Essential 8: Brandon Fulson

Courtesy of the Artist

When Brandon Fulson writes and sings about the country, he’s talking about the real country: a place where “hillbilly heroin and alcohol,” grifters, hookers and people just generally making bad decisions are more likely to be neighbors than those happy-go-lucky characters.

It’s the place where Fulson grew up and still lives and it permeates his new release, Forgotten Appalachia, the follow-up, and musical companion, to 2016's Dark Side of the Mountain. Here, Fulson answers his Essential 8 where he talks in depth about the album, his favorite "gift," Ray Wylie Hubbard, and more!

Is there a story behind you album's title?
I came up with the title "Forgotten Appalachia" while visiting my childhood home place. I lived in a holler called Beans Fork in Middlesboro, Kentucky and when I went back to see it, I was blown away at how different it looked. I caught myself saying the place looked "forgotten." Since most of my songs are about the area I grew up in I felt Forgotten Appalachia was a good fit.

Why did you choose to anchor the album with the songs you did?
Forgotten Appalachia is a sequel to my 2016 release Dark Side of The Mountain. I felt like the album had to pick up where Dark Side left off and work it's way to the conclusion, so the album pretty much wrote itself. To fully understand the story I'm telling I recommend folks  listen to the two albums back to back. Dark Side opens with the preacher preaching and works it's way through the drug epidemic, growing up in a dry county, coal mining, cut throat bars, ghost stories, snake handling preachers and a drunken car chase. Forgotten Appalachia focuses more on my struggles and is more character based with stories about my own family and ends with the song "Lonely Place To Be" which is me coming to my own conclusion about life in Appalachia. That song is me washing my hands.

With any particular song, was there an "a-ha" moment when you knew the song was completed and perfect?
For me, every song I write has an "a-ha" moment and that moment comes when I make my own self laugh. It's as though someone whispers something in my ear and I laugh out loud as the pen hits the paper. If I say "oh no, you can't say that" then I immediately know that's what I must say.

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When/where do you your best writing? 
As bad as I hate to admit this it's when I'm hungover. It's when Sunday morning is coming down or it's when I'm in a roomful of people or just any place in general and I don't like the vibe. In both cases, it's me trying to escape and get away from the pain. I wrote the song "No Time To Bleed on a Sunday" morning after a long night of drinking and I wrote "Mary Helen's Gold" in a waiting room in a hospital while my Dad was being tested for black lung. In both cases, I just hated where I was and had to escape it. 

Who would you love to collaborate with?
Ray Wylie Hubbard. I'm reading his autobiography at the moment and he just seems like a kindred spirit of sorts He's a lyrical guru and I love the way he plays the blues. He's not your typical old white guy trying to show off his chops to bunch of Guitar World reading teenagers. He's a storyteller who's lived it. I have the song idea I'd love to write with him. If it never happens then that idea will die with me.

Do you have a favorite gift from a fan?
I don't think you can all this a "gift" and it sure wasn't from a "fan" but one night I was playing the Starlight Lounge in Jellico, Tennessee around 2005 and the place was packed. This girl made her way through the crowd, came up to the stage, took off one ear ring, threw it at me and flipped me off with both middle fingers. I picked the ear ring up, put in the strap lock of my Les Paul and it's still there to this day. I never saw her before or since but every night I look down and see that ring in my strap and think about her. Did I strike a raw nerve? Did she make it home ok? Did she go on to find love and have kids? The mystery of it all and  the "where is she now" is why it's my favorite "gift."

Is there a recent release you can't quit listening to?
The Barstool Romeos "Last Call For Heroes." It came out in March of 2018 and it's still in my rotation. I love honky tonk music and it's honky tonk 101.

Is there a professional "bucket list" item you would love to check off?
Yes, I would love to see a sequel or a prequel to the tv series Justified be made and one of my songs play in the background while Boyd Crowder blows something up.

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