Today we’d like to introduce you to Chase Brickenden.
Chase, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I was born in Sacramento and raised in a small town in Southern Oregon called Grants Pass. My dad was a touring drummer, and my mom did sound for his band while she was pregnant, so I guess that life was in my blood from the very start. I had a nice upbringing with a very tight family, and I was fortunate enough to have loving and supportive parents that allowed me to take an interest in something and run with it. There are pictures of me playing on pots and pans and sitting behind my dad’s kit when I was a baby. The sticks are as long as tall at the time.
I had a pretty normal childhood in a small town in the USA. I had a lot of creative interests as a kid, but I always had an interest in music from my parents, exposing me to incredible jazz, Motown, RnB, and Rock bands. Tower of Power was always on at our house. I joined the band program in 5th grade, and that carried on into high school, where we had a large competitive marching band. I started getting much more interested in the drum set around freshman year. The drumlin I was in was headed by a former Blue Devils snare drummer named Jeff Bush, and he really instilled a solid foundation of discipline to do the work needed to reach for excellence. Our drumline and marching band ended up winning many competitions regionally up and down the west coast.
I quit marching band when I started my local band and got serious about being a drummer and moving to LA. I discovered bands like Slipknot, Pantera, Tool, and Mudvayne, and that was that. My buddies and I watched Pantera’s Vulgar Videos, and we were like, “WE WANNA DO THAT!” I attended Musician’s Institute’s summer program between my junior and senior years, which gave me a path to practice before returning to MI. That winter, we had a house fire and ended up losing all of our belongings except for our music gear in the garage. My whole family had to move in with my grandparents while our house was rebuilt. The community came together and helped us replace many things we lost. All I could do at this point was try to graduate and practice my ass off to get ready to go back to LA.
After (barely) graduating, I took a gap year to practice before starting at MI in Hollywood. My friend I had met over that first summer agreed to let me live at his place, so with housing secured, my parents and I packed the van to head to LA, where I would begin my music career. When we showed up, the apartment was a TINY studio with 3 guys living there behind the Hollywood and Highland Mall. It was so bad that my mom cried, lol. It makes for a great story now. MI was eye-opening and a ton of fun. I met lifelong friends and connections that would eventually lead to my first touring gig with Otep in 2010. I was unprepared and green as grass when I got that gig. I ended up learning 13 songs in 10 days and left for a tour the day before my 24th birthday. I used to listen to Otep in high school, so I was insanely nervous. I was the youngest guy in the band by far, and they let me know it. It was awesome, but it was ROUGH. That first tour absolutely changed the direction of my life.
Otep eventually took Butcher Babies on their first US tour in 2012, where we all became great friends. I left Otep in 2013 to pursue original music with Thrown Into Exile, which ended up making a record and going on the Rockstar Mayhem tour that summer. The name of the tour was really accurate. It was Mayhem. Rockstar fantasy camp. A massive traveling festival tour with 20 bands, unlimited booze, motocross dudes doing backflips all day, and incredible after-show parties every day. Thrown into exile, we eventually broke up, and a few of us made another band called Grimace. I was writing and recording with them while also gigging in cover bands around LA until 2016, when I got a call from Henry, the guitarist of Butcher Babies.
I joined Butcher Babies for their US tour supporting Megadeth, Amon Amarth, and Suicidal Tendencies (with Dave Lombardo on drums) in September. From there, we recorded a record, and I spent the next few years touring hard on it all over the world with them. We took a year off in 2019 when I began to expand into real estate ventures with my longtime girlfriend Ananda. Then COVID hit… We all got caught way off guard. We had a huge tour planned for April 2020, which had to be canceled. Covid was rough for me. We ended up moving back to OR to hunker down, but it was pretty brutal. But we made it through, and in 2021, we started touring again. We played most of the major hard rock and metal festivals in the US and Europe that year, including Wacken Open Air, which I dreamt of playing since I was 15.
In Jan of ’22, we recorded Butcher Baby’s latest record, which was released in July of ’23. I have now left Butcher Babies and am currently writing music, creating content, working with a couple of artists on their upcoming releases, and putting effort into expanding our real estate portfolio. It’s been a whirlwind, but it’s far from the end of my musical journey. I’m excited to see what comes next.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Not at all smooth! It’s been rocky and I feel like I’ve had to fight tooth and nail between huge blessings. I’ve been presented with opportunities at just the right time a few times, but the in-betweens have been a grind.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Almost my entire professional career has been in metal music, but I am actually a well-rounded and dynamic player. Over the years, with influences from guys like Kenny Aronoff and Dave Elitch, I’ve made being a drummer that plays for the song and buries the click my specialty. Like many guys, I used to come from a place of trying to be “the best” and show off but I see that that really isn’t important. I have chops, I can play 300 bpm blast beats, but I can also lay down pocket at 60 bpm on a country or pop ballad or a funky syncopated groove and enjoy it equally as much, if not more. I’m also very proud to endorse many of my favorite music gear brands. Huge shoutout to Paiste, Promark, Evans, and Yamaha Drums!
Let’s talk about our city – what do you love? What do you not love?
Love the food, the climate, and feeling the city has from a bunch of dreamers trying to make it real. I don’t love some of the bureaucracy and cost of living. It’s crazy.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.chasethedrums.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/chasethedrums
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Chasethedrums/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/chasethedrums
- Other: https://tiktok.com/@chasethedrums
Image Credits
Jamie Kaufman
