We were lucky to catch up with BL4RE recently and have shared our conversation below.

BL4RE, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

In 2022 I dropped what has been regarded as my best album to date, an album dedicated to my late fiancée who passed away from brain cancer this past March. The album is called “Astrodite”, a play on space and the Greek goddess of Love. My fiancée, Courtney was Greek and we both shared an infatuation with space. The album was all love songs written for and about her. She loved it and would listen to it all the time, which is all I could’ve asked for. The album can be found on all streaming services.

BL4RE, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been singing and making music. I started playing the drums when I was 5 or 6 years old, and have not stopped working on my craft since.

As a child I always loved music, and would often sing along to the songs my mother would put on in the car and imagine I was the lead singer singing in front of a huge crowd.

Throughout high school, I was in multiple pop punk and metal bands as a guitarist and singer, and in my senior year I started to produce EDM music in FL Studio, which is the DAW I still use to this day. I would release these songs on SoundCloud, and some of them actually received a decent amount of exposure.

Shortly after I got out of high school, I decided to start adding vocals to my dance music, and thus began the creation of BL4RE.

It took a few years and a LOT of YouTube tutorials, but by the time I was 24 I got to a point where I really knew what I was doing and I decided it was time to take it seriously and started releasing music under the name BL4RE, a play on my last name Blair/ the word “blare” as my music is best listened to cranked up loud.

After about 3 years of doing strictly solo music, I started working with other artists, and joined the group I’m currently part of, Fairy Tale Entertainment. Doing this has significantly helped my ability to mix vocals, as I’m regularly mixing someone other than myself. Due to this, I started offering recording time to local artists, and even produced an entire album for a new up and coming artist named JD Magee.

My main focus in music is to make people feel good, whether it’s a feel good song, or just a song they can relate to during hard times. I also really enjoy helping up and coming artists bring their dreams to life, as I didn’t have that kind of help when I first started. There’s no better feeling than seeing a new artist’s face light up when they hear themselves on a song.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Shortly after getting out of high school, I decided I wanted to become an independent professional wrestler. It wasn’t a childhood dream, but more so just something I wanted to see if I could do.

I wrestled all over the East Coast for a little over a year under the ring name “Debonair Kurt Blair” and I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t fun and it didn’t bring forth a lot of opportunities and connections that are still very useful to this day.

Due to my wrestling, I had to stop making music with the band I had been with for 7 years, as we practiced on Sunday, and my wrestling training was also on Sunday. The band disbanded and I stopped making music actively for a year. This made it unclear to me whether I was going to make music ever again, or if I was meant to be a wrestler….

I was not meant to be a wrestler, and I learned this pretty quickly after multiple concussions and a torn ligament in my right shoulder. Injury after injury made it difficult to do what I was doing, and so I picked up on music again. I released my first song as BL4RE and used my wrestling platform to promote it. The song was called “Hotel Rooms.” The song was very well received and even has a credit on IMDB for a short horror film it was featured in. At this point I knew I had something and so I finished any commitments I had in wrestling, and I was back on track making music.

The journey isn’t always linear. There will be bumps, detours, and road blocks you have to get over. They always make the story better, though.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

Go to local shows.

I can’t stress this enough. So many people are willing to pay hundreds of dollars to go see a band they’ve seen multiple times or an artist they love but when it comes time to support a friend who’s doing a small concert for $15, they’re nowhere to be found.

Streaming services pay very little to the artists. 1 stream on Spotify pays me less than $.006. Artists make their money from doing shows and selling merchandise. So if your artist friend just dropped a shirt? Buy it! Wear it around and tell your friends!

Support your friends… even if their music sucks. If their music sucks, give them positive feedback and tell them what you think could make it better. It is so important.

Contact Info:

• Website: BL4RE.com
• Instagram: @b.l.4.r.e_
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/@thechosenband1
• Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/1W5YnJnpvVHCplkYjWU8Qn

Image Credits
@harrisonshotthis @lordfloat6 @marienewbyphotos