AUXO.
The post
@cutbymusic · Jul 18, 2026 · 6 slides
The interview
AUXO. are a duo: Ben produces, Austin sings. At roughly 1,300 monthly listeners, almost everyone reading this is meeting them for the first time, so the questions stayed on who they are rather than deep catalog. Both members answered all ten separately.
Who is AUXO.? Your names, where you are from, and what each of you does.
Ben: I am Ben, one half of AUXO. I usually make the instrumentals and send them over to Austin, who does the vocals. I use Logic Pro X. I love trance, EDM, breakcore, vaporwave, and performing on stages with my boy Austin.
Austin: This is Austin, one half of AUXO, Ben being the better half. I do vocals. Ben will make beats, send them to me, I send him vocals back, and we collaborate.
How did you meet, and where does the name AUXO. come from?
Ben: The first time I ever saw Austin was sixth grade. He was wearing a sweatshirt with the Doge meme on it and I thought that was so funny, because I was the meme guy. Austin is a goat. We are best friends. I live in Salt Lake now so we do not see each other much, but every time we kick it, it is beautiful.
Austin: I used to ride home in the back of my grandpa’s truck when I moved to Utah from Las Vegas, and Ben saw me and said what is up, and hopped in the back of a random truck. Our first time hanging out was a whole Pringles iMovie thing at his house. The name originates from 0_0, a weird wide-eyed face, and XO coming from the Weeknd. We pronounced that AUXO and then changed the spelling because it was easier to say.
Read the rest of the conversation · 8 more
You are going on five years of releasing music. What have been some of your favorite moments?
Ben: I used to love making beats with Austin in the studio in my house in St. George. When rubber hit the road and we were touring with Kumo99, that was beautiful. I thought, music can take us far. Also when we played with Slater. But mainly just chilling with my boy Austin and creating an ethereal, exciting vibe in our music.
Austin: One of my favorite moments was our first performance at Kilby Court. I made a custom mask, super-glued moss onto it, and as soon as I got out there I took it off and threw it into the crowd. The early Kilby shows felt like an earthquake. Also our first performance in St. George at a local band night, all soft guitar vibes, and we got up there playing EDM and cloud rap. We stood out like a sore thumb, and I got done and was not embarrassed at all.
Walk me through your creative process.
Ben: It has changed over time. We began as silly eighth graders making funny songs. Then I moved up to Salt Lake to study design at the University of Utah, and since then we are basically pen pals with it. He sends me something, I get inspired, I make an instrumental, he sends vocals back. Sometimes those vocals do not make it onto that song and end up on a different one. It creates a collage of ideas.
Austin: Ben will send over beats and it sparks something. I am always jotting down random things I want to say, so by the time a beat arrives I already have something for it. I like being vague in my lyrics. On the surface they seem meaningless, but they mean something to me, which makes it personal, and then everyone listening can interpret it their own way.
Who are some of your dream collaborators?
Ben: Glokk40Spaz would be dope as fuck. Or Jane Remover. We saw Jane Remover live and working with them would be so cool, because they have the same musical ideas going on, that extension of hyperpop combining with rap. And George Clanton is my goat.
Austin: My top one is one hundred percent Yung Lean. He has always been my biggest inspiration. No matter what he does it is just cool. He is completely himself, he does not follow any trends. Jane Remover, Mad Ox, Brennan Jones, and Glokk40Spaz would all be fun.
How does your approach to albums differ from singles?
Ben: With singles it is fun to do songs with just Austin or just me. A lot of duos have both people on every song, but it is cool for us to each have our own. With an album, I love that it will be the one I did not think people would like that they like the most. There is lots of room for me to be weird and wacky on an album.
Austin: With a single I have the listener in the back of my mind. Make it catchy, make it enjoyable. When it is a song for a project, that is where you can really express yourself and get experimental. It is like we are trying to catch fish and our singles are the bait. You listen to it, you enjoy it, and then you go listen to the project.
Outside of music, what do you each do?
Ben: I hang out with my girlfriend and make weird beats, some you will never hear, that just live in my iPhone. Pretty much all the homies up in Salt Lake are creative types. I have been producing for Ellis Ivory lately. And I love to mountain bike. Mountain biking is the best drum and bass experience.
Austin: I work full time as a physical therapy aide, and I am a senior at Utah Tech studying exercise science. After I graduate I am applying to PA schools. I like to weight lift, so I am at the gym a lot, and I live with my girlfriend. All the normal life things.
Which of your songs mean the most to each of you?
Ben: I know Austin loves Oxygen, and I love it too. I look back and do not know how we made that with the music ability we had at the time. We were locked in. But my favorite is probably Ultra Lightweight, because that is the one we started with on tour. I shot the music video on a MacBook I rented from the library.
Austin: Oxygen. That was very personal, senior year, a lot going on in my life. The cover art is a house I had a weird attachment to. I passed it every day on the way to the most miserable job at a hotel, and the way the sun hit the sprinklers and the windows was just beautiful. I took that photo on my film camera early one morning. That song is like a period at the end of a sentence, and now I am starting something new.
Your sound spans a lot of electronic genres. How have you kept expanding it?
Ben: Originally we had an album out under 00XO that was more rap-coded. Yung Lean and Suicideboys were the big inspirations. AUXO was when we started going toward jungle and drum and bass and breakcore, 172 BPM. Now we are moving toward more house-oriented stuff, because 140 is the best to dance to. Big inspiration from Camellia, and of course Skrillex. Skrillex is kind of the Messi of electronic music, because he is always changing things and making weird noises.
Austin: I do not produce, but I know how influenced I get by music and Ben is the same. Music is ever evolving. You draw from four or five different genres and produce something new. Sometimes Ben hears one of my verses meant for one song and says that would sound good on something like this, and creates something brand new out of it. I give the credit to Ben when it comes to formulating the sound.
What can we expect next from AUXO.?
Ben: Two albums. One focused on me and Austin and our dynamic together, and the other more of a compilation with the other artists and producers we have been working with: Ellis Ivory, General James Orton, Coop, Gugger Slim, Nash Hawkins. Hopefully one by the end of the summer.
Austin: Me and Ben are working on a new project. It has been too long since we came together and made something big, so that is in the works. Coming to the listeners very soon.
What's next
- Two albums in progress: one focused on the duo, one collaborative.
- The first hoped for by the end of summer 2026.