Anton Zaslavski, better know as artist Zedd, has achieved quite a lot of success ever since he began working under that moniker in 2010. Zedd has worked with or written for Ariana Grande, Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez, and put out stuff under his own name. Though from 2002 to 2010, Zaslavski tells Billboard he was drumming away in Dioramic.
Zedd’s first place in the United States was a cramped Santa Monica apartment with walls so thin he’d be woken by the neighbor’s cellphone vibrating at night. The spot had one advantage, though: It was paid for by Lady Gaga, who wanted Zedd to have somewhere to crash while drafting songs for her Artpop LP, often with no more to go on than an email of word cues like “dark” or “metallic.”
Now Zedd puts up his brother Arkadi, 30, who is working on his own music. (Arkadi just produced a song for Bryan Adams, a gig that Zedd handed off to him.) From age 12 to 20, Zedd drummed in Arkadi’s metalcore band Dioramic, which was big enough in Germany that the boys often skipped class to tour.
Dioramic put out two self-released EPs in 2005 and 2007, as well as a self-released full length in 2005 and an album called Technicolor on Lifeforce Records in 2010. You can check out Dioramic's final album with Zedd on drums below, and it's not half bad!
It's also worth noting that Zedd's departure didn't kill the band. Dioramic put out an album in 2014 on Pelagic Records, the label owned by The Ocean guitarist Robin Staps.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxL3sjbbtpo[/youtube]
