Coffee Break with Tripolism
During the pandemic the electronic music scene took a major hit. This affected all of us: Music lovers. Something that united us all was suddenly ripped apart in a matter of weeks, alongside the feeling of sharing the dancefloor with people who partake in the same passion as us. The music had very abruptly completely vanished.
It was a tough time - no doubt about it. But it did provide us a different perspective on life. A perspective in which we were suddenly able to explore new passions and dig deeper into what we love the most.
As a direct consequence of those dark and dire times, the shared passion for music helped to form and craft the Danish trio - composed by Rasmus, Brynjar and Frederik - now known simply as ‘Tripolism’.
HI GUYS! THANKS FOR TAKING A LITTLE OF YOUR PRECIOUS TIME FOR A COFFEE BREAK. First of all, we're curious to know how the name Tripolism was born and how you would define your polis (community) in one word.
FREDERIK: Hi guys - and of course. We like you, coffee and big breaks, so this was a no-brainer.
BRYNJAR: Making music together really comes quite easily to us. When we are in the studio it just flows. Agreeing on a name was a different story. It took us a lot of meetings and brainstorming. We wanted to express the fact that we are a group of three, but we struggled to find the right wording.
RASMUS: Trinity Disko, Triple Troopers, The Bureau. Haha! We did have a shortlist, but suddenly Tripolism just came to us: Summarizing our great little techno boy band pretty perfectly. Three different people united in this … dirty triangle!
FREDERIK: Our ‘Polis’? Apocalyptic, chaotic - yet warm and democratic. Sparta meets Athens!
RASMUS: It really has nothing to do with Tripoli, but hey, Libyans: Call us! We are up for a gig.
How long have you known each other and how was this friendship born?
FREDERIK: We were all part of the Copenhagen DJ scene around 2010 where we met and formed a friendship. Actually, Rasmus and I also booked Brynjar to play in our hometown, where we did some parties a long time ago.
BRYNJAR: In the summer of 2019 Frederik and Rasmus called me and said something like ‘It’s now or never! Let's do something together! Ibiza in five years!’.
RASMUS: Actually we called Brynjar to help us make our own music. We knew he was a studio wiz and used to have a promising music career, but he had turned to the dark side and was now living the sweet life as a real estate agent.
FREDERIK: After just two or three sessions in the studio everything just made sense. He was not gonna help us produce, but we had to do something together.
BRYNJAR: And Tripolism was born! Then came Covid - pretty good timing for us, I guess - and we’ve been working hard ever since!
SINCE You're A REPRESENTATION OF COPENHAGEN’s underground scene, COULD YOU ENLIGHTEN US A BIT ABOUT it and what makes it different from other countries?
FREDERIK: We are not really a part of the fast techno scene that has been pulsating out of Copenhagen and simultaneously gaining a lot of well-deserved recognition in recent years. Courtesy, Mama Snake, Schacke, Fast Forward - these are all great acts and movements that we have a lot of respect for. What they do is above and beyond.
RASMUS: No, the underground scene for our type of melodic techno is really not that big. However, Distortion, Strøm Festival and CPH Deep are all doing a great job in promoting the scene, and there are places like Culture Box, Jolene, Hangaren, Werkstatt, Ved Siden Af that we like to visit.
BRYNJAR: Maybe we are not - or at least I am not - going out that much anymore. But I still see a wave of great Danish artists that we identify ourselves with.
FREDERIK: Denis Horvat and WhoMadeWho are perhaps the most prominent names right now - but in my opinion they don’t get the national recognition they deserve. We also have great artists like Nandu, Radeckt, Baime, M€RCY, Bongo & Pusk and so on. Now we are slowly inserting ourselves into the mix.
RASMUS: But it’s not tied up to a particular club or movement. At least not for us. We just like it deep!
WE also SAW THAT You've made your very first festival debut in the beginning of the month, can you describe to us how the experience was?
BRYNJAR: Intense! Warm! Chaotic!
RASMUS: Yeah, Brynjar almost had a heat stroke while playing. His face was whiter than snow. It was also very, very hot and he is from ICE LAND.
FREDERIK: It was a great day at a great festival called O / Day Fest. The turn up wasn't that overwhelming since we played very early in the day, but seeing our friends, families and some strangers there - listening to the stuff we made in the studio in the past three years - that was all we could ask for.
RASMUS: We played a set including our own stuff only. I mean, listening to it on that huge sound system and watching people’s reactions.. That was kind of an inciting feeling! We want more of that.
BRYNJAR: I’m not sure that people actually realize this - but together we have more than 30 years of experience in DJing. But this year - to do it only with Tripolism stuff - was next level. We can’t wait to do it again!
FOR AN UPRISING NAME ON THE SCENE, you already have an impressive discography including labels major such as just this and metrica. How do you explain this exponential growth?
FREDERIK: We’ve been pulling on old connections quite a bit. Brynjar was behind the solo project ‘Primal’ and had tracks on Afterlife and Just This in the past.
BRYNJAR: Luckily, the music we made received great feedback instantly. Thanks to Metrica and the Just This boys for believing in us from the beginning. But yeah, the existing connections were quite important. Also because Covid made it difficult for us to go out and make new friends and connections as a group.
RASMUS: I guess we also … Maybe… Felt that our stuff was pretty okay - from the beginning. Haha! And when we saw people like Dixon and Âme - our idols - play our tracks, we were just … Happy! It definitely made us believe that we were on the right path and that we were actually creating something people enjoyed and identified with.
WE AND THE AUDIENCE ARE ALWAYS CURIOUS ABOUT HOW ARTISTS WE LIKE ORGANIZE THEIR WEEKLY WORK. IN A TRIO I WOULD ASSUME THAT’s more complicated to do but how DO YOU manage yours?
RASMUS: Thursdays are sacred. It’s our regular studio night and girlfriends’ birthdays or FC Copenhagen playing Champions League really can’t change that!
BRYNJAR: Champions League is never on a Thursday. Haha. But that is true! No matter how exhausted or hung up we might be, we always take the time to go.
FREDERIK: That’s true! I just had a kid, but I have to visit my synth children named Oberheim Matrix and Juno 106 at least once a week. Meeting up with Rasmus and Brynjar is also okay.
BRYNJAR: We all have busy jobs, but as the guys say, we have at least one long studio session every week. We are crazily productive when we are in the studio and we work really well together.
RASMUS: Speaking about ‘Polis’ earlier - I guess we would make the old Greeks quite happy. It’s hardcore democrazy!
FREDERIK: Two's a crowd, and three's a party - and it’s always a party. I really can’t remember us being angry at each other. Two of us always agree and there are very seldom any hard feelings when an opinion is overruled by the majority.
BRYNJAR: And if someone disagrees with the direction of a track… Well, then there’s always a bit of organizing and cleaning up to do in the studio while the others move forward.
RASMUS: Choosing what to eat though is another thing. That’s almost always a discussion. Or when Brynjar is smoking inside. Now he switched to nicotine gum and order has been restored.
RECENTLY You've RELEASED AN EP ON NANDU’s imprint out of options. COULD YOU TEASE US A LITTLE BIT OF WHAT HAPPENED BEHIND THE SCENES THAT LEAD TO THE CREATION OF THIS EP?
FREDERIK: Well, as we just said. The Tripolism directive board of three works well together. But then Nandu came to our studio wanting to be the fourth wheel…
BRYNJAR: That would have made everything impossible. Talking about techno boy bands: I get a picture of him as our Robbie Williams. He would never fit in! The fame would just get to his head!
FREDERIK: Haha. Sure! No, but Nandu has really been a crazy big support for us since the beginning. It’s always fun to be in the studio with him, and he really helps us a lot with getting our stuff out to all the big shots in the business!
RASMUS: We made ‘Resistance’ together and it’s the perfect combination between the sound of Tripolism and Nandu. During a session we played our track ‘Magnetic’ while he was there. He told us it was the greatest thing he had listened to all year - and then we gave him permission to put it out!
FREDERIK: He will bring champagne to the studio this Thursday to celebrate the release. We look forward to that. Stay tuned: New bangers are coming up!
OVER THE PAST FEW YEARS MANY PEOPLE HAVE BEEN DISCUSSING THE INFLUENCE OF 90’s trance in melodic techno. What's your opinion on that matter?
FREDERIK: First of all… We don’t really care about genres. But of course we’ve noticed the trend and in some way we are also contributing to it.
BRYNJAR: It’s funny. When we grew up in the 90’s, trance was also pretty big and influencing the mainstream music played on the radio..
RASMUS: I think Barcode Brothers was one of my first CDs. At that time it was probably perceived as ‘bad taste’. But trance and eurodance ruled the world!
BRYNJAR: It’s just people growing up and taking parts of their childhood and youth inspirations and working around it. Times are changing. All the cool people hated ABBA in the 70’s. Now everyone loves them. Right?
FREDERIK: It’s not like we are saying ‘okay, let’s make a trance-track’. Trance music is - among A LOT of other stuff - music that formed us, and… Now we are of course also inspired by that when making music. Trance is great!
What are your main sources of inspiration?
BRYNJAR: Hmmm… How much time do we have? We listen to so much and different music. Techno, house, jazz, hiphop, classic, indie. I LIKE EVERYTHING!
RASMUS: For me Trentemøller was the guy that drew me to electronic music. I also weirdly enough loved Jean-Michel Jarre as a child - I remember him playing at some strange laser windmill show in Denmark.
FREDERIK: We love music. And I love listening to it. And almost all genres have something to offer in terms of inspiration. When we’re making music, we’re trying to make something that will be cool in 10 years as well. Sometimes we feel like we hit it, other times we don’t.
TALK US THROUGH YOUR PROJECTS/GOALS FOR THE CURRENT YEAR AND BEYOND.
RASMUS: Something biiiiiiiig is coming!
BRYNJAR: Haha! We’ve been very lucky to receive a lot of offers from different labels throughout the year. Now we are looking into the possibilities
RASMUS: It’s really interesting and a whole new world for us, but nothing is decided yet. Right now we just focus on making a lot of new music and finishing the …. 20-40 tracks we have in the pipeline.
FREDERIK: We don’t have a lot of DJ gigs at the moment. That’s maybe something we would try to focus on for the rest of the year.
BRYNJAR: It would be awesome to get to play a bit more. Consider this an open call if you are a booker or a club - we are actually pretty good at DJing. Dial Tripolism! :)
SINCE MOST OF US ASSOCIATE DENMARK TO CARLSBERG I MUST ASK IF YOU'RE A BEER ENTHUSIAST. And if so, if you have a favorite type.
BRYNJAR: Hahaha, that is the greatest question. Beer is the glue in our relationship! We always drink beer. Not a lot. But they are on the table!
RASMUS: It’s quite funny that you ask, because Frederik works for a small Danish brewery called ÅBEN. And our very good friend is an executive at Mikkeller, so beer is… Quite important. I’ve been forced to drink all kinds of weird stuff in the past ten years, and unfortunately I like it now!
FREDERIK: Yeah, we’ve been drinking a lot of great beers but also a lot of weird shit. Rasmus likes the sour ones. Berliner Weisse, Gose, Wild Ales.
FREDERIK: To be honest I’ve had too much of all the funky notes. Now I prefer those plain, watery lager type beers that don't taste like anything.
FREDERIK: Brynjar just wants a magnum Spätburgunder or anything that comes in a wine bottle. Haha!
RASMUS: Oh, the pain he's been through. When we started Tripolism he had only tried pilsners. I remember giving him some sour shit three years ago - he looked like he was gonna cry!
BRYNJAR: I’m from Iceland - I’m not used to the exotic stuff. But now I’m up for anything!
FREDERIK: Hopefully soon we will travel outside Denmark with Tripolism - playing some funny gigs and drinking weird beer. See you out there!
interview by João Alves
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