by Brett Leigh Dicks
Tyrone Wells has become something of a fixture at Santa Barbara’s annual Kids Helping Kids benefit concert. Started in 2001 by the Advanced Placement Economics students of San Marcos High School, the non-profit organization is dedicated to helping underprivileged communities across the globe. Their annual benefit concert has installed itself as a tradition in Santa Barbara’s January musical calendar. This year’s event features Sara Bareilles headlining the evening with Tyrone Wells once again joining the bill to help the local students in their charitable crusade. Wells is no stranger to the power of music. From his humble beginnings in a band called Skypark while attending Hope International University, to branching out solo at a local coffee shop, Wells has crafted a career built upon laying his heart on the line. While it might have been the sultry tones of classic love songs emanating from late night radio that introduced him to the emotive impact of music, his own music has since formed a soundtrack to the lives of countless others. After releasing two albums with Universal Music, Hold On in 2007 and Remain in 2009, last year he returned to his independent roots for the release of his third album, Metal and Wood. While he is currently the midst of orchestrating a follow-up, he is more than happy to take some time out for a yearly pilgrimage to Santa Barbara to help kids helping kids.
You have been something of fixture at the annual Kids Helping Kids benefit concerts. How did your involvement come about?
Jamie DeVries, whose brainchild Kids Helping Kids was, had seen me play a handful of times and wanted me to come and play the event. He has become a good friend now, and I love what they’re all about so it’s awesome to be a part of it.
What do you derive personally from the experience of participating in a benefit concert?
I love what it’s about, especially in my industry where it’s so easy to get caught up in yourself and ego and what people think about you. It’s really refreshing for me to get out of that and think about helping other people. I have loved being a part of this especially because high school kids are raising over $100,000 just because they’re dreaming big. That is awesome.
And bringing rock and roll to a quaint old theater must be a fun experience too?
Yeah. That place is amazing. I just love that theater and playing there.
I read where you very passionately talked about falling in love with a girl in the second grade and being so caught up in it that you listened to love songs late at night. I was wondering if that experience was what opened your eyes to the power of music and how it can affect people so deeply.
That’s probably true. I think what naturally comes out of me when I sit down and write a love song is something I can probably attribute it to listening to those soft rocks stations and all those love songs. I just love that stuff. I love old Commodores and anything from that genra back in the day.
Your songs have since come to be a soundtrack for other people’s lives. When you write a song, how much is the experience about you and how aware are you of the future listener?
That’s a great question. I think, when you’re writing a song, it’s easy for it to be just a personal expression, and you forget and forsake the listener and have it just be medicine for your own soul. Sometimes I do that. But you have to step back and listen critically and see if you have touched on anything that someone else can feel. So, I’m conscious of the listener. It’s funny because I think it’s a war that artists wage in their heads where they just want the therapy of getting a song out, and I do for sure, but they also have to make sure others can relate to it.
How conscious are you then that your therapy ultimately gets listened to by others?
It’s a fragile time for sure. It’s like putting your heart out there and getting it graded. It’s a very vulnerable time, and probably the most vulnerable time is when I share a brand new song with anybody. I remember driving my nine year old niece somewhere and I had just gotten a new mix and was playing it. I was stressing out about whether or not she was liking it. She did like it and I was so relieved. I just wondered what it was in me that gave rise to that and whether every artist is like that.
I think that’s a universal thing that all artists face if they are being true to themselves …
I think you’re right. I remember reading an article in Rolling Stone Magazine where the guitarist from Radiohead was really stressing out about their new record and how the world would react to it or even if anyone would like it. And I was thinking ‘this is Radiohead!’ At that level, they’re already demigods to people and people love everything they do. That’s when I realized it’s a universal curse for the artist to worry about that.
I understand that music was an intricate part of your life growing up. At what point did it reveal itself as a potential lifelong pursuit?
I had hoped that I could make it a career from a young age, probably in my junior year in high school, but I didn’t think it was a realistic thing. I didn’t know anybody who was making a living making music. In college, I started a band and really started to believe that I could make a go of it. Until this day, the only fulltime job I have ever worked was at TJ Maxx when I was in high school. I’m not saying music isn’t a full time job – it is for sure and can be a bit of a mistress in terms of never being able to get away from it – but in terms of nine to five, that was the last job I had to work and for that I’m so grateful.
Do you ever go back and listen to any of the early music and, if so, how does it stand up in hindsight?
Some of the stuff I like. There are always glimpses of something that could be good. That doesn’t mean it was good, but I can see little moments in some of it. So instead of listening and thinking of it as really great, I think it has a certain charm. There is definitely an eagerness and wide eyed innocence there. As you get older and more jaded and have been in the business for a while, you do hear all those other voices in your head and the critics, and you worry about what people think.
Do you channel that into something positive though? Presumably that must be a real spur to work harder and refine your craft more?
Absolutely, it’s exactly what you said. You put that very nicely!
There are two elements to what you do. There’s the writing and recording, and there’s the live performance side of things. How do they play off each other? Do you write a song and refine it live, or do you write, record and then orchestrate it for the stage?
That has changed as my career has changed. When I was more up and coming, I used to play a weekly show a little coffee shop. That’s how I cut my teeth. I played every Thursday night at a coffee shop in Orange County, and it was there that I could try out new songs and see if the audience was feeling them. So, I had a lot more refining going before I ever hit the studio because I was out playing live a lot more. Now, I’m at a different point where I do a couple of big national tours each year, so I don’t get that much opportunity to refine things. It’s more writing a ton of songs. For my next record, I have written maybe 80 songs so now it’s more a process of sharing them with the people close to me and in my camp and narrowing it down to the 12 front runners.
So, is that how the next album is coming together?
I have done it a little differently because I have recorded twenty plus songs and will release a full length album and couple of EPs after that. Imagine you as a writer and writing 100 stories a year, but only publishing 12 pieces. There’s a bit of sadness there for the 88 that never see the light of day. You wonder if one of those was the magic one that should have gone out there and changed the world. My favorite part is in the creating. That brings me the joy of a kid running out at recess.
What do you think is the best reflection of you as artist for someone not familiar with your music? Is it hearing a song on the radio or seeing you live?
I think live. That’s where I have made the majority of my fans. I haven’t had a ton of radio. I did two records with Universal and they released some singles and one of those had some success, but it never shot the moon by any stretch of the imagination. It went to number 13 and was one of my favorite songs. It was called “More” and is a meaningful song to me. I still have a goal to have a Top Five song, so we will see if that happens, but if not I’ll be just fine making songs that mean something to mean and hopefully to those who listen to them.
