It has been a minute since the world has heard from guitar-pop icon Michelle Branch, but thankfully, all of that is about to change. You remember Branch from the early aughts, when she scored a number of hits with songs like “Everywhere,” “All You Wanted,” “Goodbye To You” and “Are You Happy Now?,” among others. Those singles still rock just as hard as they did when they first took over radio, but fans have been waiting over a decade for a new full-length from the songwriter, and now the wait is over.
We spoke with Michelle recently about her new album Hopeless Romantic and her comeback, which was years in the making thanks to record label politics. She’s just as happy to be back as we are to have her back, by the way.
Let me say, it's very good to have a Michelle Branch album playing on my computer in 2017. I'm very happy to have you back. What does it feel like to officially be ushering in this new era of your career?
Thank you. It's a huge relief. I've been actively trying to put out music since The Wreckers broke up in 2007, so it's been a long time coming, and the fact that it's actually really happening is… It's huge weight off of my shoulders.
Can you talk about, in between your last album and then now, what happened that delayed this?
Well, it was a blessing in disguise, because I have a daughter who is 11. It enabled me to spend a lot of time off the road with her, which I am grateful for. But basically, when The Wreckers broke up in 2007, I found myself sitting with all this Wreckers material, because we weren't planning on breaking up. I was planning on going right back in the studio and making another record. So I decided, at that point, to record it myself and I turned that into Warner Bros. National, and right after I turned that album in, it was met with great excitement and support. And then suddenly, the label president was fired. And the label president, Bill Bennett, was a personal friend of mine, a dear friend of mine.
A new president was brought into Warner National, and he said, "This isn't country enough." So at that point, I took the album to Warner Bros. in LA, and they said, "This isn't pop enough." And so for three years, I re-recorded that record, and tried to get that album released on and off for three years. I just continued to write, and it was very, very frustrating, extremely disheartening to go through. And then finally, I was just like, "You know what? This is music. It shouldn't be this complicated. I have to start something new." Because at that point it felt like I was carrying around so much baggage with the material.
So I moved back to Los Angeles, and I sat down with Warner Bros. I said, "Hey, I'm gonna make a pop record. I've decided that if I make a country, alt-country record, that I will do it under the name of The Wreckers. And maybe one day we'll revisit it, but right now, obviously, it's not working for me as a solo artist. So I'll do a pop/rock record." They said, "Great. We love it. We support you." That was on a Thursday afternoon. And on the following Monday, they were fired.
And I waited for my new label president to get hired, and they fired my A&R. They fired my product manager. They fired all these people who I had worked with for like ten years. So I waited for them to rehire people. And then they said, "Hey, Michelle! Finally we got you a budget. You can go to make your new record." I go in and make a new record. We shoot the album artwork. We shoot a video. I'm out doing press. I have a release date. Guess who's fired? The label president. And suddenly, everything gets put on hold again.
I turned in two full albums from 2007 to 2014. I turned in two full-length albums that got shelved. And it was really, really frustrating. Because also I would be like, "Hey, you guys. Well then, if you're not gonna put out music, just drop me." And they wouldn't let me go. Basically I had my hands tied, and it wasn't until June of 2014 that I finally got off Warner Bros. and started writing this album.
What is going to happen to that music? Do you ever get that back, or is that just floating around somewhere?
No. As of right now, they're owned by Warner Bros. I could re-record them. There are some very, very passionate fans, who I don't know how they have recordings of it, but they do. So I'm sure if you really wanted to hear it, you could venture down a YouTube rabbit hole and find some of it. I mean, I don't know how people get demos and stuff, but they have them. And at this point, I could have recorded some of the songs for this album. But like I said, there's so much emotional baggage that I've attached with those songs, that I just wanted a clean slate. And signing with a new label really felt like a clean slate for me, so I decided to leave it in the past. I mean one day, maybe it'll revert back to me, and I'll be able to share it, but at this point I just wanted to move on.
How do you explain that to those fans who've been waiting? How do you communicate to the public that it's not your fault?
Well, there's like a thin line. People hearing an artist complain like that, it's hard to really understand the situation, because they're like, "You get to play music for a living. Why are you complaining?" But it was frustrating to open up my computer and sign in to Twitter or whatever, and have five messages from people that were like, "What happened to you? Where are you? You lied to us! You keep saying you have a record out, and it's not coming out." And so finally, I just had to ignore it. I had to know when music was really gonna come out and I announced it. That's when I'll be able to tell the story.
What's different this time around?
I would say in the process of making this album, I found a freedom and an independence that I haven't ever experienced before. And maybe it's because I was so protective of the project after being put through the wringer for so many years, that I was really able to have it be so contained to my little world. There weren’t a lot of outside opinions and interference with this album. We kind of just made it by ourselves, and didn't really allow anyone in the studio while we were making it. And subject-wise, it's... I've talked a lot recently about the fact that when my first record came out, a lot of the songs were about relationships, but a lot of the songs were fictional accounts. That first record, I wrote the majority of it when I was 14 and 15. And I was writing about dating, having never really had a proper relationship in my life. So suddenly I'm 33 years old, I have an 11-year-old daughter, I'm newly divorced, and I was dating for the first time, and found love again. So the songs, the album really, lyrically follows that story.
When you first popped up, you had quite a string of serious radio hits. After going through the wringer and switching labels, what is the expectation for you? What is the label expecting in terms of radio play or charts? Is any of that factored into this new album?
When I went to meet with labels after I left Warner Bros., I was so terrified of finding myself in the same situation again. Literally, I had a meeting... One particular meeting where a guy told me,"This is what you should do. You should do a song with an EDM artist. You should sing with Zedd or something." And I was just like, "What? Have you listened to my music? Do you know me at all? This is not what I want."
A big portion of a lot of my early meetings when I was trying to find a new home was, "We want you on the radio." And I've been really fortunate that I am a radio artist, and that I've had a lot of success at radio. But in the same breath, when I was writing those songs in my bedroom in Sedona, AZ; I wasn't trying to write songs to get on the radio. That was something that ... I think if we all knew the formula of what makes a song a hit song, then everyone would be writing hit songs. So I went into Verve, when I signed with them, and I was like, "Listen, if this gets played on the radio, I would love that. I would be so happy, but I also don't want to write an album specifically trying to get on the radio. If that's a byproduct of releasing this music, then great. I'm so excited. But I'm also not gonna, like, thread the needle backwards and try to chase a radio hit song, because I don't think you can predict that."
That's good to hear. I'm always happy when artists are like, "No, I just made the music I wanted to make. We'll see. I don't know."
Yeah! My goal, it sounds really simple, but sometimes, the simplest things are the hardest to execute... I just want to release albums when I want to release albums, and not have to worry about what genre or box they fit in, or don't fit in. I want to tour whenever I want to tour. And that's it. If I'm playing in 500-seat clubs, or 5,000-seat theaters, it doesn't matter. I just want to be able to be creative and not feel the pressure of there needing it to be some level of commercial success. Because it's a really unpleasant road to go down. That's not what I'm interested in.
No. That's fair.
If that success came naturally, then great!
By the way, a Zedd collab would have been awesome, but that's okay.
Thank you. If you looked at music I listen to, I'm the most un-current, uncool person. I'm like, "I don't listen to that, so I don't want to sing on it.” I'm sure a lot of people would have been stoked if it had happened, though.
What's the rest of the year look like for you?
Touring. Touring, touring, touring, which I'm so happy to report. I'm going to Japan in June, and then July and August will mostly be touring the U.S. And then September will be my first U.K. tour ever. I've never actually even played a show in London before. I'm going to London on Sunday to play my first show, and I'm like, how is it that I've never played here? Yeah. So basically, my summer, my entire summer will be spent on the road. Which I'm really looking forward to. It's been a while. I'm going out with a full band, and we're playing old songs as well as new songs, and I think it'll be really, really fun.
What have you heard from fans so far about the one or two songs that are out?
So far, the response has been great. I think I only saw one negative comment, which was like, "This sounds too much like The Black Keys." Which, I don't think it does at all.
What a great “bad” comment though.
I know. I was like, "Great. I'll take it. Thanks?" But the really interesting thing has been, in starting press for the album, I used to go in to do interviews with magazines, and I always felt like the kid. And this is the first time that I've walked into magazines and everyone feels like they're my age or younger, the majority of them being younger. And I walk in, and they're like, "Oh my gosh, I grew up with your music!" So to have the first opinions getting relayed back to me, from people who grew up with me, and who are genuinely excited about the record, and genuinely like it... It's, hopefully, a good indication for the hardcore fans who have been patiently waiting, or impatiently waiting, I should say. I'm hoping they'll love the rest of the record.
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