It has been said that making albums is like making sausages; you’ll enjoy them more if you don’t see how they’re made. The following people, for whom I am eternally grateful, saw their fair share of sausages being made during the gestation of King of Air:
Mick & Emily Flowers, Jared Wenkman, Bianca Lugo, Tim Cappello, Matt Hubbard, Nick Joswick, Sally Allen, Kristy Duff, and Jim Ranes.
I believe I experienced every conceivable human emotion while making this album, which can be attested as witnessed by Bianca Lugo, along with Donald and Linda Brown. Thanks to these three for not putting me out to pasture.
Thanks also to the musicians who supported and inspired me during this time, including Alex Moralez, Roger Wuthrich, Dan Ruscito, Jason Jones, Kevin Shoaff, and Sally Bowman. The life I love is making music with my friends.
Special thanks also to Wendy Bonn for believing in me and seeing me as I want to be seen.
King of Air is the culmination of a year of my life, with much of that time spent waiting, waiting, waiting for the next piece to fall into place so that this day could be born. It’s also the first album I’ve ever made without direct contribution from my brother, Jeff Brown, whose presence, nonetheless, can be felt all over the record. Jeff always said that making an album is like going to war; you need to be properly fortified.
The themes explored here include grief & loss, the emptiness of consumerism, the absurdity of war, and the search for meaning and connection in modern life. To put it succinctly, the record is dark, but its creation was a light to me, which I hope it will be for you.
I recently read Bob Dylan’s book, The Philosophy of Modern Song, in which he writes about how it’s perhaps less important to know what an artist was thinking/doing when a work was composed. Dylan claims it is what a song means to you, the listener, that really matters. I’ll leave any deciphering in King of Air for you, but I’ll share that the thematic key to this record is contained in the song “Don’t Be Afraid.”
Don’t be afraid to walk through the darkness; don’t be afraid to seek your own answers in a world where being an individual is so rarely recognized; don’t be afraid to make your own sausages.
Res ipsa loquitur,
Ben Brown
June 2nd, 2023