Day For Night Artist Spotlight: ODESZA
Written by Coog Radio on December 1, 2016
ODESZA is a duo made up of Harrison Mills (aka CatacombKid) and Clayton Knight (aka BeachesBeaches). They met at Western Washington University and although they had met during their freshman year, they didn’t start recording music together until they were seniors in 2012.
Knight was classically trained in piano as a child and took up the guitar later in life. Today, the duo creates electronic music. Their collaboration bared fruit quickly. They released their debut LP, Summer’s Gone, which received much praise in the underground community of electronic music, on Sept. 5, 2012. A year later, they hit 1 million Soundcloud plays before the release of their debut EP, My Friends Never Die. After opening for artists like Beat Connection and Pretty Lights, the duo kicked off their first headline tour on March 12, 2014.
After two years, ODESZA reached 30 million plays on Soundcloud on Oct. 1, 2014. That same month, their In Return North American tour sold out 28 shows. Over time, these two artists from Seattle have toured all over the U.S.—and even Australia—and have performed at festivals like Bonnaroo, Coachella, SXSW, and Lollapalooza.
The duo’s In Return, released on Sept. 9, 2014, presented their brand of “pop-infused, electronic wonder,” as their webpage describes. It showcased talents from artists like Zyra, Py, and Shy Girls.
Along with their music recording, the artists have explored other ventures. ODESZA launched Foreign Family Collective in March 2015, which serves as an outlet for musicians and visual artists. They hope to help emerging artists gain more exposure by releasing one-off singles. The official website supplies updates with releases and information about the artists.
One of the most remarkable things about ODESZA is that they have amassed such a huge fanbase in a short span of time. They began accumulating plays early on from online streaming and they now have millions of plays on Pandora and Spotify. Their music is now played in radio stations around the world. They have charted high on lists like the iTunes Electronic Chart and the Billboard Electronic chart, cracking the top ten in both of them.
ODESZA’s journey has just begun and listeners around the world will continue to see their growth in the music industry.
Check them out on Saturday, Dec. 17 from 8:00-9:30 at Day for Night.
By Vanessa Berumen
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