Today, we’d like to introduce you to Seth Brand.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
I’m a full-time musician and audio engineer. I started playing guitar around the age of 15, and shortly after, I got really interested in the recording and mixing process.
I played in bands through high school and college, got a Bachelor’s Degree in Audio Production, and started working full-time in the audio industry around 2012. My first gig was for a video production company that specialized in medical videos, t.v. Commercials, a few short films, and TV. Shows, etc. I also wrote and produced a few jingles while there.
Today, I travel the country with my wife, playing music in our duo called “Seth and Sara.” We started in September of 2018 when we sold all of our stuff, moved to North Carolina (from St. Louis, MO) using only a minivan and my 4-door Malibu, and started playing full-time. We’ve now traveled to all 50 states (although Sara still needs Hawaii as of now ha!).
Our latest adventure was a 9-week tour through Canada and into Alaska. All the while, I still do Audio Production on a pretty full-time basis as a freelancer. I currently have a recording and mixing studio in my home in North Carolina, and I work with all kinds of musicians, freelancers, ad agencies, churches, and other organizations/artists who need quality recording, mixing, and mastering.
Can you talk to us about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned? Looking back, would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Of course, it all comes so easily, but not! Just kidding, there are always going to be struggles along the way. But if you love what you do, and know that it is the path you are supposed to be on, then you find a way to get through all the struggles and obstacles.
Here is a long, crazy story of just one of our journeys:
So, our first BIG “Seth and Sara” duo music tour was in 2019. Sara booked us three full months on the road and we had tons of shows lined up ranging from Washington, Oregon, Idaho, California, all the way down to Texas and Arizona… and many stops in-between. The first two months went smoothly and were simply amazing. We were having the time of our lives… but then…
Right at the start of our third month on the road, we had booked a stop at Yellowstone National Park. The plan was to take 3 days off and just relax while camping. On our first day there, we took a drive up to see Old Faithful when our van started smoking from the rear. It was snowing, so I jumped out and threw snow on our rear tires to hear them sizzling and start smoking even more.
The only tow truck available was going to charge something around $600 to tow us 14 miles out of the park. So, we googled and found there was a tire/mechanic shop right outside the gate of Yellowstone. We decided to chance the drive. We went to bed that night in our van, knowing the next day would likely be full of headaches and bad news.
The next morning we got up and slowly, very slowly drove out of the park. So slowly, a bison walking down the middle of the road was trying to pass us. What seemed like an eternity later, we pulled out of the gate of Yellowstone, coasted into the parking lot of the mechanic shop, and about 50 feet from our actual parking spot, our rear passenger tire blew out!
I went in and explained everything going on. That we were camping in our van… which is now unusable. It had everything that we needed in it. We were on the road. We had shows coming up that we had to leave for in 2 days. We also had no place to sleep now, and there wasn’t much around. They told us they’d take a look at it and let us know, so we went out to lunch hoping and praying to hear good news.
After lunch, we walked back to the shop and of course… BAD NEWS! The rear axle was totally shot, the parts weren’t there, and they’d have to order them. They drove us to a near by hotel in which the owner of the mechanic shop knew the owner of the hotel… so they worked us a nice deal for a night. The next day, more bad news. The part was delayed, they were trying the best they could, and would keep us updated. So we booked another night in the hotel.
On our third day, the day we were supposed to be leaving for a show in Idaho that night, the entire mechanic team was working super hard to try and get us out of there by 4 pm… which was the latest we could leave to make our show. When I say it got down to the wire…I mean it. The shop manager kept coming out with updates…”almost there, guys, they are trying to fit just one more part in. Hang in there; we are gonna make this happen for you!”
Probably around 4:05 pm, they came out, and it was done. We shook hands, we all hugged and screamed together in joy, high-fived, and high-tailed it out of there to make the show with about $2300 less in our bank account, not including the hotels.
But… hold on… about 30-45 minutes down the road guess what happened? Our rear started smoking again! Unbelievable! I pulled over and called the shop, and they said that they had another location about 30 minutes further in Idaho Falls, if we wanted to keep going, or we could bring it back to them. We decided to keep going. They called their other location to explain we were coming so they’d be ready. Again, we slowly drifted to the next shop, pulling over every 10 minutes to let the rear cool down for a bit.
We finally arrived, and they were outside waiting for us. Again, they said they’d take a look. At this point, we knew for the first time ever that we’d have to call and cancel a show for that night. Thankfully, the venue was extremely nice and understanding. In the meantime, we uber’d to lunch again, hoping for good news.
And after lunch, BAD NEWS! The previous shop hadn’t quite put the parts on correctly or tightly enough, so it immediately burned them all up and re-created the exact same problem! So again, they’d have to order the parts, and it would take a day if we were lucky. They drove us to a hotel, where, again, we had to cough up more money to sleep for the night.
The next day, we got more BAD NEWS! They could only find a used part, and it would take another day to arrive. We had a show that night in Boise, Idaho, but no way to get there. So, we booked ANOTHER night in the hotel with a new plan. Now, this was on a Sunday. This is important because we needed to rent a car so we could go pick up all our music equipment from the useless van at the shop and then haul it down to Boise, Idaho, for our show.
The only rental place open on a Sunday was at the airport. We uber’d to the airport to rent the car, however…you MUST have a credit card (not a debit card) to rent a car. This is a rule, and it is only at the airport. I, at the time, did not have a credit card. Neither did Sara. We always use debit or cash. Lesson learned. We were not able to rent the car and had to Uber back to the hotel, where we called to cancel another show, ordered Chinese, and ate away all of our problems.
The next day, the shop called to explain that there was more bad news, that it would take an extra couple of days to get everything they needed, and that they were SOOOO SORRY! So this is on Monday now, and the earliest they’d have the van done would be Thursday. Our next shows were in California, starting with Los Gatos on Thursday. Remember, we are in Idaho Falls, so this is a 13+ hour drive. We needed to leave by Tuesday, Wednesday at the latest, to even make it there in time.
I remember thinking at this point that we had two options. 1. We could cancel the last month of the tour, wait for the van to be done, and then just drive home to North Carolina, defeated. This was the easiest thing to do. Option 2. We could rent a van, pack up all our belongings and musical gear, and go to California for the next week of shows.
We were so determined to make this work, that we just couldn’t give up so we chose option 2. We rented a mini-van for one week and drove off to California. The plan was to drive Tuesday through Thursday morning, play our shows Thursday through Sunday evenings (one show per night), and then drive back to Idaho Falls to pick up the van early the following week on our days off (Mon-Wed).
This didn’t happen. We got more bad news, by Friday while sitting in our rental van in California, we received a call from the mechanic shop that parts were delayed another week. So, our plan was shot. Again, we had to make a decision, so we extended the van rental for a 2nd week and ran around playing more shows in California the following Thursday-Saturday. Finally, after 2 full weeks touring and sleeping our way through California in a small Dodge Caravan rental, we had several days off to drive back to Idaho Falls to get our now fixed van! So we did just that.
The shop apologized over and over. And, to our surprise, the first mechanic shop, the ones that put the parts on wrong the first time, had covered our entire bill for this round of repairs! To this day, I am so grateful for that, as we had just spent thousands of dollars on hotels and van rentals, let alone the first round of repairs! They really stepped up to the plate!
However, this nightmare doesn’t end. We had a few days at this point to drive to Arizona for the last two weeks of shows of the tour. I think we got one full day of driving peacefully. But on the second day, the van wasn’t happy with our peacefulness… so it started making a very loud noise, this time from the front passenger side. I’m going to try to cut this short, as it’s getting really long. We pulled into a mechanic shop and got the same story. I can’t remember the exact problem with the van this time, but it was going to take 3 or 4 days at the earliest to fix. So again, we rented another Dodge Caravan, packed all of our stuff up, again, and drove to Arizona for the last 2 weeks of shows.
I remember many nights on the last month of this tour, lying on the floor of this rented minivan, staring up at the Walmart parking lot lights under which we slept, wondering what my life had become. I wondered if this was for me, if I was doing the right thing, or if I should just give it up and go back to working for some company where I had stability and comfort.
But looking back now, I’m so glad we decided to keep going on this crazy adventure. Since then, we’ve been full time musicians and entrepreneurs for over six years now, and wouldn’t trade it for the world. The memories alone are worth it all. The friends we’ve made, the places we’ve seen, and the struggles we’ve over come, simply would not have been possible had we not taken a chance and risked it all.
Oh, after we finished with the last two weeks of shows in our rental van, we drove back to Idaho and picked up our van. We then took our newly repaired tour van back home to North Carolina, where we promptly sold it. Good riddance, and onward!
Thanks – so, what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I’m a full-time musician and audio engineer. I play in a duo called “Seth and Sara” with my wife, and we travel around locally, nationally, and even internationally, playing music together for anyone who will listen.
I also work as a freelance audio engineer, specializing in full music production, including recording, mixing, and mastering. I’ve worked with a lot of artists in many genres, and I also do commercial audio work for ads, television, and radio, as well as a few full-feature films.
For example, The “Seth and Sara” album titled “Campfire Smoke” was recorded and mixed by me. We then had it mastered at Infrasonic Sound in Nashville by Daniel Bacigalupi.
I think I’m most proud of just doing it. In 2018, I quit my full time audio job with benefits, along with my wife Sara, we sold everything we had basically, and moved to North Carolina to start playing music full time, with no benefits or weekly pay check. We haven’t looked back since. This has opened many doors for us both musically and for my recording and mixing business.
Any big plans?
In regards to our musical duo, we are booking as far as a year out. We are already fully booked for 2024 through December, with only a few dates open (if that) at this point.
Most of our shows fall between Thursday and Sunday of each week, with the occasional week night show. For 2024, we’ve decided to stay local, playing mostly in both North and South Carolina and a show or two in Tennessee. However, for 2025, we plan to do another traveling tour. We are not sure exactly where yet, but we are thinking out west, either Montana or Texas.
As for my audio business, it’s still going strong, and I’m always looking to work with new artists, musicians, and creatives. I’m in the process of finishing up a new soundproof recording room, that will open the door for more possibilities on the recording side of things. We (Seth and Sara) hope to put out another album or music project within the next year or so as well. Lots of plans!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.sethandsaramusic.com and www.sethbrand.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sethandsara/ and https://www.instagram.com/sethbrandmusic/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sethandsaramusic/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCG3fPgKN5tLAkjJfq9lbQEQ and https://www.youtube.com/@SethBrandMusic
Image Credits
Sara Brand, Seth, and Rachel B. Pressley Photography
