Encore | OneRepublic

By Mark Loehrke
August 2018 View more Spotlight

An early start in music
I didn’t have brothers or sisters living with me, so I had mountains of time. I’m actually glad that the internet was slow and barely used back then, because I might have just lost myself to social media. Instead, I found time to sing and play the piano for hours.

Songs that matter
It’s critical to shed light on social problems. Everybody’s writing escapism music and I do it, too, but I’d love to see more artists also writing about what’s happening in the world. I’m doing my best to address issues that people are thinking about—issues that are real.

The live concert experience in a screen-based age
We live in a time where 80 percent of people’s communication is through a device that’s in their pocket. That’s how people see the world, and concerts are one of the rare times when people look up from their phones. That’s a real experience. There’s no replacement, and no amount of VR technology or augmented reality or any of that stuff is going to change that humans want to be in a room with other humans watching things together.

August 11 at RiverEdge Park, 360 North Broadway, Aurora
Tickets: $43–$395 | riveredgeaurora.com