Interview: The Beamish Brothers
The Beamish Brothers, consisting of brothers Jeremy and Ben have begun their year with the release of the vulnerable, emotionally jarring “Kills Me Every Time”. They piece together driving harmonies to articulate and magnify the pain of being manipulated and baited by your own feelings. Have a read of the Q&A with the brothers below!
Originally named The Beamish Boys, the two brothers are now releasing music under a new name.
Why did the name change to The Beamish Brothers act as an agent for developing your sound?
Changing our name to The Beamish Brothers didn’t necessarily contribute to shifting our sound. We noticed that we were naturally evolving musically and the name change was just us keeping up with that!
How has the transition from creating music for other people’s projects, like the Commonwealth Games sizzler reel, to releasing music that is more representative of you?
Oh wow, The Commonwealth Games seems like a million years ago! We’ve written a fair bit of music for other projects and artists but nothing excites us like creating music which is personal. It has always been our most comfortable expression of creativity.
Is it scarier now, being the face of your music and bearing the responsibility?
In a way, yes. But we’re so much more confident in our music now. We no longer feel like we’re just throwing darts at a board and hoping for the best. This music is really intentional and meaningful for us, so we’re happy to bear the responsibility of representing that.
Why did ‘Kills Me Every Time’ stand out as the first single?
We showed a few ideas to our friends and family and Kills Me Every Time went down really well with everyone. We wanted our first single to be something fun and accessible but with interpretive, dark lyrics. This is just the first side to our musical persona. The next single will show a different side to us which we’re so excited for!
How do you guys find common ground to write about in your experiences with relationships?
Well… it can definitely be a little awkward sometimes sharing these super personal relationship songs with each other! It might be about situations the other brother will know nothing about! But at the end of the day, these emotions are pretty universal so it’s never too difficult to channel them into a song.
How are you able to represent your personal similarities as well as your differences lyrically?
There can be a bit of tension some times deciding on the final lyrics for the song. We’re both equally opinionated and set a VERY high standard for the lyrical content. But we’re definitely strongest when we collaborate and use both of our styles.
Do you think that your different perspectives/experiences with an event or feeling make for a better song?
100%! As special as writing alone can be, having a second critical opinion can really challenge the songwriting and strengthen the message. For example sometimes a lyric might be really intimate and unique to the writer but would be lost on anyone else. That’s where having each other can really improve the quality.
Would you say you were doing more collaborating with producers and other creators more now as The Beamish Brothers or in your past work?
Definitely in the past, we would collaborate a LOT more! Collaborating was a big part of us discovering what we wanted to sound like. Now that we know, we don’t feel that need as strongly. Having said that, I’m sure there’ll be a few more collabs coming up eventually.
When working with producers, how has it been balancing their suggestions, whilst also keeping the minimal style that you guys enjoy?
Well when it’s their project and we’re just featuring, it’s totally up to them. If we’re working with producers for our music, we have to set pretty strong creative outlines while also giving them room to surprise us with ideas we wouldn’t have thought of. We both produce to a degree ourselves so we usually collaborate on production.
How has your confidence been growing more as you progress with this project?
We’ve become a lot more confident with saying yes or no to opportunities! When we were younger, we would say ‘yes’ to LITERALLY everything without thinking about whether it’s going to help us or not. It’s so much more important to really be intentional with taking gigs, collaborating, selecting PR, social media posts etc. We’re still working on that but we’re getting there!
Where do you see yourselves going from here following the release of ‘Kills Me Every Time’?
We’ll be touring nationally and internationally! Still in shock about it, but we’re really stoked to play our music live in so many cities. And of course, there’ll be more music coming out soon!
Has the path you want to take/plans you have for the future changed in any way after seeing the tracks reception?
In a way, yes! From everyone’s reactions, we’re really getting the impression that this single is worth promoting for a while longer. We don’t want to just instantly move onto the next project like a revolving door of music. The responses have been overwhelming so we look forward to more shows where can perform it live, and a really exciting music video concept which will be dropping soon.
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