Alec Berlin is an American musician who has been in the game for a while now, with his amazing single Flatbush Jaywalk being the culmination of all his musical efforts! He’s got a really unique style that spans several different genres, so you really ought to check his music out!
By Jane Howkins
You recently released a single titled Flatbush Jaywalk. What can you tell us about the track?
It was one of the first songs I wrote for this particular project, back in the summer of 2018. In those days, I was dreaming a lot of music – I’d wake up in the middle of the night with a song in my head, so I’d rush right to the guitar to figure it out before I forgot it. I was working on Broadway at the time, as the guitarist for the show Come From Away, so luckily, I didn’t need to be up super early – because I worked nights. I ended up not using the music that was in my head when I woke up, but it led to the music that eventually became the verse in Flatbush Jaywalk.
Also – I had the basic AABA form of the song, but I didn’t yet have the loud lick that starts and ends the song. I remember clear as day sitting down one night to watch television, I had my guitar in my hands, and I was thinking “boy, I really like this song that I wrote, but it still needs something… something is missing…” and literally the NEXT thing that I played was the loud rock and roll lick that starts the song.
Also – some people comment on the synthesizers or the brass in this song. But the only instruments in this song are drums, bass, and guitar!
Here’s another interesting little thing – we recorded the rhythm tracks for this song in 2 sections. For the part with the acoustic guitar, the drummer Rich Mercurio uses brushes and the bassist Malcolm Gold plays an upright acoustic bass. But for the loud raucous sections, Rich used sticks and Malcolm played an electric bass. Fortunately, mix engineer James Frazee was able to blend the 2 sections so that the transitions aren’t too jarring.
I made a video for the song by collecting footage from friends that they filmed on their phones out of their car windows. It includes footage from NYC; Washington, DC; Paris; Scotland; Israel; China; India; Cleveland, OH and Northern California. I think it came out really cool! You can see it by going to my Vevo page (be sure to follow me while you’re at it!).
How has the reception to Flatbush Jaywalk been so far, and where can the song be purchased?
The song is available on any and all streaming platforms, including Bandcamp!
As for the reception – well, I want more people to hear it! But it has generally been positive. I guess you don’t hear the negative reactions, right? It’s a very specific kind of song: I’m always thinking about how to create contrast within my songs, between loud and soft, major and minor, dense and light, etc. In Flatbush Jaywalk, I pushed the idea of contrast pretty far, by having a quiet acoustic-based section and a loud, raucous, almost metal-based section. And people have picked up on that, so that makes me feel good – they get what I was trying to do.
Do you plan to release any more singles in the near future?
I release one single per month! I recorded 12 songs in 2021, and I started releasing them in May of 2022. Flatbush Jaywalk was release #2 – it came out in June. My next single will be released on December 15th and there will be 4 more after that!
Do you plan to release an EP or an album anytime soon?
Well, each time I release a new song, it gets collected with all of the previous releases. So release #9, called Minir Maad (available on 15th December at a streaming service of your choice!) will include releases #1-8 also.
Did the pandemic hinder your work much?
I actually recorded all of these songs in 2021. The history goes like this: I wrote them all in late 2018/early 2019. I played them all at gigs around NYC for about a year. Then the pandemic happened, and we were all stuck at home. I spent the first part of the pandemic learning more about home recording, playing on some projects for other people, learning about music production, etc. And then I realized that I had a bunch of material that was ready to be recorded, AND I had plenty of time to record it. So, I did a Kickstarter campaign in early 2021 to raise funds to pay for 2 days in a studio with my band, where we recorded all the basic tracks. And then I spent the next 6 months at home recording guitar overdubs.
So in a way the pandemic made things easier – I had fewer distractions and could really immerse myself in the music. I think it paid off!
Your music contains elements of several different genres. What/who influences you most as an artist? What have you been listening to recently?
Let’s see… on Flatbush Jaywalk there were a few specific influences. First of all, the acoustic sections have a sort of jazz feel. My go-to jazz artists are Miles Davis and his 1950s quintet (especially for the way that Philly Joe Jones played drums on ballads); and, from a guitar perspective, John Scofield and Pat Metheny, for the way they phrase melodies. The loud raucous sections bring to mind Wayne Krantz, who writes a lot of rhtyhmically interesting unison lines for bass and guitar, especially in the lower register. And for the solo – well, I knew I wanted it to be part way between 1950s era Jazz. The loud raucous heavy sound – that seemed to imply the Allman Brothers, which is why I chose to use a Leslie emulator on my rhythm guitar sound.
There’s also a little move where the whole song modulates up a whole step for a few bars. That’s a direct lift from the song People Say by The Meters.
As for what I’m listening to – The Beatles. Always The Beatles. Lately, the recently released re-mix of Revolver.
Your music is largely instrumental. What’s the reasoning behind that?
It was deliberate. I previously released a couple of records with vocals. I’m not really a singer, but my favorite music has singing, so I decided that I wanted to try. I’m glad I did, because I learned a lot – such as how difficult it is to be a singer, how difficult it is to write lyrics and how rewarding it all can be.
But I also felt hindered by my lack of experience and expertise as a singer. I didn’t like that.
When I started writing these songs, they sounded to me like they fit into the idiom of concise pop songwriting, which implies words and singing – but I wanted to skip that part of it. So, I did! I just decided to write the songs as if they were traditional rock songs, except that they’d be instrumental.
In so doing, I created some new challenges for myself – because when you take out the singing, everything else about the music becomes more important – you have to make the writing more interesting, the playing, the orchestration, the recording, the sound design. This felt like an interesting challenge to me, and also like a way to make my music stand out.
You’re based in Brooklyn. What is the music scene like in your part of the world?
On the one hand, you can hear anything you want to hear in NYC. Any kind of music, usually played by some of the best musicians in the world. Everyone tours through NYC eventually, so you get your choice of the big name acts. But also, there’s just so many good musicians in town that there’s always something good to hear. You can go to clubs not knowing who’s playing that night but confident that you’ll hear SOMETHING worth listening to.
On the other hand, the pandemic was not good for club owners, and we’ve lost some mainstays, including the famous 55 Bar. So things seem to be changing a bit as old clubs close and new ones open.
Do you have any tour dates lined up for the UK?
Nothing at the moment, but hopefully with the help of you and your readers I can build up some interest and make that happen!
Any last words for the fans?
Thank you SO MUCH for your time and interest. PLEASE do one or more or any of the following: listen to my music; click like; click follow or subscribe; click download; leave a comment; and tell your friends!