Martin Luke Brown on life, death and everything in between
Ahead of the release of his latest album, the indie-soul artist chatted about gratitude, appreciating life’s little joys and being present in the everyday.
Photo: Dana Trippe
“For a guy, turning 30 feels like becoming a man. I know you would think that would happen around 21, but it doesn’t,” Martin Luke Brown laughs. It’s a sunny June afternoon, and the indie-soul artist is musing on the ideas behind his latest album, life & death etc, while sitting in the front seat of his car.
“I've been thinking a lot, having a lot of zoom-out moments, really acknowledging that this is the time. Most of my friends are all around, and they’re all healthy, their families are healthy — I’ve got my health. I’m just trying to home in on [the fact that] this is it.”
After a few emotional years with feelings that were too big to process on his previous album, man oh man !, as well as some difficult conversations with his dad, this new chapter in Brown’s life feels like a precious window of time. He has his health, good friends and a new relationship with his parents that won’t last forever.
“My relationship with my parents has fundamentally shifted now from being ‘I’m their child’, to now we’re both adults,” Brown shares. “I’m really aware of that being a bit of a golden era, because it’s not going to be long before that relationship’s going to invert and I’ll probably be looking after them, which is really sad to think about.”
“Me and my dad have had some really difficult conversations in the last few years, but it feels like we’ve landed in this place where there’s a real mutual respect and we’re just two adults meeting each other as equals. We’ve had some difficult years, but I really feel like we’ve moved past that now and we’re in this really amazing new chapter. I feel so grateful for that.”
But for all those big, cerebral thoughts, Brown doesn’t necessarily find it easy to notice life’s precious moments. Despite his nostalgic soundscapes and the detail-oriented nature of his lyrics, he doesn’t consider himself a particularly reflective person. Instead, he often finds himself “panicking about the future” in the middle of an “incredibly hectic life.” It’s only when he sits down to write that the world slows and his focus narrows.
“I struggle being quite mindful and actually appreciating what is around me because I’m so focused on chasing the dangling carrot,” Brown confesses. “But, actually, it [music] ends up being quite meditative, and I’m writing songs that are just reminding myself that ‘Hey, this is pretty good actually’.”
In that way, his songs have become affirmations: little reminders of what life is all about and, most importantly, what matters when it all comes to an end. On album highlight nonetheless, he acknowledges that even when there is pain, life needs to be celebrated: “My heart took a beating, but it’s beating nonetheless.” On the piano ballad nothing really dies, he highlights the importance of savouring every moment, because memory is what keeps people alive: “When I close my eyes, I know nothing really dies.” And on fully alive, he reminds us that we’re all young at heart and learning our way through life: “There’s a child inside everyone / Somebody’s daughter or somebody’s son / One day you’re here and then you’re gone / Till then I’ll spend my time / Fully alive.”
It’s this tension between everyday harsh realities and the beauty of being alive that gives the album its heart. Rather than trying to resolve those opposing feelings, Brown is much more interested in allowing them to sit alongside each other. After all, joy doesn’t cancel out grief, and sadness doesn’t make life any less worth celebrating.
“When people die, you miss people’s presence, and just someone being in the next room, doing whatever they’re doing in the next room,” Brown explains. “I think the most profound things often are the smallest, tiniest little details.”
That idea runs through life & death etc — the things we eventually miss most are often the things we barely notice while we have them. A person sitting nearby. A fleeting conversation. A throwaway joke. A warm hug. All those ordinary details of everyday life become more meaningful when you remember that they won’t last forever.
“I think a lot of the album feels like being on psychedelics, where there’s an emotional capacity to feel incredibly happy and grateful, and simultaneously incredibly sad and full of grief. They can both exist at the same time. I’ve had a lot of these moments recently,” Brown said.
“Every funeral I’ve ever been to, people are always laughing. You cry, but you laugh, and you can’t cry without laughter. Maybe it’s just a British thing where there’s this awkwardness that we can’t necessarily sit in an emotion too long. My experience of sadness is actually often intrinsically linked to humour, and trying to laugh it off and make light of the situation. That, to me, feels way more real than just being sad consistently.”
It’s clear that with age, Brown’s understanding and appreciation of those contradictions has deepened. His life now feels infinitely richer than it did 10 years ago, and while he may not always be able to recognise it in the moment, he’s increasingly aware of what’s worth holding onto.
“You experience loss and grief and breakups, and you collect baggage your whole life. That’s obviously very sad, but I think with that comes a real gratitude for everything that you have.”
Although, make no mistake, for all the big thoughts and existential questions running through life & death etc, Brown isn’t trying to impart any grand lessons. The songs might grapple with life, death, grief and gratitude, but at their core they’re still about something much simpler: being here, feeling it all, and having a good time while you can. As Brown put it: “I’m just trying to be as pure as possible about having a nice time, and not think too cerebrally about who I am, what I am, what I’m trying to say in the world. I’m just vibing. Truly vibing.”
life & death etc is out September 18th via Bright Antenna Records.