I’m working towards that balance everyday. Working towards family and friends. I think the more and more I achieve that balance, the more and more I work on life outside of music. That wall becomes a bridge.
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