Homegrown Grammy winner Shawn Everett

from The SCENE – April 2021

Werewolves, cowboys vinyl fanatics and VHS freaks

Grammy Bragging Rights

Alberta native and nice guy Shawn Everett turns his mad work ethic into studio magic and industry awards

by MARY-LYNN WARDLE

Having received his sixth Grammy Award on March 14, for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical for his work on Beck’s Hyperspace, Bragg Creek native Shawn Everett, who resides in Los Angeles, is taking things in stride, literally, walking his multi-breed, tiny dog, Ruffles, as part of his morning routine a few days after the awards while talking to theSCENE.

To put dog things in perspective, Everett, who grew up with Kananaskis Country’s 4,200 square kilometres moments away, says having a dog in LA is not really a challenge, even without a “backyard on demand,” as he gets lots of time outside, particularly when the recording engineer (and his wife with their young daughter) takes him up into the hills.

To put music things in perspective, keep in mind an obscure band called The Beatles earned, yes, six Grammy Awards while they were together (more were awarded for albums mined from their faults, er, vaults afterwards, along with Hall of Fame stuff). Everett has also won two Juno Awards.

But, with five additional little gramophone statues adorning his studio since his first, unexpected-to-him win in 2016 for Alabama Shakes’ Sound & Color, Everett avoids the corner of Been-There, Done-That Street and Jaded Avenue. “It doesn’t actually wear off; it’s exciting really no matter what’s going on. It’s a very strange experience. It seems like every time, it feels like slightly out of body, no matter what. It hasn’t lost its lustre,” he says of winning. 38 theyyscene.com • APRIL 2021

The road to these achievements was mapped when Everett was playing with his metal band in his teens and was drawn to artists like Radiohead who messed with sound. For Christmas, he asked his father, Bob Everett, a former Bragg Creek area councillor, for a 16-track recorder.

“That allowed me to find a niche. There’s an artform, like placing the microphone, there’s a lot to explore there. I got more and more interested in it; I just never left that recording room in my house. Then I got more and more obsessed and I met a guy in Bragg Creek named Rob Bartlett; he had a recording studio in the city (Sundae Sound), and helped me and hooked me up with Banff” — Banff Centre For Arts and Creativity, where Everett interned for several years, when he would sneak into the studio at night and experiment with mics in trash cans or vents, just to hear the sound.

“He was … the person that helped me get to another level, because Banff was really an international place, and through there, all the connections led to everything else in my life. I think that ending up in Banff opened my eyes to the whole world of this. It wasn’t restrained to my bedroom or one city — it was big, and that led to everything after it.”

That road was further paved by Everett’s out-there yet unequivocal approach to sound, in which anything is worth trying but only the good stuff gets invited to the party. Examples include stuffing cotton balls into Shakes’ singer Brittany Howard’s mouth for vocal tracks, or rubbing the heads on the tape machine as it plays to alter the sound, something that could be accomplished digitally but that the engineer points out has more “vibe” if done with the actual tape.

Everett’s fascinating segment on Mix with the Masters — an online video and webinar site — shows him moving objects and sounds around with gleeful abandon in his studio, giving the impression of a mad scientist at work, one captured in the aura of genius. Artists including Orville Peck, The Killers, Kim Gordon, Kurt Vile, Kacey Musgraves, Pete Yorn, and The War on Drugs have been drawn to Everett’s crazed genius aura, which helps explain all those Grammys and Junos.

In fact, for this year’s awards, he was competing against himself as he was also nominated for Howard’s solo project, Jaime, and Devon Gilfillian’s Black Hole Rainbow, making him only the second engineer in history in that position alongside the late Ed Cherney, who won in 1995 for his work with Bonnie Raitt.

Everett keeps the awards on a little shelf in his studio.

“It seems like the safest place because it’s the most locked-up part of the building. They never really have parties in there because there’s too much expensive equipment … You wouldn’t want to have a wine and cheese and find out someone took four of them type of thing.”

Of course, there are also many people Everett worked with that didn’t lead to awards but are still unforgettable. While recording the soundtrack album for Howard Zinn’s 2009 documentary, The People Speak, he got notice of the next artist coming in, Bob Dylan.

“That was a wild one. There’re a few times when you meet someone (and it’s) really crazy, and you get a pinch-me moment when you can’t believe what you’re dealing with or what you’re up against. Then it kicks in and you try and work hard.”

In the spirit of taking it all in stride, Everett didn’t find the shift from the sleepy hamlet of Bragg Creek, whose greater area population is under 5,000 people and where residents routinely see cougars, elk, bears and moose out their windows, to the Los Angeles area with its 10,000,000 people, much of a change at all.

“Weirdly, people talk about culture shock and things like that. I don’t think I ever felt like I had one. I feel like to some degree, I’m always maybe, sort of living in my own head. I was always concentrating on what I was making. So, no matter where I am, I kind of always felt like I was in a similar mind zone.

“It just felt like the difference between LA and Bragg Creek would be significantly more musical opportunities. It was mostly just (the same) for the most part, minus the fact I didn’t have my family or nature around.”

In fact, when Everett returned to Bragg Creek for a few years, a kind of inverse reaction occurred. “More of a culture shock for me, weirdly, was getting used to the kind of chaos of LA, because you kind of sink into it. It feels like a drink you put a little too much sugar in and you’re always kind of wired. (Back in Bragg Creek) the pace was just so low and I was used to my sugar kick.”

When pressed for highlights, the kid from the forest who conquered the LA jungle is stoic. “Certainly, winning the first Grammy was a bit of a shocker because that’s not really what I had intended. I had the left side of the art, more extreme, like abstract noise and stuff like that so it didn’t really seem like Grammy material. For whatever reason, the stars aligned and that happened; it was quite a surprise.

“My parents had come down and they were always extremely supportive and I think maybe a lot of parents are concerned when their kids get into music or something like that, it’s like an empty road. They never seemed to have that concern at all... to see them excited when I won was one of the best moments for me.”

If unbridled parental support for ventures that don’t often lead to security seems rare in our society, consider the fact that Everett’s dad played in a band, Done On Bradstreet, who opened for the Calgary portion of Festival Express, which featured Janis Joplin, Grateful Dead, Buddy Guy and The Band. They also recorded with Buddy Holly’s and Roy Orbison’s producer, Norman Petty.

So with six Grammys, a rich family life and decades of experience, what advice would Everett give to someone starting out?

“I think it’s something that’s not for the faint of heart. Doing something like this is doable. I mean, some people think that its hopeless, like you can’t break in, but from my experience there is luck involved in meeting the right people, but I think you can meet those people if you’re fully determined. Like, you don’t even see another option.”

It’s always interesting when someone mentions luck. Especially when they follow it with a testament to putting their shoulder to the wheel. “I was 100 per cent determined to make this happen, and that involved working 14 hours a day for 12 years and really, really grinding and not stopping.”

Everett pauses, and then adds something that seems like second nature to him. “And, you know, being nice to people helps. People want to work with people they like, so you try and be nice to everybody. Try to be someone that people hopefully want to be around, that people invite into the room.”

“I was 100 per cent determined to make this happen, and that involved working 14 hours a day for 12 years and really, really grinding and not stopping.”