{"id":44595,"date":"2023-04-11T14:51:41","date_gmt":"2023-04-11T21:51:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.drumeo.com\/beat\/?p=44595"},"modified":"2024-04-18T01:05:56","modified_gmt":"2024-04-18T08:05:56","slug":"brittany-bowman-sorry-im-not-sorry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.drumeo.com\/beat\/brittany-bowman-sorry-im-not-sorry\/","title":{"rendered":"Sorry, I\u2019m Not Sorry"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I grew up playing guitar and listening to Green Day. I thought I wanted to be in an original band, but the older I got, the more I realized how much I liked playing other people\u2019s music. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are so many genres, there\u2019s just something about jumping into different gigs with different people. My dream was to play for a major artist, so I moved out to LA from Chicago in 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a kid, you hear \u201cLA is where you need to be for music\u201d. I didn\u2019t know anybody or have a definite plan – I just knew I wanted to start getting gigs. If it didn\u2019t work out, at least I\u2019d be in a place where I loved the weather and the vibe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I started going to these weekly jam nights on the Sunset Strip and got myself a little studio lockout space because of course, being a drummer, you can\u2019t play a full acoustic kit in an apartment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I started making videos for Instagram not really knowing what was going to come of it. I\u2019d play random grooves or cover other people\u2019s music. I knew how crucial it was to be active on social media because that\u2019s where a lot of people find new talent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I would connect with musical directors who were working with big pop artists, and by consistently posting videos I got the attention of a few of them, resulting in one of my first gigs with an artist named Meg Myers. I felt like I was on my way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It took a few years of living in LA before all of the hard work started to pay off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Britt
With Meg Myers<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

January 2022 rolled around. I had the winter blues – touring with Meg was awesome, but the run had concluded, and I was wondering what was going to come next. I would get together with my friend Leanne and talk about how stressful this industry can be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s so expensive living in Los Angeles and paying for a lockout space on top of rent and everything else. I was hardly bringing in any money, and multiple times I thought maybe I\u2019ll just do drums as a hobby and find some kind of day job.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been out here for four years. I don\u2019t know if I\u2019m getting anywhere. I have a gig right now with Meg Myers, but is anything else going to come from it?\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leanne\u2019s career was progressing the same as mine was. We met at a jam at the Viper room – she was also getting smaller gigs and working her way up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s so important to have a solid group of friends – find one or two people in the industry you get along with – someone you can share things with. It\u2019s such a niche career; without a good support system, it can be so much harder, and not many people outside of the industry will understand all of the ins and outs quite the same way. Plus, you can refer gigs to each other and grow together. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leanne\u2019s become my best friend out here – we\u2019ve had many lunch and dinner dates discussing the ups and downs of this industry, and how rad it would be to one day be on a gig together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Soon enough, I got linked up with an artist by the name of Royal And The Serpent for what would be my first real tour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a Sprinter van tour, and I was worried about being gone that long – I had never done it before. As much as I love being a touring musician, I\u2019m a homebody and I was nervous about being in a van with people I just met for six weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Britt
With Royal and the Serpent<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Surprise: it was the most fun I\u2019ve ever had in my life. From then on, I knew this was for me. But sure enough, when that tour wrapped, I was like \u201cOh my God\u2026now what?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You create this family on the road for two months, and you get home and you\u2019re back to square one. As a hired drummer, it\u2019s pretty rare to get a long term gig with one band or artist. I was back in nervous mode of what am I gonna do?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

–<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One day, out of the blue, Heather reached out to me. \u201cHey, Stacy Jones is putting together a band for an artist and I threw your name in. He should be reaching out soon.\u201d I was like, \u201cGreat – okay! Thanks so much!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I didn\u2019t hear anything for the next week or two. That\u2019s the story of hired guns: Is anything going to come of this? Maybe not.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But then I got a call from Stacy. He said, \u201cIt\u2019s a major pop artist, but they\u2019re switching to more of a rock sound, and I think you\u2019d be great for it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I guess years of uploading videos to social media paid off: my Instagram was my resume. I sent him a few videos of me playing in the vein of what they were looking for, and soon found out the artist was Demi Lovato. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A big chunk of advice I learned over the course of living out here in LA is how important it can be to go the extra mile – so I listened to Demi\u2019s discography and found some more rock-influenced tunes in her catalog, made a drum cover of one of the songs, and sent it to Stacy so he could see me actually playing the artist\u2019s music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fast forward, I ended up getting the gig. I felt like I finally got into the next tier of my music journey.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Britt
Madison Square Garden with Demi Lovato<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

I called Leanne and filled her in on everything. She was in the UK with Marina and the Diamonds and she expressed her excitement for me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few weeks later, she told me that Stacy asked to get on a call with her about the Demi band.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leanne and I both moved to LA in 2017 and our careers had been growing at the same rate. We\u2019d both been on super small local performances for the hell of it, slowly moving to bigger opportunities, referring each other along the way. Fast forward a few years and here we are, like we always talked about and hoped for – we ended up on the same gig together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this industry – especially being female – there\u2019s no place for being catty and unsupportive. The more you can genuinely cheer on your friends, the better. There\u2019s room for everyone. Plus, it\u2019s only going to benefit you later because you\u2019ll have a stronger circle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rewind to the Royal and the Serpent tour. At one point, a friend of mine who is good friends with Demi\u2019s boyfriend, without giving anything away, told me that it\u2019s rad I\u2019m drumming for Royal as she might be doing something with Demi Lovato in the future. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I thought to myself…how fun would that be?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fast forward to the Holy Fvck tour in Fall of 2022 and I\u2019m drumming for Demi and get to be out on the road again with Royal. It\u2019s crazy how it all came full circle.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"britt<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

The first thing we did together as a band was performing live on Jimmy Fallon. As Leanne and I were flying out to New York, we talked about how surreal this was – that we\u2019d been talking about doing this since day one, and now we were doing it. I grew up seeing Jimmy Fallon on TV!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019d never had a gig this big before. Never played TV before. Never had a drum tech before. Never been on a tour bus before. But here was everything at once. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I remember pulling up to Rockefeller Center, walking upstairs and settling into the dressing room. Leanne and I just looked at each other. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOh my God. We\u2019re here together doing this.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the same building that hosts SNL. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You don\u2019t really process it. You just kind of do it and then before you know it, it\u2019s done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"britt<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I went out to look at the stage where my kit was set up. We did a couple of run throughs with the cameras, and being the first thing we\u2019d be doing with Demi, it was intimidating. We\u2019d never performed outside of the rehearsal studio with her, and I wanted to be confident and professional. It was an overwhelming situation – in a good way. This is exactly what I\u2019ve dreamed of doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also felt major imposter syndrome. Even though I had put in years of playing gigs for no money, creating content on Instagram, practicing for hours on end in my rehearsal space – you\u2019d think this would be enough to make me believe I deserved it, but I don\u2019t think anything will ever really make that feeling go away completely. It\u2019s the nature of it – and it keeps you striving to always do better. It\u2019s all about the balance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s crazy – I was way more nervous playing on TV than I was playing to 80,000 people at Rock In Rio a month later. Playing a show is more about just being yourself and going wild up there behind the kit – being an authentic rock drummer. Playing for cameras can feel so unnatural and almost too <\/em>organized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"britt<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

We wrapped around 5 pm. The other girls were in the room talking and I just remember thinking to myself like oh my God – I feel like I fucked that up. I could\u2019ve done so much better. I\u2019m going to feel so uneasy until it airs in five hours, and then it\u2019s out there forever for the entire world to see.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was freaking myself out. I\u2019m a perfectionist, which can be both a weakness and a strength. It makes me work hard and helps me improve, but it can also prevent you from just \u201cbeing\u201d and it becomes hard not to overanalyze every little thing I do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leanne and I went out to dinner together and watched the episode in the hotel room after. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oh my God, what\u2019s this going to sound like?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It aired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it was great. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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