Brandy Makes the Big Chop for YRB, Talks New Album & What Took So Long For Her Return

I must admit, I’m sorta feelin’ Brandy’s new short cut that she’s rockin’ for her YRB feature. In addition to the new ‘look’, Brandy dishes on where the hell she’s been, why she’s back and what we can expect from her new projects. Peep a few excerpts:

On what motivated Brandy to come out of hiding (so to speak) and work again in music and the big screen:

“I think a lot of the struggles I’ve had are what I needed to go through to get to another place…Everything is pretty sudden. One day I just woke up and I changed my mind about everything. I felt like I wasn’t fulfilled. I was acting simultaneously with singing as a kid, and I just felt like I have this talent, why am I not using it? Why am I not trying everything and doing everything I can do?”

On what fans can expect from her new album, Two Eleven:

“It’s taken a minute for me to really figure out the type of artist that I am, the type of music that I need to sing to reconnect with my audience. I just know with this album, I wanted it to be as honest and as real as possible…Sometimes, you can get caught up in wanting to make hits and wanting to get on the radio and performing on everything that’s out there. I just wanted to stay true to who I was. That’s why it’s taken me so long to figure out the right home for me to put my music out there with. Other than that, I wanted my album to represent honesty and clarity and struggle and pain, as well as love, with a different sound and a different edge. That’s what this album is.”

On pulling from her own personal experiences to play in Tyler Perry’s upcoming film, The Marriage Counselor:

“It may not be the same exact situation or the same circumstance, but no matter what, pain feels the same in any situation,” she says. “I was definitely having to pull from the most painful experiences that I had to connect with Melinda, and that’s a hard thing to do when you’re excited and happy to be doing a movie and working with Tyler Perry.”

On why she decided to work with Frank Ocean on Two Eleven:

“His music speaks volumes, and I was able to experience that before everyone else knew…I always knew he was really special and I just wanted to see how we could vibe, what we could come up with together in the studio this time around. He’s just a genius. I think his songs have so much substance and so much depth, and you need that on an album as well.”