Interview: Dennis Leise doesn’t serve up metaphor, just delicious eggs
The Indiana-based singer-songwriter discusses change and pressures of modern living.
Don’t go into Dennis Leise‘s “How Do You Want ‘Em Made” expecting a metaphor. It’s just a song about eggs. Whipped up in the chicken coop, quite literally, the kitschy track swings with a Nat King Cole, Louis Jordan and Wynonie Harris sensibility, styled with that undeniable classic pop/jazz flourish. A farmer by day, Leise calls Gary, Indiana home, so it’s certainly no surprise that his latest song is a cheeky ode to eggs and breakfast time.
“This idea kind of just fell from the sky as I was out doing chores. That happens sometimes,” offers Leise. “Flushing it out, thinking of all of the different ways — and there are far more than this song suggests — eggs can be ordered and fitting it all into a song that makes sense just kind of happened naturally. It typically takes me about a half hour to convert an idea into a song, if I deem it worthy of the consideration. This one seemed to fit the bill.”
If you weren’t hungry before, “How Do You Want ‘Em Made” will certainly get your stomach rumbling. “I can make an omelet, hard boil them or soft, over medium, hard or easy / Scrambled with scallions or with pork medallions, chilaquiles with chorizo just to make them greasy,” he croons with a charming ease. Piano pounces beneath him, playfully and alluring. It is novelty by nature, but doesn’t skimp on the musical skill, feeling truly timeless.
The accompanying visual, directed by Rob Fitzgerald, “filmed in front of a live studio audience” (laugh tracked included), fully embraces the style and aesthetic of the 1950s — from the tile and decor to the performer’s clothing and hair styles. With dancers from the Galaxie Girls Dance Troupe, owned by good friend Nicolle Wood, the clip is a time capsule and embodys what made the era in music and culture so fascinating.
According to Leise, Fitzgerald had already created “a visualization of something like this pretty much from the get-go of hearing the song. We bounced the idea back and forth some. He scoped out a local Airbnb near me that fit the aesthetic, and we got that locked in,” says Leise, who then reached out to Wood about his general idea. “She and the other dancers went above and beyond and really delivered a superb performance, from the appearance to the judge-acting to the dancing. Everyone worked like pros, and it made the work quite easy.”
As with much of his songwriting, “How Do You Want ‘Em Made” went for a bit of a tune-up once he hit the recording studio. “Song ideas tend to just come to me, and then I massage them out to full-fledged songs with forms. I then take this to the studio with my talented friends,” he explains, “and end up with something way better than what I could possibly have imagined. I consider the in-studio collaboration as part of the writing process, as well. Sometimes, things come out way different from what I present for recording. This one was one of those ‘changed’ numbers.”
Below, Leise discusses another song called “Hurry Up and Die,” pressures of modern living, and songwriting journey.
“Hurry Up and Die” perfectly captures our society. Most people are averse to change, whether it’s culturally or daily advances in technology. Why do we so often resist change and would rather stick with the familiar?
I suspect there is some parts nature and some parts nurture to aversion to change, for those to whom it applies. Here in the land of late-stage Capitalism, there are no short supply of changes that are not for the better in life or in the world, but at a certain point it needs to be acknowledged that pretty much the only constant there is in life is change itself. It’s like the old bumper sticker, “Change is inevitable, resistance is optional.” We get comfortable, and comfortable is comfortable, but comfortable may not be sustainable or socially acceptable in perpetuity. Though, many are in the mind that it can be and will be, or worse, that we can regress to something that simply doesn’t or can’t exist anymore. That’s just not how time and life work.
Related to this, I spend a good bit of time contemplating Plato’s Allegory of the cave and the impact of education of humans, in general. Fear and laziness are the two primary motivators/de-motivators for why we do/don’t do basically everything, including change. Some take to it and accept it easily, while others will remain the same until the risk of doing so outweighs the change. Some never ostensibly change, and they either exist in a bubble or are typically miserable and short-lived as a result. I endeavor to adapt to change and survive as best I can.
What about you – have you found yourself begrudgingly accepting that modern life moves at a brisk pace, even with living in Gary, IN?
With a degree in Communication and a lifelong fascination with human interaction besides — in addition to being a self-proclaimed “Compulsive Learner” — I do find the trappings of modernity to be a bit lacking of substance. I’m approaching my last days of social media use, as, based on some research both on and off of the media itself, I find it to be of little value, social or otherwise. Aside from this, I seem to have the parts missing from me that everyone else seems to have that finds what’s going on in the internet or on their phones to be more interesting or engaging than things out here in the real world. I did update to a Smart Phone about a year ago….I guess that’s the one begrudging acceptance I’ve adopted.
What is one thing you’ll never accept that is no longer the same as it once was?
I’ve thought long and hard about this, and I honestly can’t think of a single thing. Lest you think this is a cop-out, I went through a litany of things, from personal to social to abstract, and nothing, or anything around the nothings filled the blank in “I’ll never accept that __ is no longer the same as it once was.” Information, time, context, and understanding changes everything. What was is changed or gone, and it’s not coming back. Depending on your mindset, this can be tremendously sad, but the impermanence is a very real part of the condition we’re all a part of. It can also be reveled in, in the right mindset.
How do these two songs, “Hurry Up and Die” and “How Do You Want ‘Em Made,” prime the listener for the forthcoming record and where do they fit into the bigger scope of the rest?
“Hurry Up And Die” has the opening line, “The world that you grew up in is no more,” which is the title of the album, and there are several songs on the album that kind of move in that thematic direction. “How Do You Want Em’ Made” is a stylistic diversion that should, in as much as one is able, indicate to the listener that there is some variety and range in what else is to come from this artist and record. Given that, they both fit in perfectly well with what else is on the record and are within the wheelhouse of what I’ve released previously.
From the moment you were gifted an old guitar to playing in the Possum Hollow Boys, how would you detail your journey as a songwriter?
That particular part of the journey—from the gifted guitar to the PHB, didn’t have much going on in the way of crafting songs, I’m afraid. Most of that life was spent teaching myself how to play and learning on the fly, often during a song or show, how to play what we were playing at that moment. I didn’t really start writing until I’d been playing out solo for a good length of time, and I grew weary of playing the same things and learning new things to play.
I have taken several breaks, but with this, some cantankerous creativity stirred up and moved me into doing some writing. I didn’t really start getting serious about it until I was on tour in Australia, after a break from playing, where I had some really great ideas that I wanted to record, which became my first full-length record, State of Fairs. From then it has continued — there are always ideas flowing. I jot them into notes to myself and revisit from time to time to flush them out if I deem them worthy.
What have been the toughest lessons you’ve had to learn in music and in life, in general?
Woof. There are many that have been hard. I think that from an artist’s perspective — and it’s probably not just an artist’s perspective — it’s that just because you are into something, that doesn’t mean anyone else is going to be into it in any measure. This goes from top to bottom of just being into something all the way up to being the master of your craft (and I’m certainly master of nothing here), having learned every nuance and intricacy that enables you to do it to the highest degree. People may well not be into it. At best, those who you think care may only like the idea of it, but not the actual thing. The secondary lesson here is that for anything you want to do, you have to want to do it for you and for nobody else.
