We joined the one and only Samuel Kopelman aka Branchez this weekend at Avalon Hollywood for a special night filled with big laughs, good music, and great memories. This music connoisseur is a jack of all trades and continues to prove his presence in the hectic world of mashups, remix, and originals with some pure sounds not yet heard in this natural world (his sound cloud speaks for itself). With a successful hit remix of What So Not’s ‘High You Are’ and Rihanna’s ‘Stay’, there is no stopping this New York native from reaching stardom status; which he seems to have accomplished already. Between traveling the world touring with HARD and producing new music, he has a lot of work cut out for this new year, but nothing he can’t handle. We sat down with Sam as he prepped himself a mixed drink below the iconic main stage for an intimate interview where we got to hear a bit more about this rising producer.
To put in to better perspective for fans, how would you best describe the music you create?
I would describe it as a little bit of everything: some big-room, club, hip-hop, rap, electronic, instrumental, and r&b music, but I’m going to be also focusing on more vocals in the near future.
Your first EP features an array of different genres from trappy hip-hop to some sensual slo-jams. What creative process did you go through for your first collection of music and what was the hardest part?
The EP was essentially a group of beats I created in college, and the instrumentals were ultimately released cause I wanted something out there for rappers to adopt for freestyling purposes. Just like them, the way I freestyle over beat compilations in the EP I think it would be dope for rappers to hop on and use.
As a favorite track of mine and many other people, walk us through the process of how your remix of What So Not’s ‘High You Are’ was created.
I actually heard the original track and already had plans to travel and tour Australia with a friend who worked with What So Not. Since we were touring together he told them I wanted to remix it, so I met them and finally got the stems and essentially created the track while traveling all over Australia. I specifically heard one instrument in the track that I wanted to accentuate. While it was still developing, I got the chance to show Chris (Emoh Instead) from What So Not and he was really excited for it. It’s still one of my favorite tracks I’ve done.
My sounds were inspired from when I grew up on rap and hip-hop in New York, and my brother’s influence. The 808 came about when I had obtain nice sounds and samples, which worked well with the timing of Trap getting bigger. The percussion often influences genre in the world of electronic music, so the drums I use are still of the trap genre but everything else is not a characteristic of that. It still has the heavy feel that I appreciate but I try to add some elements on top of that.
Your sound is very unique and is partly the reason why you’ve gain so much success in such a short amount of time, do you think you might have stumbled on the next big thing in the world of EDM?
I don’t know about that. I think in today’s day and age, music is just evolving rapidly since everyone gets a chance to listen to each other’s stuff through the internet. If I knew i was on the next big sound, I would already be on that next sound due to influence on the web. I believe you can never force anything though, and that’s the problem with many producers. They get too caught up with sound, but it should come genuinely and naturally to them. Inspiration is important, but you can’t force it.
How did it feel tour with Paper Diamond and the rest of the crew earlier this year? Do you guys have a close connection?
Those are the homies 100%. Sometimes its hard to be productive and create music while being on the bus, but we made the best of everything. Between all the touring there was a lot of partying, sleeping, and cracking jokes so it was easier just hanging out. It was an awesome experience though and I hope to make music with each of them soon.
How has traveling with HARD been? How was playing the HARD Stage at EDC Mexico?
It was amazing! Mexico was beautiful, and to see support so far from home is pretty crazy. Really enthusiastic people in Mexico, and I also got to meet a lot of people I look up to. If i was invited back down I would do it. HARD has been showing me some love and they have good taste, so you can catch me at a HARD show in Miami and HARD Summer this August.