MORGAN JOHNSON checks in with local musician ANDREW CHEN, and chats about his current soul-infused project DRU & THE INTENTIONS.

Launching his debut LP under the Dru & The Intentions moniker, the young home-studio boffin chats about moving to Singapore, expanding from a one-man band operation to taking in seven members, and creating a new style of soul revue.

MORGAN JOHNSON: You recently changed your name – was this as a result of discovering Dru Hill?

ANDREW CHEN: I’m not too familiar with Dru Hill. I had to Wikipedia that one actually. No, Dru came from an old bandmate of mine who used to egg me on whenever they wanted me to play a guitar solo on stage. “Play it Dru, tear it up!” My solo album, You Just Might is still under my birth name, Andrew Chen, because it’s a very personal album. I’m fully exposed.

MJ: There has been something of a resurgence for soul in popular music – why do you think this is?

AC: Firstly, if you don’t mind me paraphrasing the great Stevie Wonder, I’d like to think of ‘soul’ not as a genre, but rather as a feeling. An attitude. Like how jazz is an attitude. ‘Soul’ moves people both intellectually (with jazz-inspired harmony, groove and pocket), and viscerally (talk about Let’s Get it On). It gives people time to reflect, room to express, the freedom to swing. I’d like to think the resurgence has something to do with how ‘soul’ is for both the head and the heart. A recent album that fulfils this would be Trouble Being Yourself by Aussie indie-funk/hop/R&B extraordinaire Yeo.

MJ: How has shifting from Melbourne to Singapore to Brisbane informed your scope, in regards to music making? Where do you call home now?

AC: I call Brisbane home now. I feel so fortunate growing up in such vastly contrasting societies. We left Melbourne for Singapore when I was eight, but around then I was a classical violinist and pianist. I picked up a guitar and got into a few thrash bands in my teens, as there was quite a formidable metal scene in Singapore. Eventually I got work playing bass, keyboards, guitars and writing arrangements for a few working bands, cutting my teeth on the local circuit. Last year, when I was 17, I discovered indie artist-producers like Gotye, and I decided to move back to Australia, this time to Brisbane for Uni to start a proper music career. I’m currently completing a Music Production degree at the Con.

MJ: What initially attracted you to making soul and R&B?

AC: It could have been my mum’s Phil Spector records. Or our Uni lecturer giving us hours on Motown and “groove and pocket.” This sparked my love for early soul, inspiring one of my album tracks in particular, my ode to cathartic songwriting, Higher. Being Asian, I grew up drenched in bucket-loads of classical, studying the violin passionately for over a decade. I’ll never forget this. It taught me a lot about discipline and musicality. My violin teacher was a massively charismatic daredevil of a performer, and his rule was that every single note had to mean something. Don’t play it if you don’t feel it. Soul and R&B does that for me.

MJ: You’re playing with a seven-piece band, how have your songs expanded from their home-studio solo recordings?

AC: With The Intentions, we’re always open about suggestions and ideas, and since many of my band-mates play in other bands in different genres, specifically jazz, psychedelic pop, and prog, these influences get filtered in to our live show, with elements drawn heavily from those styles. We like to collaborate, but I try to bring in arrangements so that we have something down on paper, a starting point or sketch.

MJ: How did you come to find your players?

AC: Open mics, stealing members from different local Brisbane bands, and pulling in my best mates from Uni who were just so fun to work with! We’ve got Brendan Cox from prog-rockers Conversations With The Sun, Kellie Jade from The Travelling So-and-Sos, rhythm section Nick Watson and Gene Stevens from jazz-funksters Sidewalk Trio, Jordan Wiggins from emerging indie pop act This Means That, and one of my favourite keys players (and a killer DJ too!) in Ben Miles.

MJ: Your songs tend to reflect a loose-limbed soul and R&B aesthetic. How does this correlate live?

AC: Think Funkadelic-meets-Bluejuice. That’s all I’m going to say. We’re locked up in the rehearsal room at the moment, waiting for the big moment at our CD launch.

MJ: Get Down It's Motown is coming to Australia in the New Year – do you view this as a good thing, or with some trepidation?

AC: Get On Down, It’s Motown? Oh, that’s great for a certain crowd, but I feel inclined to say that that’s not really my thing at the moment. I dig original indie music, and while the classics are great to learn from and sing-along to, I’m always on the lookout for something fresh and quirky. That said, I still find myself belting out Temptations tunes in the shower all the time. I’m learning to play the drums at the moment, and my drummer Gene Stevens has just shown me a whole heap of Motown grooves, which are plain badass. I learnt groove by studying the Funk Brothers. My bassline on Morning Rain is quite Jamerson-inspired.

MJ: Being the main impetus behind Dru & The Intentions, are you an Ike Turner, Berry Gordy or more a Chess brother?

AC: Hm … tough one. They are all so cross-pollinated and diverse! I’d like to think that there’s just good and bad music. No record labels, stations, colours, genres, ages, genders. That said, I love Isaac Hayes and Quincy Jones for their orchestration. Stevie and Marvin for their vision and style. I’m also a crazy Brian Wilson fan. I’m a record producer and engineer, so naturally a lot of my idols are studio producers. I want to produce music that lifts people, and brings people together. That’s what the song Come On Down is about. Brother don’t pick a fight, let’s jam. That’s what The Intentions are about.

ANDREW CHEN launches his album with DRU & THE INTENTIONS at The Globe Theatre in Fortitude Valley on Dec 4. YOU JUST MIGHT is available from Rocking Horse Records, iTunes, and his website.

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