Music.net.nz :: From bedroom to boardroom - Rapid rise to fame for Fraser

Wellington teenager Brooke Fraser has soared high into the charts with her first single Better, and her music career looks like it has plenty of improvement left yet. Mike Houlahan reports.

From bedroom to boardroom, it has been a rapid rise to fame for Wellington songwriter Brooke Fraser.

The teenager vividly recalls sitting in her room - the haven where she retreated to live out her dreams of making music for a living - and strumming the first chords of Better, which would eventually be her first single.

Months later she was in the boardroom of major label Sony Music, signing her first record deal. Better - a lilting song matched with an evocative video starring Temuera Morrison - saw the unknown Fraser rocket up the charts to No 3, and make her forthcoming debut album What To Do With Daylight a much-anticipated release.

"Better, I know the numbers, I know what it's done, but to me when I play it it doesn't sound like a commercial hit and it still doesn't," Fraser confesses.

"I know what it's achieved, but when I think about it I remember sitting on my bed when I was in the 7th form writing it. It's the same song now, but the context is so dramatically different."

Not only is it different because Fraser is rapidly becoming a local star, but because the early steps of her career are obviously grooming her for an international career. A US producer - Brady Blade - was brought in to oversee the album, and Fraser will soon be testing the waters in Australia.

International success has its attractions for Fraser, but not just the obvious ones such as a shot at fame and fortune. Many of the interviews she has done promoting the record have centred on the exploits of her famous father - All Black winger Bernie Fraser - rather than her own not inconsiderable achievements.

"I am wary of it." she admits.

"It isn't something (I) would like to be an issue and I understand New Zealand has an obsession with rugby. . . Sometimes I feel like saying `Actually he's not my Dad, I just made it up for a publicity stunt.'

"He was playing before I was born, so it's weird for me being interviewed about other people's flashbacks, because I didn't experience it myself."

Experience is very important to Fraser. Each of the songs on What To Do With Daylight are very personal, she says.

"All of them are close to me because there was no one else there when I wrote them and they are true from my own experience."

The songs closest to me on the record are the ones that have taught her something, Fraser adds. She will often write a song and a couple of months later understand what it was she was trying to say, or the words will seem strangely prophetic.

Her favourite songs on the album are Mystery and Arithmetic, Fraser says.

"They were a pleasure to write - some songs, you don't exactly labour over them but they take their time to come out. Mystery and Arithmetic came out really easily and as I was writing them the experience was something bigger than myself.

"All these things were coming out of my mouth, I was writing them down and saying `Hey.' I guess it was just me teaching me things.

"I don't know, that probably sounds airy fairy and strange, but those were the two songs I feel privileged I got to write - not because they were groundbreaking songs or anything, but just because when I read the words and I sing them they remind me of why I'm alive and encourage me. I'm proud to call them mine."

That pride in her work made Fraser a feistier first-time recording artist than many. After a worldwide hunt for a producer for What To Do With Daylight Fraser settled upon Brady Blade after hearing some of his work on the debut album by fellow Wellington singer/songwriter Dean Chandler.

Fraser happily concedes she could not have produced the record herself and brought it to the standard she thinks it has reached. That said, she had a very definite idea of how the songs should sound, the direction she wanted them to go in and the direction she didn't want them to go in.

"With Brady on board and the excellence he brought to the table, everyone involved was forced to bring their game up as well as a result, and I think that was the best thing that could have happened for the record," Fraser says.

"Brady and I clicked so well. He really understood the sound I was aiming for and made an effort to get inside my head, get inside the songs, and understand what I wanted from the record. He was completely receptive to me saying every five minutes `No Brady, it's supposed to be like this'. . . which I did. He was very patient with me."

Patience has rewarded Fraser with a debut album sure to see her fulfil her childhood dreams.

"I cannot remember a time in my life, ever, that I have not wanted to do music and not wanted to do it full time," Fraser says.

"Last year during the negotiation process I knew I should be feeling overwhelmed or something, but it felt so natural, so right and so timely.

"I'm just grateful every day - I step back and say to myself it's really amazing that I am able to do this, and at 19 I have my dream job. I never want to take that for granted."