Jake Brennan (born April 10, 1974, in
Worcester, Massachusetts
Worcester ( , ) is a city and county seat of Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. Named after Worcester, England, the city's population was 206,518 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the second-List of cities i ...
) is an American podcast host, author, and musician. He is the creator and host of the podcast
Disgraceland, and author of the 2019 book ''DISGRACELAND: Musicians Getting Away With Murder And Behaving Very Badly''.
Personal life
Brennan is from Massachusetts and is the son of Boston-area musician Dennis Brennan.
Career
Music
Due to his father's musical background, Brennan became involved in music when he was 20, joining the hardcore punk and heavy metal band
Cast Iron Hike
Cast Iron Hike was an American punk rock band from Clinton, Massachusetts, United States.
History
Cast Iron Hike was formed after the breakup of Worcester hardcore band Backbone, and featured that group's drummer (Dave Green) and guitarist (Chr ...
in 1994 and signing on to the
Victory Records
Victory Records is a Chicago-based record label founded by Tony Brummel. It operates a music publishing company called "Another Victory, Inc." and is the distributor of several record labels. It has featured many prominent artists including Thur ...
label. He stayed through multiple tours, two EPs, and an album release before leaving the band in 1998. He went on to write and recorded music as a member of his own group, The Confidence Men, that he formed in 2001 with members including "drummer Rob Dulaney, guitarist Eric Barlow, keyboardist Scott Janovitz, and a bassist named Binky". They signed a record deal with the Jack of Hearts label run by Nashville music businessman Jack Emerson in 2003, with the aim to release their first album titled "Singer-Songriot" in early 2004. But Emerson's sudden death in December of 2003 resulted in the album deal being cancelled. Instead, in April 2004, Brennan's band made a record deal with
Yep Roc Records
Yep Roc Records is an American independent record label based in Hillsborough, North Carolina, and owned by Redeye Distribution. Since 1997, the label has released albums from North Carolina and international artists, including Nick Lowe, Paul W ...
and Brennan also made a deal to release a solo album produced by
Paul Q. Kolderie
Paul Q. Kolderie is an American record producer, engineer, and mixer. He has worked with Pixies, Radiohead, Orangutang, Hole, Dinosaur Jr., Juliana Hatfield, Wax, Warren Zevon, Uncle Tupelo, Throwing Muses, Morphine, the Mighty Mighty Bosstone ...
titled "Love and Bombs".
By 2010, Brennan had joined a new band named Bodega Girls under the pseudonym Jacob Otis. They won that year's DJ/Electronic Act of the Year award in the
Boston Music Awards
Founded in 1987, the Boston Music Awards are a set of music awards given annually that showcase talent in the Boston, Massachusetts, area.
Past shows have featured such notable talent as Aerosmith, Paula Cole, Esperanza Spalding, Boston, Rubyho ...
and aimed to release their first album as an independent app for the
iPhone. But Apple refused to allow the app to be approved for the device due to the competition it would bring to the
iTunes
iTunes () is a software program that acts as a media player, media library, mobile device management utility, and the client app for the iTunes Store. Developed by Apple Inc., it is used to purchase, play, download, and organize digital mul ...
store if musical artists released their music separately. Acquiescing, the band released their singles on iTunes and overall aimed for their music to be entirely digital and not available in physical CDs, with Brennan noting "We’re trying to find a way to release our stuff that’s innovative. Because who’s even buying albums?"
Podcasting
In 2020, Disgraceland received the
Webby Award
The Webby Awards are awards for excellence on the Internet presented annually by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, a judging body composed of over two thousand industry experts and technology innovators. Categories include ...
for Best Music Podcast. In 2020, Disgraceland received the iHeart Radio Music Award for Best Podcast and in 2018 and 2019 Disgraceland was named to
Apple Music
Apple Music is a music, audio and video streaming service developed by Apple Inc. Users select music to stream to their device on-demand, or they can listen to existing playlists. The service also includes the Internet radio stations Apple M ...
Best-Of lists for podcasts.
In 2018, Brennan co-founded Double Elvis, an audio company that has released the podcasts Dead and Gone which Brennan co-created and co-hosts with true crime podcaster
Payne Lindsey, as well as the 27 Cluband Blood On The Tracks podcasts, which he hosts and produces. Brennan has also served as executive producer on the podcast Dear Young Rocker and the fictional show, Here Comes The Break, that Double Elvis Productions co-produced with
Def Jam Recordings
Def Jam Recordings (also simply known as Def Jam) is an American multinational record label owned by Universal Music Group. It is based in Manhattan, New York City, specializing predominantly in hip hop, contemporary R&B, soul and pop.
The ...
.
Brennan created and hosted a spinoff of Disgraceland entitled "Badlands" which explores the lurid histories of celebrities and athletes in a single-voice narrative style that Brennan used previously.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Brennan, Jake
Living people
1974 births
21st-century American musicians
21st-century American male writers
Musicians from Massachusetts
People associated with true crime
People from Worcester, Massachusetts
Writers from Massachusetts