brakence comes back to Denver with marroW, four years after the Bluebird

The last time brakence played Denver, hypochondriac was still days from release. On April 12 he brings its long-awaited follow-up to the Ogden Theatre.

The last time brakence played Denver, the record that would define the next four years of his career wasn't out yet. That show was Nov. 29, 2022, at the Bluebird Theater. Three days later, *hypochondriac* arrived on Columbia Records, released Dec. 2 after he revealed its cover art in mid-November (Wikipedia)). Denver hasn't had him back since.

That ends on Monday, April 12, 2027, when brakence plays the Ogden Theatre on Colfax. Doors are at 6 p.m., the show starts at 7 p.m., and tickets are through AXS. The date was announced Oct. 27.

The reason for the return is new music, and a lot of it was a long time coming. On Oct. 23, The Fader reported the release of *marroW*, also on Columbia, his first full-length since that 2022 breakout. The Fader described the hyperpop and rock artist holding onto the diaristic, confessional lyric writing people came to him for, while pushing rock songwriting up against electronic and hyperpop production. If *hypochondriac* was the record that made his name, *marroW* is the one that has to prove the name sticks.

The tour behind it is a long one. Archyde reported a North American run that opens March 4 in San Diego at Soma and stretches all the way to Aug. 21 at The Wiltern in Los Angeles, working through the coasts, the South and the Midwest before crossing into Canada. Denver falls in April, about five weeks into the run, which means the new songs should be well settled by the time they hit Colfax but the tour won't yet be running on fumes.

The last time he played Denver, hypochondriac was still three days away.

The size of the room tells part of the story. The Bluebird is the smaller of the two Colfax theaters; the Ogden holds 1,600. Moving from one to the other is the kind of step a Denver crowd notices, and it's a bet that the audience *hypochondriac* built here has held through four quiet years and grown. JamBase files him under EDM and hip-hop as well as the rock and hyperpop The Fader hears, which tracks with how hard he is to pin down, and with why his crowd tends to be a mix of people who arrived from very different directions.

It's also a Monday, and in Denver that means something specific. A weeknight show at the Ogden draws the people who really want to be there, and a 7 p.m. start keeps it manageable for anyone with a Tuesday morning. Plan on being in line early if you want to be near the front; the 6 p.m. doors give you a full hour to get settled.

There's a particular feeling to seeing an artist come back after a long gap with a new record in hand. Some of the people at the Ogden will have been at the Bluebird in 2022, hearing those songs before the rest of the world had them. Some will have found him since. On April 12, they'll be hearing *marroW* together, live, for the first time in this town.

Sources: Brakence releases 'marroW,' his first album in four years (The Fader) (thefader.com); Hypochondriac (Brakence album) (Wikipedia) (en.wikipedia.org); Brakence Announces North American Tour for New Album Marrow (Archyde) (archyde.com); brakence tickets, Ogden Theatre (AXS) (axs.com)