Tre Burt talks hometown Sacramento and album releases ahead of international tour dates

Tre Burt has spent his share of time on the road, beginning as a kid traveling between his mother’s home in Sacramento and his father’s place in the Bay Area. He once headed over to Australia to see a soon-to-be ex-girlfriend.

The singer-songwriter’s latest excursion will take him on a tour across two countries, following the release of his first full-length album.

Burt describes “Caught it from the Rye”, released January 31 through Oh Boy Records, as a collection of anti-love songs, or sometimes as a folk-revival-revival the artist has rewritten four times. It was originally released through Instagram before Burt signed with the label.

“Well, you have to get creative these days. It’s so over-saturated and there’s a lot of gatekeepers. Back in the day, I would go into Starbucks with my EP, and I’d sneak them into the CD section where they used to sell CDs. I’d go around San Francisco and slip them there, leave them on the subway, put them in places where people might be kind of charmed if they found something there,” Burt said.

Burt’s EP, “Takes From the Dungeon,” was released in 2017 following a two-year stint in Australia. It encompasses many of his sonic calling cards from the bluesy fingerpicking to the wanderlust of his lyrics.

And just like the demo’s distribution, its recording was realized through less-conventional means.

“I was writing new songs, and what I always do when I’m writing is I hit the record button just to capture the essence so I don’t forget it later when I finalize it. This time, when I got back to Sacramento, I really wanted to put something out as a release. I was flipping through my phone’s voice memos, and I said, ‘Oh these songs don’t sound too bad, so I’ll put them on the internet.’” Burt said of the 2017 EP, subtitled the Voice Memo Demos.

Burt’s tendency for less-trodden terrain saw him busking around Sacramento at farmers’ markets, antique shows and Old Sacramento, from the age of 13 to as recently as early 2018. The Franklin alum spoke of bygone venues for smaller acts in Sacramento like Luigi’s Fungarden and Java Cafe.

Burt also recalled his introduction to the guitar as a clumsy 13-year-old.

“That was an accident. My brother has always played guitar since I can remember. One day, he was gone at work and I went into his room to look for like a PlayStation game or something. His room was all messy and there were clothes on top of the guitar so I didn’t see it and stepped on it. I felt really bad. And after that I felt this really weird desire to kind of learn what I’d just destroyed,” Burt said.

Burt’s fraternal connection to Sacramento extends to time spent in the Boys & Girls Club of Sacramento. The artist paid back the city for supporting him by donating a portion of sales from “Caught it from the Rye” to Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Sacramento.

“I spent a lot of time in the (Boys & Girls Club of Sacramento). I got to know a lot of kids who were big brothers by an extension of mine and vice versa. I just think it’s something really important to have growing up, someone you can look up to that’s around. I wanted to bring that home, full circle,” Burt said.

His latest round of touring includes gigs in San Francisco, Texas and Canada, where he will open for John Prine, who Burt refers to as, “one of my musical idols since I picked up a guitar.”

Burt is also slotted to take the stage at the Newport Folk Festival in August, where some of his musical influences such as Mississippi John Hurt and Bob Dylan have played iconic sets, which the artist admits is, at times, hard to believe.

As Burt readies for the road, he finds solace from the weight of touring in his ability to return to Sacramento, where the artist continues to maintain roots.

“I still have a part-time job too. I’m like a glorified janitor (at Tower Theater),” he said. “It’s good to have roots and it’s stable here in Sacramento. I have a normal life, and it makes it easier when you go do these tours knowing that you have a life back in one place. That make it easier than before, when I was traveling with no home and playing.”

Listen now

“Caught it from the Rye” is available at JohnPrine.com, with physical copies hitting stores and shows March 20. “Caught it from the Rye” is available for streaming through Spotify.