Bruno Major on latest album ‘To Let A Good Thing Die’

Bruno Major releases his sophomore album, To Let a Good Thing Die’. Within the ten tracks, the singer-songwriter cultivates a distinctive intimacy that seeps itself into each song. From track to track, To Let a Good Thing Die unravels to tell vulnerable and personal stories, held up by the poetic direction in his lyrics. We chat to Bruno Major about the construction of his second album and the growth that produced this album. 

I hear that the sophomore slump is a big stigma and hurdle. Did you feel that for this album?
I think it did a little bit. I was aware of that narrative before I started making it. You know when somebody tells you that a film is really bad, but then you watch it and it wasn’t that bad? If someone hadn’t told you, then you would’ve said that the film was shit. It was a bit of that. I was expecting it to be really difficult, but in some ways, it was easier because I had so much time to do it. I didn’t give myself a deadline and I promised myself I would only hand it in when it was ready.

In that way, it was simpler. I had touring to deal with. I was going away and touring for a month, then coming back and going into the studio, and I have like two different characters. The guy that goes on tour is an indestructible soldier and gets on with it. The guy in the studio is a really delicate, vulnerable butterfly that thinks about his feelings and opens himself up. Splitting between those two people was the most difficult part. 

Do you think that the first album’s deadline structure that you followed made it easier for you to be that delicate person, as you mentioned?
I guess so, yeah! That’s what I’m always out to achieve in my music anyway, [just] total honesty. I never want to make music to be a ‘single’, or to get on a radio station or to be a certain tempo, or for any reason other than that I want it to be whatever it should be naturally. It was quite nice to have an aesthetic flag in the sand. When you make your first album, I could’ve made a heavy metal, or hip hop album, or a calming ambient album, but I didn’t. I chose to make the album that I made and everything from that point forward has context and is a development and continuation of something pre-existing. In some ways that was really nice because it gives you a blueprint to start from, but at the same time, it’s like, ‘oh I can’t make a heavy metal album’. 

You still could! 
Watch this space for album three!

The continuity point you make is interesting to note because I noticed that the drums on this album sometimes have a bit more emphasis to them.

Did that feel like a gamble at all because you had cemented a sound through the first album?
With the first album, putting drums on that stuff was so experimental to me because I’m basically writing jazz standards. I’m always trying to write ‘There Will Never Be Another You’, or ‘Autumn Leaves’… ‘Fly Me to the Moon’… That’s my lineage and where my main inspiration comes from. The decision to put A-28 kicks and snares on it felt kind of mental when I did the first album. With this one, because I made that palette, it was like ‘ok, where can we go from here?’ Working with Phairo, who was the same co-producer on both albums, we have such a natural creative synergy now. I was much more comfortable with letting him explore and exploring the production side of things together. 

Do you think you would’ve been able to get as much detail from your stories as you have?
I had the privilege of working with a lot of very good producers. Some really famous ones that have had mind-blowing commercial success. I think I worked with at least ten before I met [Phairo]. Although they were obviously incredibly talented, everything that I made with them ended up smelling like someone else’s tee-shirt. With [Phairo], he’s got a very deep understanding of music.

He feels music in the same way that I do. In a very ear-based way. He understands the importance of a song, and how music can be used to be bring out the emotion of a lyric. He’s got an extremely positive outlook on life in general. I can be quite melancholy and sincere and overly cerebral at times. I can write a song and six months later go to record it and be like, ‘oh maybe this song’s not that good’. Whereas, [Phairo] will hear it and be like, ‘this song’s fucking dope and we’re going to record it’. I need that. It’s a really good combo, the pair of us. 

The ear-based quality and listenability quality to your music is worth paying attention to, because on all the tracks, it feels like you’re singing directly to someone. 

Can you talk about that?
I often get people saying that about my voice. That it feels very intimate and very direct. The thing for me is that I’m not really a singer. What I mean by that is that I can’t do runs like Beyoncé, or belt high notes like Lewis Capaldi. What I do have is an ability to write songs and an ability to feel those lyrics and convey the feeling I have for those lyrics in a very profound way. When I sing into a microphone, all I’m thinking about is the words and the story and singing it with the right melody. I kind of do it in a conversational way. On top of that, because I sing so quietly and I’m almost whispering at times. I suppose that coupled with the act that I don’t really use any reverb, [makes it] sound dry, and like I’m sitting right next to you. 

I admire that you have that confidence about you voice, and that awareness about it. 
I’ve never had vocal lessons, but some of my favourite singers are the ones that have the most unique voices. Randy Newman, you wouldn’t call him a singer by any stretch of the imagination, but he can make you cry… All of these people, if they had gone for vocal coaching from an early age, they wouldn’t sound like they sound. In that sense, I’m really grateful that I’ve found my voice in that way. 

Do you feel like your stories into songs, or do use songs as a means to make thoughts into stories?
It’s a bit of both, because I write about things that have happened to me and feelings that I have. It’s funny because I’m someone who [my] job is to write about [my] feelings, but I actually have real trouble talking about my feelings. On a day to day level, when it comes to my personal relationships and my life, I find it impossible to sit down and talk about how I feel about somebody.

There have been several times in my life where I’ve had to write songs to people. I’ve put my thoughts and feelings into a song and sent it to them because it describes how I feel far better than I can tell them through words, which is a strange thing. Sometimes I’ll write a song and look at it and be like, ‘wow, I feel like that?’ It’s very easy to say things, and it’s not hard to lie, you just put words in the write order, but in a song, it’s impossible to write a song you care about when you don’t really feel something. 

Does that make you more of a write on your own, and then bring the idea to someone, or do you like to flesh it out with others?
It depends! There’s quite a few co-writes on this new album, probably more so than the first album. That’s probably because I found creative relationships on a writing level that I was really happy with and wanted to continue. The songs that I’m most proud of, I’ve written myself. It’s funny because when you’re writing a song by yourself, you don’t talk. You’re not sitting there mumbling out loud… The whole thing is a very subconscious process where you’re sitting at the piano playing chords, and the words are tumbling out, and you write it on your iPad, and then go back. It’s all internal.

When you’re co-writing you have to converse, and something always gets lost in translation… Something is always constantly getting lost in translation and it’s exacerbated when you’re trying to write a song with someone because it’s such an intense form of communication. Unless you have a very deep understanding, on a personal and creative level with the person you’re working with, it’s pretty hard to co-write. I feel very lucky [to have worked with] Finneas, Emily Elbert, Dan McDougall, Xamvolo, Raelee Nikole. 

Which songs on the album felt like more of a fight to complete?
There were a few really tough ones on this album! I’ll Sleep When I’m Older started when I was hungover one morning with my friend Dan McDougall. We started writing that and gave up because we were too hungover. Then, I went to LA and met up with Emily Elbert. We wrote the majority of the lyrics, and then I came back to London and worked with Dan again. We ended up changing the time signature and the whole feel of the thing. I put it on guitar, and then we recorded a demo.

Then, I took that demo to Phairo and it took months and months to record and we did a few different versions. I really had to chip away at that one. Whereas, The Most Beautfiful Thing, I wrote that with Finneas and it took us about two hours. Then I came home with Phairo and just botched it out. It just fell out and was super easy. With writing, more often than not, it’s easy for me. Generally speaking, the production is something I have to chip away at. Very occasionally is it the other way around.