“My goal is to build that infrastructure. Hartman, who’s been working in the Denver music scene for more than 10 years, most recently booking talent for the likes of Larimer Lounge, Globe Hall, and the Underground Music Showcase, created the Future Garden agency in 2019 to fill that hole. or New York or Austin, but I just don’t think the infrastructure was here in Denver for them to get to that next level,” he says. “There’s these incredible artists who, they’re no less talented than these artists coming out of L.A. But Hartman was also growing frustrated watching many of the artists he was passionate about never make it beyond the local level due to a lack of the business resources or guidance to do so. Kyle Hartman, co-founder of local music agency Future Garden, says he’s felt Denver on the precipice of similar music success to larger cities. Major labels, on the other hand, saw a slight decline. Independent music labels and artists, which make up most of the Denver music scene, overpowered the market, growing by a collective 27 percent annually and increasing their combined streaming market share to 31.5 percent. Despite pandemic challenges, global recorded music revenues grew by seven percent in 2020, according to MusicWeek. Statewide, the industry accounted for $1.4 billion in annual revenue (Denver was responsible for about $840 million of that), and roughly 16,000 jobs as of 2018. I can do what I want.’ It’s more collaborative out here.”īefore COVID-19 brought the world to a screeching halt, Colorado’s music scene was booming. Here, you can break rules, start a business, say ‘I want to start a label.
“The thing about the music industry is, nobody really knows what they’re doing, and no one wants to talk about it-but they have a set way of doing things. His efforts are part of a growing movement within the Denver music scene to better support burgeoning talent and bring the attack on the business side. But he also hopes the label, which is still in its nascent stages, can collaborate with younger artists, as well as teach them production skills. N3ptune, who grew up in Denver, plans to release all of his self-produced music through Atlantean. “I don’t have time to wait for you if you’re not ready,” he says. The entrepreneurial endeavor grew out of the frustration of looking for outside support in Denver, and watching how other labels handled business. He’s also referring to his drive for making it big, and upending the traditional business model while he’s at it-something he took into his own hands by launching recording label Atlantean Records LLC earlier this summer. The 23-year-old (whose stage name is pronounced “Neptune”) isn’t just talking about his high-octane, gospel-inspired vocals that’ve been enrapturing audiences for the past four years.
“My settings on my attack are just different,” he says, with a smirk. It’s something Denver dark-pop phenom N3ptune prides himself on. In music, there’s a term for how hard you bring the noise: “the attack.” By definition, the attack describes how forcefully a sound is initiated-something an artist can alter manually (think the beat of a drum, versus the stroke of a violin string), or with the turn of a knob in the production studio. Photo courtesy of The Salt Lick Records Music Meet the Entrepreneurs Taking Denver’s Music Industry to the Next LevelĪ new crop of local labels and talent agencies are working to make the Mile High City the next global music hub-and nurture the art while they’re at it.
( From left) John Baldwin, Chris Voss, Jason Edelstein, and Andrea Hoang of The Salt Lick Records.
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