Localized: Olympic Deth

April has been celebrated for centuries as the start of spring. And what a time for new beginnings — two of the bands on this punk-ish lineup have new names. Featuring co-headliners Olympic Deth and Vape Plug (formerly Ashbury Yacht Club) with opener YOUCH! (formerly Girl Meet), this show is bound to be sonically unpredictable and unmissable. Catch SLUG Localized on Tuesday, April 22 at Kilby Court. As always, tickets are just $5 for this Riso Geist-sponsored show. Doors open at 7:00 p.m. and music starts at 8:00.

Eli Andersen started Olympic Deth in 2021 as a personal project — something creative to fill the void after his previous Provo-based band Hobo Sapien had started to fade away, seeing many of its members move north to Salt Lake City. Andersen would eventually make the same migration, but for the time being, he recorded alone on an 8-track in a shed (credited on his projects as Big Shed Provo), an act that came naturally to him: “I’ve been recording myself making music for a really long time, since I was a little kid — not for any reason other than it feels like I have to,” says Andersen.

Writing has been a lifelong passion for him, and he finds the act of recording as a wholly unique element to creating music, one that takes precedent over producing a polished end product. “I am okay with sacrificing the fidelity of a recording just to get the idea out,” he says. At the same time, Andersen fell in love with the one-of-a-kind DIY music culture of Provo. He performed some of his favorite shows at the area’s most unique venue Thrift Rx, where he not only played in front of his closest friends but became more imbedded in the local music scene. “In a place like [Provo], people become hungry for anything crazy. It’s something I haven’t always seen in SLC,” he says of the strong counterculture that exists in Utah County.

“[Olympic Deth] is math-y, kinda post-hardcore, but there’s a lot of post-rock in there too. I don’t know; it’s so tricky to talk about influences.”

Though Andersen has recorded “well over 100 songs,” the Olympic Deth catalogue is still in its early stages with an initial self-titled EP released in 2022 and the full-length LP Nevada Homeslice in 2024. The raw and rough elements that come from Andersen’s recording philosophy have become signature to Olympic Deth’s sound, which can be heard most clearly on the track “Total Child Kid” — drowning in compressed vocals and oppressive drums that take dominance over any other instrumentation on the track. “Most of the songs I put out are practically demos,” says Andersen, and though he’s spent hours trying to properly record a more polished version, he always gravitates back to the rougher original take. “I recorded [Nevada Homeslice] three different times but ended up going with the first recordings,” he says.

Andersen is most influenced by the sounds of early Ariel Pink, Animal Collective and Hella, notably their drummer Zach Hill — though Andersen swears he “doesn’t sound anything like Zach Hill or Hella.” To me, Olympic Deth doesn’t sound like any of those bands, and Andersen agrees: “[Olympic Deth] is math-y, kinda post-hardcore, but there’s a lot of post-rock in there too. I don’t know; it’s so tricky to talk about influences.”

When Andersen plays live, you can find him sitting behind the drum kit and performing vocals at the same time. “A lot of people tell me that it’s crazy that I sing and drum but … it just comes a bit more naturally to me,” says Andersen. “It does get sweaty back there.” Recently, he’s experimented with playing the role of a traditional frontman, standing out front and swapping the drum kit with a guitar.

While he’s not sure what setup he’s going to use for the show, he is sure about who he’s taking to perform along side him: Tate Grimshaw, Jerik VanPatten, Diego Labrador and Jackson Larson will support Andersen at April’s Localized show, and he might even sneak in a few new songs onto the set list as well.

Read more Localized interviews here:
Localized: P.S. Destroy This
Localized: Fight the Future