In studios, after-hours parties and rock clubs across Denver over the last decade, a sound has taken shape.
It’s half-man, half-machine — the synthesized boom of a digital bass drum, a silkily fretted guitar and maybe a disembodied vocal sample — and outside of its devoted fan base, is largely ignored.
As with all fledgling genres, little about electro-soul is defined — even what to call it. (Of the eight artists interviewed for this article, none agreed on any one name.) But what does seem sure is its rise, especially locally. If Denver can be known as the musical torchbearer of any genre, it’s electro-soul’s half-live, half-produced swirl of hip-hop, soul, funk and jazz.
From venues like Cervantes’ Masterpiece Ballroom to Red Rocks Amphitheatre, electro-soul artists have found a home in the Denver area, playing shows to audiences here that dwarf sets just a state away. For some, that home has become literal, inspiring rising musicians like 26-year-old Detroit native GRiZ, who sold out Chicago’s 12,000-person Navy Pier this year, to relocate to the area.
If the genre is news to you, it’s probably not your fault. Much like the jam-band scene or electronic dance music — two of the genre’s forebears, and what GRiZ referred to poignantly as “pop music’s black sheep” — electro-soul has been cast aside as somehow unworthy of discussion and, in many cases, respect. Only a handful of blogs — like Brooklyn’s and Boulder’s own — dutifully cover the scene.
One reason for that, as Live for Live Music editor-in-chief Kunj Shah explained, is that your average music journalist isn’t interested in or equipped to delve into the “messy” world of live music.
“When you’re reviewing a live show of a band like Pretty Lights or a band in the jam-band world like Phish, it feels like you’re covering them from an ESPN angle of a sports team,” Shah said. “You’re judging how they transition, their song selection from show to show, crowd intensity — all these different aspects. It’s an art, but it becomes a game between fan base and musician.”
Roughly 15 years after it was created, the genre has swept across the country. But Denver remains one of its earliest adapters and most fervent supporters.
“In most cases with a certain sub-genre of music, it typically builds out of a specific region or city,” Hunter Williams, an agent with the Nashville-based Creative Artist Agency, wrote in an e-mail. “In this case, Denver fully supported this movement from the beginning … (and while the genre’s most popular artists) are doing big numbers across the country, Denver and Red Rocks specifically are special to the artists and their fans.”
Looking around Denver’s marquees this weekend, that goes without saying. Including electronic music blowout Decadence, there are a dozen electro-soul affiliated shows set to light up Denver for New Year’s Eve weekend.
If it’s clear that Denver is an electro-soul mecca, how we got here isn’t. But as with so many of the city’s post-Grateful Dead music memories, it started with a jam band.
