Odesza (producers Clayton Knight and Harrison Mills) started their project only three years ago after meeting during senior year of college. Since then, the project has rocketed to the top of festivals and sold out shows across the country — including the Denver area.
Part of this success is thanks to their improvisational live performances. Unlike many electronic acts, Odesza shapes its ambient, serene style of music in the moment.
Ahead of his back-to-back shows at the Boulder Theater on Feb. 21-22, Knight spoke on the shifting EDM landscape, the technical details of he and Harrison’s live performance and their collaborations with other high-profile artists:
Both of your upcoming Boulder dates are sold out, and thatap no isolated phenomenon. If you look at your tour schedule, all but one of your February dates are sold out as well as several in March. Being such a new act, thatap gotta feel pretty good, huh?
Itap extremely humbling. We’re very excited that people are responding so well to our music, and Colorado especially has been very good to us, y’know? We love playing there so we definitely look forward to it.
This project was born three years ago after you two met during your senior year of college. Can you talk about the specific instance in which you knew for sure that you were meant to collaborate on something like this?
Well, when we first started doing it, it was just kind of like a hobby. We didn’t really have any big ideas about it or anything like that. But when things started picking up we figured we’d give it a shot, but I don’t think it was until we played some serious shows that it was like, “Okay, maybe this is really something we should kind of pursue.” I think that Sasquatch! Festival was a big turning point; that was a couple years ago that we played that, and we had a really cool crowd.
One of your early supporters was Pretty Lights, and even though he’s moved to Detroit he’s still a pretty big deal to people here in Colorado. Do you have any plans to collaborate with him on anything in the near future?
Right now not really. I know he’s working on some new stuff and we’d be honored to do another remix for him. I don’t know how far along he is in the process, but yeah, I would love to work with him and do more stuff ‘cause we’re obviously big fans.
One thing you guys are very well known for is using those dual Akai APC live controllers in your sets, and a lot of people wanna know exactly how you use them during your performances. People assume they’re both synced up to Ableton, but do you guys just tag team your live sets or what, exactly?
So basically what we have set up is that every song we play is stemmed out and broken down into little pieces. So, on my laptop – well, first of all, we have two set up, and one is synced up to the other – and basically what we have set up is that I have control over all the drums and bass on my APC. So the kick, snare, bass, hi-hat, and percussion is broken into little pieces so that I can, like, mix and match snares from different songs, different kicks and different rhythms. It allows for a lot of interchanging so we can jam over different pieces. Harrison has control over all the top lines, which are just, like, the vocal chops, vocals, synth melody and harmonies. So we can kind of mix and match different pieces from different songs, which make for some interesting transitions and give you a lot of freedom.
Interesting, so all of the chopped and screwed vocals that your songs are known for are done live instead of in the studio, then?
Yeah, exactly.
The Pacific Northwest has a very low-key vibe, and a lot of that resonates not only in your music but also in how you two carry yourselves. Being on tour and seeing so many different locations must give you a lot of perspective on your where you hail from, so what do you feel are some of the defining characteristics of the Seattle scene?
Especially in Seattle, there’s not a large group of people that are into electronic music so itap a completely different thing up there. Folk and indie are always kind of the major players in terms of music, like what people listen to and what people go out to see, so that played a major role in what we listen to, what we grew up around, and how we make music today. Itap definitely had a say in what we listen to and how we go about making each tune. But hopefully, I think Seattle will start changing and have more electronic stuff come out, and hopefully we’ll be the start of that. We’ll try to be the breakthrough.
Whatap so great about you and Harrison’s particular success story is how natural it is. For the most part, you just made good music, put it online, and rapidly grew a following – and even members of your road team are friends who you’ve worked with on things before. However, EDM fans have short attention spans and you’ve gotta go to drastic measures to keep them interested. How do you plan to do so?
Well, we’ve been adding new pieces, live instrumentations, live drumming, and we’ll add vocalists at some point. We are always working on it, always trying to make things better and better. So I think as long as we keep that attitude, keep working on it, and keep working hard, we can stay relevant, up to date, and ahead of the curve.
The remix series you guys did of your track, “All we Need” turned out some great material from a lot of significant artists. Talk about some of the bonds you formed with these artists in the process and which remix or remixes you enjoyed the most.
Every artist that we asked to do a remix for us has been friends with us for a really long time. Especially Giraffe. Charlie’s a good friend of ours; we both hang out with him and we met him a couple years ago. Most of these people we met along the way or on the road and they took a notice to our sound. I would have to say my personal favorite would be – and they’re all good, don’t get me wrong – but the one that kind of took me away was the Beat Connection one. What he put together was one of our favorites, and Reed’s an old friend and we love what they do.
You guys are often categorized as downtempo, and as broad as the definition for that category of music is, a lot of artists – like Flume, for instance – are emerging from it and making waves in the scene. Do you feel that the deep house movement is only part of a much bigger shift away from hard kicks and bass drops in favor of more subtle, introspective styles?
I would definitely agree with that. There is a shift happening in electronic music, itap just kind of a natural evolution. For a while it was always heavy, big bass drop kind of music that was dominating the scene, but as electronic kinda’ worked its way into America a little more people are being exposed to more eclectic kinda’ stuff. There are different styles and stuff comes from overseas, and thatap definitely playing a huge role in what people are listening to and what shows they’re going to. I think as time goes on, people are just gonna get more and more used to hearing weirder stuff and newer stuff, and I’m excited to see where it goes. I think the U.S. has a bright future in terms of electronic and it’ll be interesting to see what happens.
Whatap been the most difficult part of your rise to success in the industry?
Definitely, I would say, there’s a lot of travel, and you’re kind of away from home for long periods of time so that definitely is hard to do. And itap hard to get work done on the road, so we’re definitely gonna do a lot of shows in the summer, and then go back to the studio in the summer to start writing heavily again and finish stuff. Itap just the hustle and bustle of getting to from city to city that takes a toll.
What about the most difficult parts of your lives in general, and how do you think they’ve influenced your music?
Last year was pretty tough, like, we were just kinda’ doing shows as much as we could, and traveling, and trying to make things work. When you first start out the money’s never really there, so you have those points like, “Is it really worth it? Should I just go back and get a job, basically, so I can pay rent?” (Laughs) But if you get over that hump, things change a little bit. I think we’ve passed that now, and we’re getting a little more comfortable.
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John Cameron is a Denver-based writer and a new contributor to Reverb.
