Summary
Overview
Brandi Carlile, the 11-time Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter, joins Dax and Monica for a deeply personal conversation about her journey from rural Washington to becoming one of music's most celebrated artists. She opens up about growing up in poverty with an alcoholic father, coming out as gay in a small town, surviving a church baptism rejection, and her remarkable rise in music. The conversation explores themes of addiction, faith, ambition, family dynamics, and her collaborations with icons like Joni Mitchell, Elton John, and Tanya Tucker. Throughout, Brandi demonstrates remarkable vulnerability while showcasing the fierce drive and authenticity that have defined her career.
Small Town Origins and Rural Life
Brandi discusses growing up in Ravensdale, Washington, a coal mining town of just 500 people located 28 miles from Seattle. She reflects on the freedom and danger of rural childhood in the '90s, comparing notes with Dax about the unsupervised risks they both took as kids. The conversation touches on the dark side of too much freedom in isolated areas, including encounters with sketchy adults and the lack of oversight that characterized their generation's upbringing.
- Ravensdale is a coal mining town with only 500 people, 28 miles from Seattle
- Brandi got her last spanking for playing in a mine shaft as a kid
- The freedom of rural childhood came with real dangers - near misses with predatory adults
- Brandi once got in a truck with the 'town scary guy' to find fishing spots
" I am convinced that she actually was the architect of everything from that first line to the Hollywood Bowl. She's Kaiser Sosa. "
" You can't get caught lighting shit on fire, adults weren't getting caught for stuff. And there's a general, that part of it I don't love. "
Growing Up with an Alcoholic Father
Brandi candidly shares her experience growing up with a father who struggled with severe alcoholism throughout her childhood. She describes the cycle of recovery and relapse, the family's involvement in Al-Anon, and how sobriety would become like a 'family religion' only to be shattered when her father fell off the wagon. Despite the chaos, she emphasizes the deep love within her dysfunctional family unit and her father's eventual recovery of 22 years.
- Her father had a severe drinking problem most of her childhood, working initially at Boeing but losing that job
- The family would embrace AA recovery as a religion, learning slogans and attending Al-Ateen, making relapses feel like 'falling off a skyscraper'
- Her father would get clean enough to sponsor others, making his falls even more heartbreaking
- Her father has now been sober for 22 years
" His sobriety would become a family religion. So we would be in Al-Anon, Al-Ateen. We would be learning that we'd have the slogans, we had the one liners, and then he would fall off the wagon and it would feel like we fell off a skyscraper. "
" I was already more religious than AA when we entered into AA. I was already really into Jesus. "
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