1.) First, would you mind introducing m yourself yourself?

 My name is Garrett Hendricks. I’m a Americana/Indie-country singer-songwriter.

2.) Tell me about blending the Northwest with the Southeast.

 Funny enough there’s a lot of similarities. Both have a certain ruggedness and the land has a big impact on shaping its inhabitants.  Outside of the cities both have long history of relying on the land for survival with hunting, fishing and timber and also environmental degradation and economic depression.  All of this, especially in the roots music genres, gives a grittiness.  For me that means I’m willing to bring in sounds on the fringe of what is considered country but is still organic instrumentation.  I don’t use drum loops or samples which is sometimes manufactured to be edginess just to be edgy.  I stand by that country should be made with traditional instruments but even with that there’s a lot of wiggle room.  In alternative rock that the Northwest is known for there’s a lot of distortion used on guitars, so I applied that to the guitar sounds in my music and left the country twang of the South to come through on pedal steel and fiddle parts.

3.) Do you enjoy being a solo artist or creating with others?

Both. I love the flexibility of being able to tour and pick up shows scheduling wise as a solo artist but I love playing with others.  I think songs evolve in a really cool way when played by other people through their creative lenses.

4.) Tell me about the Washington country music scene.

Washington state always shoots straight and values authenticity.  You encounter a lot of skepticism toward mainstream country music because people in Washington would rather have something that feels real and lived in than super polished and radio friendly.  They hear radio stuff and they feel that it comes from a manufactured place where a bunch of money is just dumped in to make it successful rather than it being something that truly comes from a grounded place and rises to the top.  That’s why the fans there really gravitate towards traditional country sounds and a lot of the 70’s outlaw stuff. That just resonates more with people who may have come from families in lumber and commercial fishing and the outdoor industry. 

5.) Tell me about how you start out writing a song or select a song to cover, from the lyrics to working with other musicians to the sound, the story, the feel, the audience, the goals.

Lately I’ve been writing the lyrics first while simultaneously figuring out chord progressions in my head. I have been working as a farmhand and outdoor educator and often I find while I’m doing morning tasks and my mind is relatively calm ideas come to me and i can write them down or dictate them into my phone and come back to them later and try out the chord progression I heard in my head with my guitar.  This process has allowed me to be way more consistent and prolific with my writing.

When it comes to finding the sound with other musicians I try to keep an open mind.  I always come in with a blue print and maybe a reference track of another artist that I like but I really encourage experimentation and I want the character of the other musicians’ playing to come through.

6.) What are some non-musical influences you find within your work?

 I pay attention a lot to nature and use nature imagery to create metaphors in my work.  Mark Twain did that a lot as did Emerson and Thoreau. I also watch a lot of film to analyze how to create a story- how to structure narrative and characters.  I love the work of the Coen Brothers in particular.

7.) Ford or Chevy? … or are you gonna do a write in for Toyotas?

 I’m gonna go with Ford this time, I’d love a ‘78 Bronco.  Especially one with the cool southwestern trim accents. 

8.) How do you take your coffee?

Black mostly.  Sometimes with a dash of caramel flavoring.

9.) Tell me about what motivates you.

I’m motivated by seeing the hard work of my peers pay off. The music world is such a tough one to break into and so seeing someone from my circle getting that big opening slot, a major festival date, or putting out an album is such a cool and inspiring thing. And it makes me want to work that much harder.

But also on a more personal level whenever someone comes up after a show and talks to me about how a particular song or performance connected with them. Those conversations are just as valuable as drops in the tip jar. Knowing that something I did made someone feel something or improve their day.

10.) Tell me about the things that are on your mind when you first wake up and the things that keep you from falling asleep at night.

When I wake up it revolves around a quiet morning routine. Coffee and if I’m not going straight into work fishing or songwriting. But even if I’m having to do work most of my early morning allows me to be doing tasks that free my mind to be thinking about songs.

What has been keeping me up at night is environmental degradation. Lately there have been attempts at selling off public lands and there are now multiple attempts at privatization for the purpose of resource extraction. Our wild places are part of our heritage and to lose that would be disastrous. So I’m often up thinking of ways that I can help with protecting our wild world.

11.) Any friends or fellow artists you wanna shout out?

 My buddy Will Overman did some backing vocals on a song I have coming out.  He’s releasing an album in September.  But also my buddy Evan Phillips who plays pedal steel. He’s been with me since my first year in Nashville and has been with my band the longest.  He just got to play the Opry for the first time which is pretty damn cool. 

12.) Do you see a lot of live music or concerts?

 I do, I love to go out and see my friends play and cheer them on. But I also love going to major tours and seeing the scale and all the lights and showmanship and be able to dream of doing it at that level someday.  Sometimes it can be easy to get jealous or frustrated at not being at the level I want to be but I also use every show I see as a learning opportunity.  I try to walk away from every show with one thing that I could try that is new to me.

13.) Tell me something significant, however “simple” it may be. 

I think that admitting when we’ve made a mistake can be healing. I made a mistake about 10years ago. I got a Haida (tribe) tattoo of an orca based on iconography from the Free Willy movie. I have a deep respect for Indigenous peoples and culture so I didn’t intend any harm. But nonetheless harm happened. The Haida, under colonial rule by the Canadian government, were prevented from practicing cultural tattooing. It was illegal for them to tattoo using age old techniques and designs passed down through generations. So for me to have a piece of their art tattooed without either permission or it being done by one of their artists was appropriation and also a privileged act by me. For me, a white man, to have art on me that for a long time Haida people could not was insensitive. I didn’t do my due diligence and research. I realized I was wrong and did two things to make amends. One was that I paid an Indigenous artist for a piece of art for me home. And then I also went and got a non tribal Orca tattooed over my old one. That whole process allowed me to understand another culture better and I feel I grew from it. I look forward to sharing that experience whenever someone asks about my tattoo.

14.) Future goals or plans for your work? This could be 10 years out or 10 days out.

I have a goal of establishing myself as an opener on regional and national tours within the next 2 years.

But I also would like to at some point in the next 5-10 years have some sort of permanent residency with a little land and some animals. 

15.) Any future plans you’d like to share- liveshows, travel, releases, albums, covers? Where can folks follow your music, whether it be an email list or social media or website.

Yea I’ve got new music coming out all through this summer leading up to my first album release.  I’m really excited but also super nervous.  I’m most active on instagram but you can find all my socials and email list over at garretthendricksmusic.com

16.) Tell me all about this new album.

It was a really cool experience getting to do this record. It’s been a goal to record a full length album in Nashville since I was young and so even if this is the only thing I ever get to do I will always have this record. Caleb Fisher (my producer) and I spent a lot of time talking about the approach we wanted to take and we really wanted a more old school approach of getting everyone together in a room and playing through the songs to get a live sounding record. So we cobbled together a studio band of friends of both of ours that were also top notch players. A lot of them were folks that play with other artists I like so getting to incorporate their experience into the sound was also really valuable. We spent three days cutting it and the songs turned out really vibrant and covered a lot of sonic ground. Thematically I was really interested in telling stories that feel lived in and authentic. I also reflected a lot about the finite nature and fragile nature of life and that comes through in a lot of the lyrics on the songs.

17.) Tell me all about the Camp Squatch Records project. 

Haha it’s sort of an in-jest fun way for me to market my music. Sasquatch is obviously a huge cultural element of the Pacific Northwest so I have always jokingly called my “record label” that I release music through Camp Squatch Records when I distribute on streaming platforms. So for this album I decided to present the label as if it were a real label and Camp Squatch is owned and managed by a blowhard comedic Bigfoot character named Sal. So it’s a way for me to talk about my music but in a way that is fun and doesn’t feel so self interested.

18.) Your favorite song off of this new album?

Son of the River is really important to me because it really feels like the best expressive of where I am and the pride of where I’m from. But Anthony is also a really important song and comes from a very deep place. 

I also enjoy Smoke and Oak as well as Goat Leather Boots because their fun to sing and just have cool badass grooves. 

19.) How important were the visuals for this project? 

I wanted something that was high quality but was rugged feeling in terms of my visuals. So I always wanted to craft my visuals along those lines. I’m not a very polished person so I wanted that to be reflected. I feel that the visuals should be like looking in the mirror of the artist. They should capture the artist for what they are instead of manufacturing an idea. And I think the visuals should tell a story themselves and draw the audience in to where they want more and to go deeper in the story.

20.) Do you find the process of taking an original idea and having it change, take form, expand under new influences from collaborators easy or do you find it hard to let go?

It’s a case by case basis for me. I do like collaboration and when I record and play live with a band I want them to inject their character into my work because that makes my music more dimensional. But I do have pretty clear ideas for how I want things to sound so their are times where if something is not the way I want it I will make a change. There were times in the process of making this record where I kept going back and tweaking things because I wasn’t hearing exactly what I wanted so I took the time and advocated for my vision. But I also made a point of surrounding myself with people that were experienced and artists themselves who could also check my insecurities and faults so I wouldn’t limit myself or become my own worst enemy.

Garrett Hendricks and I spent so, so long planning out these photoshoots that spanned over a few months, hundreds of miles, two states, hours of work, and genre melding scenes that perfectly represented him – a man from the Northwest who traveled South to pursue music and art.

Our first half of the project started in Nashville at the goat farm he worked at for years after moving from Washington where he is originally from. We wondered around the farm, serenaded the goats, and followed after the cows for an hour or so. We wanted to tap into what it felt like to be a musician in Tennessee and in Nashville – tired, but hard working. Striving for something more. Balancing the magic of the connections and city with the shallow-ness that has always been there.

The second half of the project brought us to Washington around his old hometown and where he grew up. I had the pleasure of getting to drive around in a borrow Tacoma, following GH through Washington towns, mountains, and flowing rivers. We got exactly what we needed, starting with hoping on horseback and working a big ole goofball in the arena.

“There will be horses” is the fastest and easiest way to get me to say yes to any and all projects.

The outcome of all of this work was exactly what we wanted and needed it to be – honesty.

The foremost concern with visuals to musicians is representation. As much as we all like to try and avoid it – books will be judged by their covers and so will albums. The visuals connected with your work are at the forefront of attracting your ideal audience, bringing people in, showing exactly what you’re offering up, showing who you are before anyone even listens.

These aren’t just little squares to post on Instagram. This is true, deep, meaningful marketing that doesn’t feel like a lie, that doesn’t feel like selling out. The work you do with me will represent you in magazines, in articles, on social media, on your music itself. Your audience will more than likely see your album covers before they ever listen to your music. This gives them a honest reason to click, to listen, to lean into what you’re sharing.

You interested? Get in touch, gimme a holler.

Check out Garret and his work:

Garrett Hendrick’s Instagram

KB From Tennessee is a musician branding film photographer based out of Tennessee but traveling anywhere in the US and the world to work with like-minded musicians looking for something honest and badass. Photographer specializing in album art, Western Branding, musician branding projects, and film.