Each month, our Residency Program brings an intriguing artist, and we’re always excited to get to know a little bit more about them, their history, and their craft.
While the city of Denver might be very familiar with option4, we’re guessing there are a fair number of you who are unfamiliar with this Mile High City icon. We’re going to change that right here, right now. Crack open a cold one, grab a bagel, and get to know Mr. Brennen Brylarly.
TMN: Let’s kick things off by talking about your upcoming releases, if you can speak about them.
O4: Right now, we’re in a different process now with everything option4. Last year, I came out with all those releases, and before I knew it, I had put out 16 releases. Way too much. I got caught up in that remix world. I needed to pay rent.
I wasn’t really focused on option4 as an artist. I was touring and working on these remixes, which are fun, and I like all of them, but it wasn’t really stretching myself as an artist, per se.
I went on a hiatus and got in the studio. I started working on original records. We’re doing it all proper this time – shopping toplines, shopping labels. To me, it doesn’t matter if I have another record come out for the next six months. I know that when they come out, they will be released correctly with the proper PR. Hopefully, people appreciate them.
A lot of time and effort has gone into these records. They are ready to go. I’m not going to tour at all this summer. I’m going to play HARD Red Rocks this summer and Bisco, and that’s it. I’m going to spend the rest of the summer in the studio.
TMN: We’ve had the pleasure of hearing some of the new stuff. A lot of it feels like it has…a lot of soul. It has emotion. Why is that important to you when you go into recording something?
O4: Right now, my main thing is – I’m just trying to do what I enjoy. Last year, I was making all these big bassline records. They’re really fun to play out in the club, but I feel like everyone is doing that. That sound is rinsed, at the moment.
Last year, there was an explosion of big bass line driven house. Single melodies draped over single note basslines, going up and down. That was cool, and it was fun. But, somehow, that became “Deep House.”
Everything is going two different ways. You have what everyone is calling Deep House from the past couple of years. You have all these EDM kids who think EDM is stupid, which, we’ve been saying forever.
They feel that way now, all the sudden, so they want to go into this thing. So, the people who were making a little bit more mature beats at the time – they’re going different routes. One way is – they’re going a lot heavier, more monotonous, darker, repetitive beats. I want to go the other way. I love techno, but I want to make music that is emotive, but is still based upon the bass and the drums.
