OddKidOut Talks His Unique Sound, Love for Hometown, and Atlanta Fans [INTERVIEW]
By Anastasiia & Stephen Riddle
If you haven't heard yet, OddKidOut is quickly proving himself to be a force in melodic bass music. The talented multi-instrumental, finger-drumming, out-of-the-box producer, Butch Serianni, is here to take you on an emotional and colorful musical journey. Just as his name suggests, OKO’s music can’t be easily put into one single category, he’s constantly experimenting, finding oddness in the ordinary, and letting that odd kid out. Atlanta EDM sat down with Butch to talk about his musical background, his love for hip hop and vinyl hunting, and his appreciation for Atlanta.
Atlanta EDM: Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how your musical journey started?
OddKidOut: I was very young. I was still in a car seat and my dad saw me air drumming in the back of the car, and so he was like, Hey, do you want to try taking drum lessons? And I was like, yeah, fuck it, why not? And yeah, that kind of started the journey. And then from middle school to the end of high school, beginning of college, I was a touring drummer, so I was just on the road and playing in bands. And then I had been producing music by myself just as fun. And eventually, I started posting my finger drumming videos, which caught the eye of Instagram, who reposted it on their main account, which got me a shit ton of followers overnight and got me in front of Skrillex. I flew out to LA and I ended up moving in with him and living with him for about a year. And that's how I got into electronic music. And then fast forward and now I'm here.
Atlanta EDM: Oh, wow. You mentioned that you had to learn everything by yourself. So what was the hardest part of doing that?
OddKidOut: I didn't have any mentor. No one around me was producing music or I didn't know anybody that did. So I just watched YouTube videos and I just made a bunch of really shitty beats until they started to sound good. But I think the initial hurdle of figuring out how to use the software in the first place was the hardest thing. And it took years, but I just tried to have fun with it.
Atlanta EDM: So how did the name OddKidOut come about?
OddKidOut: I was a freshman in college. And to clarify, I didn't think that partying was bad. And I didn't think that frats or anything like that were bad things. They just weren't for me, and I didn't have any other friends that felt the same way. So I very much felt like the odd kid out, and I just thought to myself, what if I feel this way? There's got to be a million kids out there that feel the same way, whether it's about college or high school or sports or music, whatever it is. I know there's got to be other people out there that feel the same way. So I just took something that I experienced myself and then tried to make it about everybody else who feels that way too, build a community around it.
Atlanta EDM: That's awesome. I feel like your name reflects your sound and style, which is very unique. What inspired you to follow this route?
OddKidOut: Yeah, I'm glad that you made that connection. That's the point I'm trying to get across, and that's why my music never totally sounds exactly the same. I think I bounce around a lot of genres, and one, that's the whole point of making the name was so that I can have the freedom to make all types of music that I love. But two, I think I'm just inspired by a lot of different types of music and I don't ever want to just be in one little box. I want to be able to move around and connect to different people and make different types of music. And I think that creative freedom is really important and it speaks to the name as well. So I'm just trying to keep everything in the world in one world where it makes sense, but you never quite know what flavor you're going to get.
Atlanta EDM: Yeah, that sounds awesome. How do you think your style evolved since you first started producing?
OddKidOut: So much. I started producing 90s boom bap hip hop, so I just listened to Pete Rock and Madlib, J Dilla, and I was pretty much just only making hip hop beats. I was sampling vinyl. I've been a vinyl collector since I've been 16, so I've just been sampling, sampling, sampling, making swing, hip hop beats, but I'd always listened to other shit. I remember listening to dubstep when I was 14 or 15 on the school bus, and everybody else in my little neighborhood that I grew up in was like, what the fuck are you listening to? What is that? So I always had those little things in my head. I just didn't know how to make 'em. So I knew how to make hip hop, so I just made hip hop and I'm glad that I started out with those roots because I think that helps me differentiate myself as an electronic artist now. Being able to play the drums, being able to make hip hop beats, my approach to EDM is different.
Atlanta EDM: So it sounds like you have an extensive vinyl collection. What's your favorite one?
OddKidOut: That's such a hard question, but I think the vinyl that means the most to me is... it's a self-titled LP called "Skull Snaps." The band's name is Skull Snaps, it’s a self-titled album, and one of the tracks on the album is one of the most sampled drum breaks of all time. And that was the first time that I ever sought after a vinyl. I was probably 16 or 17, and I knew I really wanted that. And my rule since the beginning was I'm not allowed to order any vinyl online, any vinyl I purchased or I have, I have to find it in a store and I have to buy it off of somebody or off a store or something like that. So that was the first time that I had hunted for months and found something that was relatively, not super, but relatively rare. So I think that one has the most sentimental meaning to me.
Atlanta EDM: Is there a genre that you haven't tried yourself that you would like to or think you would one day?
OddKidOut: Yeah, I would love to make an ambient album. I would love to make a record that's just minimalism and just kind of typical ambient. It's one of my favorite genres. What I emotionally connect to the most is probably ambient music. I listen to it a lot, but I haven't quite taken a stab at making a bunch of it. I've made maybe one or two, but maybe when the time is right, I would like to try that out. That'd be cool.
Atlanta EDM: That would be cool. You live in LA now, right?
OddKidOut: Yes.
Atlanta EDM: So when you first moved there, what were some things from the northeast that you missed?
OddKidOut: Cheesesteaks. I miss cheese steaks a lot. I missed deli sandwiches that weren't a million dollars, cheaper deli sandwiches back home. I miss the people and the flow. And I miss my family back on the East Coast and I miss my seasons. I miss the fall. But yeah, I'm an East Coast boy. I like the West. LA is cool, but it doesn't feel like home in my heart.
Atlanta EDM: So you mentioned that you've been roommates with Skrillex. Do you have any fun stories to tell?
OddKidOut: There's a lot. But I think one of my favorite memorable experiences with him was the first time that I played my EP for him, the one that I signed to his label. And when he came in and sat with me for an hour or two and listened to the whole project and called an A&R in, and they just were asking me about the project, it just happened all in one second. It went from having nothing to having a signed project in literally an hour. And just that experience of hearing Sonny talk about ways I can make it better, talking about ways that he liked it. It was just one of those like, man, if you told 14-year-old Butch that this was going to happen, he'd shit his pants.
Atlanta EDM: Did you guys get to connect over older post-hardcore and metal bands? Did that help everything?
OddKidOut: A little bit, yeah. I spent a lot of time away from him, even though we were roommates. When I did have time, I tried to make sure that we focused on the work that we had or just focused on just hanging out and chilling and talking.
Atlanta EDM: What were some of your favorite post-hardcore bands?
OddKidOut: There's one band out right now called Colletta, and they are so incredible. They're relatively new, I believe, but they're really, really great. Would you consider Dance Gavin Dance?
Atlanta EDM: Yeah, I think so.
OddKidOut at The Eastern February 2, 2024 - Photo by Matthew Demarko
Atlanta EDM: So going back to the time that you were roommates with Skrillex, is there any advice that he's given you that changed the game for you?
OddKidOut: Yeah, I didn't know how to DJ at all. And he would sit down and pretty much tell me the do's and don'ts of what you should do in a set. And he basically said to me, look, do whatever you want. But when I was talking about those moments that I did have with him being impactful, that was definitely one of them, where he would kind of give me the skeleton of this is how long you should play a buildup and a drop, and this is how many drops. It was very scientific to listen to and very informative for someone who has never built a set before. But he also helped me figure out how to make the set my own, such as the finger drumming part. I was like, look, I know I can do this, I just don't know how to translate it. I don't know how to make it work in that setting. And we spent a lot of time kind of spitballing ideas. And that was a long time ago. That was like 2018, and I played my first show in 2022, so I spent a lot of time at the drawing board. But I think a lot of those preliminary plans that I had are from those conversations with Sonny.
Atlanta EDM: I have a question about the finger drumming and the sample pad. So each one is a different drum and you have to memorize which one of those, and then you also have other samples. So you just have to memorize what every single one of those squares is, right?
OddKidOut: Yeah. So there's 16 per bank, and there's infinite amounts of banks over here. Usually on a show I don't run more than 1, 2, 3, 7, but so if I hit bank A here, I know that's my fast finger drumming section. I know there's a kick, snare, high hat. I know that this is muted. I know every single thing. And then when I hit B, I know it's these two, these two, and these three. So I just have to memorize where all the pads are and kind of come up with the best way to make it into a set. But yeah, it gets confusing. And then that one is easy, the push. The other thing I use is 64 pads, that one only has 16 and they're very small, and when the stage lights hit the pads, you can't see your lights anymore. So there's a lot of room for error. And to be honest with you, I fuck up every show. Yeah, no one can tell, but I know in my head I'm like, oh, I just hit the wrong note. Or Oh, I could have done that better. But that's the whole point of it being live, there is going to be that. It was funny, a lot of times online people write like, "Oh, what he's doing is fake. There's no way he's playing that" blah, blah, blah, which is funny to me. But what was really funny was someone commented yesterday and was like, "I was at the San Holo show in Orlando, and at the end, he wasn't playing exactly on time. And that's how I know it's real." But it wasn't like he was defending me by saying, no, you can tell he's fucking up. You know what I mean? So it was kind of cool in a way where it's like if you hear a guitarist play, he's not going to hit everything perfectly.
Atlanta EDM: But yeah, I mean, I played drums in the bands that I was in for a while and everything, so I've always been curious about finger drumming. I'm always tapping my fingers on stuff, so anytime I see any of you guys do it, that's what I'm focused on at the live set. So it was cool to see.
OddKidOut: I appreciate that. And I will say too, if you are a drummer, I think you have such a leg up. Most of the finger drummers that I know don't know anything about syncopation, they don't know how to split their limbs. They don't know how to do anything. They just know how to make beats and they know how to use their hands and they have good rhythm. And however you do it is great. But if you do know how to split your limbs, if you do know syncopation, if you know how to play polyrhythms, if you know all that shit, there's no difference between this and this. At the end of the day, it's just practice.
Atlanta EDM: So what's something you look forward to whenever you see Atlanta on your upcoming tour dates?
OddKidOut: Barbecue.
Atlanta EDM: Oh wow, okay.
OddKidOut:
I don't know if Atlanta's known for barbecue, but I've only been twice. You met me the second time. The first time was years ago, and I don't remember the name of the restaurant, but I went and had a barbecue there and it was unbelievable. And so I've kind of built it up in my head that Atlanta has amazing barbecue and that's what I associate it with. But I will say the two times that I've played in Atlanta, oh, I'm sorry, I've played three times, all three times that I've played the crowd has been so amazing, and I feel like they were very much there for the art of the music. Reciprocal energy on stage is very important, and I feel like every time I've done a show in Atlanta, I get that energy and it's good for me on stage mentally, so. People and barbecue.