All I have to say to one of Brown’s old boyfriends, is, ‘You are so busted.’  From her ex-boyfriend mistakenly phoning her at two o’clock in the morning, thinking he was dialing his new girlfriend, was birthed the song, “Bebe,” a fun tune which demonstrates a lot of creative ingenuity. If ever an original song born in this century captured the flavor of the late fifties and early sixties music, then “Bebe,” would be the one.

“It was so much fun to record,” she says despite being under the weather, Brown perks up noticeably when discussing, “Bebe,” “I had the wildest time doing it. I am a ham, so I like breaking into different characters and stuff, and with “Bebe,” I got the opportunity to do that. This is me doing my thing with voice acting (something else Brown does), and I got to explore that a little bit. I kept thinking about the feeling that I get when I listen to Ronnie and the Rockettes. I had a friend that I hung out with in high school, and whenever I was at her house, her mom always had the radio on the oldies station. I heard a lot of Ronnie and the Rockettes and The Platters. That is the memory that is attached to the song, “Bebe.” 

When I ask who owns the magical, deep male voice on “Bebe,” Brown squeals with delight and then laughs. “That is a friend of mine, by the name of Brian Hamilton. I just dragged him in. I said, ‘Your voice is perfect for this. You have to come in and do this.’ He was really happy when I told him that his voice made the record, because he had said, ‘If my voice doesn’t make it (she lowers her voice to imitate his) that’s okay.’ He has that big burly bear voice. I needed a big burly voice, and he was the only person that I could think of who could pull it off.”

When the question comes up, about how audiences respond to the song, “Bebe,” Brown starts to laugh before I finish asking my question. “Saturday night in Winnipeg, was the second time that I performed it live. I found that the girls immediately started doing the twist, before I even started doing it myself. They immediately do this (she starts to twist in her chair), so they know what the connection is.”

For all but one of the songs on The Love Chronicles, Brown did her own background vocals. The exception was the fifties influenced song, “I Need Your Love,” a tune for which producer Colin Munroe already had background vocals, but wanted Brown to record her own. “There was something about these background vocals that seemed very fitting to me. I told him that we needed to keep them, and that we would drown them in reverb from that time period.”

“For this CD we used an old fender bass on a lot of the songs. My bass player wanted to use his suave, brand spanking new bass, but the producer and I were like, ‘uh, uh.’ We need the old, dirty, gritty fender. We used some old, vintage guitar amps as well, to try and get a certain feel. It’s about the texture. We even recorded a couple of the songs, on two-inch analog tape. There is such a big difference in the warmth. We had to dump it back into digital of course. We also recorded all of the horns on two-inch tape as well, and then dumped that back into digital,” as Brown discusses the recording process you can easily detect the enthusiasm in her voice.

Brown called upon Nashville strings maestro, David Davidson to come up with the strings arrangements for the song, “Sweet Surrender.” “He was referred to me by Ron Sexsmith. Ron told me, ‘Devine you don’t have to worry, just send him the track.’  David Davidson really understands how to do arrangements around vocals, so that they never get in the way. I would definitely like to have him to some arrangements for my next record,” she says.

For her disco era influenced song, “Boogie Slide,” Devine Brown channels Donna Summer, whom she grew up idolizing.

Early in her career, Brown shared the stage with George Benson, Nikka Costa, Maceo Parker, The Temptations and fellow Canadian Taylor Dayne, soon we will be asking, ‘Who got to share the stage with Devine Brown?’

In 2005  Brown’s first chart buster, “Old Skool Love,” helped ensure her debut album would reach gold status. One cannot help but be excited for an artist whose music is fun and whose vocals are as beautiful, as she is pretty.

Devine Brown’s music is all about memories, recalling the past, respecting the music that paved the way for today’s artists, personalizing it, and then placing it within a contemporary context. Start building your own memories today, by attending one of her concerts and getting your copy of Love Chronicles (to be released in August), so years from now you can say about your  Brown experience, ‘I remember when..’

June 2008

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