Chelsea Cutler and Jeremy Zucker drove by Brentwood Road, and the direction of their artistic lives changed.
Brent was born. First, with the five-track Brent EP in May 2019, followed by the five-track Brent II EP in February 2021.
“When we were coming up with the name for the first one, it was a big conversation,” Zucker tells Uproxx in a joint interview with Cutler. “We wanted to create something that had a name of its own that didn’t have anything attached to it. We wanted a name that would become sort of a thing. We got attached to the idea of it being a name, and we were going through names. It was literally on the way home from the cabin where we did that original Brent. We passed Brentwood Road. Brent just sounded right. For a second, we were like, ‘Is that too weird? Does that not make sense? Who is Brent?’ The more we started talking about it, the more natural it felt.”
Brent III, their first-ever collaborative full-length album out now via Mercury Records, captures Cutler and Zucker in their most naturally reflective and vulnerable states.
Cutler and Zucker talked all things Brent with Uproxx below.
Brent III — and your entire Brent world — is described as “home away from home.” Are there pieces of you that only feel at home within Brent?
Jeremy Zucker: Honestly, when we started, I would say yeah. That was one of the first times that I’ve really embraced wholesomeness as a young adult, and that’s the first time I felt like it was cool to cater to this feeling of wholesomeness and comfort. But now, I definitely experience it outside of Brent.
Chelsea Cutler: Yeah, I mean, I think that making Brent was one of the first times that I also experienced the intersection of collaboration and friendship in the music industry. Obviously, I think we’re both really fortunate. We do a lot of collaborations and have a lot of friends that we work with frequently in the music industry, but it definitely kind of defined collaboration for me and working relationship for me.
Brent III was recorded in several locations, but “A-frame” was born in an A-frame cabin in Big Bear, and the Brent universe metaphorically lives in a cabin in the woods. So, what does the Brent cabin represent to each of you?
JZ: A safe place. Where you are doesn’t matter; it just matters who you are with.
CC: I think of the Brent world as current nostalgia, if that makes sense. Well, I just think of Brent as this place where I get to make really, really special music and bring my inner child’s creative vision to life while experiencing watching movies, getting food together, and laughing.
JZ: It’s just like summer camp.
CC: Yeah. It’s the most raw human experience, and it’s very vulnerable to exist that much in the present with someone.
I like the phrase “current nostalgia.” None of us can predict what our future self will miss most about the version of life we’re living right now, but what do you think you will cherish most about this time with Brent III as time passes?
JZ: That’s a good question. The thing is, you never know what you took for granted. That’s why you’re taking it for granted.
CC: I know I’m going to be really intentional about enjoying [Brent Forever: The Tour] because it’s our first time touring together. I hope there will be a time in the future when we’ll tour it again. You never know. That could be a fun thing to revisit in some years. But because we don’t know the future, I think I’m going to try to be really intentional about just cherishing each night and even all the time we’ll spend together on off days.
When you’re in the thick of making a Brent record, do you notice a shift in yourself, whether it be your behaviors, perspectives, or enjoying the frivolous things, more than when making any other music?
CC: I would say I had a pretty bizarre and all-over-the-place year, so I would be the first to take accountability that I feel like — definitely, when we had weeks of writing, it felt like an escape and a beautiful thing. And also, there were times that I wish I was more present, which is why I’m obviously trying to really lock in for tour.
JZ: Since it’s outside of our solo artist projects, it’s always an opportunity for Chelsea and I to make music and feel like we’re really good at what we do, where it isn’t attached to either one of our individual identities and it feels less dire and less critical. It feels lighter, in a lot of ways. That’s the most striking thing about it for me.
CC: That’s something I’d love to carry forward into music making in my own career. too.
It’s interesting. In 2019, around the first Brent EP, Chelsea talked about how it represented an opportunity to get away from criticism and music industry pressures. Has that need to escape escalated as you’ve gotten further into your solo careers?
JZ: For me, definitely. It ebbs and flows. Sometimes, I’m super down to work with the pop songwriters and just to be open to new things, but I almost always inevitably need to retreat because when you hear too many other people’s voices, it’s easier to lose the sound of your own. Every once in a while, I need to reset and just be away from everything to get perspective.
What perspective did Brent III give you?
CC: At least for me, I definitely had more fun and felt that special kind of feeling in my chest around a lot of the songs that we made. I think, sometimes, in my own music, I just put so much pressure on myself that I am not even having that much fun making it. I feel like that’s good perspective to carry forward.
Speaking of pressure, you are always under pressure from the fans for more Brent. Why was it finally time to give in and do another Brent record?
JZ: The pressure from fans never really got to me. I just knew it was something we were inevitably going to do. So, I was like, we’ll do it when the time is right.
CC: More than anything, it was the first time in a couple of years that our schedules made sense to do. it.
I was going to ask why it was finally time to do a full-length album. Was it just as simple as logistics?
CC: Honestly, I don’t think either of us went into it expecting that to happen.
JZ: We just had so much more to say.
CC: I think it had been a long time since we’d written together, and then we also removed the physical restraint of just spending a week on a project. We gave ourselves a bunch of weeks over the course of a year, thinking, Let’s just keep writing and keep trying to beat what we have. And then, we ended up just having so many songs that genuinely felt so special and worthy of keeping on the project. So, we just kind of came to a place where we’re like, Well, this has become an album totally by accident.
Which song dictated the direction of the rest of the album?
JZ: When we made ‘And The Government Too!’ was a pretty decisive moment. That was the first song that really felt like Brent.
Why?
CC: It’s a very intangible thing that’s hard to describe.
JZ: For me, it was like the marriage of a heartstring, desperate longing song, which Chelsea and I have written a lot in the past, and pairing that with a really big energy. We knew that we wanted big reverb — the sound of the room in the recordings — so this really beautiful close intimate song just blows up into a massive thing. I remember when we were writing it, we start slamming on the guitars, and the whole room reverberates. We kind of just knew — I don’t know if we ever had a conversation about it. But that’s what Brent always felt like to us. Brent III, specifically.
Individually and together, you have always been exceptional at using outsized, uninhibited emotion — whether sonically or lyrically — to elevate the beautiful minutiae often overlooked in our daily lives. Brent III romanticizes everything because romanticization shouldn’t be reserved for romantic love. Do you constantly just take notes, or where does this bottomless pit of anecdotal hyper-specific lyricism come from?
JZ: [Laughs] Life!
CC: No, literally. Even with ‘And The Government Too!,’ it was funny. We were just having a literal conversation, and I remember Jeremy having that line, ‘I would scream at the stars / For keeping us apart.’ And then, he started laughing and was like, ‘And the government, too!’ I was like, ‘Bro, just say that.’ It was awesome. I think so much of our lyrics come from just literal pieces of conversations between us, which is probably why it feels familiar and so real.
Why did you want “Good Things” to be the last song people hear?
JZ: The lyric is, ‘Good things never stay,’ and it ends with this massively dramatic melody lead. When we were writing, it feels like a grand finale. It feels like flipping the page and closing the book. Everything that is special doesn’t last forever because if it lasts forever, the moments aren’t special.
Is “Good Things” your ode, or farewell, to Brent?
CC: Thematically and sonically, for sure. Lyrically, we were kind of just storytelling a bit with it. The way it crescendos into this massive moment, and then breaks down. Jeremy actually ripped the audio of some home videos from my parents. The way the song ends feels really spectacular.
Where did those embedded home videos come from?
CC: It was Jerm’s idea. He asked if I had any home videos, and my parents were so excited. They sent, I think, an hour straight of compiled home videos that they’d put together. Jerm ripped some really special moments from it. I think that embodies that nostalgia we’ve talked about. Listening to it again, I feel like working on Brent nurtures the inner child. To get to make music with a good friend and being creative with a good friend and get to just romanticize your life and live out all these emotions, hearing my parents and my family’s audio at the end, it’s definitely very emotional for me to wrap the project up that way.
As per the Brent bylaws, you each contributed a solo song. But are there any other songs on the album that could, in theory, also be a solo song?
CC: I think we have a few that particularly represented stories in our individual personal lives more so than others. I would say “Ashes & Rush” for me, and “Government” for you.
JZ: Yeah. Usually, though, the chorus will be more general, and then each of us do a verse where we can write about our own stuff in relation. If the chorus is the thesis, then the verse is our supporting paragraph.
It’s an obvious question because this is your first collaborative full-length album, and every album is different from the last. But what really differentiates Brent III from the past two EPs?
CC: The hope is, as you continue to grow and mature as a person, you can honor the complexity of your feelings a little bit more maturely. Hopefully, that translates in the music. Another thing about Brent III is we tackled some subject matters that I thought were pretty cool.
Such as?
JZ: “Ashes & Rust”?
CC: Yeah, “Ashes & Rust,” we wrote about my granddad, and it’s about generational trauma. “Government” is about an international, long-distance relationship.
JZ: And something as ridiculous as the government getting involved in people’s personal lives; having a say over relationships is insane.
CC: I love “Terrible Things,” too. I just love that feeling of a crush.
JZ: And the irony of calling the song “Terrible Things,” but [the lyric] is really, “Is that such a terrible thing?” It’s a very conversational phrase.
CC: Well, yeah, because starting to like someone and starting to notice and want all of those things about a person is terrifying. So, your visceral reaction is like, Oh, no, please don’t!
The album is a mosaic of 11 little stories. I have interpreted it as reveling in simple pleasures and pure romance. Do you see a narrative through line?
JZ: I think seeing the romance or beauty in simple things and not taking things for granted feels like a bit of a through line. Maybe an even deeper through line is the album is a safe place where we can talk about these things.
CC: I think Brent has always been a reflection of Jeremy and I having a close enough friendship to have these intimate and vulnerable conversations about things across all facets of our lives. The fact you have 11 songs about, as you described it, 11 different stories represents true friendship. Being able to talk openly about our feelings and just be there for each other.
What is your primary hope for Brent Forever: The Tour?
JZ: To cry on stage every night?
CC: No, I don’t want that. That would be emotionally taxing.
JZ: I’m just excited to give the show to the fans. I feel like we’re really doing something for the people that the project means a lot for. We’re really doing it up, so to speak, and really putting together an amazing experience for people.
CC: I will say, selfishly, I’m pretty stoked because it’s a really cyclical industry, and there’s so much of put out a project, tour that project, put out another project, tour that project. It’s nice to break the cycle a little bit and get to do something collaboratively — something that’s a little bit, again, outside of our individual careers and individual cycles. It’s definitely refreshing, to be honest, and I feel like it obviously is going to translate into us bringing something to the shows that fans wouldn’t get by coming to our individual shows.
Are you afraid to let Brent go?
CC: Oh, wow. Let me think. I guess I just don’t feel it has to be so finite. That’s the thing about music: It always exists. I mean, we could wake up when we’re 40 and go make another EP. There doesn’t have to be any definitive finality around it. I think it’s cool to live in this grey area of not necessarily needing to close the door on anything. Life is so long, and you never know where we’ll land with it later.
JZ: It’s alive forever. Brent forever.
