Oddioblender
Gustuf Young is an electronic musician from the electronic-musically challenged area of Fort Worth, Texas who has been producing electronic music since 2000 who was also largely active in Denton, TX.
His earliest knowledge of electronic music was video games and his early musical influences included his grandmother's kitchen band, a garage filled with classic rock and air compressors and flea market child instruments given to him by his grandfather.
His earliest known releases were on Japan’s Intikrec Records, johnhenry’s Spiritual Noise from 1981, an independently distributed CD-R named Welcome to Gusland as well as two electronic albums on Crazy Fungus Records. He became a contributor to the Aud.Stim collective, Xltronic.com’s Xltronic Vibes series, Planetarium Records (New York), multiple Rhyme Torrents Volumes and, also, released several albums online through Lacedmilk Technologies in the Orlando, FL area.
He also released two albums on Give Daddy the Knife Records. He also produced beats for MC Router, Emergency Pizza Party, MC Wreckshin and Frankie Castle in nerdcore’s heyday as well as an independent nerdcore release of his own and two ambient albums under the moniker of Zio Magus.
His early works under the name Organ Grinder were largely experimental chop-n-pastes of noises inspired by various IDM, much of which was compiled on the reflective 2003 release of Spiritual Noise from 2001. (Most of the rest is in a landfill somewhere.)
However he became interested in breakbeats and jungle a few years later after seeing shows by X-Ecutioners and other DJ's and began to pursue more dominant, throbbing base beats to accompany his drillish and odd sound. Welcome to Gusland was distributed amongst friends and its authenticity is distinct - the CDR's were so ghetto that only the first six tracks of the twelve were playable.
He attempted a more accessible approach with his two releases on Crazy Fungus - Baron Von Ugly tinkered with fractals, breakbeats and downtempo, while Daily Dose of Cancer played with space synths and actual home-brewed Alesis SR-16 drum beats for a bassier sound, and even industrial tinges of distortion. However, thanks to the Oddioblender curse, the label folded. Only one copy of Baron Von Ugly ever sold. Good luck finding it.
With an album shelved and finding himself unemployed, Young began living and caring for his ailing grandmother sometime in 2003. Becoming obsessed with the classic video game music that nudged electronica into his subconscious, he wrote 8-Bit Breakcore Action! in 2003 - his first of numerous releases on Lacedmilk Technologies' weblabel. The album was received much more fairly, returning to more drillish beats but resorting to more raw, organic drum sounds and even more raw synths.
His next release, Clandestine Boy Strikes Back, was a shelved release originally meant for Crazy Fungus that showed a more ambient, downtempo side that would be explored later, as did his side project of Zio Magus - dark, ambient music inspired by the likes of Silent Hill that were originally crafted as film soundtracks, left unused.
Subsequent releases, NOW!! That's What I Call Nerdcore! Volume 1 and Level 21 Drum Smithy continued to define an Oddioblender sound - a cosmopolitan mix of gabber, drum and bass, breakbeat and video game chiptunes fueled by pawn shop kid synthesizers and turntable-sampled drums.
In 2005, his music took an odd left turn. When Oddioblender shared tracks with the label's head as a mere sharing of ideas, it was inadvertently posted as an album called, fittingly, the Great Crossover Catastrophe. The album was initially meant to be two separate EP's - but the disjointed album, half typical Oddio and the other half a strange space rock and alternative techno hybrid, hit a chord with fans. The next album was an even further leap, Analog Exodus, where Young abandoned his computer to use only live-recorded loops for the album, an abstract, experimental and somewhat uneasy failure.
In 2006, equally-cursed weblabel Give Daddy the Knife took Oddioblender in, releasing NOW!! That's What I Call Nerdcore! Volume 2, an album that contained both new work and previously unreleased tracks from the Lacedmilk era.
In 2007, Young had moved on from Lacedmilk and found himself invited to join the now-famed Rhyme Torrents where he contributed the strange Gustuf's Blues (aka Samurai Dreams) and Eli the Indie Rocket which stood in stark contrast to the various nerdcore rappers he now stood amongst in a genre he had been, for some time, unrightfully been claiming to be part. However, he made friends in the genre, from RT founder High-C to future beat-robbers MC Wreckshin, Big Sherm and Frankie Castle, slowly becoming a stalwart producer for the genre. He even produced his own nerdcore album, Kubla Khan, in 2007, stealing nearly all the melodies from video games - and even rapping himself.
As feuds erupted in the nerdcore scene and RT began to self-destruct, no doubt thanks to the Oddioblender curse, Young returned to his trademark sound for Gustuf Young is Dead in 2007, his most melodic and atmospheric work yet, finally fusing the ambient part of his sound with the raw and drum-thuggery nature of his louder tracks.
He released one more album as Zio Magus, Head Like A Wasteland, and a badly recorded live EP called Real Time Samurai with guitarist Wes Harper, but the relationship strained with time and the two went separate ways after Young's black cat Loki destroyed his guitarist's short stack.
Life changes forced him to take a hiatus in 2008, including a marriage, the birth of his children, one of whom is high-functioning autistic, later leading to the discovery of his own high-functioning autism. He slowly began to fiddle with music again in 2011, writing the first loops of what would become Asperger's Beat.
As of 2014, he is once again active and released the Asperger's Beat LP. He is working on new material and reissues of the mass catalog of previous works. He lives in Fort Worth, Texas and still frequents Denton, produces for fellow nerdcore rappers and is working on a new live set.
In 2015, his back catalog surfaced on iTunes, Spotify, Google Play and various other online channels. He began experimenting with the usage and creation of analog synthesizers as a way of rebuilding his now defunct studio setup as well as a way to progress his sound into new territory. He has no new material planned as of 2015 as he is currently focusing on being a parent and building a new studio setup. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.
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