Pam Brandis "New Blues" Music Finally Available at Z Art Tones Dot Com

July 31, 2014 - PRLog -- Wearing the title of blues artist is Pam Brandis--likely the most obscure of the most obscure. The Brandis trajectory can be described as “on the cutting edge while catching up.” Rarely at a loss for exercising her combination of musical skills and always in unique ways, Brandis has avoided the spotlight, preferring behind the scenes work in the shadows. Thus little biographical information has ever made it to other than newsletter print. Here is the brief version of the Pam Brandis blues story very few have heard or seen . . .

At age eight, Pam Brandis was drawn to the beginner’s acoustic guitar her father had purchased for her mother. Within a few days, young Brandis had learned a few chords and was soon writing songs. During high school (1981), now slinging an electric guitar, Brandis began performing around the Omaha area in a series of cover bands with set lists of a variety of styles from country to rock to electronic—all of which Brandis could emulate vocally—from falsetto on one song to gravel blast the next. At age 24, Brandis began registering her “Prairie Blues” songs and pitching her self-recorded demos (including drums and bass) to Nashville publishers. Though she longed to retire from performing, put teaching school on hold and pursue her love of songwriting and recording exclusively, Brandis continued her side study of music publishing and sought the monthly mail-in song critiques by writers based in Nashville.

In June of 1996, Brandis finally made her own move to Nashville, fully prepared to pitch her lyrics and her sound. Brandis was churning out a steady stream of respectable four-track demos—complete with programmed drums, bass and rhythm guitar overlays—not the norm for Nashville song demos at that time. Within a few months of perusing the tip sheets, Brandis began dropping off her fleshed-out, bluesy living room recordings to a few of the major label artists. Meanwhile, Brandis’ second and beloved acoustic guitar (a gift from her father in 1976), recording equipment and master demos--all in the wrong hands, came up missing. Another several months led to a court ordered judgment against the guilty party who then disappeared, making collection unlikely.

Brandis, now faced with a choice between returning to Omaha or rebuilding musically, remained in Nashville.  Without her equipment and collection of song recordings, Brandis was forced to begin again. This situation caused Brandis to set her mind on recording her own CD album, starting with new digital equipment. With the purchase of new recording equipment, Brandis could not afford a new acoustic guitar. Thankfully, her seasoned electric guitar was spared from the theft. As a result, she found a second style uniquely Brandis—less bluesy country and more bluesy rock. Two years later (1999), Brandis released her self-funded, self-penned, self-recorded, full-length solo debut album entitled, “Multiple Exposure”--a bit out of step with or on the cutting edge of the trends in Nashville at that time?

Realizing that promoting the album via traditional means meant an undesired return to performing, and being entirely against promoting via the newer technology of illicit digital upload and sharing, Brandis returned to Omaha and began promoting the debut work and two subsequent full-length works, “Elemental” (2002) and "Squared” (2006) to Midwest public libraries where they were added to several catalogs. Brandis wrote several songs for a fourth album which she never completed. The tone of the songs was too somber and not worth the emotional effort to record for future generations. Rather it was time to consider a return to teaching.

Breathing a sigh of creative accomplishment, Brandis has no regrets looking back at a decade well spent. During summer vacations, Brandis recorded a series of CD singles. Last summer, she was consumed by the process of building another potential personal legacy, ZArtTonesDotCom – audio art meets visual art. (See a previous press release for details.) Since a year ago September, Brandis had planned to release another single but has since become dissatisfied with the song content—gang stalkers, incompatibility, fornication, illegitimacy and gun violence—not necessarily in that order--probably too many concepts for one song or not worth the time and effort to record.

Brandis is currently considering a refreshing change from the CD and MP3 singles pattern—possibly some first time creative collaboration. Not that Brandis has never before considered creative collaboration—only that she has always had a very detailed mental picture of what she wanted to accomplish as an independent musician, proving time and time again that she is very capable of focused solo work. Whatever Brandis decides to take on creatively, each goal or project is always pre-researched, well organized and typically outside the norm.

So, the creative journey of Pam Brandis continues as she remains on the cutting edge while catching up, finally making her music available for online listening and purchase at ZArtTonesDotCom. Brandis describes her place in independent music thusly, “Eventually, ‘catching up’ doesn’t mean anything when you are a life-long artist. All that matters is the path God points you to—the one with unexpected destinations and the body of work you have produced literally through sweat, guts, tears and an occasional cut.”

Find Pam Brandis “New Blues” albums and MP3 album cuts at ZArtTonesDotCom.