Songs on struggles, spirituality: Kalamazoo’s Branden Mann and the Reprimand delve into big topics on new album

By Mark Wedel | Special to the Kalamazoo Gazette 

KALAMAZOO — When his appendix became infected, Branden Mann was at a point in his life where he’d been questioning his faith for a long time.

It was 2007. “I was in so much pain, I prayed. And it didn’t help,” Mann said. He told himself, “You know what? God’s not going to help. Maybe you should go to the doctor.”

The doctor who operated told him that the useless organ had turned gangrenous in his guts. There were complications, infections, a lot of pain, but Mann survived.

On Branden Mann and the Reprimand’s new CD, “The Chemicals Won’t Balance,” is his song “Staring Down a Barrel of Monkeys.”

On it, Mann sings in his usual gruff voice over a darkly twangy Western-sounding tune lyrics that sound like they’re about suicide. But they’re not — he’s staring down a barrel of monkeys, not a barrel of a gun. “I wanna live my life … ’cause one of these days I know that I’m gonna die,” he repeats in the song.

The title track was inspired by a friend who was tired of living a life on medications for depression and anxiety. “The chemicals won’t balance like you need … When you wake up in the morning you might just feel more all right. I don’t think you need to end it, but you just need to end this for tonight.”

“I related to it a lot, too. Because I’ve had those times where I didn’t understand what’s going on, but I realized it was more internal than external,” Mann said.

The Kalamazoo singer/songwriter has wrestled with spiritual doubts for much of his life. One way for him to figure out things is to write a song.

Mann was born in 1978, lived most of his childhood and teen years in Mottville, Mich., a tiny town near the Indiana border. But he spent his grade-school years commuting to a Baptist school in Elkhart. “All my friends were in Indiana, so I had a lot of time to myself,” he said.

His parents were strict, but not as strict as his school. A school rule ordered students to not attend movie theaters, even for G-rated films, because that would support a sex-and-violence filled industry, Mann said.

“My parents thought that was ridiculous,” and often took him to the movies. “We ran into some teachers there one time,” and Mann saw his first example of hypocrisy.

He formed his first band in high school, and got a chance to play in chapel. “Our band had drums and a drum beat, and some of the teachers in the school had some moral issues with rock ‘n’ roll music, they felt like certain rhythms were evil,” he said. Teachers in the audience walked out, but fellow students loved that “these guys are singing about God, but they’re being rebellious? Whoa.”

Mann went to Cornerstone University with the goal of becoming a youth pastor. “Then I started seeing a whole bunch of inconsistencies.” He saw a pastor dishonestly reallocate a large donation. He wondered why Baptists at school had beliefs that contradicted his family’s Missionary Church denomination, and vise-versa, and both sides claimed the other “was going to hell” because of it.

“I had to figure out what I believed.” He left Cornerstone, studied other denominations, religions, became attracted to Quakerism and Buddhism. Eventually he moved to Kalamazoo to attend Western Michigan University.

Though he’d taken time off of music, “whenever I got frustrated with something, I’d write music to work my way through it.” Around 2006 he got back into playing and became a fixture at Kalamazoo open-mic nights.

In 2007, he formed the first Reprimand, with Tommy Ufkes (drums, guitar) and Bill Clements (bass). “Bill’s influence kind of helped me find what sort of sound I wanted to have,” Mann said. But Clements wanted a harder sound, and “I wanted to be a bit more dynamic, instead of just being in your face all the time.” Clements left, and Jeff Weller joined on bass.

They developed a sound that Mann used to call “alt-blues,” in the same vein as alt-country. There are rock, traditional country, folk, blues and other influences in the Reprimand sound. Then there are styles that aren’t apparent, but are big influences in Mann’s music — hip-hop and R&B.

Though he loves the simplicity of a trio, Mann has often had guest musicians with him. “We’ve had up to eight on stage before.” While recording the CD at Mike Roache’s Broadside Studios, “as I was listening to it, I was thinking things like, this would sound cool with a banjo … Oh, this would be cool with keyboard.” So they layered on the instruments.

The result are hard-driving sermons on living life with respect for others and respect for one’s self.

It’s almost as if Mann is becoming a secular form of the pastor he’d thought he’d be. But he’s more concerned with figuring things out for himself, and he’s happy if others benefit, too. “A lot of times just a rhythm and two chords can brighten your day depending on how it was written.”

Once he was wrapped up in worries, and had to struggle in “transcending that inner bulls— dialog,” Mann said. He’s learning to “just enjoy now.”